Fantasy Week 10 - GERMANY

Bill Belichick's future as the head coach of the New England Patriots is uncertain. There are rumors that he may end up coaching elsewhere, but some believe he will stay in New England. It would be difficult for a new general manager to come in and take over the program. Despite a rough season, Belichick is still considered one of the greatest coaches of all time. If he were to leave, there are teams like the Chargers and the Bengals that could benefit from his coaching. The Patriots have a lot of salary cap room and potential for rebuilding the team. J.C. Jackson's behavior has been a concern, and he may not have a future with the Patriots if he doesn't improve. The Patriots are playing the Colts in Germany, but the game is not generating much excitement. There's rumors swirling that maybe Bill Belichick will end up being a head coach somewhere else. Then that leads to a conversation about, no, he's going to stay at New England, he's going to be the head coach, he's not going to be a GM. In theory, that sounds good. There's no way in hell Bill Belichick will stay at New England and a new GM will be brought in, unless it's a guy like you, right? Like, how would that work and could it ever work? Well, I was there once. I mean, you know, but I think my days have passed there. I mean, look, he's having a bad season. They're not a good team for a lot of reasons. It's just not one person, right? It's just not one thing. There's a lot of things going on, injury, you know, no excuses. But I can't imagine that any general manager is going to have enough conviction of the heart to be able to walk into Bill's office and say, here's what I want to do with the program. Like, the program's been built, it's been successful for a lot of different reasons. And so because of that, I think they're ultimately going to, you know, how do you take all that authority away from him? I don't understand how you do that. Yeah, me neither. They're talking about it, though, as if it's a real thing. He's, 23 years he's been there doing, I don't know how you would, how that would work. So then you would just assume that if they wanted to move on, he would have to go somewhere else. Would he coach somewhere else, Phil? I think he's, look, everybody thinks he's lost his fastball. I disagree. He works harder than any coach I've ever known. He's still on top of everything. He understands the salary cap all the way through. Hey, look, one of the things I think the Patriots people lose, they're going to have over $100 million in cap room next year. Plus, the other thing is, Pat, is they haven't spent any money. I mean, they're one of the lowest payrolls in the league because of what's happened in the past. So, yeah, I mean, he can manage a cap. He understands value. Look, everybody could take a shot because he's down right now. I think he's one of the greatest coaches of all time. And whoever, if he goes somewhere else, if he stays, they're going to be very happy. Oh, if he goes somewhere else. Okay, so Lombo thinks that that is a possibility. A lot to break down in that clip. Levels. So a lot to get through from that clip from Michael Lombardi on the Pat McAfee show. Clearly a big-time Bill Belichick supporter there. You know, he kind of makes it seem like there's no one else he would really pick to run a team. And he's actually a former general manager of the Patriots. It's interesting to hear him state, and he's a guy that still talks to Bill a good amount, that he actually potentially could see Belichick on another team in the future. Obviously, Bill Belichick's not going to stop until he gets Don Shula's record. Let's make no mistakes about that. Nor should he. He's close enough. He's a great coach. He obviously still has a passion for the game. Watch him on the sidelines this season. He is in full freakout the entire game. At 72 years old, and the guy, I mean, he hasn't lost a step. I'm pretty sure he broke up with his long-term girlfriend to continue to just focus solely on the team. Now, has that gotten us very far? No. But I do think it's a valid point that Bill Belichick, he's still a great coach, and he's still, he's still got something to him. You know, he still has the passion that kind of he's always had. There's been some reports that there's a chance, if the Patriots were to lose to the Colts this weekend, that Bill could get fired. I don't know that I believe these reports, really. I don't see Kraft making that kind of a move. And Kraft has said previously he doesn't really believe in making those in-season moves because it just totally breaks up the continuity of a team. He sends the wrong message to players. Football's about making your organization appealing for players to come to. You know, as fans, we definitely are super