Speaker 1: Be Around the NFL Podcast. We'll never wear lanyards again.
Speaker 1: Welcome to another addition to the Around the NFL Podcast.
Speaker 1: My name is Dan has Since I come to you
Speaker 1: from a room filled with some heroes, Mark Sessler, Gregg
Speaker 1: Rosenthal and boys. Did you know that mitochondria is the
Speaker 1: powerhouse of the sound? Well, I feel like I'm from
Speaker 1: I did learn that in science about twenty seven years ago.
Speaker 1: I believe it is trending on Twitter right now globally
Speaker 1: or at least nationally. J. J. Watt tweeted that five
Speaker 1: hours ago, and people are going nuts connecting dots trying
Speaker 1: to figure out what is the code in there, if
Speaker 1: any connecting him to any number of teams that are
Speaker 1: pursuing the future Hall Pass Rusher Um and you know
Speaker 1: you guys are educated men. I was wondering if there
Speaker 1: was anything you took out of that Micae Mito condrea
Speaker 1: is the powerhouse of the cell. Anybody got anything? There
Speaker 1: is a link to our show because our our friends
Speaker 1: of the show. Seth Payne down in Houston, not being
Speaker 1: on the Jack easterby Beat for a minute, put up
Speaker 1: a post suggesting this that translocation of active mitochondria during
Speaker 1: Buffalo o sites in vitro maturation, fertilization and preimplantation embryo
Speaker 1: development some sort of science jargon, but he tied it
Speaker 1: to the bills, and people are thinking this could be
Speaker 1: a hint that he has headed to Western New York.
Speaker 1: You know, there is there is somebody else that I
Speaker 1: He always seems to have a strong, uh unique take
Speaker 1: on things, and I I take what he says seriously
Speaker 1: at all times, and I'd like to know his thoughts
Speaker 1: on In fact, let's bring him in one of the
Speaker 1: all time friends of the Around the NFL podcast and
Speaker 1: now a big old star for s I in Monday
Speaker 1: and winning quarterback Connor or or you kidding me? Connor
Speaker 1: Mido Condria is the powerhouse of the cell Buddy. I
Speaker 1: I don't I I don't see how you could take
Speaker 1: that any other way outside of the fact that he's
Speaker 1: going to Green Bay. He's going to be a packer,
Speaker 1: um and that this all goes back to you know,
Speaker 1: uh cow's milk production, uh Wisconsin mitochondria. It all folds
Speaker 1: in really neatly there. I think, Yeah, you know, Greg,
Speaker 1: I don't want to bore you with the science, but
Speaker 1: I think it's pretty easy to get from point A
Speaker 1: to point be there. But I do enjoy U j j.
Speaker 1: Watt is doing like a I guess it's sort of
Speaker 1: a breaking bad thing right with the episode titles or
Speaker 1: the ozarks when they had the pictures at the beginning
Speaker 1: of every episode, he's he's having fun with it. He's
Speaker 1: like every other you know, kind of boring, boring, old
Speaker 1: white dude at this point. So I I'm I'm happy
Speaker 1: for him. I do like when he tweeted out something
Speaker 1: like free agency is wild and then people are just like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: J j WA's crazy, like a kind of like like
Speaker 1: like what like this guy's hilarious. It's it's like the
Speaker 1: the baseline and this was an old old West is
Speaker 1: um um, you know. The baseline for like considering what's
Speaker 1: funny from an athlete is so low. It always drove
Speaker 1: him crazy that people thought like Peyton Manning was like
Speaker 1: the second coming of George Carlin or something that that's
Speaker 1: like you could just say the most basic thing possible
Speaker 1: and be like, these athletes they're wacky. They're really hilarious.
Speaker 1: My problem with my problem with this whole thing though,
Speaker 1: is like so with Tampa Bay last year, I started
Speaker 1: running my mouth like the second the Tom Brady got there,
Speaker 1: and I was like, all these superstar like huge air
Speaker 1: quote acquisitions are so ridiculous and meaningless, like Rob Gronkowski,
Speaker 1: Leonard four Nett, And I was like, you guys think
Speaker 1: this is a dream team. This is just an absolute joke.
Speaker 1: And then you know, of course, and one of my
Speaker 1: articles ended up on Tom Brady's postseason hype video and
Speaker 1: finger and so you know it, Uh it felt good,
Speaker 1: I guess to get my point there was I was
Speaker 1: gonna say that all these fans are getting excited to
Speaker 1: decipher these codes from like who is eventually going to
Speaker 1: be like a middling thirty three year old defensive end,
Speaker 1: but like, of course he's gonna have twenty four sacks
Speaker 1: next year and break Michael Strahan's record and make me
Speaker 1: look like a huge idiot that I do love the
Speaker 1: idea of Tom Brady's you know, like circling around in
Speaker 1: his basement stewing over a Connor or Yeah, but that
Speaker 1: means Connor made it. I mean, I totally agree shows
Speaker 1: the visibility of his platform, uh, which is astounding. But
Speaker 1: you're right, I think, and there is only one Tom
Speaker 1: Brady obviously, but yeah, he does remind you that, you know,
Speaker 1: don't don't count out the old guys having another huge
Speaker 1: year in the tank. I think what certainly qualifies Connor
Speaker 1: what what's going on? How are you? What's going What's
Speaker 1: what's going on in your world? Are you? Are you happy?
