The 49ers Crush the Jet-Lag Bowl, Rams Overreactions, Bills-Texans, and Week 1 NFL Picks With Joe House

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Joe House to react to the 49ers taking down the Rams in Australia before making their Ringer 107 picks for Week 1 and more! (0:00) Intro (1:08) 49ers-Rams reactions (24:03) Ringer 107 picks (01:13:14) U. S. Open thoughts Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Joe House Producers: Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Chris Wohlers See what boring banking can do for you. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Bill Simmons?

  This episode is brought to you by PayPal. The holiday rush is coming and you can get ahead of it with PayPal. Shop your favorite online stores with PayPal this season like eBay for collectibles, Fanatics for teen gear, Walmart for tech. Check out the flexibility to pay now or pay later and split your payments with Pay in four with no interest, no late fees. Shop now with PayPal. Paying for subject to approval. Learn more at paypal.com slash paying for PayPal, Inc., NMLS 910457.

• 0:39Bill Simmons?

  The Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by FanDuel. The NFL is here and it's the most rewarding season ever on FanDuel with the all time FanDuel Rewards Club. Every eligible bet can earn you points. Win or lose, you still get points. The more points, the bigger the rewards you can unlock. Head to FanDuel.com slash BS to start earning with FanDuel Rewards Club. 21 plus select states or 18 plus DC, Kentucky, Wyoming. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER, call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat Connecticut.

• 1:41Bill Simmons?

  It's the Bill Simmons Podcast. We are live on Netflix Thursday night, fourth podcast of the week. If you missed the other three, go check out my archives. That's Joe House, who seems awake. Do you have coffee, Joe House?

• 1:53Speaker 01

  I don't eat coffee when we have the NFL, even if it's on the other side of the world. I was consuming everything that the good people of Australia had to give us. Noah Eagle got off every single Australia.

• 2:08Bill Simmons?

  Shrimp on the Barbie joke, yeah.

• 2:09Speaker 01

  He got it all in. And by the way, we call it, we call it Melbourne. Everybody calls it Melbourne. We do not, it's not Melbourne, Australia. It's just Melbourne.

• 2:18Bill Simmons?

  Well, a lot of people don't know, we knew we were going like about 25 minutes after Netflix's, the game ended, they were doing a post game show. We simulated this with House in 20 different ways to see if he napped before, if he ate before, if he didn't have food. We tried 15 different ways and we landed on this one to get the most awake House. Unfortunately, the Rams, who we found out today from Peter Schreger, who's banned from this podcast.

• 2:44Speaker 01

  Banned.

• 2:45Bill Simmons?

  Well, I don't know. He went on part of my take, didn't come on here. But we found out from him, he reported that the Rams tried 15 different staffers last two years, tried to figure out the right sleep science for this. And guess what? It came up snake eyes because they got their asses kicked. 27-7 in Australia. I don't know where to begin. I'd like to thank the following people though, House. Thank you to the Los Angeles Rams for taking Drake May off the hook. It was a day long beating for him in the national media. Now that shifts to the Rams. Drake, enjoy the next eight days. Thank you to Sean McVay for teaching us about 15 hour travel.

• 3:28Bill Simmons?

  Thank you to the Rams for, I didn't realize giving us kind of an NFL villain a little bit here.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  Oh, fun. Yeah. The prohibitive favorite, the, you know, the all star team on both sides of the ball.

• 3:41Bill Simmons?

  Is this the best defense ever? They traded three first rounders for Myles Garrett and Jared verse. They had the 13th pick in the draft and they said, we're so good. We're going to take Matthew Stafford's successor. They were five to one to win the Super Bowl. Guess what? It's six to one now. It's already dropping.

• 3:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. Kyle Shanahan, Kyle Shanahan said F them, F them, F them, boys. F them, boys.

• 4:03Bill Simmons?

  You know what he did? He put a shrimp on the Barbie.

• 4:05Speaker 01

  Oh, God damn it. Don't do that.

• 4:07Bill Simmons?

  That's what he did. No, that's what he did. He took, he, he put a big koala nap on them. They, they got their asses kicked. And what's funny is this actually could have been a close game and it all came down to 17-7. Third down, it looked like Puka scored, tackled at like the half yard line, whatever it was. Fourth down, they run a QB sneak with the decrepit Matthew Stafford, who moves like we do.

• 4:36Speaker 01

  Why did they do that?

• 4:37Bill Simmons?

  Is he bad back? Does he have a bad knee? What are, like, what's his number one injury now? He's terrible at sneaks to begin with and they decide to do that. It gets stuffed. The Niners go all the way down the field and end the game. I thought that was an inexplicable decision, House.

• 4:51Speaker 01

  Yes, and that was the sequence of the game, the beginning of the fourth quarter. That stop followed by a 99 yard masterclass truly by Shanahan. And Shanahan was, was truly firing on all cylinders in terms of the offensive game plan. This is.

• 5:10Bill Simmons?

  And how he shifts it during the game, right? They come out second half, all of a sudden the fullback and the tight ends are doing these little in motion like blocking and chipping people. It's really fun to watch.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  This is what we get when you get Shanahan and McVay though. They, there is this, this chess match kind of thing. I'm surprised we didn't hear more folks getting on the, the 49ers side in terms of, of moving the number maybe. There was a little bit of action, it seemed like right at the end, folks coming in.

• 5:42Bill Simmons?

  It was like three and a half, three was threatening to go to three. It never did. We had them at three and a half and all day I was going to hedge it because I parlayed the, the Niners with the, with the Pats yesterday to four and a half each on FanDuel. And I was going to hedge that in some way today.

• 6:00Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 6:01Bill Simmons?

  And I didn't.

• 6:02Speaker 01

  Good.

• 6:02Bill Simmons?

  Because the more I thought about it, the sleep stuff, you know.

• 6:06Speaker 01

  I'm not so sure though, really it was about the sleep. I mean, it was, you know, reminder.

• 6:13Bill Simmons?

  Oh, are you going to do, are you going to do the talking head thing? Oh, I like to go, do this.

• 6:16Speaker 01

  When Fred Warner plays football, when you put Fred Warner at linebacker in the middle of this playing defensive quarterback, when you have Nick Bosa rushing, rushing the passer, when those guys are on the football field, reminder that, man, that's, that's a hell of a defense right there, Bill Simmons.

• 6:34Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, the sleep thing is insulting. It's insulting to the 49ers. This is a good football team. They didn't win because the Rams made the idiotic decision to fly in for the fucking game the night before.

• 6:45Speaker 01

  Now, there should be, if we're going to talk about the sleep, somebody should ask Myles Garrett how he rested because there, that was kind of, those were some shocking, there were shocking numbers, shocking numbers.

• 6:56Bill Simmons?

  It wasn't just so he ends the game with zero tackles and zero pressures, which was the first time in a while. It was more than that. It was one of those, wait, is he playing? And they would mention him every so often. And I know Trent Williams was out there and I know they were shifting stuff away from him and et cetera, et cetera. But he was also not present in the game. And usually like when you'd watch Myles Garrett and the Browns, you'd feel him in the game no matter what was happening, right? He was always around. He was pushing his side of the line back. It was not happening. It made me wonder, you know, we talked about this Rams super team. And then the Niners, all their guys played today. They lost too. We'll talk about that later, but you know, Trent, Trent Williams, really good at football.

• 7:39Bill Simmons?

  Mike Evans has been one of the most consistent, really good receivers for a long time. Brock Purdy, always has been an underrated quarterback. McCaffrey, always has been one of, you know, Fred Warner, Bosa. It's like these, this team's good too. Did you, did you have regrets with the Niners and how we, we approached them in the off season? Where did you have them? I didn't even have them as a playoff team.

• 8:02Speaker 01

  I took them to win this division. If you look at their schedule.

• 8:06Bill Simmons?

  I forgot. Yeah, you did.

• 8:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. Because you know, the way it lines up for them, you know, the, the part of the assessment was if they could win this first game and if, you know, their approach to this rest plays out successfully for them, what they have over the, the next seven or eight games eminently winnable, including the toughest matchup they have still in those first eight games is Seattle, which is in a handful of weeks and they might face Drew Locke. They might get Drew Locke because we, we have an update on the Sam Darnold situation, just that, that he's definitely going to miss at least one game. And the question is whether it's going to be multiple. It seems likely.

• 8:51Bill Simmons?

  My guy's missing four to six.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. And if that's the case, then it might be the case that the Niners catch Seattle with him out. But if, sit down and look at the, the Niners record. And part of why I grabbed the, the vision number for San Francisco was because if indeed they go on this run, you're not going to get a better price for them to win the division until, you know, much later in the season if they fall off.

• 9:17Bill Simmons?

  Well, right now we have Rams are now plus 155 for the division. That was basically even, right? For the season. Seattle's plus 180, they're 1-0 and San Francisco's 1-0, they're plus 210. They're bunched together. Rams six to one in the Super Bowl. They're 11 and a half over under, which had some juice on it for the overs. Now the under for 11 and a half is minus 130 on FanDuel.

• 9:40Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 9:41Bill Simmons?

  They are to miss the playoffs now only plus 270. And that before the season, I think, was plus 420, plus 430, something like that.

• 9:49Speaker 01

  Definitely north of 4-1.

• 9:50Bill Simmons?

  What's interesting is, all of us were a little suspicious of this first game and how they're playing it. And I talked about this with the fantasy guys yesterday about, were they basically like rolling the dice with this game, but they didn't want to screw up the rest of the season, whereas the Niners are like, we're going in early. We have to win the game and if there's ramifications after, we're fine with that. So we'll, we'll see what happened. I, I thought all the travel stuff was fascinating. I saw some tweet online, somebody tweeted like, if everyone cared about the Steve Ballmer Clippers story for the last year, like we cared about the Niners Rams travel, this Clippers thing would have been settled a while ago. It's like, no, that's not why. I, I think everyone with the Clippers thing was like, just tell us when we know what happened.

• 10:33Bill Simmons?

  Give it, when the decision happens, we'll be really interested. This travel thing, I talked about with everybody in my life. I thought it was fascinating, like how do you play it? Who's going to be right or wrong? So are you convinced now we learned the answer or is this just a small sample size?

• 10:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's impossible to say. The one thing that was apparent from watching the game is that San Francisco really ingratiated itself with the community, was part of the community engaged with Melbourne. And what, what do you call the good people who live in, in Melbourne? Are they Melbourneites? Whatever.

• 11:08Bill Simmons?

  They're sh- Barbie shrimpers.

• 11:10Speaker 01

  There, there was enormous support for San Francisco.

• 11:13Bill Simmons?

  There was.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  It was supposed to be on the calendar, a Rams home game. It definitely was not that. It was a 49ers home game. Big pops for the 49ers each time they made a successful play. And I think that did have an impact on the energy. It felt like it did. You mentioned a whole bunch of players.

• 11:31Bill Simmons?

  The stadium was weird too, though. Cause the field was, it felt like the seats were really far away from the field, right? It was, it's a stadium that's not built for football games.

• 11:40Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 11:41Bill Simmons?

  Um, but the Niners had been there for five, six days. So maybe they won over some people when they were there, yeah.

• 11:46Speaker 01

  Right, yes. Demonstrated a commitment to the whole thing.

• 11:51Bill Simmons?

