Playoff Push.....

Welcome back to the Pine Pony Podcast! This episode we discuss my wild journey in the States to returning to Costa Rica, we dive into the NFL playoff push, the MLS triumphs of Miami, and overperforming teams like the Jaguars and Texans. We also tackle college football playoff structures, Notre Dame's playoff snub, the future of NCAA's organization, and key issues in both NFL and college coaching. Finally, we take a look at Mike Tomlin's shocking stat, Chip Kelly's swift exit from Vegas, the Ravens' playoff hopes, and the resurgence of Jordan Love with the Packers. Tune in and get ready for a dive into the thrilling world of football!

Transcript

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Welcome, welcome to another edition of the Pine Pony Podcast. Glad to be back, as always got me to og hanging out with the fantasy Uncle Persian. What's happening? Howdy, howdy. I am thankful for this podcast and I'm glad that we are back in action. That's right. We're back in action. We were out for a couple weeks with all the holidays. Thanksgiving being the only one. Yeah. And then I think we, we actually missed in the States three in a row, right? Yeah. Something like that. I was, had a wild visit in the States. You know, don't wanna go back anytime soon. Lost a set of car keys, got pulled over, broke a couple, all sort of cards, few laws. Yeah, that's right man. I'm a, I'm a law breaker. But with that being said, we're back in Costa Rica and, and since we've been away for a while, we're gonna mix it up and we're gonna talk about. The playoff push for the NFL and then college football playoffs, and then a little bit of MLS and let's start the show. All right, so, like I said, MLS Miami has won the MLS messy and company won again. You know, I mean, that is wild. How old is this guy? How does he keep doing it? He's younger than we are, so that's pretty wild too. Yeah. You know, it's interesting though because like Charlotte ffc lost to NYFC and then NYFC went out and beat Philadelphia, which was the best team in the league for the regular season. Miami was like a. Like a fourth seed, something like that. Fifth seed, something like that. Like, oh wow. They weren't projected to win this at all. Yeah. So yeah, they ended up beating, beating who did they play? And was it because LA team like messy was carrying them? Like he was like back in fucking peak vintage, messy form or something? No, I just. That team just knows how to turn on. They just got hot and they beat Vancouver. Yeah, I mean that team's full of vets, man. They just know how to play winning soccer when it matters. Yeah, yeah. They were a, sorry, they were a three seed, but still like NYFC was a, was a five seed. That's where I was getting confusion. So yeah, MLS season has come to a close. See you again next year. Yep. Maybe Charlotte FC will have their season next year. Hey, solid season. Solid season though. You know, nothing to be mad about. Won most of the games you watched, so can't be mad about it. All right, and then let's go into college now, because we were gone. I didn't get my opportunity, so I'm gonna do it now. Clemson B South Carolina yet again in the series, letting'em know who exactly is ownership in that series. Take that. Yeah, so it was a sad day in Columbia. Yeah, it was, you know, and I was sitting at this, this bar, chubs and Tubs watching the game. Shout out chubs and tubs and there was a gamecock in there and he was. Just running his mouth like every play a c, c refs, it's all their fault. And I'm just like, bro, he, they ain't throwing the ball, they ain't throwing us picks, man. So it was nice to see you know, not much shit talking had to be done because they did it on the field for me. So all in all, good week there. Any thoughts? Yeah, I mean I just I'm happy for Clemson to beat their rival and that's always satisfying for you guys. Or at least it certainly seems like you guys love that shit. So you know, that's good. It's good.'cause, I mean, it's been a disappointing season, right? So it's nice to have something to be like, yeah, fuck you bitch. So, I mean, it was a disappointing season for our standard, but this would've been like the gold standard season for the Gamecocks seven wins. Yeah, I think it would, you got beaten your rival. I think they did so bad that it wa it was still a very disappointing season even for them. Right. If I'm understanding. Yeah, they. Gamecock pants correctly. Sure. They were like four, four games. Yeah. They're, they're not very happy about the situation, even with the difference in standard. But, but hey, that sometimes that's how it goes, man. Yeah, man. That is how it goes. And then, we had the, the championship games. Indiana beat Ohio State. Look at that man. I'm pulling for Indiana in the playoffs, man. But I don't know about you, man. Indiana's gotta be the favorite after beating Ohio State. Right? I would think that they are. I mean, yeah, I would argue. Yeah. I mean, I, I haven't been following it closely. You know. But it, like, my understanding was that Ohio State was the team to beat. And so I, I think this is pretty cool. You know, I know they've got some young talent that's expected to go. Toward the top of the draft in the NFL next year. So they, they probably really want to end on National Champ as national champions and show the various organizations that, you know, hey Fernando Mendoza is a championship caliber guy who plays well in the clutch or whatever. And yeah, he probably is. Yeah, I know he's passing it to a guy. I think his name is Serna. That's supposed to be going in the first three rounds or so. We will see how the draft process goes, but I think it's interesting from the NFL's perspective, just how much importance. They place on the big games for