Speaker 1: Are you content? What's new? I just just making it through,
Speaker 1: you know. I think we're all we're all learning to
Speaker 1: swim in a little bit of a different way during
Speaker 1: these times. But uh, at the same time, it has
Speaker 1: made work. Uh Like, we all are very lucky to
Speaker 1: do this job and to talk about football. But I
Speaker 1: think we've sort of double and tripled down on that
Speaker 1: appreciation over the last like ten months. You know, I
Speaker 1: have you know, people that I know who are like whatever,
Speaker 1: you know, you're doing something very granular. But we do
Speaker 1: get to in the middle of the day, even if
Speaker 1: it's a pandemic, be watching football, you know, And so
Speaker 1: I think that that, uh, that's sort of changed my
Speaker 1: perspective on a lot of stuff. But I still I
Speaker 1: get to write about uh I I get to write
Speaker 1: about all sorts of fun stuff about Pokemon today. So
Speaker 1: that was so that was good. You know, we're gonna
Speaker 1: get into that a little bit later, because Pokemon is
Speaker 1: one of those things that whether it's because of age
Speaker 1: or just I've never been connected to sci fi and
Speaker 1: that culture or whatever that is. I don't even know
Speaker 1: what it is that I would like to know more
Speaker 1: about Pokemon and the NFL and how they connect. But Connor, you,
Speaker 1: of course, as a former NFL media employee, we go
Speaker 1: way back, and we got a big show. Connor is
Speaker 1: gonna be with us. We're gonna get into the news
Speaker 1: and we're going to take a look ahead at UM
Speaker 1: surprise cuts, and there's gonna be a lot of them
Speaker 1: UM releases cuts, some that you expect, some that you don't.
Speaker 1: UM with the salary cap going down, and Greg, you've
Speaker 1: been h grinding it out on the old dot com
Speaker 1: with pieces the last few days. So we're gonna get
Speaker 1: into all that and we're gonna do some news. But Connor,
Speaker 1: as we've been doing the last a couple of weeks now, uh,
Speaker 1: following the passing of Chris Westling, you are a former
Speaker 1: NFL media cohort, and we had a lot of times together.
Speaker 1: We still have great times together whenever we see each
Speaker 1: other at Tent Pole League events, although they haven't been
Speaker 1: happening for about a year now. But since you're on
Speaker 1: the show, Uh, have any memories you want to share
Speaker 1: about your time with West, either at the company or
Speaker 1: before or even after. Oh my god, there's just so many.
Speaker 1: Um And you know, I was going through my phone
Speaker 1: after I had heard the awful news and it's so
Speaker 1: like West that our last conversation just left you with
Speaker 1: this beautiful feeling. And he's just such an incredible guy.
Speaker 1: Like we were talking about he texted me in the
Speaker 1: middle of the day about like an Orioles game that
Speaker 1: he was watching from Mike Massina was pitching, and he
Speaker 1: knew that I liked the Orioles and so we're talking
Speaker 1: about that, we're talking about books and uh, just the
Speaker 1: way that a certain passage in a book made us
Speaker 1: both feel and you know, he was just talking about
Speaker 1: these these golden moments that we have in life and
Speaker 1: that's really what life is all about. And I went
Speaker 1: back and I read the text, and you know, we've all,
Speaker 1: I think during the pandemic sort of looked for the
Speaker 1: big answer, like what are we doing here? And leave
Speaker 1: it to West to be able to just have dropped
Speaker 1: that in a text message, you know, to you in
Speaker 1: the middle of November, um at a time when he
Speaker 1: was hurting, you know, and that's just so like him.
Speaker 1: He was. He was such an example of a way
Speaker 1: that we should be living life. You know. It's just
Speaker 1: so appreciative of every moment of every meal. And uh
Speaker 1: so you know that that really meant a lot to
Speaker 1: me that I got to go back and reflect on that.
Speaker 1: But I would say my favorite West memory. You know,
Speaker 1: when I first started working here, I was so intimidated
Speaker 1: by him because he was His football knowledge is just
Speaker 1: out of this world and he has a BS detector
Speaker 1: like nobody else. I think you guys know that. And
Speaker 1: I was like, you know, is he gonna like me?
Speaker 1: Is he not gonna like me? And uh, you know,
Speaker 1: lo and behold fast forward to I think it was
Speaker 1: our first Super Bowl together and we're down in Arizona
Speaker 1: at the League Hotel after the Panthers lost to the Broncos,
Speaker 1: and that whole year we had a running bit about
Speaker 1: me picking against the Panthers and everybody getting you know, upset,
Speaker 1: and you yeah, so we started getting keep pounding and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, you guys were taping the podcast and So
Speaker 1: I was back at the hotel and I was arranging
Speaker 1: for your arrival. I cleared out the uh the downstairs
Speaker 1: shop of any beer and he and Patron that they had,
Speaker 1: and I was getting ready for the gang to be back.
Speaker 1: And just remember sitting with West and we were in
Speaker 1: a big table, you know, in full view of the
Speaker 1: entire hotel, and we're just screaming keep pounding at the
Speaker 1: top of our lungs and like, but he he brought
Speaker 1: this like such a twang to it, and it still
Speaker 1: makes me laugh, Like I can hear it right now.
