Joe Manganiello Predicts the Steelers Will Win HOW MANY Games This Season???

Joe Manganiello walked onto the set with Bubbles the Chihuahua, a pair of custom Metallica Jordan 4s and an Eli Heidenreich Steelers jersey straight from the team's equipment department. Bubbles was shivering, so Rich handed over a Terrible Towel signed by everyone who appeared on the show's draft programming. Problem solved.

The jersey is personal. Manganiello went to Mount Lebanon High School in Pittsburgh, and in 2021 the school won a state championship led by Heidenreich. Manganiello was shooting the AMC series Moonhaven in Ireland at the time, so he got a VPN and stayed up in the middle of the night screaming through the playoff run.

"A kid from our high school wins a state championship, sets the all-time Naval Academy receiving record, gets drafted by the Steelers," he said. "The first time the draft is ever in Pittsburgh. It's like this kid's a legend."

He met Heidenreich for the first time at training camp this year, and he has since moved home. Manganiello bought a stone manor house in Mount Lebanon, around the corner from the home he grew up in, a house where the architect lived 100 years ago and where his mother used to volunteer as a docent during the holidays. Now everyone in town wants to know where to get the jersey. His pitch to the Steelers: set up a kiosk in the neighborhood like a lemonade stand.

The real reason for the visit is Bloodlines, his memoir, out Tuesday, October 13th. Manganiello did not want to give away spoilers, but he shared the frame. "For the better part of 10 years I was battling a near fatal, undiagnosable mystery illness," he said.

Rich admitted that even as longtime friends, he had no clue. "Kept it hidden from everybody," Manganiello said, adding that there were a lot of reasons he felt he had to. The book covers that period, why it happened and how he worked through it, which is part of the reason for the title. Is he through it? "I'm through it," he said. "But you'll have to read the book and find out."

Bubbles is a big part of the story. When she came along, Manganiello said, "I was in a pretty dark place." She was his first pet, and Rich remembers being at dinner a night or two after the adoption while everyone watched her on a baby monitor in the kitchen. She has since been to 17 countries and 150 cities, including six months in South Africa while he shot season 3 of One Piece. She also has a collection of South African blankets.

The shoes deserve their own note. They are Levi's denim Jordan 4s that his friend MSH bleached and stenciled into Metallica kicks, in honor of the band opening at the Sphere in Las Vegas this weekend. Manganiello is heading there twice. It will be his fifth and sixth Sphere visits, though Bubbles is sitting this one out. She did not care for the giant sharks, the giant monkey or the air blowing at her during an earlier Sphere film.

Then it was time for football. Manganiello was at the game this past weekend and came away a believer: in Mike McCarthy, and, after Rich made him say the name, in Aaron Rodgers.

Darnell Washington drew the best line of the day. "He's like if Jerome Bettis was like Bruce Banner," Manganiello said, then called him Eric Green, Greg Lloyd and Bettis all in one. Up close, Washington "doesn't look like a football player. He looks like one of the giants in WWE wrestling." TJ agreed that the only option is to get out of the way.

Manganiello also liked seeing Rodgers find Michigan's own Roman Wilson for a touchdown. He credited McCarthy for moving pieces around on the offensive line and for leaning on Jaylen Warren and Washington, which he believes will free up DK Metcalf in the end zone. He is high on the rookie lineman the team landed after missing on Makai Lemon, saying the eye test on him is scary. The mention of rookie Gennings Dunker brought back fond draft-week memories, and a joke: "Pittsburgh runs on Dunker."

That set up a rare midseason edition of the win-loss game, with the Steelers sitting at 2-1. Rich pulled a schedule out of his drawer, and Manganiello went to work.

Thursday night in Cleveland, where Pittsburgh has not won since 2021? Rich noted Cam Heyward recently said things just do not go the Steelers' way there. Manganiello was not worried. "I saw magic there on Sunday, Rich," he said, comparing the team to the Cleveland Indians in Major League, a show he once directed Rich in on stage. Win.

From there he rolled. The Colts at home, coming back from London: win. At the Buccaneers, who he said "feel hung over to me": win. The Saints in Paris, after he was at the first NFL game in Dublin: win. The Browns at home ("I'm never going to say we're going to lose to the Browns"): win. The Bengals off a bye on Sunday night: win, completing a sweep.

The first loss came in Philadelphia, because "Philadelphia gives us problems." Then wins over Denver the day after Thanksgiving and Houston in a revenge game with Mike Tomlin in the building as a broadcaster. Monday night at Jacksonville became the second loss. Wins over Baltimore, Carolina and Tennessee followed, and he took the loss in the finale at Baltimore with the division already locked up and starters resting.

Final answer: 13-4. "We're winning the division," Manganiello said. "We're a better team than we were last year."

Rich floated the dream scenario of a Raiders and Steelers AFC Championship Game in Pittsburgh, which is apparently all it takes for a Pittsburgh native to start choreographing a deflection catch.

Before leaving, Manganiello mentioned he is now a chief creative officer within Dungeons and Dragons with his own Icons line, fresh off a week-long writer summit relaunching the Dragonlance line. He offered to put together a Steelers game, and said Cam Heyward wants to play. Rich, naturally, suggested it could raise money for charity.