the college kids. They, I think they feel like, okay, you know, really big time games in college are going to be similar to what they're gonna be dealing with in the NFL. And so I think it really is time for a lot of these guys to step up and boost their draft stock if they are wanting to declare. So, a hundred percent? A hundred percent. So speaking of the. The college football bracket. Let's take a look at it. So we got the four teams with a by Indiana at number one. Number two, Ohio State, number three, Georgia, and number four, Texas Tech. Then you've got the next eight teams. You got number five, Oregon playing number 12, JMU. Now, some people are upset by JMU, but this is what it's supposed to be. Yeah. And then you got. Number six, Ole Miss versus number 11, Tulane, number seven, eight. Texas a and m versus number 10, Miami. Thank God Miami got in there because Marco Rubio was, was about to call Donald Trump and tell him he needs to handle college football. I don't know if you saw that press conference. Donald Trump was falling asleep during it. I did not, I actually don't know anything about this story. That's wild though. Yeah, he said Marco Rubio said that if the University of Miami got left out of the college football playoff, then he would have to get the White House involved. And that Donald Trump would do whatever it took to set college football straight. There's just never, there's never a bottom. There's never a bottom. There's all, we can all a bottom always just get weird. Like it's just, it's, it's wild, bro. It's like we're, we're just out outright never ends. We're just outright threatening Our, are ridiculous corruption. Like we're just, we're not even trying to like. Keep it the quiet part. Quiet. We're just, we're just, oh, outwardly threatening our corruption. Like what are, yeah. And then the final game is Oklahoma, number eight versus number nine, Alabama. Now some people would say, you know, college football is, is broken. I would agree. And my one way to fix it is. Let's get rid of all these non-conference games. Just play conference games only. Play eight games a season, eight, nine games a season, and then make the bracket. You can make the bracket bigger. And that way because you're not having these three cupcake games. You know, you get rid of the ffc s games is what I mean, the non-conference FCS games where you're just paying the, like the ones that are obvious, you still donate the same money cupcakes. Yeah, yeah. You can still donate the money to them. You can still give it to'em, you know, that's what you're doing anyway. You're paying for a win. So, and then you get rid of all this fluff and, and you really only play the teams you should be playing anyway. And then open the, the, open it from 12 to like thirty two, thirty two teams and just call it a day, or, or you make it more like NFL, you re you re conference everybody to where it's an even number of teams in every conference. And just the winner of that conference moves on. And then you got the other, the be other best teams, you know, every, every conference winner moves on. And then you've got the next best whatever schedule ranked. Not ranked, but. By record team, I'm actually surprised that there hasn't been more consideration for a top down, like restructuring of the NCAA because it, the NCAA is like an authoritative sort of organization, right? And the thing is that the money has got, not really, not this anymore. The money has gotten to a place where there's so much money involved that you think that there would be more of a push for an organized, like fair division sort of system. I mean, you could call'em conferences, whatever, it doesn't matter. But the thing is just like the fact that it's still feels like the wild, wild west with these conferences doing whatever they want and these teams jumping in and jumping out based on whatever's good for them themselves is, it just feels like. There, there would be more hunger, especially from the fans I would have thought for, Hey, let's get a more fair, structured, top-down system instead of the conferences getting to dictate everything. How about the NCAA dictates what's gonna be fair? You know what I mean? As far as I could tell, there's not a ton of you could do that, as far as I could tell. There's not a ton of people trying to do that though, so it. It's just me out here with my own opinion, but I do think it feels like the wild, wild west, especially considering how much these kids are getting paid nowadays and, and stuff like that. It's like, man, shit. I, I think it would be better if they just, I, I think it would be better if they had it more organized. Yeah. I just think that, you know, we've, we've gotten to the point. To where we almost need to go backwards a little bit and get rid of this human element of voting. I mean, the whole situation, we've been, we've said it a long time before, the rankings need to go away. They just need to go away at least until midway through the season because you rank these other teams high enough. That even if they stumble a little bit, they're still gonna be playing good teams because they're pre ranked good teams. Whereas if you don't rank them, then you actually see who they are and how good they are. Like, I mean, just for example, Clemson, South Carolina we're both projected to be really good teams. One was projected national title. And look at their record. Now, would you come back midway through the sieges and still go, you know, that's a number four ranked team after that. No. So therefore, all the wins are actually calculated correctly versus this pre-season biased ranking. Yeah. And then on second, let's get rid of the human voting. Let's go back to BCS error style, like computer system. Where it's like the