Speaker 1: He's like keep Yeah. There was a real base to
Speaker 1: his delivery of keep pounding, for sure, my god. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then you know, just I mean every time I came,
Speaker 1: you know, just him being oh warm, and you know,
Speaker 1: I remember going to the Cozy together um and just
Speaker 1: hanging out and having drinks, and we would always talk
Speaker 1: about Steely Dan together and I would I would always
Speaker 1: put on what if I knew that he was coming,
Speaker 1: I would put on, um, this must be the place
Speaker 1: by Talking Heads, which is one of his favorite songs,
Speaker 1: and and he would always turn to me and say
Speaker 1: it's my favorite song. And it's I know because I
Speaker 1: put it on because I knew you were coming, and
Speaker 1: you know, but he uh yeah, God, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: I just missed him every day and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I just you know, I pray for Lakisha and Lincoln
Speaker 1: and know that there that I'm thinking of you guys
Speaker 1: all the time. So you mentioned that the post super
Speaker 1: bowls and there is like, uh, Mark and I were
Speaker 1: texting about this yesterday. There's like an innocence, um that's
Speaker 1: kind of lost now with with West gone, and you
Speaker 1: look back at, you know, the times that we spent together,
Speaker 1: hundreds and hundreds of hours, thousands of hours not just
Speaker 1: with the mics in front of our faces, but just
Speaker 1: by the virtue of what our job obs where we're
Speaker 1: always together, whether it was in the newsroom, traveling together,
Speaker 1: and um, the super Bowl was always that culmination of
Speaker 1: a long year of work. Even though as we all know,
Speaker 1: the football calendar doesn't really end at the Super Bowl.
Speaker 1: For a lot of people, super Bowl at the end
Speaker 1: of the season. As markus lamented, it's not the end
Speaker 1: of the season for us, but also it is when
Speaker 1: you get to the game, the long Super Bowl week
Speaker 1: at the city where you cover the game, and then
Speaker 1: you watch the game, you go through the long day
Speaker 1: of Super Bowl and then the way it always has
Speaker 1: worked out, then we would go and sometimes we go
Speaker 1: to a radio station. In recent years we've done it
Speaker 1: from the stadium itself. Um, we would do the post
Speaker 1: show podcast. Would usually be one of the last people
Speaker 1: out of the building on Super Bowl Sunday, and then
Speaker 1: you would get that release where we would all get
Speaker 1: together and Connor all time hero super Bowl fifty in
Speaker 1: San Francisco, when you you had us well stocked and
Speaker 1: we turned the lobby into a party and you're you're
Speaker 1: right that with West and the golden moments like he
Speaker 1: enjoyed those moments, like all right, we we worked hard,
Speaker 1: we did the job, and now we're gonna have fun together.
Speaker 1: He I remember to the Seahawks Super Bowl, the the uh,
Speaker 1: the interception at the goal line, right. And I had
Speaker 1: come from, you know, a newspaper background, and so you're
Speaker 1: used to being in these just dead quiet press boxes
Speaker 1: and everybody so serious about themselves. They take themselves too seriously.
Speaker 1: And I remember that entire game that that was the
Speaker 1: first game I think I ever watched with West. And
Speaker 1: he is on his feet from the minute the game
Speaker 1: starts and he's yelling and he's like, oh, did you
Speaker 1: just see that? You know? And he's like turning around
Speaker 1: and he's like you know, and I'm I'm like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, like what is going on here? And and
Speaker 1: but it was just this moment that hit me like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, like we are we're watching football for
Speaker 1: a living, and like this guy embodies that appreciation and
Speaker 1: that and that endless joy. And so that was like
Speaker 1: you never heard him complain about it once. He was
Speaker 1: just this, uh, this beautiful soul. But that game too,
Speaker 1: in particular, just like every two seconds, yeah, did you
Speaker 1: see that catch? To see that you and just he
Speaker 1: was watching games with him was just unbelievable. I sent
Speaker 1: you Connor that picture of West in an easy chair
Speaker 1: in that hotel lobby after you and you know, when
Speaker 1: you say to Connor, go please if you wouldn't mind,
Speaker 1: would you would you fetch a couple of beers? He
Speaker 1: doesn't show up with a six pack. It was like
Speaker 1: bottles of wine. Um, it was a massive assortment. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was just like Connor was the absolute best person
Speaker 1: on the planet to do that job. But there's a
Speaker 1: picture of West. We're all exhausted just sitting there and
Speaker 1: he had this big woolen cap because remember how cold
Speaker 1: and windy that's said that Super Bowl fifty was in
Speaker 1: San Francisco, and if I'm not mistaken, that was also
Speaker 1: the game that in the middle of it, Um West
Speaker 1: got yanked out of our ability to observe because Marshawn
Speaker 1: Lynch retired like minutes into the game, and suddenly West
Speaker 1: was stuck writing this article. And that was you know,
Speaker 1: there were times when you could look I could, I
Speaker 1: was sitting next to West and you could feel the
Speaker 1: uh sometimes the irritation um in the timing of a
Speaker 1: situation coming off, and I was like thinking, my god,
Speaker 1: I'm glad I'm not writing that piece right now. But
Speaker 1: West is doing it, did a great job with it,
Speaker 1: and he celebrated after. He was a unique guy on
Speaker 1: that front. Marshallsha Lynch didn't even have the common decency
Speaker 1: to stay retired at least, I mean, are you gonna
Speaker 1: deal with that? Make less deal with that? If if
Speaker 1: West is writing your retirement post, stay the hell retired. Well, now, Connor,
Speaker 1: you're taking his place as the guy that's gonna need
Speaker 1: to have the nick cap um at the Super Bowl
Speaker 1: because now you're going West style shaved head um, and
Speaker 1: it can get a little you know. He he often commented,
Speaker 1: you know, get a little cold and get a little
Speaker 1: cold without that that hair as protection. I uh, I
Speaker 1: didn't realize how much just a light, thin dusting of
Speaker 1: hair on top of your head actually did for you
Speaker 1: until um I confronted the looming baldness, got rid of
Speaker 1: the hair, and then you know, I went outside one
Speaker 1: day and I was like, oh my god, it's cold.