passionate about the team. A lot of these guys, this is their job. It's a paycheck. You know, do you like every single place that you've ever worked? Probably not, but if it's somewhere that's going to pay pretty well, well, then it's worth going to do. I think the interesting question in this is, let's say that Kraft did want to move on from Belichick. Would any teams actually go and pick him up? I think that's a resounding yes. I look at teams like the Chargers. Justin Herbert's never had a good coach, and Bill Belichick's pretty on the record being a big fan of his. Can you imagine a team of Justin Herbert and Bill Belichick going at it with a team that's never had a good defense? You know he would fix that in two seconds. I look at teams like Cincinnati. I'm not the biggest fan of their coach. I really think he's kind of been the problem in a lot of cases of them underachieving because they're starting to hit their stride, whatever your flat. To me, they need somebody to come in who can really get that locker room together. They've got a lot of big personalities there, and they need a coach that they can really believe in. The thought of Joe Burrow with Bill Belichick, tell me how that's not something that could go in a Super Bowl. Then when I say all those things, it does make you question, do we really want to get rid of Bill Belichick? I don't know. I think it's a hard question. I think there's very few people I would want to make that trade for. Would I like to strip him of his GM title? Sure. That would be great. I don't know that we can necessarily do that and keep him happy. Yeah, the Patriots have over $100 million in cap this offseason. They're going to have a high draft pick. We've seen the team. This isn't a team that's going to win a lot of games. The question is, do you trust Bill to rebuild this team? Now, a couple years ago, we had a lot of money as well, but we were picking up a rookie quarterback. We didn't know what he was going to be yet. You kind of had the coaches in place. When Josh McDaniels left for the Raiders, a lot of those coaches went with him. Could this be a good time to kind of get that solidification of these coaches together and go and really make a good pitch to rebuild this team with a new quarterback? It's going to be interesting to see how Robert Kraft wants to handle this because, at the end of the day, this is his team and it's going to be his decision as far as how he wants to move forward. Another Patriot that's been making some news for not necessarily a correct reason is J.C. Jackson, who will not be traveling with the team to Germany to play the Colts this weekend. Definitely been a bizarre year for J.C. Jackson, to say the least. He comes back to the Patriots' first couple games, looks pretty good, goes to that Miami game, absolute disaster, and now suddenly he's not showing up to the team hotels on time and he's just kind of shooting himself in the foot as it sounds like has become kind of a trend with J.C. Jackson. Now, he's a very talented player, but the question is, how many of those can you get away with with Bill Belichick? We saw Randy Moss wear a hat to a press conference and basically shit all over the team. He was shipped out, what, one week later? To me, J.C. Jackson's on thin ice for not only his Patriots career, but he can't make it work here. That guy's probably not in the NFL next year. So a lot of interesting things coming up with J.C. I would like him to figure his shit out and be on the team next year because my thought of him and Gonzalez on the same, kind of blanking each other on each side of the field. That seems pretty good to me, and I think you could do some really good things match-up-wise with the two of them and Jonathan Jones being kind of your speed corner. But he's got to figure his shit out. So we'll see how he's able to do that. But hey, at least we kind of got something fun this weekend to get to wake up early at 9.30 and watch the Patriots. Patriots are heading to Germany. ["Ode to Joy"] Yep, Patriots are heading to Germany to take on the Colts. I don't know how they're selling that game to the poor people of Germany. But that's what they got. We got to go see Minshew Mania this weekend, which I will say I do have a soft spot for Gardner Minshew. His posts online and pictures of him are just absolutely hilarious. But, you know, it's an interesting team. They started 3-1, had Anthony Richardson. Things are really exciting for them. This is before Jonathan Taylor came back. A team that seemed like, hey, is this going to be a sneaky, pretty good team this year? And then Anthony Richardson goes down, really wasn't playing smart, and I hope that they start to teach him that way. I know in college you can run through guys. In the NFL everybody's bigger. And