- 8 hours ago
Jeremy White and Joe DiBiase are joined by NFL Insider and creator of Pro Football Talk Mike Florio for his weekly segment to break down the week that was in the NFL. The guys start off by discussing the disappointing loss the Bills suffered at the hands of the New England Patriots in week 4. Florio explains why it’s such an impactful loss, and how the team can bounce back. The guys then move on to discuss the rest of the league and some of the biggest stories around.
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00:00Mike Florio joining us in the Western Hotline, dialed up on our YouTube stream as well.
00:04We talked to him Tuesdays about this time, chatting all football things, all bills, all around the league.
00:10Mike, good morning. Jeremy and Joe, good to have you on again. How are you today?
00:13Great to be with you.
00:15Mike, we're reeling here. We're over here having let the Patriots get up off the mat and fix their season.
00:22We thought this division was going to be over 4-0 and 1-3, and Sunday did not go as
00:27expected.
00:28Yeah, I was stunned. I thought the Bills would win. The Patriots seemed to be in disarray.
00:34The questions about Drake May, nobody understood exactly why he's been playing as poorly as he has.
00:40Mechanical issues, confidence issues, what is really going on between him and Mike Grable.
00:46All those questions were on the table, and he came out, and he wasn't spectacular, but he was good enough
00:51to make people realize.
00:53He has figured a way out of whatever wilderness he had landed in based on those first three games when
00:59he seemed to have no confidence whatsoever.
01:01And look, the Patriots won up there. Not that I need to tell you guys. It's just one of those,
01:09like, wait a minute.
01:10They beat us the last game at the old stadium, the first game at the new stadium.
01:14That's an ugly set of bookends that you're not going to want to put out on the shelf.
01:19Yeah, and one thing about it, Mike, that strikes me is, like, the Bills are the strongest argument the Patriots
01:24would have
01:25against the idea that they only beat bad teams. Now they've beaten the Bills twice.
01:30That's right. Now, the rest of the schedule was a lot tougher this year than it was last year for
01:36the Patriots,
01:36but they had a storm of four difficult games, four playoff teams from last year, and it was looking like
01:45they were going to go one and three.
01:47Two and two, and, you know, this is the time of year where you've got a bunch of teams that
01:51are two and two.
01:51Some teams that are two and two, you're like, they're not very good. Like the Packers, they're not very good.
01:56The Lions, they're not very good. They're two and two.
01:58The Patriots are two and two, but they feel like they're better than two and two.
02:03And those division games are so critical because it's a two-game swing, and if you lose at home to
02:11the rival,
02:11you've still got to go to their place. And if they sweep you, then you've got to otherwise make up
02:16three games in the standings
02:18to be better than them, higher than them in the division.
02:21And obviously it's coming down to the Bills or the Patriots, but as of last week, it looked like the
02:26Bills were going to be in a position
02:27to run roughshod over the division, fatten up their record, and be the number one seed in the AFC.
02:31Now, that changes.
02:34Mike, how concerned, given what New England looked like on offense before they played the Bills,
02:39and now we have a few games that have looked like this, how concerned should Bills fans be about the
02:44defense?
02:45Oh, I would be very concerned. You can't count on the offense to outscore every opponent.
02:51You can't count on Josh Allen to engineer a game-winning drive every week,
02:55to wake up and snap out of a funk early in the game.
02:58You've got to be able to hold the other team down. You've got to be able to keep it under
03:0325 points, ideally.
03:05Under 20 would be great. The offense is good enough to win if you can keep the opposing team in
03:12somewhat of check.
03:13So, yeah, it's alarming. And, you know, the focal point of every game and the takeaway from every game,
03:20how does this translate to the postseason? How are we going to be able to function when it's single elimination?
03:25What lessons are learned from this that can be incorporated into wildcard round if they don't get the bye,
03:34divisional round, conference championship?
03:38How do we ensure that we go 3-0 between the first and the third rounds of the playoffs?
03:45Mike Flory on the Western Hotline.
03:47Mike, the Bills will play a lot of good teams this year.
03:49They will not play the Jaguars in the regular season,
03:51a team they played in the playoffs last year and beat in a close game.