computer takes all of that in. Well, now that we have ai, let AI do it, man. Yeah, I, the, I agree especially with the, your, your first sort of idea there is like, let's not have any official rankings, the preseason shit, because we have seen throughout history, not just like nowadays, but always that people will carry those preseason rankings. Two months later, it'll still be influencing what they do. And I mean, I'm not just talking about the people in the media, I, I mean all the fans too, just, just college football fans just reading these things in fucking July and August and they get set in their mind for, for 6, 8, 12 weeks before a single game's even played, what the lay of the land is. And so often. We find that we didn't know the first thing about how these teams are actually gonna stack up. Yeah. It's like they go, it's like they go, we beat, we beat so and so, and they were ranked number 10 when we beat'em. And it's like, yeah, what? I don't mean shit. Now they're unranked. Like, yeah, I, no, I agree. And, and it's not that that can't be a good quality win, it's just that it should not be considered a good quality win based on. Shit that we know before any games are played. You know what I mean? It just, you just should just dismiss everything in the preseason. I, I understand fans are always gonna love power rankings and stuff like that, but you could basically do it like how people do NFL Power rankings. Completely informal, your own fucking sports Bob opinion or whatever, you know, radio personalities, TV person. You could have your own fucking power rankings every week. You could update it all throughout the preseason. No one cares. But to have like official sort of like. Oh, this is the, the coach's poll, this is the AP poll, this is the whatever, like in any of those sort of official organizations, putting their stamp on things I think doesn't help. It just makes things unfair because people carry those biases ended. Like I said, sometimes two months later we'll be debating things and are like, oh, well they were preseason top 10 or whatever. It's like, man, come on. We didn't know shit. Yeah. Yeah, Nick Saban had some comments as well on like the new NIL era and coaches leaving. He basically recommended that they need to go to, to like an NFL style system where it's like. It's okay. No one can leave a team until after the season is officially over. You know that there's a free agency period, basically of, of a new signing period. Mm-hmm. And all of that. And you can't make any moves unless it's during those times, which I completely agree. Because one of the problems that we're having now is we just saw Lane Kiffin leave a team who's in the playoffs. And has to play Tulane, which they'll likely win that game. And they've played Georgia before. They can win that game too. So he had a great shot at actually winning the national title and he left that team to go to LSU because what they're paying him more like and, and then I mean, outside of that there's more controversy, but for this specific talk, it's like. That deal shouldn't have even allowed to have been made until after the season is over. Because it's like, now these guys that are playing on the team, they've gotta go through the playoffs without a head coach essentially. And it's like, well, damn, this was, this was my shot that like make sure people knew who I was and they know that he's already. That like those kids know that he's already trying to figure out how to make his next team better. Like the, the recruiting and the how you're gonna have the, the stuff. I really hated how he handled this because it puts his kids in a awkward. Position because, you know, he's coming to them and he's being like, Hey, I like you. You wanna come over here? Do you wanna, you know, transfer, whatever. And he's going to his coaching staff and these kids signed up to this school oftentimes because of that coaching staff or him himself, you know? And so he's like, I'm actually, I'm actually balancing. And so now you, you have a team and it's not like. No one cared anymore because their season didn't matter. You had a team that was already a shoo in for the playoffs. They already knew that they had a chance to be national championships. A national championship. Mm-hmm. Team, they weren't a, a bad team. They weren't even like, oh, if they get lucky, they'll sneak in. Like they got a shot. They legitimately have a shot and. On top of it. Think about the school, how the school now has to try to handle those kids and the other coaching staff and the stuff, you know, when he's like, oh, I'm leaving like this. Now they're in a position where they have to feel like, oh, should we, should we try to protect our school? And then tell him, well, you can't coach out the remainder of the year. Then if you're gonna leave, then. Then we don't want you here on campus recruiting our kids and taking all the staff with you or whatever. I mean, it's a weird situation for everyone. He really, I, I just feel like he, it was basically just faux pa bad manners, rude for him to do it the way that he did it. It just puts everyone in a tough position, including himself, I think. But whatever. Well, and it got worse though, because he came out and said that he wanted to finish coaching. The season and that the players wanted him to finish coaching the season. And the players were like, no, once we knew you were out, we did. Like, they came out on social media and said, that's not true. Like we, we hated you. Oh, awkward were gone. Awkward. And then, so I don't know how true the rest of this is, but, and then there was like screenshots of like his Snapchats and. Like messages to like college girls. Oh Lord. So, well, I don't know. I don't know. I mean old, I mean, old ole Ms. May have