Speaker 1: It's it's yeah. You know, there's a reason we were
Speaker 1: born with that stuff. You know, whatever it is there
Speaker 1: in the evolutionary train, there was a purpose for that.
Speaker 1: When we were talking about like the the back and
Speaker 1: forth of having to shave your head frequently, like and
Speaker 1: and missing spots in the back, I mean, you have
Speaker 1: a lovely wife at home when she's shaved your head
Speaker 1: for you so that you don't have to deal with that, right.
Speaker 1: It was Yeah, I would say it was one of
Speaker 1: those days where, like early on in COVID, where we
Speaker 1: just you know, nobody knew what the heck was going on,
Speaker 1: and it just felt like normal was never going to return,
Speaker 1: and so we were just like, you know what, we're
Speaker 1: gonna lean into this. We're gonna order, you know, our
Speaker 1: own haircutting kit off the internet, and we're gonna go
Speaker 1: outside and we're gonna shave Dad's head. Didn't it was?
Speaker 1: She's been great. She's been my barber ever since. And uh,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't trade her for the world. I recently got
Speaker 1: the I made the decision, oh, this could save us
Speaker 1: potentially hundreds of dollars, and I got all the equipment
Speaker 1: to start giving my boys haircuts. And I gave one
Speaker 1: of the most insane looking haircuts to my eldest son, Jack.
Speaker 1: And now it's like, now I'm in the caught in
Speaker 1: this in between because Harrison's hair came out okay and
Speaker 1: Jack's he looks like a child from an orphanage. And
Speaker 1: I'm like, should I Should I take that as practice
Speaker 1: and keep building toward it, or should I bail on this?
Speaker 1: I already have the equipment. I'm kind of a caught
Speaker 1: in between. Right now. You gotta go to Dan. I mean,
Speaker 1: we grew up with these, with this very vibrant company
Speaker 1: coming to age in our youth. Barbazon, remember you go
Speaker 1: there and get a few skills on on hair cutting
Speaker 1: and maybe make as well. It's no different than going
Speaker 1: to you know, before my wife is cutting my hair.
Speaker 1: You would go to you know, super Cuts or one
Speaker 1: of these chains. And it's like I told people, it's
Speaker 1: like seeing an off Broadway show. You could get the
Speaker 1: next Picasso in that chair. You know, you could get
Speaker 1: the next star the Lynn want the Lynn Manuel something
Speaker 1: thank you? Uh, or you could get you know, a
Speaker 1: horse Tony Danza and and you know, like they're times
Speaker 1: when somebody would give me the greatest haircut in my
Speaker 1: life and send me home feeling good. And then there's
Speaker 1: another time where you get a stylist who's talking about
Speaker 1: how she was like a roadie for alien Ant Farm
Speaker 1: and it's just here trying to get you know, a
Speaker 1: couple of bucks, get away from my head, you know.
Speaker 1: But you know, these chances we take Lynn Manuel Miranda's
Speaker 1: sorry sorry uh. And one final thought before we before
Speaker 1: we get to news, um, because you mentioned the golden
Speaker 1: moments and I had a moment on Sunday night where
Speaker 1: I was sitting outside in southern California and for all
Speaker 1: California's ills right now and there are many, um, one
Speaker 1: of the great things about living here and it's cliche,
Speaker 1: but whatever if you grew up in the Northeast, you
Speaker 1: get it is the weather is so great and it's
Speaker 1: it was the middle of February, uh, middle of February
Speaker 1: here and it was just you know, sixty five degrees
Speaker 1: and a perfect sunset. And I was grilling, and I
Speaker 1: was on my second Tito's, and I had music hanging
Speaker 1: out of the garage, and I thought, this is always
Speaker 1: usually when I would text West and I would have
Speaker 1: I would be a little bit loose and a song
Speaker 1: would come on, or I'd be grilling, and I've always
Speaker 1: you always think about West with with the big green
Speaker 1: egg and everything. And I shoot him a text about whatever,
Speaker 1: and it actually that was one of like um. And
Speaker 1: then it happens occasionally like a sad moment where I
Speaker 1: got really sad because I like, go, I can't text um.
Speaker 1: But that at the same time, even though that was sad,
Speaker 1: it again kind of speaks to West. At that in
Speaker 1: that moment, which is like a perfect life moment, I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, I was thinking of West. That's when
Speaker 1: West and I would communicate, because West, that would he
Speaker 1: lived for those moments to uh truly special man. Chris Wesley. Um,
Speaker 1: all right, let's get to it. Let's do some news.