03:55Do you feel like Jacksonville is getting enough love for how good they are as a complete team?
04:01They're not, and they use that to their advantage.
04:03That is the best outcome for a coach like Liam Cohen to have.
04:07Your team doesn't get a big head because no one's saying how great they are,
04:11and then you can turn around and use that as motivation because no one is saying how great you are.
04:16And they are great.
04:17And you look at their division where you've got 2-0 and 4 teams.
04:23Now, barring a tie, one of them will get a win this week in the game that even the Weather
04:28Channel
04:28doesn't want to broadcast.
04:30If you notice that on social media, the Titans and the Texans are both 0-4.
04:36You've got the Colts at 2-2.
04:38They feel like a bad 2-2.
04:40The Jaguars haven't played a division game yet.
04:42They've got six of them coming up.
04:44They could fatten up their record in a weak division and be the one seed.
04:50And if that happens, their stadium's under renovation.
04:54It only holds 42,000 this year.
04:58We could have an AFC Championship game with 42,000 people in attendance in cranes
05:05working on the stadium during the commercial breaks.
05:08Yeah, yeah.
05:11The Chargers, I remember this being like a thing.
05:13Like, oh, home field advantage for them isn't even that big if they were to be, you know,
05:17a one seed, which I know they're not near right now.
05:20Who else looks impressive to you in the AFC, Mike?
05:23The Chiefs kind of look, I don't know if they look flawless,
05:25but they certainly look like they're back.
05:28The Chiefs look like the Chiefs that we knew and loved or hated,
05:33depending upon your perspective.
05:34They didn't blow people out.
05:36They would play with their food.
05:38They would find the gas pedal when they needed to.
05:41And they would end up with more points than the other team.
05:43I can remember a game at their height against the Raiders
05:45where the final score, I believe, was 28 to 10.
05:49They scored all four touchdowns in the second quarter
05:51and didn't do anything in the other three.
05:53This is what the Chiefs do.
05:54And they just do enough.
05:56They find a way to do enough.
05:57Now, they've got issues at receiver.
05:59Rasheed Rice has a hamstring injury.
06:00Tyquan Thornton had that ugly, dislocated ankle on the long catch.
06:05He had a career day.
06:07Felt horrible for him.
06:07Felt horrible for any time anyone has a serious injury.
06:11But he was having the best day of his career.
06:13They're looking at bringing back Tyree Akil,
06:15which could make things a little spicy as the season unfolds.
06:18I don't know that he's going to be 100%.
06:19And if he is, he's 32 now.
06:21But it just feels like they're in that groove.
06:24They get an early bye, probably too early of a bye.
06:28But 4-0 at the bye.
06:31They beat the Raiders.
06:32And they beat the Broncos already.
06:35And it just feels like they're back to being the team
06:38that we were all sick of a couple of years ago.
06:41The Raiders, that game was kind of fun to watch.
06:44Like a little bit of a are the Raiders real moment.
06:46And they had kind of a typical Raiders-Chiefs meltdown,
06:49the fumble of the kickoff.
06:50Did you come away with that,
06:51thinking the Raiders are very much in the mix to be a playoff team?
06:55Yes.
06:55Yes.
06:56And to the extent that power rankings matter and they don't,
06:59I actually moved them from 15 to 11 this week
07:02in our power rankings that we just posted,
07:04even though they lost.
07:06And it's rare that a team moves up in a loss.
07:08But I think we need to take them seriously.
07:09I think they proved that they're legitimate.
07:11I like the fire from Clint Kubiak.
07:14I really didn't love the moment where he said at halftime
07:19that Tracy Wolfson of CBS were going to win this game.
07:22It had shades of Matt Hasselbeck.
07:24We want the ball and we're going to score in the playoff game
07:27between the Seahawks and the Packers right before he threw the pick six.
07:30I mean, he was directly responsible for the score that decided the game,
07:34but not in the way he intended.
07:35It's just, it's one of those all-in moments.
07:37When you go all-in, when you go all-in, there's a downside.
07:41And Clint Kubiak went all-in.
07:43But I like that.