actually dodged a bullet with him getting out of there. Right, exactly. But, and then speaking of LSU, so remember when we were talking about what's the stop a coach from who just got fired with a big buyout and go into another team and only charging them like a dollar? You know, to have basically 60 million NIL money, right? So in order for Brian Kelly to continue getting his buyout, he has to actively be searching for another job. That's funny. So that's kind of funny, but it still doesn't stop them from like getting a small amount, but. There are, I mean, this is, you know, they might put loopholes in them. They might put, they might restructure their, you're gonna end up getting people just like playing games like they do with the Rooney Rule. You know what I mean? They'll be like, Hey, we're gonna set up this interview. You're gonna come in and interview and we're gonna like, and he's gonna be like, I need to keep getting my, my disability money, so I'm gonna pretend like you're gonna hire me. And then at the last minute, you're not, not do shit. Yeah. Oh, and then the last thing on college football. Also, man, what's kind of getting sad about these playoffs is that these teams like Notre Dame, where they're like, oh, I'm so mad I didn't make it. I'm not playing in any bowl games now. Yo, that is some like, you know, and these other teams that are opting out, like that's just some bitch shit. I wanted to ask you about that, actually. I'm glad you brought that up because I, I did see like a bunch of people basically sort of bemoaning the fact that Notre Dame didn't get in and. There seems to be a suggestion with some people that they got hurt by the fact that they're independent. Do you think that that's true? Because I, I'm skeptical that that actually hurt them, but at the same time, I don't know, I haven't been watching the season well enough to really say for sure that they should have gotten in. Do you feel like they should have gotten in and B, do you think that they were hurt by the fact that they're independent? Well, let me take a look. Take a look each at their, were they 10 and two? Yeah, I think there were two lost team, but I'm, I'm not sure how 10 and two. Yeah. Two loss team quality, how bad the losses were and how good the wins were. I don't know. Yeah, that's fine. I mean, they were a two lost team, so. In my opinion, I don't think any teams with two losses should be getting in. I don't care who they play. If they don't have 12 teams with one loss or less, then they just cut that shit down. Right? We got nine teams going in this year, bro. We got let's see. So all the teams with one loss made it. Okay. Alright. No, James Madison. Yeah, they're in there. Okay. But that's fair. So anyway, okay, so this year maybe they had a shot'cause Tulane was there. But what, what hurts them about not being in a conference is they don't get that extra game. So ultimately what got Tulane in was probably winning the conference. Oh, I see. Whereas if Notre Dame had a conference championship game, if they win that game, that further helps them. Helps their schedule. Yeah. And I don't see the conference game being that big a deal though.'cause it's a chance for teams to have another good win, but it's also a chance for players to get hurt and for them to actually lose that game. You know what I mean? It's like. If you had a good enough regular season before that, before the conference championship week, then you probably are better off just not having a conference championship. That would be my guess there. Also, their schedule to meet their best win is against number 22 Pitt. And yeah, but what were the choices or number 20? Number 20, no, excuse me. Their best one was against number 20 USC. Their two losses were against playoff teams, Miami and Texas a and m. So, so they probably, they got a decent argument, I guess, getting in over maybe Tulane, but I don't know. I don't know. I, I just I'm skeptical that being in a conference and having to have that extra conference game actually helps most teams, I think. For most teams, it just leaves'em susceptible to A losing, and B, like losing some of their good players. You know? I mean, they do have a strong argument against Tulane.'cause I mean T Lane's like best win is against number 24 North Texas. Like they don't play just their best win like Northwestern, south Alabama, duke. They lost the ole Miss. They beat Tulsa. ECU Army lost the UTSA beat Memphis, FAU Temple Charlotte, north Texas. Damn. Damn. You lost the UTSA. Nah U. All right. I'm on, I'm on Notre Dame fans side now. Actually, they should have gotten in over Tulane, I think. I mean, there's this, I mean, you could have put in Vandy over Notre Dame. In my opinion, Vanderbilt probably deserves to be there more than anyone. Hey, this is a pro Vandy pod right here, my friend. You. You won't get any argument from me. I mean, if you look at this schedule, they'd be at the time, number 11, South Carolina. They lost to number 10, Alabama. They beat number 10. LSU, number 15, Missouri lost to 20. Texas beat Auburn, Kentucky in 19 Tennessee. I mean, they, they won. That's even better than Notre Dame. Damn. That's what I'm saying. They, we should have more Vanderbilt fans calling into the radio stations. That's what I think I know, right? Van? There's so many. Not Dam Van. So many people at, so many butt hurt Notre Dame people. Where are the comms at? Where are the commodore at, man? All right, moving on from college football. Let's talk a little bit about Mike Tomlin and how he has 62 games in a row. With seven or less points in the first quarter. Wow. What a stat. Jesus. 