SI.com’s Peter King joined the Dale & Holley Show for his weekly appearance, Friday. The following is a transcript of their conversation. (To listen the interview click here.)

Good afternoon Peter.

Hey guys. I don’t mean to start on a downer because I know we will discuss fourth-and-2 for 25 minutes but I did want to start by sending out condolences, and I know that everybody listening to this will also send it out. Chris Spielman’s wife died last night. She was undergoing treatment for her fourth reoccurrence of breast cancer in the last 11 years. Four children, just an incredibly, incredibly sad situation. Chris Spielman is one of the great guys that I have ever covered in 30 years as a sports writer. I don’t know, I am just totally blown away. I went and wrote a story about them 11 years ago about when they first started dealing with it and I am pretty connected to them and I am just really devastated. I don’t mean to be a downer but I know that there are so many people out there who are fans of Spielman, the way he played and the kind of person he is. We all should say a prayer for their family.

Stephanie Spielman was her name. 11 years ago I went to their house. Chris had retired to go be Mr. Mom to their two kids, they now have four kids, but to go be Mr. Mom to the two kids and what was incredible was that as snarling and angry as Chris Spielman was on the football field, he had about 50 crisis a day where one kid says “where is my book, where is my pencil set.” You don’t realize sitting at home that you have 50 crisis a day. In football there is maybe only one or two.

It was an interesting game on Sunday night, if you didn’t have a dog in the fight it was a wildly entertaining game.

Tremendous football game. That is one thing that we shouldn’t forget in haranguing in whatever side of this that you are on. That is why we love football. About three weeks ago I sat down and watched film with Mike Shanahan about Peyton Manning and at one point we are finished watching and we are talking about what he [Shanahan] is doing this fall and he’s got six games on simultaneously he is watching, one thing I realized is why so many people love this game. Because it is so exciting and it is so fun to watch and I was thinking of those words Sunday night watching this one because it was beyond an instant classic. It is clearly the game of the year so far and is one of the best football games I have ever seen.

You were watching the game (at the NBC studios) with Rodney Harrison and Tony Dungy nearby. What was it like watching the fourth-and-2 with them around?

Well, here is the weird about our show. I was not with them at the time. Late in the third quarter my job is done there and I leave and hustle back to my hotel to watch. I miss like two or three minutes of the game because my hotel is catty-cornered from Rockefeller Center. I watch the fourth quarter of almost all the games from the hotel but I did see Rodney when he came back to the hotel. The ne thing that people should understand really is that beyond the shadow of a doubt, Rodney Harrison loves Bill Belichick for him achieving what he did in the last half of what he did in football. Understand something, Rodney has a very, very difficult time in criticizing Bill because he has such a high regard for him, so what he said is I think one of the hardest things he ever had to say in his life – “I’ve known him a long time and that is the worst call that I have ever seen him make.”

I am convinced that Belichick does not do that against any other team or quarterback except Peyton Manning and the Colts. I think Manning is in Belichick’s head a little bit right now.

A little bit. I would agree with you on that but I would also make another point on him being in his head, so to speak. There is good reason why he is. He is so good. The long and short of it is, and I wrote probably 2500 words on it on no hours of sleep Monday morning, but the long of short of it is that I think there are three factors, I thought he should have punted. Number one, only two of the previous seven possessions, even though two of the previous three were touchdowns, the previous seven possessions were three punts, two interceptions and two touchdowns. That is number one. Number two is rookie mistakes by Austin Collie who clearly made a couple of them as time went on in this game and Pierre Garcon even though Garcon is not a rookie. He, in essence, is one because he played such a small level in college football. I think the last thing we forget is the pressure on Peyton Manning to go 72 yards or whatever it would have been to go the length of the field with one timeout. I think the final little X factor for Indianapolis is that Larry Coyer, the defensive coordinator coached fourth-and-2 different than Ron Meeks or Tony Dungy would. He is going to give you pressure. Mike Mayock did a fantastic job on NFL.com where you see him going through and showing that when the they brought two linebackers on the fourth-and-2 and all the other lineman sort of blocked down, what that means is that Dwight Freeney was not going to be blocked by any body. Sebastian Vollmer was blocking down on the inside guy, whoever that was. So, Freeney was going to come free, arguably that is the reason that Tom Brady never looked at Wes Welker because if he looked to his left he was looking into the arms of Dwight Freeney coming to sack him. There are a lot of fun aspects of this play that, in the light of day, make it more understandable than it was in the knee-jerk reaction time Sunday night.

What do you expect from both of these teams on Sunday? Interesting games with Patriots and Jets and Colts and Baltimore.

Interesting talk of defenses that Peyton Manning might be in the head of and I will say the Baltimore Ravens. I remember the playoff game that was about three years ago and Peyton Manning went to Baltimore and the final score was I think 15-6 and Rex Ryan was absolutely positive that he had and antidote for Peyton Manning. He had a great plan, I actually sat with him on Thursday of that week with his defensive staff as they were game planning and talking about stuff for Manning. It was very smart. But, at the end of the day, I remember talking to him at the end of the game and he said the guy is just too good. Just keep this one other thing in mind. Manning has beat this great defense six times in a row. Only one time has this great defense held him under 20 points and that was the 15-6 playoff win. The last two years Manning has scored 75 points on them. So, I know everybody is looking at this game that maybe Baltimore could win but Baltimore especially without Suggs and with a wounded Haloti Ngata, I don’t think I like the Ravens chances in this one.

How about Jets/Patriots?