  I'm going to give you four possible overreactions, because it is, usually we have overreaction Monday after week one, but now we have Wednesday and Thursday games, so we get more overreactions. Four overreactions, pick one. Pick, if you had to put your hat on one, give me them. Matthew Stafford looks washed. Myles Garrett is actually overrated. Rams super team momentum is already dead? Or the 49ers are the best NFC West team? Of those four possible overreactions, which one do you like?

• 12:17Speaker 01

  The super team being dead one. That's the one. That's the one that feels closest to the, to the truth. I, I, we were skeptical from the get-go about this. I mean, you know, the, the, the super team for the Rams, we're not going to see it until it gets to be playoff time and we'll know by then how healthy they are.

• 12:40Bill Simmons?

  The Rams are an NBA team. Yeah, this is like what we have in the NBA, where it's like, judge them in mid-May. We'll see how that goes. In the NFL, it's judge them in round one.

• 12:48Speaker 01

  Judge them in, in January, that's right.

• 12:50Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they left Aaron, Aaron Donald home. I will say, out of those four, Matthew Stafford looks washed, Myles Garrett overrated, Rams super team momentum already dead, San Fran's the best NFC West team. I thought Stafford was terrible. I thought he missed a bunch of throws. I thought he looked old. Um, I didn't like the way he was moving around.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  He had nine completions through three quarters. Is that good?

• 13:14Bill Simmons?

  He missed a couple of wide open guys on some big throws. Uh, I thought he put Puka in danger a couple of times. And, uh, just in general, I, you know, it's week one, he'll probably be fine. I remember last year, the beginning of this season, he also looked a little shaky. But that was one of the many things to worry about with this Rams team. The 38-year-old quarterback and this, you know, who's had some injury and some wear and tear and things are against him. Um, okay, a couple more things. I underestimated Mike Evans and Debo. I was going glass half empty on those two. Mike Evans, who get, plays 11 to 13 games a year and you catch him at the right points of the season, he looks awesome. You had Debo last year in Washington, it looked like he was semi-washed.

• 13:57Bill Simmons?

  Um, maybe it's just one of those things where he has to be on this team to look like Debo.

• 14:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I wouldn't say that Debo looked washed here in, in Washington. He just, the, the role that they imagined for him, they, he couldn't fulfill and they couldn't really put in the place because they had injuries right away. Austin Eckler got hurt at the very beginning of the season and that completely changed how Washington wanted to attack the ball on offense. So we never really got to see the version of Debo that Washington had in mind. I will say this, he was smaller and he looked more spry tonight than at any point during his time with Washington. He was much bigger in, in size and playing a role that, you know.

• 14:43Bill Simmons?

  I think he's doing hot water and lemon?

• 14:45Speaker 01

  Among other things, for sure, yes.

• 14:48Bill Simmons?

  And Mike Evans looked great. Somehow the, uh, the 49ers electric substation, even though they were across the world, had still claimed two victims tonight. They lost, Stribling hurt his ankle and it looked like Ton just got hurt. But Tom Pelissero from The Ringer, who did the Netflix game tonight, he was saying, uh, didn't look like either of those are season enders. So people were worried the Stribling thing was an Achilles. Um, injury Twitter was in rare form with slow-mo's of non-contact, but it seems like it was an ankle, so.

• 15:18Speaker 01

  Okay, good, knock on wood for that.

• 15:20Bill Simmons?

  Unless you took him on your fantasy team. Uh, I thought McCaffrey's backup.

• 15:25Speaker 01

  Oh, electric. His name is Black, is that his name?

• 15:29Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, they, they just keep finding these guys. You're like, who's this guy? It's like, oh, this guy's good. It was like when they got Mostert that time and they, uh, Jordan Mason, like over and over again, they just find these dudes.

• 15:40Speaker 01

  Emmanuel Wilson, right, Jordan Wright, exactly. That's, that's what they do.

• 15:44Bill Simmons?

  So this guy came in, he had a big, I think he played like 16 snaps in the first half. Um, they kept McCaffrey fresh, they unleashed him, leashed him at the top of the third quarter. When Debo has a big kick return, McCaffrey breaks off two run, all of a sudden it's 17-7 and we feel like we have a, we have a game.

• 16:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, that, just to, just to put a quick, you know, side note, reminder, Rams special teams still suck. Like, you know, another game altering play from the Rams special teams. They're coming out of, of the halftime tunnel, they kick the ball off and Debo has a huge return to keep the momentum for San Francisco.

• 16:22Bill Simmons?

  I wonder if the Rams special team staff also did the travel preparation for, no, no, we'll go right before, it'll be great. Um, the 49ers D with Warner back was, I wanted to see it. I wasn't against him, like, I was like, oh no, he's not going to, but I just wanted to see him look like Fred Warner again and he did.

• 16:42Speaker 01

  He did, 11 tackles, five solo, that's pretty good.

• 16:45Bill Simmons?

  Um, the big, the big revelation from today, they ran an ad at one. My wife joined for a little bit, because I had the tennis on the, on the small left TV. Coco golf, honestly, like left it on the table there in the, in the third, third set, tough one. Um, but they ran an ad for the Wednesday night Netflix game before Thanksgiving.

• 17:10Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 17:11Bill Simmons?

  Did not go over well in my house.

• 17:16Speaker 01

  Oh no, because she didn't know that there was a Wednesday night game.

• 17:19Bill Simmons?

  I literally wasn't going to tell her. I was going to hide it. I was just going to hide it the whole time. So she was like, wait a second, didn't they have a Friday game a couple of years ago after Thanksgiving, the day after Thanksgiving? And I was like, yeah, they did. And she was like, so now there's a game on Wednesday? I was like, I, apparently I didn't know. I tried to pretend I didn't know. And then she's like, but then there's also the Thanksgiving games? And I was like, yeah. And then she's like, but then they're also going to have Sunday and Monday? I'm like, yeah. And she was, she was like, you know, fuck this, fuck football. Football can fuck off. Say this on your podcast, football can fuck off. Furious.

• 18:00Speaker 01

  That Wednesday night is one of the great nights in, in America. I mean, it's one of the all-time best, it's where everybody's come, has arrived from out of town, everybody's getting together. It's, it's joyous because of what's on, on tap for the next day.

• 18:14Bill Simmons?

  So now we need a football game playing on the TV during all this? That's what I said to her. I was like, it's really for the people in bars.

• 18:19Speaker 01

  It's kind of true.

• 18:20Bill Simmons?

  It's a happy day, yeah.

• 18:22Speaker 01

  Very happy day.

• 18:24Bill Simmons?

  Well, she didn't like it. Yet another reason she doesn't like Roger Goodell. Um, other than that, I don't know. San Francisco looked like they were in mid-season form already and the Rams looked like they were still in the preseason. So I don't know what to make of these games. And, and the season is now 18 weeks and takes forever to play. There's going to be a million injuries. Um, I think the one thing that today did for real was it threw some water on whatever this super team people had in their heads with the Rams. I thought it was out of control, the whole offseason. They need a lot of things to go right from a health standpoint. They're a top-heavy team and there's other really good teams. And two of them are in their division, so.

• 19:05Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 19:06Bill Simmons?

  So that's, those were my big takeaways. Do you have anything else? Did you win money?

• 19:11Speaker 01

  I did win money because I had teased the Patriots and under 50 and a half yesterday with the San Francisco 49ers plus nine and a half today. So that was a big fat winner. That was a good one, I liked that one. Yeah, so I did win money on that.

• 19:29Bill Simmons?

  You know what wasn't winning is putting the Rams in anything.

• 19:32Speaker 01

  I didn't do it.

• 19:33Bill Simmons?

  Like, like literally anything, any sort of points thing, any sort of tease, get any of their fantasy guys, I'm sorry. Um, it was just across the board. Not great.

• 19:45Speaker 01

  It was too many points for what we've seen out of this matchup over the years. And I understand the question marks surrounding the San Francisco defense. Um, but man, Kyle Shanahan, whatever injuries he suffered from his car accident, he is over them because that man cooked tonight.

• 20:05Bill Simmons?

  I parlayed the Niners, um, plus three and a half with Schreger not coming on the podcast this week, but going on a different one. My friend.

• 20:14Speaker 01

  Shreags.

• 20:15Bill Simmons?

  I, he, he, he shouldn't text us for a while, I'll just say that.

• 20:19Speaker 01

  No, I want him to.

• 20:21Bill Simmons?

  No, it's, he's in the shit house.

• 20:23Speaker 01

  He tagged me this week, he went on a golf pod.

• 20:25Bill Simmons?

  He's on the shit list. It's on my shit list now. He's got to really make it up.

• 20:30Speaker 01

  He's got to, if he takes us out to a great Italian meal, we'll be back. I'll be back. That's all it takes for me. I can, I'm so, I'm so easily.

• 20:38Bill Simmons?

  Upsetting, hit a new thing to promote, I'm not even going to promote it now. You know what? Whatever, Schreger's up to stuff, good luck to him. Uh, we are going to take a break. We're going to come back, we have Ringer 107.

• 20:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, oh, let's go.

• 20:52Bill Simmons?

  By the way, we, so we're two games in in week one, two underdogs and two unders. So what does that mean?

• 21:03Speaker 01

  It's an all time under week.

• 21:05Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, because there's no preseason anywhere. Everybody's learning how to play football with each other.

• 21:09Speaker 01

  Seventy percent to the under, so.

• 21:10Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 21:11Speaker 01

  Beware, as you look at the Sunday slate, beware of jumping in on overs.

• 21:18Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 21:19Speaker 01

  Proceed cautiously.

• 21:21Bill Simmons?

  Okay, well, I'll give that, that, that, that Australia game, I'm going to give a C minus. Only one team showed up.

• 21:28Speaker 01

  Oh, I, I mean, it's still.

• 21:30Bill Simmons?

  It was mildly entertaining, but it was, the Niners were prepared and the Rams were not.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  I give it an A plus because I don't know if the referees, when they arrived, six total penalties in the whole game. Do you, like, very quietly in the back of my head, I was really enjoying, no goddamn yellow flags, anywhere to be seen. Just let them play. Two very good teams, no penalties. Last, the, the, the Seattle, New England, false start here, illegal shift there, come on, man, let's, let's play football. We got that tonight.

• 22:03Bill Simmons?

  Well, you know what the other thing with the Netflix, for some reason, there were, I felt like there were less ads. I thought the first half moved fast.

• 22:09Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 22:10Bill Simmons?

  Did you notice that?

• 22:11Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 22:11Bill Simmons?

  They were like scoring or like somebody would kick a field goal, kickoff, we just stayed on the field, we're running plays again. Yeah, it was, it was pretty good. Okay.

• 22:21Speaker 01

  All right.

• 22:21Bill Simmons?

  We're going to take a break. We're going to come back with Harlan Coben's week one NFL picks. I just said that to help with the Netflix algorithm, but now we're going to take a break and come back. And House and I are going to bang out some picks on Pump Buddy. The Bill Simmons Podcast is brought to you by FanDuel. You know how NFL Sundays go, start with the early games, roll into the late ones, before you know it, Sunday football is kicking off. And then you're watching me and Sal do Guess the Lions that night. You know the drill at this point. FanDuel has something for you every step of the way with the Sunday Spectacular. We're talking rewards throughout the day from the first games kicking off, all the way through Sunday night. And if you're listening to our Thursday night podcast every week, House and I are going back and forth.

• 23:04Bill Simmons?