07:44The Raiders haven't had that fire.
07:46They haven't had anything for so long.
07:48They've just been irrelevant.
07:50And good for them that they're back on the scene
07:53and they get a chance to go back to New England
07:55and do what they did last year.
07:56When they were 3-14, they started 1-0.
07:59They won at New England.
08:01We were just talking before you came on about a play in that Chiefs-Raider game
08:05where the Trey Tucker catch goes and then there's a spike
08:08and they can't replay it.
08:09They kind of kill the replay system.
08:11Do you envision the league tackling that as something that they might want to try to fix?
08:16It can get a little shaky in terms of how it would be administered
08:20if you're hurrying to the line.
08:22But Andy Reid's upset about that.
08:24They've got the sky judge.
08:25The league is very much wanting to get things right,
08:28and yet they still have this built-in kind of loophole
08:30where if you get to the line quick enough and snap it and spike it,
08:32you can kill the replay system.
08:34I wonder if there's any way that they would consider it,
08:37if it would be brought up at owners' meetings or competition committee,
08:40or if you think it's possible they swim in those waters.
08:44I'm a big fan, generally, of getting away from the chapter and verse of rule books
08:50and relying upon common sense in all things that relate to officiating,
08:54in pass interference.
08:55Like I said all last week, you know it when you see it.
08:57I don't need to have seven different definitions of pass interference,
09:01and I don't need an official trying to synthesize all of them
09:03and come up with what I just saw.
09:06Is it pass interference or not?
09:07We know it when we see it.
09:08And as it relates to activating the replay process,
09:13yes, the clock is ticking.
09:14But if you see that the team that benefited from the mistake
09:18is rushing to the line of scrimmage,
09:20probably a good idea to hit the button to take a closer look at it.
09:25That's probably all you need to know,
09:27that there may be something wrong with this picture.
09:30And if it's in an automatic review situation like that,
09:33I think it makes plenty of sense to do it.
09:35I'm still not a big fan of the expedited review process
09:41because it seems shadowy and vague,
09:43and we don't know when it's used and when it's not used.
09:45But I love the idea of using video to get it right.
09:48Too much is riding on these calls.
09:50I think they need to embrace it even more than they have,
09:52and they need to inject transparency
09:53so we know what's going on behind the curtain.
09:55Yeah, almost in that moment, just hold on.
09:58We'll stop the clock.
09:59We're going to take a look at it.
10:00Hold them right at the line until we can find out.
10:02Now you can spike the ball.
10:04Yeah, almost like an official's timeout at the moment.
10:06Easy to do.
10:06Yeah, that's right.
10:07That's right.
10:08All right.
10:10Refereeing in general, big story this week.
10:12I don't know if those get brought up as controversies
10:16if they're not caught on camera, but there are a lot of cameras.
10:18So, you know, hard to hide, I guess, when you're swearing at players.
10:22Well, it's funny, too.
10:23Somebody asked Mike McCarthy yesterday because last Thursday night,
10:26he and Aaron Rodgers exchanged unpleasantries
10:28that were caught on camera and microphone.
10:31And a reporter asked McCarthy yesterday,
10:34do you think it's gotten too intrusive during these games?
10:37He said, your question's about 15 years too late.
10:39That's the way it is.
10:41The cameras are everywhere.
10:42The microphones are everywhere.
10:44You didn't need a microphone to know what Jeff Seaman said
10:47to Trey McBride during the Cardinals-Giants game.
10:51And I don't know that Adrian Hill, the referee from the Vikings-Dolphins game,
10:55gets suspended for how he reacted to getting knocked down
10:58if they weren't already suspending Jeff Seaman two games
11:02for the double F-bombs directed at Trey McBride.
11:05But, hey, look, I understand it's an emotional sport,
11:09but the officials need to be above the fray.
11:13When I practiced law, there was never a time that the judge banged the gavel
11:17and then told me to go F myself.
11:19Like, there's a level of decorum that I think the people
11:23who are in charge of administering the rules need to display.
11:26Because if you're showing that animosity toward an individual,
11:29then maybe you're letting the world know
11:32you're going to allow your personal feelings
11:34to get in the way of your exercise of discretion
11:37as you're trying to officiate a game.
