- 10 months ago
If Nick Caley can’t get this offense clicking — and cleaner — in this spot, will it ever happen this season? ITL debates whether Caley can, will, or simply won’t get it right.
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00:00John Lopez, were you as fascinated as I was listening to Nick Haley talk this week?
00:06I feel like this is actually an every week occurrence.
00:08Yes, it is.
00:09And sometimes it's a morbid curiosity, to be entirely honest.
00:12It doesn't always come from the best place if I'm going to be real.
00:16But, yeah, this is of great importance and intrigue to me,
00:19especially as we get further along in this process with these Houston Texans.
00:23And it feels more and more like this defense can hold it down to the degree of a Super Bowl.
00:28You wonder, what is the other side of the coin going to do?
00:32And so we keep looking at the offense, and namely, we keep looking at Nick Haley.
00:35Yeah, here we are, second week of December, and we're still talking about playing cleaner,
00:40getting to the line faster, the offense clicking.
00:44And I guess I'm kind of complaining.
00:46I don't mean to complain.
00:48I think where I landed on this is...
00:49I'm bleeped, but let's complain.
00:50Yeah, let's go ahead and complain.
00:51But I think where I landed on this, and I don't know where you are, is,
00:55all right, we know it's been forever.
00:57You know, it's December.
00:59If you can't get it going this week, can you get it going?
01:03Will you ever be able to get it going?
01:05713-572-4610.
01:07It feels like the answer is no.
01:11You know what the weird thing is, is as I'm gearing up for this week,
01:14one of the things I like doing is I like checking in with, you know,
01:17some other national folks that cover football,
01:19especially the dorks that really cover it in a way that speaks to me.
01:23One of those being, or two of those rather, being Mina Kimes, Ben Solak.
01:26They were talking about this game.
01:28And they both seem to be like, yeah, the Cardinals actually defensively in the past game,
01:32like, you know, not as bad as you would think.
01:34And I keep going, I'm looking at all these underlying metrics,
01:37and I'm like, I don't feel like that's the case.
01:38No, it's not the case.
01:39Maybe I misheard them or misunderstood them.
01:41And so it feels like this should be an opportunity to be a little bit of a get right,
01:45especially coming off of the heels of you seeing a few flashes is the way that I'll describe it
01:51with this offense.
01:52Obviously, running the football was, what is it, two and a half yards per carry?
01:562.6.
01:57Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:58That was not particularly where you wanted, but it served its purpose, I guess,
02:02especially in the waning moments as you're able to just kind of battering ram your way
02:06through the end of it.
02:07But the past game showed some flashes, right, making some plays off schedule,
02:12seeing the continued development of Jaden Higgins as a foil to two ones.
02:17You wonder, and can you push that forward, especially against a defense like the Cardinals
02:23that isn't great.
02:24They have their things, right?
02:25It's an NFL team.
02:26They have their things, especially when they start dialing up disguised blitzes
02:30and things of that nature.
02:30But it feels like this should be the time where you come out and put it on the table.
02:34And if you don't do it here, I don't know.
02:37Well, I mean, like the Raiders feels like part two.
02:39You have the Chargers headed, and that's a team that actually is clearly better
02:44than this Cardinals team, even if you go, I don't know exactly what team shows up
02:48on any given occasion, or I don't know how great they are.
02:51And then the Colts, like, we know that that's a team that's admirable,
02:54if not necessarily, you know, set up for super success right now.
02:58Yeah, I don't know what the better occasion is for you to put your best foot forward
03:03than this week versus the Arizona Cardinals at home.
03:04Yeah, and that's why, look, the Texans like to run the ball,
03:08and they want to make sure that C.J. Stroud stays upright.
03:13Well, the Cardinals gave up 249 yards last week, rushing, rushing, 6.9 yards per carry,
03:226.9 yards, I mean, come on.
03:25Nice, that's indeed nice.
03:26If you can't establish the run against the Cardinals, and oh, by the way,
03:31you talk about dialing up blitzes, the Cardinals rank 28th in scoring defense
03:36and have just 24 sacks for the season, for the year.
03:42I think that's 8th worst, 7th or 8th worst.
03:44So what I'm saying is, if you can't do it now, are we going to be in like,
03:48well, let's go defense?