  Our four favorite bets of the week for Ringer 107, our big contest that we're having, heading toward that Sunday. And then we're going to post one extra last minute Saturday, we're going to post on social as we get closer to the kickoff. So feel free to ride us. We're feeling really good this year. Wherever the NFL Sunday takes you, keep an eye on the FanDuel app to see what's waiting for you. Maybe take the Steelers this week. I think that's my favorite bet. It's a full day of football, more ways to get rewarded along the way. Download the app to check out the Sunday Spectacular and make this your most rewarding season ever with FanDuel. 21 plus select states or 18 plus DC, Kentucky, Wyoming, restrictions apply, see terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com.

• 23:45Bill Simmons?

  Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER, call 888-789-7777, or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by PNC Bank. In today's sports, everyone is constantly trying to outdo each other. Trick formations, infield shifts, constant rotation changes. And yet, it's proven time and time again, that strong fundamentals are the thing that will lead you to victory. And banking is no different. While everyone tries to outdo each other, PNC Bank just keeps going right down the middle with steady, calculated money moves. And the financial wins, they just keep coming. PNC Bank, brilliantly boring since 1865, brilliantly boring since 1865, is a registered mark of the PNC Financial Services Group, Incorporated.

• 24:31Bill Simmons?

  PNC Bank, National Association Member, FDIC.

• 24:37Bill Simmons?

  Today's Ringer 107 picks are brought to you by FanDuel. Make this your most rewarding season ever. That's what we're going to try to do. Download the FanDuel app, check out all of our 107 picks and our boosted teaser every week this season. All right, House, we've been waiting for this all spring, all summer. We've been waiting for redemption. We are doing Ringer 107 again. We're changing the rules in general, but also for this podcast, you're getting your own five picks. I'm getting my own five picks. We're doing four today. One has to be a teaser. And then on top of that, we get to do a social media pick on Sunday. That's our fifth pick. Which is hilarious because we told Raheem this today.

• 25:20Bill Simmons?

  And Raheem, who is the reason we added this rule, because all he did all weekend was, would be complaining about how the Lions moved and it changed. And he hates locking in these picks on Thursday. And two people on Twitter said something to him and he's upset. And then we tell him we're doing this, and then he asks on our text thread today, can I put in all my picks on Friday morning? And it was like, we created the rule for you.

• 25:45Speaker 01

  The Raheem rule.

• 25:46Bill Simmons?

  The Raheem rule, and he didn't even want to use it. So Raheem was teasing himself through the zero. Anyway, shout out to Raheem.

• 25:52Speaker 01

  Shout out to the dream. Love the dream.

• 25:54Bill Simmons?

  So we added the teases because we brought the teaser back on FanDuel this year. They're going to do a whole teaser promotion. Six point, minus one 10 juice.

• 26:04Speaker 01

  There we go.

• 26:04Bill Simmons?

  Up to $50 bets and we're doing it.

• 26:07Speaker 01

  Baby.

• 26:08Bill Simmons?

  So that's going to be one of our things.

• 26:09Speaker 01

  Teaser. God damn, let's go.

• 26:12Bill Simmons?

  So for us, we were talking about going back and forth. And if somebody makes a pick, the other person can't use it. But we also want to win this Ringer 107. There's going to be prizes. So what we're going to do, even if you take a pick and I decide I like it, I'm going to say I'm going to piggyback on yours. And we're going to keep track of the piggybacks all year. And that's just going to be a code of honor. Who, who piggyback the other guys picks more?

• 26:35Speaker 01

  Oh, okay. Good, good.

• 26:37Bill Simmons?

  Because I'm going to try not to piggyback your picks.

• 26:41Speaker 01

  But we want to give the people lots of things to consider, lots of ways of looking at the world. We, as we've advanced into our, you know, AARP stage of life, we see the world the same way quite a bit. You know, quite, quite often, so we're probably.

• 27:01Bill Simmons?

  You and I see the world the same way.

• 27:03Speaker 01

  That's what I just said. You and I see the world the same way.

• 27:05Bill Simmons?

  I didn't know where you were going with that. I got nervous for a second.

• 27:08Speaker 01

  No, we're, we're more aligned than not these days.

• 27:12Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, like we see a story like Aaron Rodgers complaining on a podcast that he proposed to Shailene Woodley, but she has to have sex with somebody one more time. And you and I are probably going to have the same reaction to that, which we don't need to share in a podcast.

• 27:24Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 27:25Bill Simmons?

  But I think you and I are on the same wavelength on that whole story.

• 27:28Speaker 01

  The whole, the whole thing's a little suspicious, that's all.

• 27:31Bill Simmons?

  So every week, we're going to alternate. This week, because it's week one, you're going to go first with your first pick, then I'll go with mine. And we'll keep going. We should mention, I really liked this season. I liked the week one slate. I remember last year being, just like trying to talk myself into certain matchups. This one, it's an embarrassment of riches. I had multiple things for the tees. The Lions line up to like teams I really liked heading into the season, going against teams I didn't like that much heading into the season. And we had on Wednesday, I thought was a good example of the Pats line seemed a little high. They covered this Australia game, just throw it out, I think with the travel and stuff, where we've learned nothing from that.

• 28:14Bill Simmons?

  We are going to learn stuff from these Sunday games. House, you have the first pick.

• 28:19Bill Simmons?

  What are you going to do?

• 28:20Speaker 01

  Let's go. So this will be, you, you just hit on this. I want to bet immediately on teams that I have a favorable opinion of for the entire season. I just want to get right into, not a lot of foreplay, we're going right to the meat of the matter. And that's why the first pick here is the Houston Texans at home, catching points from the Buffalo Bills, which is really just a wonderful opportunity. Couple of ways of looking at this. In the first place, Josh Allen has had a problem with the Buffalo Bills, and especially the Buffalo, no.

• 28:58Bill Simmons?

  Against the Houston Texans.

• 28:59Speaker 01

  The Houston Texans, yes, that's what I meant to say.

• 29:01Bill Simmons?

  Was it one and four lifetime?

• 29:03Speaker 01

  One and four and oh and four when they play in Houston.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  I think that this Houston defense is absolutely magnificent coming into this season. They're the best defense in my, my opinion, even with the outstanding performance that we saw last night from the Seattle Seahawks. That's pretty good defense, even with some of those.

• 29:23Bill Simmons?

  Your wise guys showed on this podcast, we were all in on the Texans across the board.

• 29:27Speaker 01

  That's 100% correct. And, and part of that is on the offensive side of the board for me. And I think that this Texans offense has an enormous, you know, space to, to improve into. You have to remember that they had new offensive coordinator, Nick Calley, last year. And he had in mind a rush attack that never materialized. It could not come together because Joe Mixon got hurt at the beginning of the season and didn't play a single down. I think.

• 30:00Bill Simmons?

  And by the way, the guy they replaced him with is no longer playing football, Nick Chubb. He is retired.

• 30:06Speaker 01

  And, and, and Woody Austin's a fine third down.

• 30:10Bill Simmons?

  Woody Marks, yeah.

• 30:10Speaker 01

  Marks.

• 30:11Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 30:11Speaker 01

  Austin Marks, I'll get it.

• 30:12Bill Simmons?

  Hey, we're, it's a week one start. Yeah, yeah. But now they have David Montgomery, who you and I both love, who was kind of a sneaky fantasy guy. And he's a move the chains, four yards a carry, good around the end zone. He's serviceable.

• 30:25Speaker 01

  Yes, exactly. So, I mean, making the case for Houston, the one unit that I trust in this game is, is the defense. And, and I, they've done a really nice job. They have exactly the right personnel to cabin up Josh Allen. And we've seen it, you know, with our, with our own eyes. And I think that there's tons of potential for this Houston offense. I, I think that I wouldn't mess with this game if Houston was favored. And I think they should be favored, but there's just too good of an opportunity here.

• 30:56Bill Simmons?

  It's in the Tic Tac Zone. It's Buffalo by one and a half. I think Houston should be favored by one and a half, so I'm with you. There's also the Keyshawn Booty, where the Pats trade him, A.J. Brown gets hurt. They don't have Keyshawn Booty to put in for A.J. Brown, and I just know he's going to do something in this Texans game.

• 31:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's a giant question mark surrounding this Bills defense. New defensive coordinator, Tim Leonard, coming over from the Broncos. There's a personnel question at all three levels with this Bills defense. And if the Texans.

• 31:28Bill Simmons?

  They sucked last year.

• 31:29Speaker 01

  They, they did.

• 31:31Bill Simmons?

  Whenever people wanted to go down the field on them, they did. And what's going to be better about it this year?

• 31:35Speaker 01

  One of the worst run defenses in the NFL last season. Um, I kind of expect to see the same. So if Houston comes out and establishes the run, then I really like what they can do. Obviously, the Houston offensive line, you don't, you're not going to go crazy for that. The only pushback for this is, you know,

• 31:53Bill Simmons?

  You're betting it's Josh Allen.

• 31:55Speaker 01

  Josh Allen. Yes, the numbers are incredible. And interestingly, CJ Stroud, three seasons, 0-6 against the spread in the first two weeks of the season. So, but that, you know, that, that's, that, that's the counterbalance to, you know, this, this Houston angle. It's just some, some trend stuff.

• 32:14Bill Simmons?

  There's some good, there's some good football nerd stuff with this matchup, too. Like, the kind of defense the Texans have, where they can spy Allen, and they can, they can basically just make him for, DJ Moore will be the big X factor that they didn't have last year. Can he get open? But, I don't know, I just, I think Texans, I think they have the best defense in the league, and this is the perfect defense to go against Josh Allen.

• 32:36Speaker 01

  It, it's Petri at the super nickel. He's like, not just nickel, he's super nickel. So I love that. That's what I, that's what you're getting at. And I,

• 32:42Bill Simmons?

  So the fear would be CJ Stroud, would be the, would be the fear that he just basically does with him in the playoffs last year. I, I had them down as a straight up as well, but I moved them into the teaser section.

• 32:55Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 32:56Bill Simmons?

  Which, which, um, I might as well just do now as my first pick.

• 33:01Speaker 01

  Great.

• 33:02Bill Simmons?

  Um, nothing more fun in a teaser than taking a home team you like to possibly win anyway, and bringing them over the seven. So with the six-point teaser, you can bring them to plus seven and a half, which is just wonderful, because this is either, I think this is either a one-score game, or Houston kicks their ass. But they'll, I think they'll hang around. I think they're gonna win, but I'm happy to take the plus seven and a half.

• 33:26Bill Simmons?

  And in general, I think they're the best AFC team.

• 33:28Speaker 01

  I want to pat you on the back for this Houston teaser leg, especially because these games are always super low-scoring between these teams. They don't combine for many points when they play. So that plus seven and a half is very valuable in that context.

• 33:41Bill Simmons?

  And they have a top-five field-goal kicker, they're home. I just, I like getting that many points. And I'm gonna put that with the Jaguars minus two and a half. With the caveat, I know this is an obvious pick. They're home, they're eight-and-a-half-point favorites against the Browns. It's Deshaun Watson. Uh, I have a bunch of reasons I like this one. I don't really like the Jaguars that much this year. Um, I, they'll be somewhere nine and eight, eight and nine, whatever, but this is a nice spot for them. Two things. One, we have two more chances in our lives to bet against Deshaun Watson. This week.

• 34:13Speaker 01

  This is one of them.

• 34:14Bill Simmons?