11:38We talk with Pro Football Talks, Mike Florio, every Tuesday, 9.15.
11:42Mike, thanks for the time. We'll chat next week.
11:44Thanks, guys.
11:45Mike Florio.
11:47Yeah, I was over here trying to devise a replay system and go.
11:51He's like, just halt play.
11:54So if the official puts the ball down and then hands up,
11:58hold on, I got a buzzer.
11:59We're going to hold the ball.
12:00We're going to stop the clock.
12:01You're going to spike the ball as soon as I set it.
12:04But we're going to whistle this here.
12:07And are we clear?
12:09Sky Judge, wait.
12:10We want to look at it.
12:11Officials timeout.
12:13Inside two minutes, maybe.
12:15That, though, when that does happen,
12:19someone still usually gets mad.
12:22Because if the clock is running, do I have this right?
12:27There's a 10-second runoff.
12:29And if the Raiders have a limited amount of time
12:32because the clock is ticking, they're trying to get in field goal range,
12:34and now, oh, you just killed 10 seconds from us?
12:37No, because you need to stop.
12:38You just wouldn't do the runoff.
12:40Well, if you don't do the runoff, then the Chiefs are mad.
12:41You need to throw the ball to the official.
12:43He puts the ball down.
12:44He's been buzzed on his wrist.
12:45He both arms out, stop the clock, and then will wind the clock on my count.
12:50Then you need to trust that other team to not be mad because, hey,
12:53you're reviewing it.
12:54You might benefit from it.
12:55Don't get mad at us if it was a catch,
12:57and now we've just given the Raiders 30 seconds to think of their next play
13:00instead of fire drill to the line of scrimmage.
13:03Because you are – it basically comes down to you don't know who it benefits
13:08when the replay starts.
13:09Right.
13:09Now it's a free timeout.
13:10Right.
13:11It's kind of a free timeout instead of spiking the ball.
13:13So if you're the Chiefs, it could benefit you if it's incomplete.
13:16It also could not benefit you if it is complete, and now you've just –
13:19right, exactly.
13:20You've given Kubiak 45 seconds to figure out what he wants to do.
13:24Hey, listen.
13:25You also give Gene Steratore another chance to get on your television.
13:28Shout-out Sam Franklin, by the way, is the only guy on that field that knew
13:32that was not the Bills' ball in that punt that got fumbled.
13:35You notice that?
13:36I did.
13:37Sam Franklin was hands down like, calm down, calm down.
13:41That's not our ball.
13:42Right.
13:42The Bills –
13:43Fans were very upset about it, too.
13:44The Bills touched the ball, and the guy picks it up and fumbles,
13:47and Ross Tucker knew the rule right away, too, on the broadcast.
13:50I have a question about that rule that I legitimately do not know.
13:53Is there no limit to how far he can run before he fumbles?
13:56No limit.
13:56So if he runs 99 yards and fumbles at the one-yard line, it's still Patriot ball.
14:00Nothing can happen.
14:01He can run out of the back of the end zone.
14:02Got it.
14:03Anything can happen.
14:03You can take the ball where it was touched by the team.
14:06Got it.
14:07All right.
14:08Because that's what I –
14:09I'm like, are we about to debate whether he established possession first?
14:13But no.
14:14Nope.
14:14Doesn't matter.
14:15Anything he wants can happen, and you go back and get it where the guy touched it.
14:18That also, though, is to say the official didn't know the rule either in the moment
14:23because the first official on the scene pointed Bill's ball.
14:26Unless he didn't know it was touched.
14:27Okay.
14:28Maybe.
14:28Maybe one official would then come over and say, no, it was touched by that guy.
14:31All right.
14:31Good.
14:31I just called the fumble and the recovery.
14:33Right.
14:34All right.
14:34803-0550.
14:36Bob, we'll get to your call on the other side.
14:37Thanks for being patient.
14:38I've had a bunch of things to get to here.
14:40Sabres game night tonight as well.
14:41Sabres and wild here on WGR.
14:46Sabres game night tonight as well.