Speaker 1: You know, very rarely what I get on. Um, I
Speaker 1: school kid getting buried by the national media. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the kid that came after Cam at Cam's camp to
Speaker 1: help other kids, that's a bad job by that kid.
Speaker 1: I'm happy at least someone got to him and had
Speaker 1: him do the old cliche take take out the notes
Speaker 1: app and write the apology and tweet it out. Hopefully
Speaker 1: he meant it. Um. But I truly you feel for
Speaker 1: Cam then, because then that goes viral and uh, and
Speaker 1: Cam is ultimately right. At the end of the day,
Speaker 1: Cam is rich, even if he is a free agent.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't know about you guys, but we're
Speaker 1: all parents And I watched that and a couple of
Speaker 1: things stood out that the high school kids standing around
Speaker 1: the mouthy one were like their looks were one of
Speaker 1: awkwardness because they were like, wait, suddenly our friend who
Speaker 1: is our teammate, and you know we we like this
Speaker 1: guy is taking on Cam Newton, which makes which is
Speaker 1: sort of um hard to process. But then I, as
Speaker 1: a parent, I'm just thinking it made me uneasy. I
Speaker 1: am praying that my children never approach anyone um with
Speaker 1: that someone of that stature and an accomplished person with
Speaker 1: that kind of um attitude, I would be I would run,
Speaker 1: I would I would fly to the farthest reaches of
Speaker 1: the world to get away from having to deal with that.
Speaker 1: It made me think of once that is St. Patrick's
Speaker 1: Day parade, uh in Scranton. Hillary Clinton was running in
Speaker 1: two thousand eight, and um, I didn't I wasn't nearly
Speaker 1: as mean as this kid was to Cam Newton. But
Speaker 1: I remember like just being in the moment and seeing
Speaker 1: her like ten feet away from me and just being like,
Speaker 1: Harry Clinton, you know, And I'm thinking, like now, like
Speaker 1: as a thirties year old, I'm like, what was my
Speaker 1: plan if she had turned around and addressed me? And like,
Speaker 1: thank god, she just kept walking. And it was one
Speaker 1: of those things where this kid probably didn't think that
Speaker 1: Cam Newton was going to turn around, like he thought
Speaker 1: he would be hilarious with his friends, and then as
Speaker 1: soon as Camp turned around, Uh, you just saw the
Speaker 1: life drain out of his face. But I think it
Speaker 1: was amazing about it was Cam is such that boy
Speaker 1: did he turn the power of television production on that
Speaker 1: kid in a cocaine heartbeat and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: this kid is like Cam, Cam gets the cameras around
Speaker 1: and it makes it a teaching moment, totally flips the
Speaker 1: narrative and just pins this kid under his thumb and
Speaker 1: makes him look like a little jerk. And uh, you know,
Speaker 1: you know that I think Lesson learned that day. I
Speaker 1: would say if there was one misstep by Cam is
Speaker 1: that when he took to social media to address the incident,
Speaker 1: that would have been a good time, especially with the
Speaker 1: kids of America involved here and teaching lessons to drop
Speaker 1: that dopey font of his that he uses with his
Speaker 1: post right and standard point kings English. Let's let's roll
Speaker 1: forward as a society and accept that as a failed experiment,
Speaker 1: just like that kid failed in his attempt at garnering attention.
Speaker 1: I don't know, is that, as Greg, is that unfair?
Speaker 1: You've been silent? Uh? Well, it just feels like if
Speaker 1: if if it's one of those stories that it was
Speaker 1: only a story because of the day it happened, It's
Speaker 1: like why or why is anyone talking about it? Is
Speaker 1: if this offense you go to any high school classroom
Speaker 1: in America for three minutes, like you will see something
Speaker 1: that offensive and like be a sixteen year old for
Speaker 1: three minutes, like you you were. One of your friends
Speaker 1: will probably say something that offensive, like do we need
Speaker 1: to talk about it that much? Letting the kid off
Speaker 1: the hook? It sounds like letting well, I I said
Speaker 1: before the shows, like why is anyone talking about this?
Speaker 1: That's also to your point, though I do remember being
Speaker 1: that age and the Hillary Clinton thing. Like my friend
Speaker 1: and I were in the Mets game and we were
Speaker 1: centered over like the outfield somewhere, and we spent seven
Speaker 1: straight innings um trying to get Kirk Gibson's attention, shouting
Speaker 1: at him, berating him, um, waving our hands and giving
Speaker 1: him the finger, and finally, like in the eighth inning,
Speaker 1: he finally looked up and he was like you and
Speaker 1: we were like, yes, we did it. You did it.
Speaker 1: And that was like So it's like when you're that young,
Speaker 1: like you don't like you just want to get the
Speaker 1: famous person's attention. So not to stay sidetracked here, but
Speaker 1: now you're giving me memories. The Yankees had some truly
Speaker 1: dreadful teams in the early nineties, and there was a
Speaker 1: matinee game in August and they were probably twenty five
Speaker 1: games under five hundred. Me and my cousin Matt were
Speaker 1: in the upper deck and right field of the old
Speaker 1: Yankee Stadium, which was really now that it's it's gone
Speaker 1: and there's a new stadium there. The old Yankee Stadium,
Speaker 1: the upper deck you st almost hang over the field,
Speaker 1: So if you were there in the front row and
Speaker 1: the place was empty and the right fielder was in
Speaker 1: the field, you were kind of on top of them.