  And next week. And then we'll never have the chance again, unless it's a situation where he's like the third-string quarterback on a team that has a situation like what the Falcons had this week, where the top two guys are out. So, I just want to enjoy this and enjoy our, our, our last stretch here with having money against him and watching him throw grounders to guys across in the middle, and fumble, and scramble at the wrong times, and throw it in a triple coverage. That will be fun.

• 34:40Speaker 01

  It's so sad, because the Browns actually have some weapons, some talent on offense.

• 34:44Bill Simmons?

  Right. And maybe by week three, they'll unleash them. The other thing, and we talked about this, um, maybe Sal and I talked about it Sunday. It, the weather is gonna be hot and humid in Jacksonville. They're saying low 90s with the humidity way higher than that. It might be a little drizzle. It's just gonna suck. It's gonna be like, uh, you know, like a Miami Vice episode, basically. So, you have a road team that normally is, you know, playing outdoors in Cleveland, dealing with the humidity. You have Deshaun Watson, who's already got enough obstacles against him. You have a brand-new coach. You have no Jim Schwartz for the Browns' defense, who always seemed like he was worth a couple wins.

• 35:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:22Bill Simmons?

  And this is one of those. If the Jags can't win by three, punt the season with them. Like, that, then that, that tells me they're gonna be like a seven-and-10 team. So, my teaser is Texans plus seven and a half, Jaguars minus two and a half. Jaguars keep it a one-score game, and the, and the Jags just have to win by, by three. Feeling pretty good about that one as my first.

• 35:43Speaker 01

  So this is an incredible segue, because, shocker, I also have the Jaguars as one of the legs in my teaser, for all the reasons you just laid out. But most prominently, one of our last cherished opportunities to bet against Deshaun Watson. That's the number-one thing here, for sure.

• 36:02Bill Simmons?

  They should have a ceremony before the game.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  Well, we could do it.

• 36:05Bill Simmons?

  People should watch, all the, all the different people who run the online sportsbooks, the CEO should come out. Christian could come out from FanDuel. He could give Deshaun a watch. Thank you for your service. You've made so many betters money over the years. We know you have two weeks left. Here you go. Um, I just, it's, it's, it's somewhat emotional. Three weeks from now, we'll never have this chance again.

• 36:28Speaker 01

  It's emotional to our pocketbooks, for sure. Um, other leg for me of the, of the tease, and there are many, many good candidates. I love, uh, your Houston leg. Um, I'm putting it with the Lions, where the line has moved from seven and a half down to six and a half. So, not getting the benefit of, of, uh, moving through, but the Lions down to a half-point, from six and a half down to a half. So Lions winning outright at home against the New Orleans Saints as a teaser leg, it's a kind of a must-play. I mean, for sure, the Saints have a lot of pundits blowing smoke up their skirt for this upcoming season. I understand

• 37:11Speaker 01

  all the reasons that Kellen Moore seems like he's a pretty damn good coach.

• 37:15Bill Simmons?

  Wait, do, do you understand the reasons? Because I don't really understand the reasons.

• 37:20Speaker 01

  It's the Shuck and Kellen Moore when they went on their little mini-run over the last portion of last year against a bunch of bad teams.

• 37:27Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, you can pick apart easily with the schedule they played.

• 37:30Speaker 01

  Bad teams and bad quarterbacks. And, and, but New Orleans did beat them. They did. And they did beat the Buccaneers, which really had a big role in keeping the Buccaneers out of the playoffs, and kept them from winning the stinky NFC South. I still have questions about the Saints, uh, defense, and I think this Detroit team is absolutely loaded on offense. There is some moving parts on the offensive line that are a tiny bit concerning, and it's fine to point at the holes in the secondary for Detroit, you know, with, with, um, Branch and Joseph both out and.

• 38:07Bill Simmons?

  Well, there's gonna be, and Tarran Arno gone. Yeah, there's gonna be a week.

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Abroad.

• 38:11Bill Simmons?

  Abroad. There's gonna be a week in these first four weeks when they get absolutely torched by a QB. I don't think this is the week.

• 38:18Speaker 01

  And, and even if this is, you know, kinds, ends up a shootout kind of thing, uh, I'll just take the, the half-point. That'll be fine. All I'm asking to do, them to do is win the football game in this tease context. And the, the, the, uh, Dan Campbell record is, is wonderful. I mean, he's, he's great against the spread. He's great in, in the opening part of, of seasons. He has one of the strongest against the spread records in season openers. Uh, this Lions team has something to prove. They're forecasted to get to 11 wins. This better be one of the wins. So, I'm playing them as the, the other leg of my teaser.

• 38:51Bill Simmons?

  I thought it was curious that the line dropped.

• 38:54Speaker 01

  Uh-huh.

• 38:55Bill Simmons?

  And I think it dropped under a touchdown because of the cheap touchdown potential with Shuck, who we watched do in the second half of last year against a Lions team that the secondary is shaky, where this is like, Lions are up 14 with three minutes left, and Shuck does the drive, and all of a sudden, and I think that's why it went down. I think the way you played it, this was my backup choice for a tease.

• 39:18Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 39:18Bill Simmons?

  The Lions. So, there's three teams that could really F you on a, on a big-ass tease. One is the Lions, who you took. One is the Jaguars, who I took. And then, the third one would be the Chargers, if you wanted to bring them down to three and a half.

• 39:36Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 39:37Bill Simmons?

  I gotta be honest, I looked at that Chargers game, the Cardinals were the other team I was looking at for a tease, and I backed off because they're the Cardinals. But, that line is minus nine and a half. Um, I've, I, are we sure the Chargers' defense is, I kind of like the Chargers, but are we sure their defense is even gonna be that good this year? Um, and getting that up to 15 and a half with the way the Cardinals had some of the garbage time shit they did last year, I was like, that seemed kind of appetizing.

• 40:05Speaker 01

  They, they might be the king, the kings of the backdoor this upcoming season. With LaFleur, I mean, this is why I've been cautious with my Arizona exposure this season. They have talent on offense. I mean, they still have weapons across the board, and they still have, you know, running backs.

• 40:21Bill Simmons?

  They can block a little bit, too.

• 40:22Speaker 01

  They, yeah, yeah.

• 40:23Bill Simmons?

  percent wasn't bad last year. I don't know. Lot of running backs, like, they have big-play potential with two receivers, plus Jeremiah Love.

• 40:31Speaker 01

  Receiver room, plus Trey McBride, like, I don't, I don't want to be on the wrong side of the backdoor with that one.

• 40:36Bill Simmons?

  I thought fif, plus 15 and a half was enticing, but ultimately, I didn't want to do it. All right, so you have two picks. I, uh,

• 40:46Bill Simmons?

  I gotta do this one next. I just love the Bucks this week. And I like the Bucks in general this season. They're plus three and a half in Cincinnati. Cincinnati has been a very sexy preseason team. We've talked about it for the last couple of weeks of pods. I like this spot for a couple of reasons. One, this line is basically saying they think Cincinnati is two points better than the Bucks. Cause the minus one and a half is a neutral field. I just completely disagree with that. I think these two teams are, I would, I would have them even. And I think the Bucks might actually be a slight, slight more talent proficient. What's the opposite of deficient? Proficient?

• 41:26Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 41:26Bill Simmons?

  Pro, talent loaded? I'm still.

• 41:30Speaker 01

  Talent affirmative?

• 41:32Bill Simmons?

  Talent affirmative?

• 41:33Speaker 01

  I don't know.

• 41:34Bill Simmons?

  I just like their team more. This feels like a back and forth game. There's some unbelievable stats with the Bengals in week one, which we just forget every year was Zach Taylor.

• 41:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:44Bill Simmons?

  Every year they, they look awful in week one. Last week they almost lost to the Browns. It was that 17 16 game, which I think they fucked everybody over on the tease. If I remember correctly, I think they were favored by like eight or eight and a half. And somehow they won, but didn't cover the tease. I don't trust Zach Taylor at all. This whole Joe Burrow is going to be under center a lot more this year. When he's, all the stats say he's bad when he's under center. That worries me. And I like the Bucks. I just, I think this team's pretty good that they had a great draft. And I think they can go in there and throw some punches. It feels to me like an either or three point game. Somebody's going to have the ball at the end with a chance to win. And I think the Bucks could win. I like the money line too, in this game house.

• 42:28Bill Simmons?

  But for the purposes of our contest, I would go Bucks plus three and a half.

• 42:32Speaker 01

  That's interesting. You, part of the thing also that I like, you know, the Buccaneers are coming in off of a failure to cover streak. They haven't covered nine straight games. So I like this one coming in, you know, sort of angle wise. But the, the real compelling thing is these, these home openers.

• 42:53Bill Simmons?

  With Zach Taylor.

• 42:54Speaker 01

  Yeah. And he's, he's four and eight against the spread. In terms of the first two games of the season.

• 43:04Bill Simmons?

  Right. Right. So Bucks, they're plus 168 for, for the money line. If you wanted to potentially put them with another dog. And we'll talk about some other dogs. All right, you have the third pick. What is it?

• 43:20Speaker 01

  I am going with, and this is against one of your rules, but I don't know if it applies in week one. I'm going to a shit game. And it is the New York Jets at the Tennessee Titans.

• 43:35Bill Simmons?

  Listen, you think I'm surprised that you're doing this? You have nine Jets bets. I think you might have 10 Jets. How many Jets bets have you been in the last three months?

• 43:43Speaker 01

  I, I have said, and you know, the, the Jets is, I have the Jets a million ways on, on teaser legs as well. So yes, I have the Jets all over the place. Many of those bets that I'm referring to when I'm making the references in our threads about having Jets exposure. It's in this, the tease context. I have them teased with Houston. I have them teased with the Jags. I have them teased with a lot.

• 44:06Bill Simmons?

  I just can't put bad teams in a tease. I'm really trying not to do that this year. I like the straight up, the, the salary revenge game is funny. Cause I don't, does he even have revenge in him? I don't know.

• 44:19Speaker 01

  No, no.

• 44:20Bill Simmons?

  They looked.

• 44:20Speaker 01

  He has, he has semen in him. I mean, he does have that.

• 44:24Bill Simmons?

  He has nine kids. But they had a, probably the worst buzz of any AFC team in the preseason.

• 44:32Speaker 01

  Right.

• 44:33Bill Simmons?

  Like they, at the beginning of August, people were seriously looking at them as like, could that be a worst of first? Right? Could that be the Patriots this year? They fit a lot of the profile. By the end of the preseason, people were wondering if they could win four games. So I like this a lot. It scares me. It's a stay away for me because of what we saw from Gino last year, which is now, it's funny. It's the, we get amnesia with all this stuff, but Gino was really reprehensibly awful last year. And now it is because in September of the new year, it's like, well, his offensive line was terrible and he didn't have any weapons. And Bowers got hurt half the year. And it's like.

• 45:14Speaker 01

  All those things are true.

• 45:15Bill Simmons?

  Or he was awful. I don't, or maybe it's both. Maybe those things were true and he was awful.

• 45:21Speaker 01

  Both things could be true.

• 45:23Bill Simmons?

  But he might be completely washed though.