03:50I mean, yes.
03:52Yes, you will, I think.
03:53And we've heard enough, and we've heard it a lot,
03:57the idea of, well, we've got to carry our own weight in essence.
04:01Yeah.
04:01This is the moment for you to prove that you can.
04:03And I see you on the text line immediately jumping up, 281 and 832,
04:07to the same idea.
04:09832 says, don't jinx us with the get-right nonsense from the 281.
04:12The overconfidence is completely unwarranted.
04:14Well, to the idea of jinx, I am amazed that you think I have that kind of power.
04:18I swear, if I had that kind of power, I'd have a lot more money in my pocket right now.
04:22And are we overconfident?
04:23We're asking the question.
04:24That's what I'm saying.
04:25I think that this is the antithesis of overconfidence.
04:29This is like, hey, man, if not now, when?
04:32Because there's been a lot of instances where we look at this offense
04:35and we go, all right, can we see something?
04:37And to the large degree, we haven't been able to see a lot, right?
04:41We've been able to do just enough in some of these instances.
04:44And it's like, can you be average?
04:47Can you even show us a little bit above average in a circumstance
04:50that might be situated for you to do it?
04:53That is the question that we're asking.
04:54And I don't think we're asking it in a definitive way either.
04:57I don't know that we're asking it in such a way where we go, yes,
04:59the answer is definitely yes.
05:00The answer is, I don't know, let's see.
05:02And I guess let's hear from Kaylee because I guess when I listen to him speaking,
05:09obviously you're hopeful, but it's just how many times have we heard this?
05:14Yeah, I think playing clean football consistently, eliminating pre-snap issues.
05:19We have to rid ourselves of that.
05:20And you can't, again, we've had too many of them happen for too many weeks now.
05:26We've got to clean that stuff up to give ourselves a chance to really, you know,
05:29stay on schedule, play well.
05:32And I think, you know, still want to continue to move the needle in the red area, for sure.
05:36Same thing on third downs.
05:38Short yardage has been a point of emphasis.
05:40So those things, I think, across the board want to improve on everything.
05:43But I think first and foremost, you know, not beating ourselves,
05:46especially prior to the ball being snapped.
05:47So that, you want to know what the question was that, was there?
05:51What do you feel like your offense still needs to unlock?
05:53Which is somewhat an aspirational question, right?
05:56And I get it, Nick Kaylee especially, but I think coaches in general tend to be,
06:02you know, very locked in on where they are and what the game plan is for a given week.
06:06In fact, Frank Ross was talking about that.
06:08And he kind of a little bit disparagingly for himself was like, look,
06:12my brain ain't big enough to be able to worry about anything other than this week,
06:15which I kind of found to be charming, as Frank Ross typically is.
06:18And so that might be the factor here.
06:20But the idea that he jumps in and he's like, what do you need to unlock?
06:24Just being all right, just being clean, just getting done what we can get done, right?
06:28Focusing on the things that we can impact.
06:31And maybe, like, there was two parts of me.
06:33One of those was like, hey, we can't dream bigger.
06:35But also, second part was like, yeah.
06:37Yeah.
06:38If you can unlock that, can you just find a way to be normal, right?
06:42Can you just find a way to be okay?
06:43It's week 15.
06:45So, you know, getting it done now.
06:48And I'm not saying, you know, we saw some stuff.
06:50You touched on it earlier.
06:52We've seen a few things better.
06:53We've talked about them this week.
06:55Obviously, there's hope in how C.J. Stroud is, you know, sort of embracing the offense.
07:01But again, you're facing a defense that lets you run all over them
07:06and really doesn't pressure the quarterback a lot outside of a couple weeks.
07:09Especially when you want to be a running team.
07:11Well, and the only thing about it is you mentioned this from the perspective of last week.
07:15And I don't know if we can do to just be like the Los Angeles Rams, man.
07:20Like, I don't know if we can do that.
07:21That is a very good running team as well as just one of, if not the best teams in the NFL right now.
07:27That's true.
07:27But they also are on a five-game losing streak in which they're averaging.
07:31Who, the Cardinals?
07:32Yeah.
07:32Okay.
07:33They're averaging giving up more than 35 points a game.