Speaker 1: So me and my cousin Matt, we're probably both like
Speaker 1: eight oh no, we probably about nine or ten, just
Speaker 1: screaming at the top of our lungs for like three
Speaker 1: straight innings. No, ho, no, And finally like he just
Speaker 1: looks up and he's like what, We had nothing else
Speaker 1: to say. We just wanted a reaction. I guess that
Speaker 1: kid wanted one to He got it every day of
Speaker 1: their lives for seventeen years. You know, if you had
Speaker 1: a long MLB career, it's just like every single day,
Speaker 1: every day, sneaky challenge of being a Major League Baseball assuather.
Speaker 1: All right, let's get into it. Uh, speaking of New
Speaker 1: York sports, we haven't touched on Sam Donald in a minute. Here.
Speaker 1: Sam Donald is the uh entering his fourth season in
Speaker 1: the league, very disappointing first three years in New York.
Speaker 1: There are um different ways to look at it. It's
Speaker 1: Donald being um, not living up to the prospects of
Speaker 1: being a number three overall pick and not playing well,
Speaker 1: but then also the Adam Gates disaster in general, just
Speaker 1: Jets putting a lot of bad things around him. So
Speaker 1: with the Jets potentially ready for a fresh start, Donald
Speaker 1: is reportedly allegedly on the trade block. NFL Networks Ian
Speaker 1: Rappaport reports the Jets have received quote real interest in Donald,
Speaker 1: and rapp Aboard added that the team would complete their
Speaker 1: evaluations of the top qu v's in the NFL Draft
Speaker 1: before making any decisions on what to do. Greg. So
Speaker 1: this is, uh, this all seems to be pointing in
Speaker 1: a certain direction that Donald will be moved. What are
Speaker 1: your thoughts about where this is and in general just
Speaker 1: the subject of Donald and where his career goes from here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I thought, you know, when some of the New York
Speaker 1: reporters said a second round pick is you know where
Speaker 1: it's starting for Donald? I took that to mean that's
Speaker 1: like what that's what the Jets want, and maybe they're
Speaker 1: not even getting that yet. And my reaction is similar
Speaker 1: to the Wentz thing. When I heard that they were
Speaker 1: getting offered two seconds, I was like, take it now
Speaker 1: before anything changes. Trade Donald now, like his numbers over
Speaker 1: his last you know, sixteen games at football perspective, put
Speaker 1: this up today. It's like, are literally worse than Dwayne Haskins,
Speaker 1: and we we and Haskins is younger. We would never
Speaker 1: think to give Haskins like the benefit of the doubt
Speaker 1: that Donald has uh compared to Gardner Minshew, who's also younger.
Speaker 1: It's like, of course, he's not even in that same ballpark, Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: the Gays thing was a disaster, but he's played a
Speaker 1: lot of football, and there's almost no historical precedent to
Speaker 1: be as bad as Donald's been and recover for anything
Speaker 1: more than oh then early average. That okay, maybe you'll
Speaker 1: have a couple of seasons where people are like, hey,
Speaker 1: this guy's an average or above average, Like take take
Speaker 1: whatever you can get now. I think the longer you wait,
Speaker 1: and I just don't expect him to be with the Jets,
Speaker 1: I guess I've sort of thrown in the towel there
Speaker 1: on Donald. I would just ask, like, you know, we
Speaker 1: talked with Damna Check on our last show about the
Speaker 1: subjective quarterback saturation, which has not been the case for
Speaker 1: this podcast but the last couple of years. Like who's calling?
Speaker 1: I look around? It could be I guess maybe the Bears.
Speaker 1: That would make sense. I could really see Donald in
Speaker 1: a Chicago Bears uniform. I mean the Panthers potentially. I
Speaker 1: doubt that. What if you what if you're the Jets
Speaker 1: and the only real um interest you got came from
Speaker 1: in the end based down you know, the stuff happening
Speaker 1: the New England Patriots? Would you ever move them? Just
Speaker 1: to move them if you were to land there? I like,
Speaker 1: I just seems like the anti Patriots quarterback though, like
Speaker 1: I would say, take take a year ago. I think
Speaker 1: they would want like guys who are either athletic or
Speaker 1: like process quickly, like just the kind of mental mistakes
Speaker 1: that Donald's I guess shown and a great again. You
Speaker 1: have to give him some leeway with Gaye, but it's like,
Speaker 1: what are we hoping for if they if they could
Speaker 1: get a second round pick, take it while they can.
Speaker 1: It is what I would say. It's a great point
Speaker 1: on saturation. I was talking to Jordan Palmer Carson's brother
Speaker 1: who trains draft prospects um and has Trevor Lawrence this year,
Speaker 1: and he had said, like, dude, I have clients now
Speaker 1: ten year old eleven year old kids in Germany. Like
Speaker 1: that's how many clients I have, and I'm treating them
Speaker 1: all to be NFL quarterbacks. Every single college in America
Speaker 1: is four deep with kids who are capable of starting
Speaker 1: in the NFL. It's gotten that good, you know, And
Speaker 1: and teams on the flip side have gotten willing to
Speaker 1: bend their idea of a traditional offense to make something work.