I like the Patriots just because, you know, they handle adversity better than any franchise in sports. They have proven it time and again. I am not sure there has even been that much adversity. Talk about a wagons circling, it is so great, I absolutely love Jerod Mayo saying, with all due respect, shut up Tedy Brushchi. Which, you know, is in essence what everybody in that room is going to say. Brushchi had a great point on ESPN Monday night. You know what his point was? I am vastly paraphrasing him, but he said you can say whatever you want about this play but when you show up for work on Wednesday morning is the guy who holds your fate in his hands, you better listen to him and do what he says. There is a pretty easy way out of town and that is to be an idiot and to say what are we doing around here?

And I think one of the other things about this particular game, you guys touched on it earlier, I don’t think the Jets are kryptonite for the Patriots. I mean, they have played them tough a couple of times, they beat them last year and they beat them this year, certainly not the Impossible Dream but I look at this matchup and especially with Sebastian Vollmer playing the way he did last weekend, I was talking to somebody in Indianapolis who said there is no question that, in his mind, Sebastian Vollmer gave Dwight Freeney the best game they he has gotten this year in nine games. So, with the weird little change up blitzes the Jets send, we thought it was going to be a total fire drill without Matt Light, but Vollmer has done a good job.

What is the national impression of Rex Ryan as a head coach?

That he is what he is. Everybody knew he was going to be like this. You remember 1986, ’87, ’88, with Buddy Ryan and Philly and then later with the Cardinals, I remember there was about six weeks in Arizona that I would call the Sports Illustrated correspondent the day after his radio show, these are pre-internet days, about what did Buddy say last night? Cause all the writers would listen to him on his show and he would say the craziest crap. Well, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. You knew that when Rex Ryan got this job that once a week that something was going to be said by somebody that would be kind of crazy. This sort of tells you the story about what is going on with the Jets right now. Somebody in the organization told me earlier this season that when they had the opportunity to compare Eric Mangini and Rex Ryan how it was different in a nutshell was that when Eric Mangini would talk with his team about the media it was a 45-minute discussion. When Rex Ryan talked to his team this year about the press it was a 45-second discussion. You know what he said? He said, when you talk to the press, don’t say anything stupid and every interview you do with the press I want you to mention two teammates and one coach. That is it. Next subject. Eric Mangini did not treat assistant coaches and players like adults when it came to dealing with the press because, I don’t want to say that he was afraid, but in essence he was so controlling that he didn’t trust anybody about what they would say with the press. Where Rex Ryan doesn’t think that it is World War III if somebody says something that is in the headlines somewhere. I love people who are honest.

Does Mike Shanahan have any interest in being the next GM and coach in Buffalo?

I will tell you what Mike Shanahan has interest in. At the end of the year, considering all the openings and not looking at the openings in a piece-meal way. I am convinced, and I don’t know this from him, but I am convinced that he could have had the Washington job if he just snapped his fingers. That he could have done whatever he wanted in the Redskins organization, control the draft, whatever. Why would he talk that? Or, why would he take Buffalo before he had the opportunity to consider everything that might be out there? For all we know Chicago might be open, no matter what anybody says right now. They go 5-11 and they are going to be burning Halas Hall down if they bring Lovie Smith and Ron Turner back. So, I don’t know that Lovie, I know what Jerry Angelo and the teams says, that Lovie is coming back next year and is not in trouble, but how many times in our lives have we heard something like that? Thousands. And three months later they turn out not to be true. What happens if the Chargers fall off the face of the Earth and Norv Turner gets fired? If you were Mike Shanahan, wouldn’t you feel like a dope if you went to a place where you probably didn’t want to live in Buffalo and a place where the quarterbacks are Ryan Fitzpatrick and Trent Edwards. Wouldn’t you want to see the quarterback, or the team that has Phillip Rivers or Jay Cutler on it has an opening at the end of the year?

Will any big name coach want to go to Buffalo anyway?

I think so, first of all it is one of 32. The question you need to ask yourself is if anybody would want to go to Oakland? No self respecting, good coaching prospect would want to go to Oakland. Having said that, somebody will go to Oakland if they feel that is the only chance they have of being a head coach. So, having said that, what doesn’t Buffalo have? Buffalo hasn’t had a quarterback since Jim Kelly, but they certainly have paid for quarterbacks. They paid for Rob Johnson. They took a shot on taking Doug Flutie down from Canada. It looked like a few times that Trent Edwards might be the guy. But, listen, Ralph Wilson will spend the money. All you care about in the NFL, in considering a coaching job, is if the team is going to spend to the cap or spend what it takes to win. Buffalo will.

Unfortunately I watched the Cleveland Browns on Monday. There is not one skill player on offense that I would want close to my team. Is it just a matter of time for Mangini or has Randy Lerner tied his hands by firing so many coaches he still owes money to?

That will have nothing to do with it. Will he go apart and curse himself if he has to swallow $9 million dollars? Of course. But he knows that the worst thing he could do is to return next year if there is no faith among the organization or the players in Eric Mangini. He is not going to bring him back. His big thing right now is that he is going to see if he can bring Mike Holmgren in and be the oracle that they have never had there since they came back 10 years after losing the franchise.

Is Marvin Lewis crazy for taking his successful Bengals and bringing a potentially destructive force in Larry Johnson in?

Here is the thing about Larry Johnson and it is very, very simple. There is a line that Larry Johnson has to walk and it is straight. If he puts a toenail on the wrong side of the line, they will cut him. You know? He doesn’t have a guaranteed contract. They are paying him per week. That is the way contracts in the NFL work. If you are not on the roster on opening day, you are paying the guy per week. Basically they are paying the veteran minimum for [a guy with his service time]. They are paying him that. In essence, what they are doing is saying that as long as you are going to be a good guy and be around and be cooperative and all that other stuff, we will keep you here. Think of it like this – Larry Johnson is right now playing for 2010. Nobody is going to bring him back if he does anything remotely stupid in Cincinnati. That is why he is going to be a choir boy for the rest of the weekend.