he learned that kind of the hard way with a couple big hits. He didn't finish a couple games. So hopefully he's able to return looking good at some point. But, yeah, I mean, I'm bummed out that we don't get to see him play. I mean, this game would be a lot more fun with him in it. Now, again, I will say Minshew is fun to watch because Minshew does just kind of chuck the ball around and see what happens, which, again, as we've said, we would love if the Patriots would do something similar to that. But this is a team that was on a three-game skid, was able to break that against the Panthers. Panthers, also a team desperately struggling. But I can't imagine too many people in the U.S. are setting alarms specifically to watch this minus Colts and Patriots fans. Yeah, I mean, this is a team, they had a lot of drama with Jonathan Taylor, obviously. Now that's over. So maybe this is a team that's going to start to figure some things out. But let's not sugarcoat it. This game is just gross overall. I mean, I feel horrible for the people of Germany that they have to watch this. They just had the Chiefs and the Dolphins come play, and now they have to watch the Colts and Patriots play. They just got to watch some of the best football, and now they're going to experience some of the worst, which I guess in a way kind of gives you the full experience of being an NFL fan, get to see the best teams and the worst teams. But as far as promoting the NFL product, not sure how well this game's going to do that. But hopping into what I want to see out of the Patriots this weekend, obviously I want Booty to play. Let's just call that what it is. It's going to be an interesting week as far as I'm intrigued to see how Mac Jones bounces back this week. Again, did he play horribly last week? I didn't think so, but there have been some rumors coming out around how the team's starting to feel about him. What are you hearing on Mac Jones? I think, so one thing that's really infuriated people there is He's not there. People in the building, yeah, is the decision-making. And they've been sold the smart, efficient, game-managing quarterback, and they're not getting it. Now I'll tell you, I don't put a whole lot of stock in that, as those are kind of Boston sports radio guys talking. And they will literally say anything to get clicks, to get the guy driving his truck around to get angry. But I do think there's probably some validity there. Mac Jones' decision-making this season has been really bad. And that's kind of what was known to be his best strength. He's not a physically gifted guy. He's not going to be able to run around and make plays. But you thought, drafting Mac Jones, he's going to be able to come in and read the defense, make the right throw, and just make good decisions. And, obviously, this year he hasn't done that. Now, again, in that last game, did I think he made that many bad decisions? No, but he also didn't make any really outstanding decisions either. I am starting to get interested to see if there's ever going to be a point where we officially see the Patriots make a move. Because I think at this point, if they do make any moves in season, that's probably it for Mac. So going into kind of some, you know, things I'd like to see in the game, obviously pop Douglas Mbuti to get most of the snaps. I'd love to see Mandre continue to get back into form. Again, last week was awesome with him. I'd love to just see him continue to build on a great performance like that. This defense should have a pretty good chance to have a decent day. Now I know they're going to be missing J.C. Jackson, but Colts really don't have a lot of good receivers. And it's kind of funny because Colts and Patriots debatably have some of the worst receiving cores in the NFL. So that's what we get to be excited about this week. I think even being down corners, and I'm sure this could be why Belichick said, hey, J.C., I can actually make a point with him this week and leave him back. I think they're going to be fine. Predictions-wise, you know, I actually don't think the Colts defense is too bad either. So I don't see a lot of points in this game. Now the one caveat to this, these overseas games, you never know what the score is going to be. There's been some that suddenly turn into shootouts. But most generally are pretty low scoring because the guys are all jet-lagged and they're playing at 9 in the morning and they don't know what's going on. I'm going to predict 13 to 10 Colts. I don't feel comfortable even picking the Patriots right now, given how they've been doing. So that's kind of where I'm at. I don't see them scoring a lot of points. Maybe Mandre rips off one good run to get them into decent position, but I don't feel comfortable taking them in any games. And I think