Speaker 1: So once that all comes together, like, we're not going
Speaker 1: to you know, the game is going to be so
Speaker 1: saturated that we're done getting attached to this idea of
Speaker 1: a franchise quarterback. Like I think that they're going to
Speaker 1: be as replaceable as you know, maybe a really good
Speaker 1: wide receiver or defensive end, like you can move on
Speaker 1: and you can make it work without them. I think
Speaker 1: it's been It's it's hard for Jets Vence because you
Speaker 1: really did invest in Donald and everything pointed to him
Speaker 1: being the right guy right down to like we talked
Speaker 1: about West West Uh saw good things from Donald. We
Speaker 1: talked about Tony Romo talked about how he saw special
Speaker 1: things and special trades and an a lot of smart
Speaker 1: football people. I think Donald's a player and and a
Speaker 1: lot of people still think you could be a player.
Speaker 1: Dan Orlovski at ESPN is a vocal supporter of Donald Um.
Speaker 1: And he's actually younger than Gardner Minshew. You know, he's
Speaker 1: twenty three still, which is insane. So there is there
Speaker 1: is this path where it's like, could he get straightened
Speaker 1: out in the right situation a la Tannehill ala Alex Smith,
Speaker 1: But at the same time with a new regime with
Speaker 1: the Jets, um with Joe Douglas now firmly in charge
Speaker 1: and handling all aspects of the roster building with Robert
Speaker 1: Solo there, it just makes too much sense, I think,
Speaker 1: at the number two pick to get a fresh start there.
Speaker 1: Soannehill is a good comp because he came into a
Speaker 1: terrible situation in Miami and played receiver in college. And
Speaker 1: it's like you saw things like Tannehill was average from
Speaker 1: the jump, and I guess that's that's where you hope
Speaker 1: there's some GM like like a Lewis Riddick um if
Speaker 1: he was in charge of a team that like still
Speaker 1: believes in his college evaluation so much that he'll give
Speaker 1: up a pick for m I'm not even sure that
Speaker 1: guy is out there though, because because what he's shown
Speaker 1: on tape, it's just he's never shown to be like
Speaker 1: average like Tannehill did. Right, That's my question, Just like
Speaker 1: I don't understand, like what where all this interest is
Speaker 1: coming from? But tbd um in other quarterback news check
Speaker 1: back in on this Russell Wilson situation. Wilson kicks started
Speaker 1: a lot of chatter and a lot of phone calls
Speaker 1: UH being made when he told a couple of different
Speaker 1: media outlets that he's sick of being hit and essentially
Speaker 1: that improvements need to be made with Seattle to get
Speaker 1: over the hump uh and get back to the super Bowl.
Speaker 1: NFL Networks Tom Pelasero reported UM earlier this month. The
Speaker 1: teams have continued to call the Seahawks about Wilson's availability,
Speaker 1: and then Michael Silver, our own Michael Silver at the
Speaker 1: NFL Media reports the teams believe a deal with Wilson
Speaker 1: would start with three first round picks, and uh Connor
Speaker 1: like we we talked about this grag a little bit
Speaker 1: with Deshaun Watson as well, like, is there a limit
Speaker 1: with with when you're coming up with random trade cop
Speaker 1: station packages for a true superstar quarterback? Is it where
Speaker 1: does it get ridiculous? Is it five first round picks?
Speaker 1: Ten first round picks? Like, at what point, uh do
Speaker 1: we not buy into this being feasible? And his three
Speaker 1: first round picks a worthy price for a thirty two
Speaker 1: year old quarterback like Russell Wilson. I would compare first
Speaker 1: round picks to Gin and Tonics, right, and that once
Speaker 1: you get past three, uh, you're in a realm of
Speaker 1: ridiculousness and trouble that doesn't uh doesn't offer any sort
Speaker 1: of sound return for you. But yeah, I think that
Speaker 1: Russell Wilson is interesting in that none of this is unintentional. Right,
Speaker 1: this guy has his entire day planned out physically but
Speaker 1: also mentally. Every day. This is exactly what I'm going
Speaker 1: to do. This is how I'm going to think. I mean,
Speaker 1: he has a mental processing coach that helps him along
Speaker 1: in this way and to go out and state, um,
Speaker 1: what he has to me feels planned and maybe he
Speaker 1: wasn't getting what he wanted On the other end of
Speaker 1: conversation sans with Seahawks management, whatever it is, but you know,
Speaker 1: this is a guy who knows exactly what he's doing.
Speaker 1: You know, Aaron Rodgers gets a lot of credit for
Speaker 1: doing that in Green Bay, but Russell Wilson is not
Speaker 1: far behind in terms of someone with that power, that
Speaker 1: cash a and that knows how to sort of move
Speaker 1: the chess pieces around um on a on a sleepy
Speaker 1: afternoon in the NFL offseason. Yeah, I mean it also
Speaker 1: feels a bit quirky to me because the Seahawks don't
Speaker 1: value gin and Tonics. I mean, I don't think I
Speaker 1: can't think of a team that cares less about first
Speaker 1: round picks. So why why what is in this for
Speaker 1: the Seahawks on any level to trade them? Like and
Speaker 1: again where right that Well, that's where it makes it.