• 45:25Speaker 01

  He might be, but they have a vastly superior offensive line with the New York Jets than, than what he experienced with the Raiders. This, this might even be, and, and you know, folks can look it up and see this offensive line for the Jets might be better than the offensive line that Gino played with in Seattle before he jumped over to the Raiders. You can go back and look, that Seattle team was, was decent, but that offensive line could not establish the run. I think that this offensive line against the Titans and the Titans front seven is good. And that's the strength of the team. But I think they're going to be able to establish the run. Very quietly, the Jets did something that was curious. They, they gave us the indication they were going to be in rebuilding mode. And then they went out in the off season and got a bunch of talent.

• 46:09Speaker 01

  They got talent on both sides of the football.

• 46:11Bill Simmons?

  We all liked them. We all liked the over. Yeah, we had like seven, eight wins possibly for them.

• 46:16Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I, I look at this offense and you know, they establish a run with Breece Hall. They, they have AD Mitchell joining opposite Garrett Wilson.

• 46:30Bill Simmons?

  It looks like Cooper, it didn't seem like Cooper had a good preseason. That was one where they thought, cause it was like the Jets had three first rounders and it's unclear if Cooper's going to play. So counters to the Jets buzz here. They're the Jets. That would be my biggest counter.

• 46:45Speaker 01

  It's a good counter.

• 46:46Bill Simmons?

  You just have to keep your guard up at all time. I like that you're playing them straight up and that you're not putting them in a tease. I'm with you. I think they should be favored in this game. I think when Sal and I did guess the line Sunday, I think I was off by four points on this. Cause I just assumed the Jet, why are the Titans favored against anyone other than Miami? Yeah. Maybe Miami is the only team, right?

• 47:06Speaker 01

  Right. That's, that's the point here. That, that, and it was, there was a time, I think this line opened at two and a half and it's, you know, bet down to one and a half, which tells you a little bit of something directionally about the market. But the, the Titans over the last three seasons haven't been favored very often. They're one and eight against the spread as a favorite. So I'll, I'll go ahead and take that. I, I like this Jets team. If we are going to get to a Jets over, then this is one of the wins. And that's part of the priors.

• 47:35Bill Simmons?

  They're not going seven and 10 or eight and nine if they don't win this game. I think that's fair. All right, we're going to take a break and then we're going to do the rest of the picks. And now it's time for a special part of today's episode brought to you by our buddies at NFL Sunday Ticket. The NFL Sunday Ticket YouTube TV. You get every game, every Sunday, all in one place. And I cannot recommend it highly enough. YouTube, as you know, has crowned me their CMO, their chief multi-view officer. It's my job to tell you which four games deserve a spot in your multi-view this week. Well, obviously Tampa, Cincinnati, fantasy guys galore. I love Tampa just in general this season, and I don't like Cincinnati that much. So you can guess where I'm standing on that one.

• 48:17Bill Simmons?

  Buffalo, Houston is the best game of the week. Cleveland, Jacksonville, just from a, what's going to happen with the Cleveland quarterback situation? Plus Jacksonville scores a lot of points. I have my eye on that one. And then my last pick would be Baltimore at Indianapolis. Baltimore as road favorites. Indianapolis, all the signs pointing toward them being frisky, at least for this one. So those would be my four. Also keeping an eye on Atlanta, Pittsburgh as well for, for financial reasons for myself. And guess what I'm talking about there? That is the beauty of multi-view. You don't just have to watch Houston, Buffalo, which is going to be awesome. Fit three other games in there as well. Instead of flipping channels every two minutes, you just build your own Sunday slate.

• 49:02Bill Simmons?

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• 51:12Bill Simmons?

  All right, coming back. I have two picks left. You have one pick. This one is easy. I can't believe it's still on the board. It might be our first piggyback. Cowboys, Sunday night, minus two and a half against the Giants. I think this line's inexplicable. It's been between two and a half and three all week. By the time when we locked down the lines on Thursday, it was Cowboys minus two and a half. I'm grabbing it. Dak has had a lot of success against the Giants, and in general, this whole division. This isn't the Giants team that I think we're gonna see probably in Week 8, when they have all their dudes back. Like, we're not getting, you know, 70 plays from neighbors in this, in this game. They don't have Wondell Robinson this year,

• 51:57Bill Simmons?

  which I think people forget. He had 1,000 yards for them last year. He's on the Titans now. And, look, this is a classic. I was high on the Cowboys. I was low on the Giants. And it's a borderline miracle that they're playing each other, and that this is the line. I honestly do not understand the line. I think the line should be Cowboys minus four and a half. This is a case of, people are like, ah, suspicious of this Cowboys thing. And it's like, I think they're gonna be really good. I don't love that they lost their all-pro guard right before the season. That's my only fear, especially against this Cowboys defensive line. But, uh, but man, if you think the Cowboys are gonna be good this year, you have to take them in this game. So Cowboys minus two and a half.

• 52:40Speaker 01

  I'm taking them.

• 52:42Bill Simmons?

  Is this a first piggyback?

• 52:44Speaker 01

  This is a piggyback. Yeah, I'm looking at my notes. I had them right here. I could not agree more vigorously with the proposition that this, this is, uh, underpriced. And it's, it's a market that is reflecting sentiment that is not in alignment with reality. This is a, a, a Harbaugh-driven, he's going to come right the ship. Look at the offensive coordinator. This is the thing that really pushes it over.

• 53:14Bill Simmons?

  Go ahead, let's do it.

• 53:15Speaker 01

  You're gonna put Jackson Dart in the hands of, of, of Matt effing Nagy? Show me the last time that we saw Matt Nagy give us anything that looked like innovation, that looked like modern football? I mean, this is a wonderful opportunity. So if this Dallas defense has any of the potential that we've come into this season and anticipate, we better see it, because their offensive line remains, to my way of looking at it, shaky. It is not a top-half-of-the-league offensive line. Yeah. Neighbors, who the hell knows? It's a, it's a, it's a receiver room.

• 53:59Speaker 01

  Wondell, Wondell going abroad is not helpful to Dart. He was Dart's safety blanket. Go, go take a look. Scataboo coming off of, you know, that, that, that injury. This is not a team that, that is built to hang in with the Dallas Cowboys within a field goal, unless Dallas's defense looks like last year. And that's the big open question. The other element of this-

• 54:24Bill Simmons?

  They've made trades, they've spent money, they've spent draft picks, like, and as the Bundo pointed out on Ringer Wise Guys, 17 of the 26 guys from last year's defense no longer play professional football? That seems relevant.

• 54:36Speaker 01

  That's interesting.

• 54:37Bill Simmons?

  But, look, their defense, I mean, you could say the same about Cincinnati, and you could honestly say the same about the Lions. Their defense just needs to be somewhere between 14 and 17 for them to be a 10-win team. I think that's gonna happen, especially with the schedule they have.

• 54:54Speaker 01

  The Giants secondary is, is super gettable. You're, you're gonna let Dak cook with the weapons that he has? I mean, this is, they better get the, the pass rush. No Dexter Lawrence? Okay, well, let's see what, what this, this, when Dexter Lawrence isn't occupying two linemen, let's, let's go ahead and see what these other guys have in them.

• 55:13Bill Simmons?

  You also said the Brandon Aubrey factor, that's worth three points. You have a Giants home game, but you know there's gonna be Cowboy fans there. You know it. I don't know how many Cowboy fans, but they're, they're gonna be there, and they're gonna be loud, so.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  The one thing, well, we'll just confess upfront, we are putting ourselves in harm's way with one of the most compelling Week 1 trends.

• 55:32Bill Simmons?

  Go ahead, talk, talk about this.

• 55:34Speaker 01

  Divisional home dogs. You go back 20 years, when two teams inside the same division are playing each other, uh, and one of them is at home as an underdog. They are 27 and 16 against the spread. This is from the good people at Action Network. 11 and 4 against the spread since 2018. 19 and 6 against the spread since 2012. 25 and 9 against the spread since 2000. So, all of the more recent vintage reflects that that home dog is valuable, that home in the division dog.

• 56:09Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but I think the line reflects that. And I, and the Seattle-New England line on Wednesday night was the same thing, because it was three and a half. And I think, I think it was as high as it was because of the Super Bowl, and the loser, and all the, it was basically an extra point toward the Pats, which ended up helping them cover. So, for, in this case, it's the other way.

• 56:29Speaker 01

  Drew Luckett's quarterback helped them cover.

• 56:31Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that did help us cover. But, uh, we lost them, anyway, because our quarterback threw three interceptions.

• 56:39Speaker 01

  That did happen.

• 56:39Bill Simmons?

  He became the first quarterback since Cordell Stewart, 2001, to throw three picks in the fourth quarter of a game he had a lead in.

• 56:46Speaker 01

  Are you feeling half-full or, or, or half-empty? Glass half-full, glass half-empty about the Patriots? Again, after, after, you've had 24 hours to kind of, to-

• 56:54Bill Simmons?

  First of all, thank you for asking.

• 56:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:59Bill Simmons?

  I've landed here. Drake had no preseason. A.J. Brown got hurt halfway through the game. The game plan was awful, and the Seahawks have an awesome defense, and we're at home. When we started the podcast last night, I felt like we were gonna go 6 and 11. Now, I'm like, you know what? The, there was a Pats Super Bowl, 03 team, maybe? 04, one of those ones where they got killed by Buffalo, 31-0 in Week 1, and they ended up rolling off. So, I'm, I'm just trying to, trying to calm down. But Drake was really bad, and I don't really have an explanation for it. He was just really awful.

• 57:36Speaker 01

  Well, I have an explanation for it. The Patriots couldn't establish the run. And so you let that-

• 57:42Bill Simmons?

  Well, they kept trying. We kept running it on every first down and getting stuffed.

• 57:46Speaker 01

  And Seattle was like, thank you, thank you, thank you so much. I mean, there, there is a, a tiny bit of a mismatch there, that, that offensive line for the Patriots isn't quite up to that elite level to take on a front seven like, like Seattle. And the innovation of, of Seattle, what McDonald brings to the table, and stunts, and simulated pressure and all that stuff. What you saw out of Byron Murphy, all game long, moving side to side, they couldn't locate him. And he was, he was awesome, yes. I, I, I think you should be-

• 58:16Bill Simmons?

  It was an awful, awful, awful game plan, and it really, it honestly concerned me, because it was just the opposite. Like, Danny Kelly was on the pod. He was like, everything the Pats did, he was like relieved and excited. That shouldn't be the case. It's like, please, please don't throw deep on our, on our precocious cornerbacks with A.J. Brown. They never did it. They never went to him once.

• 58:39Speaker 01

  Here's the surprising thing to me. The single best weapon, and the thing that keeps that Seattle defense off, uh, kilter, off of being able to just load up, is, is Drake running. And he's so good at it. Drake May, running, not scrambling. Scrambling, he's very good at also.

• 58:56Bill Simmons?

  Semi-designed runs, yeah.

• 58:57Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 58:58Bill Simmons?

  Almost like you're doing video games. You send everyone deep and roll them out.

• 59:01Speaker 01

  If you can't establish the run, then let the quarterback run. They can't account for it. That's the one position that makes it a challenge. I'm sure Josh McDaniels is, uh, in the lab cooking up some, some stuff to respond to.

• 59:14Bill Simmons?

  It was, it was a, it was a horrible, horrible, horrible game plan, and they were not aggressive enough. And they lost the game in the first two hours of the game, before Drake May ended up actually losing the game.

• 59:26Speaker 01

  I agree with all of that.

• 59:26Bill Simmons?