62 chain. That's wild, isn't it? That's like every game. Wow, bro. That is like, damn, this man ain't never got off to a good start in his life, bro. That's wild. It's like fucking season. That's like five seasons of football. I mean, it's wild. Even if all 62 of those games, they had seven points that it's like no one's excited about that. That's wild. That they've never had a good fucking first quarter. 62. That's a shit load for football, bro. Jesus Christ. And then another news Chip Kelly out as OC in in Vegas. Yeah. Does that mean that was quick feel? Anything? That was quick, man, I, I, I thought that they would at least give him the year to try to figure it out the second year or whatever. They did not, bro. They were like, we're tired of shit. The dude should stayed in college football a long time ago. He should have never came out. I, A lot of people, people are saying that I didn't, I don't know, man. I feel like everyone was like, oh, chip, Kelly's gonna be good. He's gonna be a good oc. I felt like there was people and then he wasn't immediately. Yeah, he wasn't immediately. That's true. She was awful immediately. I just feel like now everyone's pretending like they weren't in on it. Six months ago, and they definitely were, they're like, oh man, you should have known, he can't, he can't do it in the NFL. He's trying to do college shit in the NFL. I'm like, bro, y'all all wanted his ass in the NFL. I mean, is what it is though. That offense has been really bad. So speaking of college shit being done in the NFL. I know I can't wait to see your face when I say this name, but if Kevin Stefanski doesn't stop running, the wildcat on the goal line, sniping Sanders, touchdowns sniping, that man, dude cannot stand him. He's sniping him. Man. Dude, every time he gets in the goal line, he runs like Wildcat instead of. You know, putting the quarterback out there, man, I, I feel like Ur had a good game last week. Yeah, he had 389 yards, three touchdowns. He was second in the entire NFL. Well, for this week. There's a couple teams on by, but he was the second in the NFL for catchable air yards. Yeah. He was pu he was pushing the ball Downfield. And still being pretty accurate. I was. I was impressed. I did. I don't understand how we got five games of Dylan and Gabriel when you had a completely capable quarterback sitting there the whole time. I mean he, because Gabriel was awful. He symansky hates. Sdo sand, I'm, I'm running. I will die on that hill. I'm running that narrative. I feel like I'll run that propaganda every single week that goes by. We get more evidence that that is the case, that the, the o like on draft day, the owner had to step in and be like, yo, you are drafting his ass in the fifth round, or whatever it was. I mean, it is just wild. Like Stefanski lost this game for them against the Titans with the Wildcat call. And this other's just terrible, terrible, terrible. Anyway, so the next thing on my list is every week Michael Parsons makes this trade look incredible. It's his fifth year with 12 sacks at minimum, and all, all five years that he's played. Yeah, he is absolutely dominating offensive lines. I mean, I, this. The last game against the Bears. I mean, he was making Caleb Williams work for it. Yeah, for sure. He, he was all over him. He was having a, himself a hell of a game. And the thing is that the Bears offensive line has been good this year. It has been good. And so, I mean, he, he was going up against decent quality double teams and still winning on some of those reps. And, I mean, okay. I, I mean, when you, when you on it like that and you're just stronger than two people at the same time, I mean, yeah, brother, go ahead. You're worth it. You're worth all those fucking dollars. And speaking of him, man, green Bay, it's Toyotathon Boys is Toyotathon, so you know what that means. That's it's, Jordan loves time, time of the year to just ball out like we always do. I hope not. And I mean, you going against Broncos this week, team's looking good. Oh yeah, we about to, we about to stomp though, we about to beat the number one team in the A ffc. Speaking of, let's look at, let's look at the playoff bracket playoff picture. We got on the a f bro C from Broncos pulled ahead of the Patriots. Starting starting number one. We got the Broncos Patriots. Surprise Jaguars pulling it together. Jaguars low key. Yeah. Like Liam Cohen's got the offense turned around, bro. They're, they're playing better. Each Trevor launch is looking good. Yes. If he's playing better each week. I think the offense as a whole is just coming together better each week. And their defense was like surprisingly better this year. The offensive line is. Not a disaster like it was last year. They're something like League Average and I, they're like the type of team that I don't wanna have to play in the playoffs, you know? Well, you're likely gonna have to play them because they're probably not gonna lose this week to Philip Rivers and the Colts. Wow. I was shocked about the Philip Rivers snake. If you were like, man, who are the Colts gonna pick up to back up Riley Leonard? I would've, I would've named probably 50 names before I got to Philip Rivers Road. Yeah. Who is he gonna play? I think he had his, I actually don't know. I just made that up. He had his 40, he had his 44th birthday yesterday. Philip Rivers had his 44th birthday yesterday. He probably had another kid that decided that he needed to come make some money, that he probably had a kid and was like, that's right. This shit annoying. Let me get out the house. Yeah, I mean, either way. So I think the Jaguars are gonna beat the jets this week, so looking good for them. Moving on. We got the Steelers up next. Then the Chargers, the bills and the tax on the bubble. Colts Ravens Chiefs Dos Bengals, man. Yeah, I, I think the Texan's Ravens. I think the Texans are almost like the Jags and where the offense is kind of low key, doing a little bit better each week. The offensive line seems to be just doing a bit better than it was. I mean, they're not great or anything, but they're not like 32nd in the league like they were the first few games of the season. So I, I mean they're, I know it's not a fluke. I think that they are a decent squad now that we've read that list out of Colt's, Ravens cheese. Dolphins. I'm not even gonna count the Bengals. There's no way the Bengals are making the playoffs. But anyway, Colt's, Ravens, chief's, dolphins. Do any, any of those, I wonder what the percentages for the chief make the playoffs. Does it show you percentages? 