But yeah, I think part of it is the opportunity at hand, right?

W- for sure.

Uh, that's it, is two months from now when there's three injuries, are, are you gonna be scramble drill again? 'Cause I don't wanna scramble drill it unless it's at the end, end of a half or end of a game where you're trying to win with Joe Burrow.

And, and so you want to, to fill out this roster, and linebacker's one that obviously everybody's gonna talk about, and rightfully so.

They're extremely committed at this point to Barrett Carter being the guy running the show, but that doesn't mean that that room can't get better, that you can't raise the floor a bit, especially if there is an injury.

And even if there isn't, I think there are guys out there that can help and, and give you a- another option if things don't work with Barrett Carter, or if things don't work as well as you hope with Demetrius Snyder or Oren Burks for that matter.

So that's one.

They love that.

Mm-hmm

...

in the belief, in the ability that they, that the whole locker room had, i- i- i- the ability, the belief in the ability was just...

It was night and day, boom, switch, completely flipped.

And you think about it when they traded for him.

Two touchdowns, six picks, four starts for D- for, uh, the, the Browns.

Gets dealt to the Bengals on Wednesday.

But not having that drop-off to, to what we saw in the collapse last year, if you need it, man, that's important to avoid.

I feel like they're going into a, a new era of Buccaneers football, but do they have enough in the tank to, uh, to try to still make the postseason and, and give themselves a puncher's chance?

You can find Kyle over at Locked On Dolphins.

You can find James over at Locked On Bucs, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day.

Rounding out the one o'clock slate of games, it is the Bengals and the Cardinals, two teams that, again, are not in the playoff picture and looking for answers.

So James Rapine of Locked On Bengals and Alex Clancy of Locked On Cardinals talk about which one of these teams will come out with a win.

All right, let's keep things rolling with a, a playoff, uh, preview.

Like I said, uh, it's Bengals, it's Cardinals.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, James, I, I, I'd ask you, what's your biggest key to victory from the Bengals' lens, coming into this game?

It's gotta be Joe.

And it's, it's weird to say, and I do expect him to bounce back, but you still need to see it.

And we'll, we'll know pretty early on.

But are you getting the Joe that, for three quarters, went into Buffalo and felt like he was the best player on the field? And Josh Allen was awesome that game as well.

And are you getting that, or are you getting what we've seen over the past five quarters, which is shaky at best, and a guy who's had multiple pick-sixes and a bunch of interceptions and mental mistakes? And so yeah, it starts there.

If, if Joe Burrow is the Joe that we usually, or and we're used to seeing here in Cincinnati, well, then I think they're gonna have a shot, uh, not just against Miami, but maybe they do send everybody home happy and win the next three and, and go that route.

For 39 minutes, right?

(laughs)

I'm sick of talking about it.

And, and what does that mean? Well, I think the Bengals' corners have been pretty good overall, but when we talk about Derrick Henry or we talk about Lamar Jackson running it or, uh, the tight ends, a lot of that is linebackers.

A lot of that is, uh, the defensive linemen holding, uh, the, their gaps and where they're supposed to be and being in the right spots and all of those things.

So, those, e- whether it's Lamar or Derrick Henry, those rushing lanes aren't open.

Or whether it's these tight ends making big plays downfield.

An- and those are all things, those specific things plague them against the Bills.

But if they can't, could be a repeat of Thanksgiving, which I know a lot of Ravens fans do not want.

And if they don't, then I, you know, I worry that, you know, like, Bengals are gonna get up to the 35, 38 mark, and the Bears aren't gonna quite get that high.

high.Yeah, I, I totally get it.

I think the turnovers are a good point.

Uh, weird fun fact, Bengals safety, third year safety Jordan Battle has three interceptions, one in each of the Bengals wins.

He didn't have one last week.

I should have known mid-fourth quarter, hey if Jordan Battle doesn't get a pick, then, then we know.

And so you'll know too.

And so I'm learning to trust that a little bit more than I distrust the Bears who usually find ways to lose instead of finding ways to win.

So, I think, I think those are three things the Jets absolutely have to do to win the game.

Yeah, I, I think there, there's a path, and for the Bengals, the number one thing is to eliminate that path early.

Like, if, if you have a team like this that's making a quarterback change and there's so much uncertainty, well, they, they scored on seven of, of their last eight possessions last week against the Steelers.

Like, score in your first four this week.

Like, just make it so...

A- and there might be field goals.

I'm not saying they're gonna go up 28-nothing or anything, but like, can you, can you midway through the second quarter be in command of the game, where it's 10 to 3 or 10-nothing or 13 to 3? I, that's not something the Bengals have done, really, at any point this year, uh, super consistently.

If you let them hang around, that could be the week where they finally pull one out in the last minute.