  But they, they, they played like 10 points was good enough to win. They did the same thing in Denver last year, and it actually worked, because they played the odds right with their backup quarterback. But the Seattle defense is a different animal at home than Denver was, it was a snowstorm.

• 59:40Speaker 01

  Also, remember, the, the weather in Denver-

• 59:43Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 59:43Speaker 01

  Went from like, you know, perfectly solid, and then all of a sudden, we're playing in a blizzard. Like, the, the weather produced that outcome as much as the backup quarterback, as much as Jarrett Stidham.

• 59:53Bill Simmons?

  The Super Bowl, making the Super Bowl really threw off all of the expectations and everything about this Pats team, which was a young team that, last year, that probably shouldn't have made the Super Bowl. And now it feels like they should be a contender on par with some, I think they have as much talent as Buffalo, but I don't, I don't, defensively, like Seattle and Houston, possibly Philly. Like, I wanna see this Philly defense, especially this weekend, but-

• 1:00:17Speaker 01

  For sure.

• 1:00:18Bill Simmons?

  There's a defensive class of teams that's just a whole level above the Pats. Anyway, uh, I don't like that it's 10 days till the next game, too. Because in Boston, everyone's going-

• 1:00:29Speaker 01

  Oh, losing their mind.

• 1:00:30Bill Simmons?

  Everyone's going crazy.

• 1:00:31Speaker 01

  But it's a home game against who? Somebody decent?

• 1:00:34Bill Simmons?

  It's Pittsburgh. They, they have a good front seven.

• 1:00:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:00:38Bill Simmons?

  And speaking of Pittsburgh-

• 1:00:41Bill Simmons?

  I thought about holding this pick because we get one extra pick on Sunday and holding this pick hoping that Tua was going to be cleared to play and that the line was going to go down because this was three and a half, this was three, three beginning of the week, got to three and a half. It was still too low because Tua was the quarterback in Pittsburgh against a team that has a really good pass rush and Tua is not a starting quarterback anymore. He gets hurt. Now it's Cooper Rush. Line goes to four and a half, which is in the Vegas zone. And you have this weird Steelers team with Aaron Rodgers that inexplicably doing this super candid podcast right before the season. I don't know what he was thinking.

• 1:01:22Speaker 01

  Inexplicably.

• 1:01:23Bill Simmons?

  Inexplicable podcast. Although I did enjoy the shots at Danica Patrick.

• 1:01:31Bill Simmons?

  It worries me to lay this many points with them. But I think before the year I had the Steelers at 10 wins. I actually like McCarthy. I think they're going to be a playoff team. And I think the Falcons have a chance to be the worst team in the league. Or at least the worst team in the NFC. And this is minus four and a half. And I wonder in five weeks, is this line minus eight? Minus eight and a half. So I'm going to hold my nose and I'm going to lay the four and a half. I think in real life, we don't have a parlay option for this, but to me, this is a natural money line parlay with something else. Just take Steelers money line, put it with another game. Like if you like the Ravens, maybe you like the Bengals money line, but I like that Steelers

• 1:02:16Bill Simmons?

  money line with something else. I thought about teasing them through the zero and putting them in the tease.

• 1:02:22Speaker 01

  Don't do it.

• 1:02:22Bill Simmons?

  Just to lay the smackdown with Raheem, just right away to show him.

• 1:02:26Speaker 01

  That's not a smackdown. That's a dumbedown. Don't do it.

• 1:02:28Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, that was a dumbedown. That's why I didn't do it.

• 1:02:30Speaker 01

  There's too many good ones out here.

• 1:02:31Bill Simmons?

  So I'm going to hold my nose and I'm going to do Steelers minus four and a half against a Falcons team that looks like it's starting Cooper Rush.

• 1:02:38Speaker 01

  Hmm. Well, I'm putting together a parlay, a money line parlay. Oh, boy, do I love this one.

• 1:02:44Bill Simmons?

  What is it?

• 1:02:45Speaker 01

  I came dressed in my team's garb today to show my respect, to show my enthusiasm. No games have been played. Hope springs eternal. It's a divisional game. Washington has demonstrated an ability to be feisty with the Eagles. They've also gotten slaughtered by the Eagles. But they, look, it's week one. Nobody knows anything about this Washington.

• 1:03:12Bill Simmons?

  Oh, so you like their money line for this?

• 1:03:14Speaker 01

  I sure do not. No, sir.

• 1:03:16Bill Simmons?

  Why are you bringing up Washington? You already made your four picks.

• 1:03:18Speaker 01

  I'm no, I'm just saying, you raised the idea of a little money line parlay. Why wouldn't we just go ahead and give the people a way of looking at some other games? This Philadelphia Eagles team is so good in the trenches. And on paper, right now, on paper, the Washington team is very bad in the trenches, especially with the absence of Larry.

• 1:03:40Bill Simmons?

  I know where you're going. See, this.

• 1:03:43Speaker 01

  I'm not playing.

• 1:03:44Bill Simmons?

  No, I've already looked at this.

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  Any numbers. I'm not playing the numbers. But look, the Eagles on the money line parlayed with the Steelers on the money line is dead even money, plus 100.

• 1:03:55Bill Simmons?

  Yep.

• 1:03:55Speaker 01

  I am betting that. I'm telling you right now. Philadelphia Eagles at home, beating Washington on the money line. Pittsburgh Steelers at home, beating the Atlanta Falcons at home. Even money, money line parlay. Let's go. That's one that I'm getting down right now. Okay?

• 1:04:14Bill Simmons?

  I really like it. And I wanted to talk about some possible options for the fifth pick. And one of these was the Eagles, which is five and a half right now. And I think the way to play them is the money line with the Steelers and hold your nose and bet against two bad teams on the road, basically. My fear with the Eagles and why I didn't put them in a tease, other than it would have teased them through the zero. How many times have we been fucked over by an Eagles Washington game, one way or the other? It's once a year.

• 1:04:43Speaker 01

  Fair. Yes, sure.

• 1:04:44Bill Simmons?

  It's once a year. Something weird happens, right?

• 1:04:47Speaker 01

  Yes, yeah.

• 1:04:48Bill Simmons?

  I don't understand for the life of me why this line is in seven and a half.

• 1:04:51Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:04:52Bill Simmons?

  Other than these divisional matchup underlag, all that shit. That's really the only reason. But the Eagles have way more talent. They're dominant in the trenches. Washington is going to be the opposite, especially because you don't have Tunsil. And I just, I'm dumbfounded by this line. Is it because the Eagles receivers?

• 1:05:11Speaker 01

  Well, it's an unknown quantity with the offense in its entirety, right?

• 1:05:15Bill Simmons?

  Because Wicks is the number two receiver for them now. Because Lemon, I guess, wasn't good in the preseason.

• 1:05:20Speaker 01

  Well, he's hurt. He has a hamstring problem, Lemon.

• 1:05:23Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but I think he's playing week one.

• 1:05:24Speaker 01

  I understand, but I'm just saying, we barely saw him because he was, he missed a big chunk of preseason with the hamstring.

• 1:05:29Bill Simmons?

  You can see it in the fantasy drafts because I had two, I had one on Monday, one on Tuesday. And Lemon, I don't even think Wicks got drafted. Lemon was like $1 at the end of the draft. Like this is not nothing. So, you know, if Devante Smith is, oh, he was a number two all along. What's the basketball analogy for this?

• 1:05:54Speaker 01

  Well, not Bradley Beal, not Beta Beal.

• 1:05:57Bill Simmons?

  Bradley Beal took Chris Paul's number. The Clippers are like, they had a, they had a staff meeting.

• 1:06:03Speaker 01

  Gets a number?

• 1:06:05Bill Simmons?

  Chris Paul's number three.

• 1:06:07Speaker 01

  I know, but so what? Bradley Beal was number three for the Wizards.

• 1:06:11Bill Simmons?

  I know, but Chris Paul, I mean.

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  Paul's legacy isn't the Clippers.

• 1:06:16Bill Simmons?

  Well, whose legacy is he then? What team is his legacy? The New Orleans Hornets? Played for the Clippers the longest. Like, like he had most of his good years there.

• 1:06:26Speaker 01

  All right.

• 1:06:27Bill Simmons?

  I just think if the Clippers were ever going to retire a number, it would be Chris Paul or Blake Griffin. They have no retired numbers.

• 1:06:34Speaker 01

  They showed us what they think of Chris Paul.

• 1:06:37Bill Simmons?

  I know.

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  They kicked them to the curb, unceremoniously.

• 1:06:40Bill Simmons?

  So on top of that, they gave his jersey number to Beta Beal. What a fuck you that is. They should have given it to Uncle Dennis. We've given to Uncle Dennis number three.

• 1:06:52Speaker 01

  Well, he, yeah, that, I mean, that three is one worse than two. And he took a giant number two all over that organization for as long as.

• 1:06:59Bill Simmons?

  They should have retired Kawhi's number. The Clippers, they have staff meetings trying to figure out how their fans can possibly hate them more. They haven't apologized to their fans. They've said nothing. What about the lawsuit? Oh, we're going to sue. What happened? This is, this whole thing was nine days ago. What are you guys going to do? The season's starting in a month, in five weeks. What are you going to tell your season ticket holders?

• 1:07:22Speaker 01

  Look at the other teams that cheat, cheat the salary cap. Look at, look at, I'm not going to name teams or players, but I guess that's it.

• 1:07:33Bill Simmons?

  I, I.

• 1:07:35Speaker 01

  Anyway, Devante Smith might be just a number two. You're right. The problem is, we have no idea what the hell's going on with this.

• 1:07:42Bill Simmons?

  Clippers are definitely a number two. Okay.

• 1:07:45Speaker 01

  So, yeah.

• 1:07:46Bill Simmons?

  So here's some possibles for my fifth pick on, on Sunday. Right now, leaning toward Broncos, plus two and a half against the Chiefs. I didn't do it in the Ringer 107 now because I'm really hoping that goes to three. I want to take the Broncos plus three.

• 1:08:03Speaker 01

  It's a super cheap, two and a half. It's minus 105. So the three is right around the corner at a fair, like minus 118, minus 120 to get the three. That's super fair. That's a very fair price.

• 1:08:18Bill Simmons?

  By Ringer 107, it's midnight, Saturday night, I think.

• 1:08:21Speaker 01

  Oh, I, I got it. I'm not, I'm not going to circumvent. I'm going to play by the number that is the number. Do we have a piggyback rule for the fifth pick or no?

• 1:08:30Bill Simmons?

  No, no piggyback rule.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  Okay, well, so it doesn't matter. Yeah, so that's who I already, I mean, that's who I'm, I'm 96% there already with Denver.

• 1:08:39Bill Simmons?

  I thought about them long and hard for the tease too. That was the other one. They were one of the runners up for that one.

• 1:08:44Speaker 01

  Amazing teaser leg.

• 1:08:45Bill Simmons?

  I don't understand how this isn't a one score game, one way or the other. I think Denver, both of us think Denver is just better than Kansas City. So that was one. I'm still looking at that Panthers Bears line. There's a lot of good things at, toward the Panthers and that, especially the weather.

• 1:09:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:02Bill Simmons?

  Is going to be really bad.

• 1:09:04Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:09:04Bill Simmons?

  Um, it's going to be hot and humid. I think that's going to be an advantage for them. The Bears.

• 1:09:10Speaker 01

  Panthers are a very live teaser leg also.

