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The Bill Simmons Podcast

Oh No Mahomes, Burrow’s Funk, Old Man Rivers, Denver’s Hot Streak, and Guess the Lines With Cousin Sal

105 min episode · 2 min read
·

Episode

105 min

Read time

2 min

Topics

Productivity, Economics & Policy, History

AI-Generated Summary

Key Takeaways

  • Chiefs Dynasty Collapse: Kansas City finishes 10-4 after losing to the Chargers, with Mahomes tearing his ACL in the fourth quarter. The team is $44 million over the salary cap for next season, faces potential retirement from Travis Kelce, and has Andy Reid turning 68 in March, creating uncertainty about whether to rebuild or push for one more run with an injured Mahomes.
  • Denver's One Seed Path: The Broncos defeat Green Bay 27-23 to improve to 11-3, with Bo Nix delivering four touchdowns in his best performance. Denver is now minus-260 to secure the AFC one seed, meaning home field advantage throughout playoffs at altitude. Their defense and Nix's development position them as legitimate Super Bowl contenders despite earlier season doubts about the rookie quarterback's capabilities.
  • Buffalo's MVP Case: Josh Allen leads the Bills to victory over New England with five straight touchdown drives, tying Tom Brady and Russell Wilson for second-most wins by a quarterback in their first eight seasons. Allen demonstrates elite cold weather performance and establishes himself as the league's best player despite never reaching a Super Bowl, making him the clear MVP frontrunner over Drake May.
  • NFC Wild Card Strength: The current playoff picture features Buffalo, Chargers, and Houston as AFC wild cards, with Seattle, San Francisco, and Green Bay in the NFC. This represents the strongest collection of six wild card teams in at least a decade, with no easy matchups available. Teams securing the one seed gain significant advantage by avoiding this gauntlet in the opening playoff round.
  • Joe Burrow Trade Speculation: Burrow throws a critical interception in Baltimore's 34-17 win and makes cryptic postgame comments about not having fun, sparking retirement speculation similar to Andrew Luck. At 29 years old with injury history and a massive contract, his trade value drops to potentially one first-round pick plus a quarterback like Daniel Jones or JJ McCarthy, with the Giants and Vikings as possible destinations.

What It Covers

Bill Simmons and Cousin Sal analyze Week 16 NFL games, focusing on the Chiefs' dynasty ending with Mahomes' ACL tear, Denver's playoff positioning, Buffalo's dominance, and playoff race implications across both conferences heading into the final weeks.

Key Questions Answered

  • Chiefs Dynasty Collapse: Kansas City finishes 10-4 after losing to the Chargers, with Mahomes tearing his ACL in the fourth quarter. The team is $44 million over the salary cap for next season, faces potential retirement from Travis Kelce, and has Andy Reid turning 68 in March, creating uncertainty about whether to rebuild or push for one more run with an injured Mahomes.
  • Denver's One Seed Path: The Broncos defeat Green Bay 27-23 to improve to 11-3, with Bo Nix delivering four touchdowns in his best performance. Denver is now minus-260 to secure the AFC one seed, meaning home field advantage throughout playoffs at altitude. Their defense and Nix's development position them as legitimate Super Bowl contenders despite earlier season doubts about the rookie quarterback's capabilities.
  • Buffalo's MVP Case: Josh Allen leads the Bills to victory over New England with five straight touchdown drives, tying Tom Brady and Russell Wilson for second-most wins by a quarterback in their first eight seasons. Allen demonstrates elite cold weather performance and establishes himself as the league's best player despite never reaching a Super Bowl, making him the clear MVP frontrunner over Drake May.
  • NFC Wild Card Strength: The current playoff picture features Buffalo, Chargers, and Houston as AFC wild cards, with Seattle, San Francisco, and Green Bay in the NFC. This represents the strongest collection of six wild card teams in at least a decade, with no easy matchups available. Teams securing the one seed gain significant advantage by avoiding this gauntlet in the opening playoff round.
  • Joe Burrow Trade Speculation: Burrow throws a critical interception in Baltimore's 34-17 win and makes cryptic postgame comments about not having fun, sparking retirement speculation similar to Andrew Luck. At 29 years old with injury history and a massive contract, his trade value drops to potentially one first-round pick plus a quarterback like Daniel Jones or JJ McCarthy, with the Giants and Vikings as possible destinations.

Notable Moment

Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films including Stand By Me, Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally, Misery, and A Few Good Men, plus founding Castle Rock Entertainment which greenlit Seinfeld, television's most lucrative decision ever.

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Episode Transcript

This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra, the official beer partner of the NBA. While the NBA season is heating up, the best moments are served cold, just like a refreshing Michelob Ultra superior light beer with only 95 calories. Nothing better than enjoying the games with a crisp, cold beard in your hand and even better to see them in person. Luckily for you, that's where Michelob Ultra comes in, getting you closer than ever with the chance to see all the action in person with courtside tickets to NBA games and more Michelob Ultra superiors worth playing for Enter now at michelobultra.com/courtside. Michelob Ultra courtside twenty five to twenty six. No purchase necessary. Open to US residents '21 plus begins on 10/01/2025 ends on 06/30/2026. Multiple entry periods. See official rules at miglowvoucher.com/courtside for free entry entry details, prizes, and details. The Bill Simmons podcast brought to you by the Ringer podcast network. I have a new rewatchables coming for you on Monday night. We did high fidelity with four people for this one. Went almost two hours. It's the twenty fifth anniversary of this movie. So, we did, we did it justice. I'm excited to have this one come out. You can watch it on all platforms, watch it on Spotify, watch it, or listen to it wherever. If you miss music box, we put up our latest installment, which was about whiz kid. So we have Jeff Buckley, whiz kid, and then this week coming Thursday, the counting crows, have you seen me lately? It's called it's really about their first two albums. And the idea from this came from a podcast that I actually did on this feed with, with Adam Duretz once upon a time, and we decided it would actually make for a really good documentary. So, it's really good. I can't wait for you to watch that one. So stay tuned. That's coming Thursday. You'll be able to watch on HBO Max as soon as it goes up on HBO. This was, a really sad and and, just kind of an awful weekend. We had the the shootings at Brown University, which, every parent's worst nightmare, every student's worst nightmare, every faculty member's worst nightmare, just horrible. There was another mass shooting in in Australia. And then, and then as before we started doing this podcast, news broke that Rob Reiner and his wife were murdered at their at their house, And it seems like a family member was involved. I'm not gonna speculate on that, but there's pretty strong evidence that, somebody, somebody who is related to them did it. And it's just, just an awful story. And Rob Reiner is one of those guys that, I think had a pretty close to unanimous approval rating for, just a career he had. He was a little bit of a one on one when I was growing up, he was an all in the family, which was. One of the …

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Books, tools, and gear mentioned in this episode

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Books

  • by Rob Reiner

    Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films including...When Harry Met Sally
  • by Rob Reiner

    Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films including...Princess Bride
  • by Rob Reiner

    Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films including Stand By Me
  • by Rob Reiner

    Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films including...Misery
  • by Rob Reiner

    Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films including...A Few Good Men

Tools

Products

company

  • Sponsors: State Farm
  • Sponsors: CarMax
  • by Rob Reiner

    Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career...plus founding Castle Rock Entertainment which greenlit Seinfeld

podcast

  • Rob Reiner's death was announced during the podcast recording, prompting reflection on his remarkable career directing six Rewatchables films

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