Let’s move to the quotage from The NFL Today on CBS and That Other Pregame Show on CBS Sports Network. It all occurred on a new set for the NFL Today, but with the same cast as last year and of course, the TOPS crew has remained the same as well.
This is the quotage from today’s dynamic duo of pregames on CBS/CBS Sports Network:
NEWS, NOTES & QUOTES FROM CBS SPORTS’ “THE NFL TODAY” WITH
JAMES BROWN, BOOMER ESIASON, BILL COWHER, TONY GONZALEZ AND BART SCOTTAND
“THAT OTHER PREGAME SHOW” WITH ADAM SCHEIN, AMY TRASK, LONDON FLETCHER AND BRANDON TIERNEY FOR WEEK 1 ON SEPTEMBER 13
SUPER BOWL 50 PREDICTIONS
BOOMER ESIASON: Denver-Green Bay
BART SCOTT: Denver-Dallas.
BILL COWHER: New England-Philadelphia.
TONY GONZALEZ: Buffalo-SeattleQUICK HITS
TONY GONZALEZ:
(On Indianapolis’s offense with Frank Gore and Andrew Luck): If Frank Gore can come over and do what he’s done throughout his career, and that is average 4.5 yards a carry, I’m telling you what, coach, this offense is going to be unstoppable. You might as well give that MVP trophy to Andrew Luck right now.
BILL COWHER
(On Patriots and Deflate-Gate): The game has evolved. We’ve become more transparent as things have gone on. But when we start to clump all these as “Gates” together… Yes, understand, these are all very different. But the Head Set-Gate as you referred to it, it happens a lot in every city. So that’s not unusual. You look at Deflate-Gate, that’s still pending. So that’s not over yet. Spy-Gate, there was some references to the games that we played, championship games against the New England Patriots in 2001 and 2004. I don’t believe we lost those because they stole our signals. I believe we lost those games because they made more plays. I think it’s unfortunate you have a team out there that [are] well-coached, [have] good players, and unfortunately it’s been tarnished a little bit by all these allegations.
TONY GONZALEZ SAT DOWN WITH HOUSTON’S J.J. WATT AND VINCE WILFORK
(On Houston’s Defense)
VINCE WILFORK: We talk all the time about, I don’t care how good it looks on paper. We have to put it together on the field. But if we put it together we’ll be very, very special on defense.
THAT OTHER PREGAME SHOW (TOPS) NOTES
(On Quarterback Controversy in Washington)
LONDON FLETCHER: I was surprised by this. I talked with Robert when he heard the decision about Kirk Cousins, and he was blindsided by this, very disappointed, and not happy at all with everything that transpired. I was of the mindset, why not give Robert Griffin, three, four, five games to see if he’s going to be the quarterback of the future. (Jay Gruden) came out in February and said (Griffin is) going to be my quarterback opening day. This has been the statement (Gruden) made all along in training camp. And then against Baltimore, a game (Griffin) doesn’t play, Kirk has a decent game, so you name him the starter, without Robert even getting the chance to prove whether he could be the quarterback of the future. Jay Gruden did not want Robert Griffin as his quarterback. At all… He took the job under the premise that he would make Robert Griffin a better quarterback. And he failed at that.
(On Peyton Manning)
BRANDON TIERNEY: Are people really inclined to ignore the statement that he made, that he doesn’t have feeling in his fingertips? Isn’t that a prerequisite to playing the sport, playing the position?… He’s also lost a little velocity since (the Broncos played in the Super Bowl). It seems like it’s worsened. The end of the year, that’s what everybody fixates on, but the middle of the year wasn’t very good either. In the middle of November, in three straight weeks he had at least two picks in each game, (including) the disaster in Cincinnati when he had four. Nobody wants to see an icon crumble. I rarely hope that I’m wrong. I hope that I am wrong here. I fear that I am not. I think Peyton is going to have a really bad season by his standards.
AMY TRASK: I’ve been critical of Gary Kubiak meshing with Peyton Manning. But the one benefit that this may have is that (Denver) may go more to a running game. That’s a Gary Kubiak hallmark. Go to the running game and take pressure off of Peyton Manning.
And that will do it. We’ll move to Fox’s quotage next.