• 1:09:14Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they, they did have the bad juju preseason, which worries me. So I'm going to stare at that a little longer. I'm staying away from Ravens Colts, except for the over, I thought was enticing. The over's 47 and a half right now. It's indoors.

• 1:09:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:09:32Bill Simmons?

  Um, and I don't really trust either defense. And I wonder if that is going to be a point bonanza. So we're allowed to pick overs for the fifth one, right?

• 1:09:43Speaker 01

  I don't know.

• 1:09:44Bill Simmons?

  Or is it just for teasers? Oh, yeah, it's for teasers. Sorry.

• 1:09:47Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Right, right, right. Yeah. I mean, I like that over quite a bit also. That, that game is fascinating. I decided to stay out of it, just like you.

• 1:09:55Bill Simmons?

  I don't like the hook. It's Ravens three and a half. I don't like.

• 1:09:58Speaker 01

  And Ravens have cooked. Lamar has absolutely cooked against Anarumo defenses.

• 1:10:03Bill Simmons?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:03Speaker 01

  He's annihilated them. But I can't get into a game with a guy coming off an Achilles at, at record speed. I just, you know, the, oh, he's, he looks fine. He's been fine in practices. We haven't seen him under center. We haven't seen him try and play proper football against it. I'm, I'm very skeptical about Danny Dimes coming out and just boom, slotting right in and stiking in that offense being, you know, but maybe modern miracle medicine, maybe so. I just need to see it before I'm going to bet on any of it.

• 1:10:41Bill Simmons?

  They're a four-team 13-point teaser candidate, that over/under two. You bring that down to 34 and a half. It's 35 points covers. They'll have that at halftime.

• 1:10:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. What do you, it's back. Are you putting out Sunday, Sunday morning?

• 1:10:55Bill Simmons?

  Fando would not give us juice on the, yeah, no, I'm going to send it to you guys. Fando would not give us the juice on the 13-point teaser. Maybe we could talk to Christian. I don't know. But yeah, getting that down to 34 and a half, I think there's going to be, plus it's in a dome.

• 1:11:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:11:11Bill Simmons?

  I just think there's going to be points in that game. And then the, the other one I was looking at was that Titans Jets game that you already took. The, the two stayaways for me, Raiders Dolphins, especially with Bowers out.

• 1:11:29Bill Simmons?

  It's what really annoys me about this is it's one of the late games. There's only like four late games and I know we're gonna all end up betting on this game.

• 1:11:39Bill Simmons?

  I don't want to bet on this game.

• 1:11:40Speaker 01

  I'll be, I'll bet, I'm betting on it.

• 1:11:42Bill Simmons?

  I don't want to bet on it. I want to stay away from it. It's stupid to bet on it and I know it's gonna suck us in, but Raiders minus three. Now without Bowers, I don't think they have a single receiver or tight end on their roster that would get like a 70 in Madden, right?

• 1:11:59Speaker 01

  That's true, right? Yes. They have two, they have two running backs, but right, not a receiver or tight end, right?

• 1:12:06Bill Simmons?

  And then the Dolphins, who the F knows. But then the other stay away to me. Vikings Packers, I really wanted to talk myself into the Packers. I just can't. There's bad matchups everywhere. If Kyler in his first start going against Jonathan Gannon, who coached him last year, that's a red flag for me. You have the shitty Packers offensive line against Brian Flores, even though I can't name five guys in their defense anymore. I'm staying away from that. I don't want to bet on Kyler. I don't want to bet on Green Bay with the bad offensive line in Minnesota. I'm just out. I'm out on that game.

• 1:12:38Speaker 01

  I came like, not this close, but this close to taking Minnesota. Cause it kind of fits my narrative coming into the season, which is I think Minnesota's gonna be a slight tick better than their forecasted win total. And I have, I'm very pessimistic about Green Bay this season.

• 1:12:55Bill Simmons?

  The only other one I was looking at from a parlay standpoint was something, trying to keep something in the same game with the, with the Chargers and the Cardinals and doing some alt, alt stuff, like getting the Chargers down to minus two and a half. Trying to get the over under as far down as possible with the over so that it could get to like plus 100, but, um, cause I just feel, that game has cheap touchdown potential to me. I think the Chargers are gonna be pulling it out, Dirk Dever style.

• 1:13:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, I agree.

• 1:13:25Bill Simmons?

  They're gonna be slapping it on the table and flapping it around and, and doing every, and it just feels like they're up 15 in the fourth quarter and percent, oh, Michael Wilson, the Cardinals aren't, oh, they're going for two. And now it's like, oh my God, could the Chargers, it just has all the makings.

• 1:13:42Speaker 01

  Chargers under Harbaugh, early season, they come out and they look ready. They look ready to rock.

• 1:13:47Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:13:47Speaker 01

  Last couple of seasons, like they, they're like, there had been an early season, they've impressed us even with the offensive line situation of last year. I, I, I like the Chargers, but I, I see what you're doing. I don't mind it.

• 1:14:02Bill Simmons?

  They're saying Harbaugh is like a young Bob Chesney.

• 1:14:07Speaker 01

  Wait, no, the other way around. Chesney's much younger than Harbaugh.

• 1:14:10Bill Simmons?

  I know, I was kidding.

• 1:14:12Speaker 01

  I'm, I'm a dummy.

• 1:14:13Bill Simmons?

  That's the other, uh, one for parlays. UCLA is minus, UCLA is minus 12 and a half and minus 480 this weekend at home against San Diego State. The coach made, the coach of San Diego State made a mistake. Took a couple of like late shots at UCLA about polos and tried to make it seem like they were the rich kids and San Diego State were the gritty. Yeah, it was.

• 1:14:39Speaker 01

  Pop the collar.

• 1:14:39Bill Simmons?

  It felt sour grapesy. He was also up for the UCLA job and didn't get it.

• 1:14:43Speaker 01

  Oh, interesting.

• 1:14:46Bill Simmons?

  I do not think there's any chance UCLA will lose this game. And I would put them in a parlay. Yeah, I think, I think.

• 1:14:54Speaker 01

  On the money line.

• 1:14:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, on the money line.

• 1:14:56Speaker 01

  Okay. Hold on, I'm gonna put them in.

• 1:14:58Bill Simmons?

  Put them in, add their minus 480 in.

• 1:15:01Speaker 01

  What time do they play on Saturday? Do you know yet?

• 1:15:03Bill Simmons?

  They're playing at, it's a night game. It's 7:15.

• 1:15:06Speaker 01

  Okay. So let me get there.

• 1:15:08Bill Simmons?

  I was debating about going since I'm an unofficial UCLA booster, but, um, I didn't want to go to the Rose Bowl and spend my entire day going back and forth to Pasadena.

• 1:15:17Speaker 01

  I mean, that's understandable.

• 1:15:19Bill Simmons?

  Today's Ringer 107 picks were brought to you by FanDuel. Download the app now to find all of our 107 picks and make this your most rewarding season. We're trying for you. FanDuel, play your game. Odds subject to change.

• 1:15:35Speaker 02

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• 1:16:20Speaker 03

  Having uncontrolled eosinophilic esophagitis or E O E can mean you're stuck in many ways, like cutting your food into tiny pieces.

• 1:16:30Speaker 03

  Or stuck chewing food for a long time.

• 1:16:34Speaker 03

  Dupixent Dupilumab, a prescription medicine for patients one year and older weighing at least 33 pounds can help with that. It's a breakthrough treatment that can reduce inflammation in the esophagus and improve swallowing.

• 1:16:47Speaker 03

  How about this? Dupixent is not a steroid. It proactively treats E O E so you can get ahead of it.

• 1:16:52Speaker 04

  Severe allergic reactions, including skin reactions can occur. Get help right away if you have trouble breathing or wheezing or swelling of your face, mouth, tongue, or throat. Tell your doctor of new or worsening joint aches and pain, or a parasitic infection or asthma. Don't change or stop other treatments without talking to your doctor.

• 1:17:07Speaker 03

  Feeling stuck with E O E? Start treating with Dupixent. Talk to your gastroenterologist or allergist today about Dupixent. Learn more at dupixent.com or call 1-844-DUPIXENT.

• 1:17:19Bill Simmons?

  I didn't get a chance to talk about the US Open. And how stupid it was that the best match of the entire tournament started at 11 o'clock and then people defended.

• 1:17:29Speaker 01

  What? Who's defending it?

• 1:17:31Bill Simmons?

  People were like, well, you gotta understand people in the night.

• 1:17:34Speaker 01

  No, you don't. No, gotta understand anything.

• 1:17:36Bill Simmons?

  There's two matches, people pay, it's gotta be an ash.

• 1:17:40Speaker 01

  Nope. Don't have to understand any of it.

• 1:17:42Bill Simmons?

  Can you imagine if they started the Eastern Conference NBA Finals, game seven, at like 11 at night and it just ended at two in the morning? How fucking stupid that would be? It was like, hey, or when's, when's Spurs Thunder game seven? Oh, the other games ran late. It's not gonna start till 11:30 tonight. What are you guys doing? You have Alcaraz against Shelton. This is like the best possible matchup you can have in the whole tournament. You're trying to establish Shelton as American superstar. You get Trinity Rodman in the stands. You have this awesome, incredible five set matchup, which by the way, took four and a half hours as usual. And the games that, the, the matches ending at 3:30 in the morning.

• 1:18:26Speaker 01

  Right. 3:30 in the morning.

• 1:18:28Bill Simmons?

  It was great for me. I had nothing to do at 12:30 at night.

• 1:18:32Speaker 01

  On the West Coast.

• 1:18:33Bill Simmons?

  I came home from my fantasy draft and watched the fourth and fifth sets. I loved it. But guess who didn't see it? Everyone I know on the East Coast, including you.

• 1:18:42Speaker 01

  Most of fucking America. Like, it is stunning. It's beyond stunning. How can you be so disrespectful to your own product? Like this is a moment in, in American tennis that we haven't had in, in a couple of generations.

• 1:18:58Bill Simmons?

  We haven't won since oh three. Roddick won in 2003. That was the last American US Open winner for men.

• 1:19:04Speaker 01

  And the three greats have cleared the space. Nadal, Federer.

• 1:19:08Bill Simmons?

  And Djokovic. Yeah, they're out.

• 1:19:10Speaker 01

  Are all out. And so it's wide open for Americans to take the stage and Big Foe is doing his part and Shelton is doing his part and Fritz is doing his part. Like, you know, this is an amazing moment in American men's tennis and they have come up with a, an arrangement where they have marquee matches going off after fucking 11 o'clock at night on the East Coast.

• 1:19:36Bill Simmons?

  The marquee match. This is the best match you could have. Shelton against Alcaraz.

• 1:19:41Speaker 01

  Do you want people to watch? Do you care about like?

• 1:19:44Bill Simmons?

  It's the dumbest fucking shit.

• 1:19:45Speaker 01

  How does ESPN tolerate this? ESPN pays a fuckload of money to have this, this tournament on its, its station and then ultimately on ABC. How can you go along with, with the number one player in the world playing one of the very best, um, American prospects going off after 11 o'clock at night because they had to accommodate two very talented, uh, American women, Navarro and Pagula, playing in prime time. We can't have that, that match happen simultaneous with Shelton and Alcaraz playing in prime time? They can't be on ESPN and ESPN2? That's impossible? Is that what you're telling me?