11%. 11%? That's rough, bro. I was gonna say the chiefs, but I just, I don't think that they really, I, I think they're outside of, they're gonna have, they're gonna have to win out when they're, get a ton of help also though, like, it's probably not them. They, they look really bad. I mean, they look really bad. I almost don't like any, so this is who they got left. They got Chargers, Titans, Broncos, Raiders. I mean, couple easy teams in there, but I mean, they're still gonna have to get help if they went out though, I would think. Can you read me the li list of teams again? I've got myself distracted. If they went out, they'll have nine wins, right? So we got Broncos, Patriots, Jaguars, Steelers, chargers, bills, Texans, Colts, Ravens Chiefs, dolphins, Bengals. Bengals are 1% with the dolphins. Dolphins are less than 1%. I mean, I would predict the bills get in, but they're six, seven. I would predict the The bills get in, well, the bills are already in at six seed. Oh, they're in the top. So yeah, so who, who's like eight? Texas, who's like eight to 12 then Colts, Ravens Chiefs, dolphins, Bengals. I mean, Ravens, I guess, is probably the best team in there. I mean, honestly, I would say the Chiefs, but I think that the Chiefs just, I think that that it's too little too late for them now. I, I bet. Yeah. I agree. But the way they've been playing, if I had to bet on one of'em, it would be the Ravens. So the Ravens have the Bengals, Patriots, Packers, Steelers. That's kind of a tough lineup actually, dude, that is, that is every, like the Bengals are starting to pull it together with Joe Burrow. Right. And the other three teams are playoff teams. I like that The Dolphins could sneak in after all of this. I think they have an easy lineup. There's no way. Tell me their schedule. Okay, hold on. Let me go to all fans. Have. Steelers Bengals, bucks. Patriots. Yeah. I What's crazy is like everyone on the bubble has to play the Patriots apparently. I was just getting ready to say, it seems like everyone on the bubble is like playing each other, so it's like we're really gonna find out the, a soon. Yeah, I mean, I, I, the calls are done. I would guess the grievance. Yeah, I, I think the quotes are done. That's that. But I think I would, I would bet the Ravens at this point, but yeah, who, who I would be the most enthused by. The most amused by would be if the dolphins could sneak back in there. But I, I think it's probably the ravens of the best shot right now. Yeah. Well, the thing is, is who, whose spot are they gonna take?'cause I don't think they're taking Texans. Texans play Cardinals, Raiders, chargers, Colts. Well that, I mean, they could still win their division though, can't they? I think that would be the more likely scenario. Yeah. It's just the Steelers in front of them, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was just, just curious. Just curious. So I think it's the Ravens that are most, most likely, likely. It would be the Ravens to Win and the Steelers on the outside looking in. Yeah. I think that's, I think that's more likely than than the Chiefs, the Colts, well, you know, they, they play the, so they play at Pittsburgh for the last game of the. Be. That's gonna be a good one. Could be all the marbles right there. That's gonna be a good one. Yeah. Yeah. Basically the playoffs start early for those boys. Yeah. Playoffs starting now. All right. And then you, you see any movement on the other half? Like Broncos, Patriots, Jaguars, any seeding movement? I, I feel like all three of those teams are, I have been overperforming what they actually are. I think, if I'm being honest, I think that probably both the Jaguars and the Patriots are a little bit more of a complete team right now. But the thing is, like, I still don't trust these weapons that Drake May is using. Like he seems to be getting big plays outta random guys every week. It's like Matt Collins and then it's Khan Buter, and then it's Kyle Williams, and then it's De Mario Douglas. And it's just like he keeps getting these huge down the field plays. And I don't, I'm not saying it's a fluke because. I think that it's a pretty good offensive scheme that Abel's got, or I, I don't think it's his scheme, but that they've got going on over there and then it's Josh McDaniel's. Right. But anyways, I, it's a pretty good scheme that they've got going on over there. And then Drake mate is really good at the deep ball. Like he's really good at these explosive plays, so. Right. I'm not saying it's a fluke, but I'm saying I, I could, I could easily see them having a letdown game where. First round of the playoffs, you know, they just get, they just get some drops, some, some you know, nobody wants to get open down the field for'em or something. I, I think what may have been happening from most of this. Season is that they've actually been trying to conserve and keep Stefan digs healthy. There's a chance that he just becomes like the full blown alpha guy like in the playoffs and they just have him with a hundred percent snap share and running all the routes. He's, he's been remarkably low this season, even though