that's oddly a good thing at this point because I don't want them to win. I want them to lose. I want to get that draft pick. So we'll see how this game goes in Germany. Well, enough of that sad Patriots talk. Let's hop into the good old world of fantasy. So for scores last week in a very fair game. And again, did we see the Chargers defense last night absolutely destroying Zach Wilson and putting up 26 points? Dan Allen, great call playing them, gets a win, goes to 3-6. He beats me 131 to 111. Sean, I really need people to step up, especially if you're going to get 20 points from Taysom Hill. I need people to step up if Jarn's only going to put up 110 points and win that game. He has no bad weeks. He finally has one, and Sean fails to put up 110. Now we've got a very close game here, 110-109. But, guys, I'm pleading here. Buddy, do something about this. The guy's 8-1. We had Bo taking down James, 119-108. We had Pat taking down Tom, 121-115. So we have the two guys in the basement both got wins. And, ooh, yeah, that's right. Ben Gordon, now officially tied for the lowest record in the league once again. Also I'd like to just point out this is post-Austin-Eckler trade. At 3-6, he only puts up 103 points and is this week's low scorer, losing to Sabati, 116-103. So now we do our classic, take a look at the leaderboard. James Arnold's in first place by himself still, so that's awesome. And then we've got Bo. And then me, and as crazy as it is, those are the only three teams above .500 in this league right now. We have a very wide open couple of playoff spots coming up here. But right now in fourth place, Tom Driscoll, honestly much deserved with how many points his team generally puts up. We've got Jimmy in fifth, Sean in sixth. I think that's Sabati. Yep, Sabati in seventh. And then Pat actually has jumped up to eighth now, considering the fact that his team actually has put up decent points. And now in ninth place, Ben. And unfortunately, Dan continues to be in last. But came up with a big victory last week. Let's see if he can continue that momentum into this week. As I was looking at what my game of the week would be, one pretty clearly jumped out at me. We've got two, three, and six teams playing each other this week. That's a big game. This could decide who comes in last. And unfortunately, Ben Gordon looks like he has about 15 players on by. So, unfortunately, Ben, I don't think that's going to end super well for you, and Pat's actually projected pretty highly. But, hey, Ben's team's pulled it off in the past. Is this the Austin Eckler game? Will this game come down to Austin Eckler? And that's kind of what I hope happens so that we can finally decide that Pat won that trade very clearly. Unfortunately, at the taping of this podcast, we did not decide on a Fantasy League topic for the week, so I don't have any fun sound to play. But, obviously, we've seen the messages. We've seen Pat beginning to think about what he needs to do to mount a defense. We've seen James amping up Pat and making him feel like he needs to become a wartime commissioner. Listen, Pat, this isn't war. This is a friendly league. So what? I came after you a little bit on the last podcast. We're good. We don't need to do this whole war thing. I just need you to shape up, and then we'll be okay. Now, on next week's show, I was thinking it could be fun. I'll do a mailbag. If you guys want to record audio messages and send them to me via text, I will play them on the show. I will not listen to them beforehand, and I will react to whatever it is that you want to say to me. It could be fantasy-related. It could be Patriots-related. It could be none of those things. Hey, it could even be about dictatorship. I don't know. I'm just throwing out ideas. But I think that'll be a fun way to kind of spice it up and get you guys a little more involved in the podcast. But on that note, I don't really know what I'm going to play to send this out, so it's going to be something completely random. And, yeah, see you guys later. Hey, Charlie. Hey, Charlie, wake up. Yeah, Charlie. You silly, sleepyhead, wake up. Oh, God, you guys. This had better be pretty freaking important. Is the meadow on fire? No, Charlie. We found a map to Candy Mountain. Candy Mountain, Charlie. Yeah, Charlie. We're going to Candy Mountain. Come with us, Charlie. Yeah, Charlie. Come with us, Charlie. Yeah, Charlie. It'll be an adventure. We're going on an adventure, Charlie. Yeah, Candy Mountain, right. I'm just going to, you know, go back to sleep now. No, Charlie. You have to come with us to Candy Mountain. Yeah, Charlie. Candy Mountain. It's a land of sweets and joy and joyness. Please stop bouncing on me. Candy Mountain, Charlie. Yeah, Candy Mountain. All right, fine. I'll go with you to Candy Mountain.