• 1:20:25Bill Simmons?

  How about do a poll? What do people would, where they rather watch in prime time? Navarro and Pagula or, or, uh, or Shelton against?

• 1:20:34Speaker 01

  It's batshit crazy. It's other world crazy. They, they tell me as a, as a, as a sports fan who tunes in because it's our national championship, what they're telling me is to fuck off. We don't care what you think. We don't give a shit about you. Who cares whether you watch or not?

• 1:20:50Bill Simmons?

  The matches are too long anyway. And I said this last week, I planted my flag on it.

• 1:20:56Bill Simmons?

  And, and I knew, you know, I, the tennis people, they get mad when the outsiders come in, but the reality is nothing before like the quarterfinals should go for four and a half hours. And I think it's arguable that the quarterfinals should go for four, like in basketball. When we had the best of fives, the best of fives are great. Sometimes you'd have an upset, but it would shorten the series. Then there was too much money at stake and they didn't want to do that anymore. And the tennis, these guys are, these rallies are just longer. The sport's harder to play than it was 20 years ago. The equipment's better, the conditioning's better. Everything's better and the game and the matches are just longer. They're all like heading toward an average of three hours now and they have to figure out some sort of fix and they just won't.

• 1:21:39Speaker 01

  Well, I don't mind long dramatic matches. It does heighten, like the Mickelson Big Foe match that ended up going five sets.

• 1:21:48Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, but that, but that was the reason that the Alcaraz match didn't start till 11 o'clock.

• 1:21:54Speaker 01

  Well, no.

• 1:21:54Bill Simmons?

  Like that was what the Bundo said. He was like, well, you had four matches on Ash and they played the maximum 16 sets. And it's like, well, this is dumb. If you, if that, if you didn't have that variable that, oh, if there's 16 sets, everyone's going to be here till 3:30 in the fucking morning.

• 1:22:09Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:22:10Bill Simmons?

  Without a way to get home, by the way.

• 1:22:12Speaker 01

  The Pagula Navarro was the reason. That's why those guys came on at 11 o'clock.

• 1:22:16Bill Simmons?

  Also, like if you have Alcaraz Shelton.

• 1:22:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:22:19Bill Simmons?

  That match has to start on Ash. I would say like 9:30 at the latest.

• 1:22:24Speaker 01

  At the latest.

• 1:22:25Bill Simmons?

  Because it needs to be on television for everybody like you on the East Coast to watch it.

• 1:22:30Speaker 01

  To suck me in.

• 1:22:30Bill Simmons?

  This is like fucking.

• 1:22:32Speaker 01

  Get invested.

• 1:22:32Bill Simmons?

  Sports 101, like are you trying to build your sport or not dumb asses?

• 1:22:36Speaker 01

  It was a Tuesday fucking night. There was nothing else on. I would have watched it. I would have been all the way in from, and by, by the way, you know what the schedule said? That match was supposed to start 9:30 at night. It didn't because the other matches went long and then you had to, and the Pagula Navarro.

• 1:22:51Bill Simmons?

  If the matches go long, have the ability to take that other match with Pagula and move it to the stadium that what has 14,000 people? Push it over.

• 1:23:00Speaker 01

  That's fine. That would have been fine. We could have lived with that. I mean, whatever. It's, it's up to, tennis can, can do, do whatever they want.

• 1:23:11Bill Simmons?

  I do really love Big Foe.

• 1:23:13Speaker 01

  Big Foe.

• 1:23:14Bill Simmons?

  Cause it's like rooting for one of those teams that you know, you know, they're, they're gonna, the, this, the tire's just gonna blow at some point. You don't know what it is.

• 1:23:24Speaker 01

  Heartbreak could be right around the corner at any moment.

• 1:23:25Bill Simmons?

  It's just, and it's almost like he needs to go down so that he can have the comeback and yell to the crowd and do fist pumps. Like he, he just can't have it easy. He can't cruise.

• 1:23:35Speaker 01

  Oh, you know, he's my guy. He's from PG County.

• 1:23:38Bill Simmons?

  Oh, I know.

• 1:23:38Speaker 01

  DMV, I mean, we go thick, we're, we're very thick with Big Foe love here.

• 1:23:42Bill Simmons?

  Yeah. So, and then Shelton, I, I can't believe how good shape these guys are in is the other thing. Shelton's doing like the hardest possible serve to do. Like he's jumping up in the air and fucking hitting 140 mile an hour serves for four and a half hours. Like these guys, I don't think anyone's, maybe soccer player, who's in better condition than some of these tennis players?

• 1:24:04Speaker 01

  Well, that, that's also part of what really adds to the drama of it. They're incredible athletes. They're in these marathon contests. Um, if they were playing at the appropriate time of day.

• 1:24:17Bill Simmons?

  Right.

• 1:24:17Speaker 01

  Then we could enjoy it.

• 1:24:19Bill Simmons?

  I think, I wouldn't mind if it was like three sets, two or three sets. And then maybe the, the third, fourth and fifth sets just have less games or something. Like it's like, you have to get to four of that.

• 1:24:33Speaker 01

  I like best of three up to quarterfinals. Then when you're in quarterfinals to the finals.

• 1:24:36Bill Simmons?

  That's fine.

• 1:24:37Speaker 01

  Play all five.

• 1:24:38Bill Simmons?

  The three, the quarterfinals is great.

• 1:24:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:40Bill Simmons?

  That sounds awesome.

• 1:24:41Speaker 01

  Let's get through it.

• 1:24:42Bill Simmons?

  I also like, I think there could be a mercy rule where if you're up more than, if you're up three games in a set, you won the set. If you went out of the five sets, but if it's like you're up 4-1, you've won, now let's look at the next set.

• 1:24:57Speaker 01

  All these innovations you're talking about in terms of shortening up, that makes sense for lesser tournaments. When we're playing in the majors, then let's have a rule where we can have five set, you know, competitions for the majors.

• 1:25:09Bill Simmons?

  Or best, or best two or three until we get to the quarters.

• 1:25:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, because there are these, these, uh, the 500 series tournaments that only play best two out of three sets anyways. But tightening that up so that we get our best players not coming in injured, right? Like, you know, there has been a lot of scuttle, but in that tennis world about the guys, the schedule's too compressed. The guys are, you know, and gals are not coming in healthy.

• 1:25:33Bill Simmons?

  It's similar, it's similar to basketball.

• 1:25:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:25:36Bill Simmons?

  I just think the sport's harder to play than it used to be. And the, and what's happening is not sustainable to me.

• 1:25:42Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 1:25:44Bill Simmons?

  Unless you use PEDs and cheat in various ways.

• 1:25:47Speaker 01

  I'm okay with that.

• 1:25:48Bill Simmons?

  By the way, did you see the pictures of Sabatini?

• 1:25:51Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:25:51Bill Simmons?

  They send those to you? She looks great. One of the heroes of the eighties for us.

• 1:25:54Speaker 01

  Oof, I'm relieved.

• 1:25:55Bill Simmons?

  Yeah, no, she looked awesome.

• 1:25:57Speaker 01

  Glad to hear that. Okay, good.

• 1:25:58Bill Simmons?

  Very important, very important person for us in the eighties.

• 1:26:02Speaker 01

  Very important person for us, yes.

• 1:26:03Bill Simmons?

  I don't even think we knew each other. But my buddy Bish from high school, we, we just, just completely in love with Sabatini.

• 1:26:10Speaker 01

  But you were a big tennis guy back then too. Still a big tennis guy.

• 1:26:13Bill Simmons?

  I was.

• 1:26:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:26:15Bill Simmons?

  Um, all right. Anything else before we go?

• 1:26:17Speaker 01

  Just this four leg parlay that I want to make sure America hears. We're gonna take the Eagles, the Steelers. We already put those two together. If you add the Chargers and your, your UCLA Bruins, plus 192 on the FanDuel Sportsbook, almost two to one.

• 1:26:33Bill Simmons?

  Will they put that on the? I'm gonna, I'm gonna ask, I'm gonna ask Jack to put that on the FanDuel for us. Plus 192.

• 1:26:41Speaker 01

  Plus 192.

• 1:26:41Bill Simmons?

  Four, that's.

• 1:26:43Speaker 01

  Four leg.

• 1:26:43Bill Simmons?

  Juicy price.

• 1:26:44Speaker 01

  Four leg money line parlay.

• 1:26:45Bill Simmons?

  What are those?

• 1:26:46Speaker 01

  We must be playing some fucking football. It must be football season. It must, four leg money line parlay, must be football season.

• 1:26:52Bill Simmons?

  What happens if we take Philly out of that? Just out of curiosity.

• 1:26:56Speaker 01

  We can do that for sure, yes.

• 1:26:57Bill Simmons?

  Because I still don't know if I trust Philly.

• 1:27:00Speaker 01

  Okay, fine.

• 1:27:01Bill Simmons?

  How many times with Philly? Like, oh, Jalen Hurts, slow to get going. And it's like, well, I have a parlay on him.

• 1:27:08Speaker 01

  Plus 108. Plus 108 if you take Philly out. Still plus money. That's Steelers, Chargers, UCLA. Yep.

• 1:27:16Bill Simmons?

  Oh, man.

• 1:27:17Speaker 01

  Steelers, Chargers, Bruins. Steelers, Chargers, Bruins, plus 108.

• 1:27:22Bill Simmons?

  House, you're an American treasure. It's great to see you. Uh, I will see you next week for week two of Ringer 107. Don't forget, we have our bets coming. Uh, our fifth bets will be online. We'll tweet them out on Sunday morning and, uh, here's to a whole year of winning. Thank you, House. Thanks to Eduardo and Jack and Chris and Gahal as well, our guys. Uh, we're going to be back on Sunday and it's going to be live on Netflix with the dastardly cousin Sal, who I'm really starting not to like. Coming off this Cowboys Giants game.

• 1:27:58Speaker 01

  He'll be coming off of Cowboys Giants.

• 1:28:00Bill Simmons?

  Right. So I might put as much money on the Cowboys as, as I can put on a game and feel good about it.

• 1:28:07Speaker 01

  Well, how's Hank, how's Hank feel about that?

• 1:28:09Bill Simmons?

  On the Cowboys? Yeah, I'll talk to Hank.

• 1:28:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, talk to Hank.

• 1:28:12Bill Simmons?

  Hank's doing great. Hank says hello, by the way. Uh, thanks, everybody. Have a great weekend and we will see you on, uh, Sunday night here.

• 1:28:39Bill Simmons?

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• 1:29:17Speaker 03

  Having uncontrolled eosinophilic esophagitis or EOE can mean you're stuck in many ways. Like cutting your food into tiny pieces.

• 1:29:27Speaker 03

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• 1:29:31Speaker 03

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• 1:29:44Speaker 03

  How about this? Dupixent is not a steroid. It proactively treats EOE so you can get ahead of it.

• 1:29:49Speaker 04

  Severe allergic reactions, including skin reactions can occur. Get help right away if you have trouble breathing or wheezing or swelling of your face, mouth, tongue or throat. Tell your doctor of newer worsening joint aches and pain or a parasitic infection or asthma. Don't change or stop other treatments without talking to your doctor.

• 1:30:04Speaker 03

  Feeling stuck with EOE? Start treating with Dupixent. Talk to your gastroenterologist or allergist today about Dupixent. Learn more at dupixent.com or call 1-844-DUPIXENT.

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