he's been good when he is been on the field, he's, he's been right around 60 to 65% snap share all year. And I don't think it's because he's unhealthy, I think it's because they're trying to keep him healthy. So it'll be interesting to see how that unfolds.'cause it could be that Stefan digs just explodes at the end there. But other than digs though, true, true. I just feel like there's a lot of guys that can let them down here. Nice. Okay. Over to the NFC, starting with the number one. We got the Rams Packers, Eagles, Buccaneers, Seahawks, 49 ERs, bears, and then on the bubble we got the Lions, the Panthers, the Cowboys, and the Vikings. Yeah, so honestly, I feel like the, the NFC teams are stronger right now. Like I, I feel like if, if I'm the Broncos and I am the Broncos fan, I'm happy to be on the a FC side right now because I mean, there's just like. In the NFC, it's like the haves and the have nots, and it's like there's some teams that really blow chunks, and then there's some teams that are really good, whereas the A FC, it feels like the entire fucking conference is like average, right? And then some of the teams are good at winning the three point games, the Broncos, and then some of them aren't, you know? So that's just the difference. Whereas in the NFC. Some of these teams are getting their asses kicked. So yeah. Looking at the NFC as a whole as a Packers fan, the Buccaneers don't scare me. They've kind of had a little bit of a slid skid. Yeah. B'S trying to play it through injury. He's not playing well. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm not really worried about them'cause they could possibly not even make the playoffs. The Seahawks, they're playing really well, but they don't like, they're good, but I don't know. They just, they, they don't seem explosive to me, like I'm, I'm not impressed by their schedule. So yeah, see what they do. I really like their, I really like their defense. I feel like their run game has actually been underwhelming. I thought that the Chardonnay Ken Walker duo was gonna be more explosive than they've been, but they have been having some efficiency in the passing game for some, at least for most of these games. Yeah, for sure. And the defense is really good, so I think they're a legitimately good team. The question though is like, oh no, for sure. Would I have put'em ahead of many of these teams though? Probably not. I probably have more toward the back of the playoffs, which is interesting. So one of the questions I was gonna ask you is when you're looking at this, right, you've got your teams 10 and 3, 9, 3, 0 1, 8, and five, seven and six, and then you got the Seahawks here at 10 and three sitting in the five seat. And it's like, you know, you get these arguments every year where people are like. The, the seeding should be based on your record, not on your record, and the fact that you won your conference. And for me personally, I kind of like it the way it is because I understand that if you're, even if you're a 10 and three team or 11 and two, and you didn't win your conference, then that, to me, that says that you're. You're kind of not good enough anyway, and you should have to, you know, if you,'cause you didn't beat the other team in the conference, you know what I'm saying? Like, if, so, if the Seahawks and the Rams like, you didn't beat the Rams dude like you, you know, or you beat'em one time or something like that. I don't know. It just, it just seems to always work itself out this way. I think that the, the best way to handle it, my personal opinion would be that if you win your division, then you're guaranteed a spot. But I don't think you should necessarily be guaranteed home field. I don't think that you should be guaranteed, like the advantage in that first round or second round or whatever. I think that like, you should be guaranteed a spot, but. Once you're in, once the teams are in, I think that they, it makes more sense to see them based on their record solely. But I get the argument because it is, it is like a rivalry thing. Rivalries I think are really fun and they. They are good for the NFL in general. And so what makes those rivalries mean something is to make that division championship mean something. So I, I don't mind it how it is, although it wouldn't, it wouldn't be the way I would do it myself, but I get it though. Yeah. I, I, I I. Your last point there is what? Icing on the cake. For me, it's what makes conference games matter and they should matter if we're gonna have conferences. If not, then we should just, everybody should just be in one conference. Right. And you just play 18 games and call it a day. Yeah. I mean, a lot of people would just say. Let's make it one conference, open it up, make it completely fair for each winner. But I, I do like the idea that there are like fierce rivals and you know, you're gonna play'em at least twice every single year. And that if you can, if you could just beat your three rivals. Then you at least get something for that. You, it means something more than just, oh, we hate them. You know what I mean? So I think it keeps, it keeps those rivalries, you know, intense, which I think is usually fun for the league and fans. So as far as the lower half of the seating with the 49 ERs and the bears I could foresee the bears actually moving out of the playoffs because. They played a very easy schedule up until this point. They still have the Packers one more time. And they still have, I think, the rest of the division a little bit. Let me look at the schedule. So they still have Packers, 49 ERs, lines and Browns. So I could see them losing to the Lions, the Packers, and the Niners. So it would make sense for me to have them out of the playoffs. The way the Panthers are playing, I, I kind