07:35That's not just the Rams.
07:36No, you are correct in that.
07:37They're giving up 35 points a game over the last five weeks.
07:40So, then Kaylee was asked about, you know, how you prepare for, you know, getting this thing right.
07:45I mean, you know, we want to run the football better.
07:48I think, you know, getting out and get back on track.
07:50And I felt like in the third quarter we just couldn't really get out of our own way to start the drives.
07:55And, you know, certainly we've got to do a better job.
07:56I've got to do a better job, coaches, players, everybody.
07:59But we just could never get going.
08:00I mean, the three and outs are, you know, we don't want that.
08:02So, starting better on first and second down, which we did not do.
08:06We did that in the first half.
08:08And we were able to move the ball and keep it going.
08:11But in the third quarter it was certainly a lull.
08:13And drive starters, positive plays, you know, fundamentals, playing with good fundamentals
08:17so we don't have any negative runs or anything like that.
08:19Good protection, all those things really boils down to fundamentals.
08:22But getting off to the right start each drive is imperative for our success, for sure.
08:28It's just fundamental football stuff.
08:29In week 15 of the National Football League season, right?
08:33That is where exactly I come back to the idea that, hey, there's not confidence.
08:38We still got the coaches talking about fundamental things to get this thing to the place.
08:42So, yeah, especially also in a game where, with all due respect to the Cardinals again,
08:47I think your defense is going to give you even more ample opportunities.
08:51Like, this isn't the same circumstance that you're talking about with, like, the magician
08:55that is Patrick Mahomes, even though you were able to really limit him.
08:58He still ran for 60 yards and was able to pick up some first downs at times.
09:02I do wonder if the Cardinals are going to be able to.
09:04Like, I feel like they're going to have some three and outs or some instances where the
09:07ball is turned over quickly.
09:08Right.
09:08Like, back to the offense.
09:10So, I feel like you're going to have opportunities ahead of you.
09:12Like, you're going to have shots and chances to go at this defense that, as you rightfully
09:16noted, is not great at stopping the football.
09:18It's allowed a lot of offense.
09:19If not this week, when is the question that we're ultimately asking?
09:23And it feels like never, right?
09:24Like, this, you got the remainder of the season, which isn't the, like, most difficult,
09:27but you've got the remainder of the season.
09:28Then you're playing big boy playoff football, man.
09:30So, you've got to show up here.
09:33You've got to be able to execute well.
09:35Like, I don't even know what you'd be particularly afraid of in this instance.
09:39But also, to be fair, I think that this would be an interesting challenge for you to see,
09:44can you, are you going to be good at getting up to the line?
09:47CJ Stroud, in particular, getting up to the line and diagnosing what that defense is bringing,
09:51especially if they're doing sim blitzes or, like, you know, trying to disguise what they're
09:56doing.
09:56This is a game where we need to focus on making sure that we get that right, because if you
10:00don't get it right here, you've got games down the stretch that are going to make it
10:03so that that gets tough.
10:04And you hit on the thing that I think is going to be very important to watch.
10:08How many possessions does the offense get?
10:10Because I think you're right.
10:11You know, you can talk about the magic of Patrick Mahomes.
10:14There's been magic of Jacoby Brissett against this organization over the years.
10:18I don't think that's the case, you know, Sunday.
10:22But...
10:22Knock on wood?
10:23Do I need to watch knock on wood?
10:24I think you're going to, I think you're going to have a lot of three and outs forced by the
10:27Texans defense, which means nine, 10, 11 possessions.
10:31This isn't going to be one of those where you only get a few, a handful, you know, here
10:34and there to try to make the most of it.
10:36You're going to get your chances.
10:37And if it doesn't work, then we're, you know, then because we're talking about how this
10:41team moves forward beyond the regular season.
10:44And with this offense, if you're in week 15 and you can't improve it, then the hopes for
10:49the postseason have to be minimized.
10:51Yeah.
10:52I mean, yeah.
10:52Even though we're looking at a defense that we think could be a carrying type defense,
10:57we've talked about it a lot, right?
10:59The idea of the offense got to add in something.
11:01And this is a day where if you can't add in here, then I'm going to be pretty disappointed
11:06in what they have there.