of want them to like, I don't know, make it, I don't know, I'm just kind of like behind, oh yeah, this Panther train right now. I, I want them to sneak in and, and like. Play spoiler, at least for somebody because the thing is like, and they got the Panthers. The panthers are jekyll and hot and like one week they will look really bad. But also sometimes they have some really good wins where they just look really good. And so I could see them beating any team in the NFL any given week. And so. I love, I love the chaos and the variance That seems to be the panthers week to week. Yeah. And I mean, they could easily do it. They have Buccaneers twice, Seahawks and Saints, so I could see them, you know, beating the Buccaneers. Yeah. I mean, they, they could, and stealing that spot, they could win that division. So I think that's the only way to get in. That would Oh, true. That makes sense. Yeah. I mean, I think they can get in another way, but they would have to win out and the bears would have to lose out. And the lines like the bears and the line, there would be, have to be a lot of losses between teams in front of them. Yeah. But I think the only realistic way is they've replaced the Buccaneers as the fourth seed. I think like, and then where we stand right now, I would actually I would actually predict that. Like if you were like, oh, you gotta put money down, is it gonna be the bucks or is it gonna be Panthers? I think it's gonna be Panthers like. The bucks just haven't been as good and they got a ton of defense, or they got a ton of injuries piling up on defense. And Baker has basically come out and said, yeah, I'm playing through injury. It sucks. I'm making the best of it. And he's not making the best of it. It's it. The offense hasn't looked good. No, it's not. It hasn't looked good since. I mean, it looked great in the first month of the season, and then he got hurt. And it's been, and we've seen this before from him when he was in Cleveland. He played an entire season when he was injured and he looked like straight trash there too, so. Yep. Yep. I and what I don't wanna see is, I don't wanna see the Cowboys somehow make it to the playoffs, just, just because I hate, I'm surprised they're still in, they just lost two. Yeah, well, there's six, six and one, I mean. Okay. They could Okay. Theoretically win a division. I thought they were below 500 for some reason, but Okay. I guess they got, they, they got a, an outside chance. I, I wouldn't expect, expect to make it 10 and then I can't believe the Vikings are still in it at five and eight. They still have a chance. They're not, so, yeah. No way, bro. Less than 1%. Less than 1%. So, so the real. I think the real patrons could be Panthers lion, and I think I agree with you. I see the Panthers moving up and stealing the fourth seed from the Buccaneers, and then I see the lions stealing the seven seed from the bears. Yeah, so I mean, we've already talked about this on the pod, but I think the bears are pretty fraudulent. Like, I'll give them credit, they've, they've done all right despite Caleb Williams kind of seemingly being lost out there. Sometimes I think that maybe there's Ben Johnson offense was like. Hard for him to learn or something, but whatever it is, he hasn't looked very good and somehow yet they keep finding ways to win, but they, they're just not that good except for last week they, they could not find to win against Jordan Love. Except for last week, where apparently love owns them too. It's just the entire Packers lineage that owns them. Yeah, that's right. That's right. And then in two, what is it? What do we play the next, I can't remember. Anyway, continue your thought. But yeah, I, I could see the lions overtaken the bears as well. That would not shock me at all. I do think the, the rankings as they are, are probably pretty accurate. I think if I really had to pick a team to come out of the NFC right now, it would be the Eagles. But I think your packers are right up there with them, and I think that man, who am I forgetting? There's someone else up there that I was, that I think's pretty good too, but at any rate. 49 ERs. Oh yeah. Both Rams and the Seahawks. I would put behind the, the Eagles and the Packers, but like any given week you could see Rams are looking good, man. Any given week, you could see Stafford Catching fire and that offense just being too much to chase. And the same thing with the Seahawks. The Seahawks defense is legitimately elite. They're right up there with the Broncos and the Eagles, in my opinion. And they have these explosive plays to JSN. And last week they had one to Rashi or. Rashid Shaheed finally. So I think he's starting to get more incorporated into the offense and so you know, would not shock me at all if, if they come out of there as well. But I feel, I feel shakier about the teams outside of those top four. But I think that those are about right. I think the way that they're seated now actually is pretty close to how I would power rank them. Right, right. Right on. All right, well that's all we got on the playoff push. You got anything else you wanted to add to that final anecdote to the pod? No, I guess not. I, nah, there's like a lot of little thoughts in my head that probably nobody even cares to go on rants about, but I would just say I'm, I'm gotta be back. It was fun talking ball with you and I'm happy to be getting into the, the meat of the football season where all the games matter. Yeah, man. Yeah. It's playoff times. Yep. All right. Well, and we play the Packers. With that being said, go pack. Go. And stampede coming for their cheeks. Whoop, as always, you can't hit us up on the social medias at Pine Pony Podcasts on Threads, Instagram, Facebook, wherever you can find social medias. Adios, adios.