Speaker 1: I think there'd be plenty of wares. But I mean,
Speaker 1: Denver for any of these teams. By the way, I
Speaker 1: three sure, four or five? I don't know. I think
Speaker 1: five I would give up, Like depending on who you are,
Speaker 1: people get so I think the first round picks are
Speaker 1: somewhat overrated. That you can you can, like look at
Speaker 1: the last five Seahawks first round picks. Now that they're
Speaker 1: they're a unique team, They're used drafting late, but James Carpenter,
Speaker 1: Bruce Servant, Jermaine Effetti, Rashad Penny, L J. Collier, and
Speaker 1: Jordan Brooks. I would trade fifteen of those guys for
Speaker 1: Russell Wilson. What's the what's the difference? And you could
Speaker 1: do that with more teams than you think in those
Speaker 1: five would not app add up to me to to
Speaker 1: Russell Wilson. So I I don't think for a team
Speaker 1: like like the Patriots or the Broncos, teams that literally
Speaker 1: have nothing right now, um that that that would be
Speaker 1: too much, because you should be able to figure out
Speaker 1: how to build a team other ways too, with the
Speaker 1: rest of your draft picks and free agency and trades
Speaker 1: and everything else. And that solves, like not only solves
Speaker 1: the biggest thing that you could have, but gives you
Speaker 1: a monster advantage at quarterback too. Here's something interesting I
Speaker 1: learned from the latest Monday Morning Quarterback Peter King column. Uh.
Speaker 1: He was talking about Deshaun Watson and he was cooking
Speaker 1: up trade possibilities for the disgruntled Houston passer, and he said,
Speaker 1: keep it mind, teams cannot trade draft picks beyond right now.
Speaker 1: So I guess that's that's the limit. I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's something that um is written in stone, but
Speaker 1: the way King wrote it, it it seems like it is,
Speaker 1: so you can't do more than three and then you
Speaker 1: have to guess get creative second unpicks and then already
Speaker 1: traded him. I guess if it was. I mean, you're
Speaker 1: just like you're shooting an arrow into a future GM.
Speaker 1: But what about this Mark? How about this is a move?
Speaker 1: What if you offered, um, let's use the Browns as
Speaker 1: an example. If you offered ten first round picks between
Speaker 1: two thousand forty and two thousand forty nine, would you
Speaker 1: give that up for Russell Wilson? Hell? Yeah, Like that's
Speaker 1: the kind of GM me and I would do, which
Speaker 1: is like burry a few someone who's three, like four
Speaker 1: months old right now. But we'll grow up to be
Speaker 1: a general manager. They can deal with it. That Bill
Speaker 1: is gonna come do though. I mean, maybe we will
Speaker 1: ME for it. I hope we will. But it's not
Speaker 1: that it's twenty years away. Imagine ten straight years without
Speaker 1: first round pick and the guy, imagine you're twenty years
Speaker 1: old at that point, you're like, why is my team
Speaker 1: always terrible? Oh? We made the worst trade ever twenty
Speaker 1: years ago and never got out of the divisional round.
Speaker 1: It's like a million dollars every year until you know
Speaker 1: Jesus returns. I guess that's why they make those rules,
Speaker 1: because the NBA has running into this a little bit,
Speaker 1: like the thunder have like thirteen first round picks through
Speaker 1: seven or something like that, and the Pelicans have have
Speaker 1: a ton of them too, and it it there is
Speaker 1: something about it that it just feels ridiculous, but also
Speaker 1: like an interesting experiment. That was always my favorite thing
Speaker 1: to do on Madden that day, Like before the draft,
Speaker 1: you would trade your entire roster for first round draft
Speaker 1: picks and then you would end up with picks like
Speaker 1: two through seventeen and you were just you were just
Speaker 1: on the clock for like fifty five straight minutes and just, uh, yeah,
Speaker 1: the fantasy is real. I've always and this goes all
Speaker 1: the way back to why not my not Days of
Speaker 1: the Around the NFL podcast, And you're, well, I believe
Speaker 1: the college football game, um connor um. But you have
Speaker 1: always been a person that when you get into your
Speaker 1: sport video game, you dive deep, like you really get
Speaker 1: into the roster management and all that stuff. It's almost
Speaker 1: like actually playing the games a secondary for you. And
Speaker 1: I think there's a whole market of people that are
Speaker 1: like that. Yeah, it's funny, Like after that we did
Speaker 1: that whole bit, it really did take off. Like there
Speaker 1: are people who do that now, that's like what they
Speaker 1: do on YouTube. I'm not saying that we we deserve
Speaker 1: credit for it, but when you're old and you don't
Speaker 1: have time for the franchise setting on a sports game now,
Speaker 1: like the only video games that I play, my wife
Speaker 1: and I play Family Feud for the Nintendo Switch at
Speaker 1: night when the kids go to and so you you
Speaker 1: have to build. You have to build like a character
Speaker 1: archetype from like this just man and like you're just like, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's like a board businessman who's gonna moneyball family Feud
Speaker 1: and figure out a way to you know, and then
Speaker 1: the wheels are turning, even if I can't play mad necessarily.
Speaker 1: Um on the subject of games, before we get into
Speaker 1: the uh cuts and franchise tag players, Connor, you have
Speaker 1: a new feature up um on SI dot com about Pokemon,
Speaker 1: and I revealed my ignorance on this earlier. I referred
Speaker 1: to it as as a science fiction game. Maybe I'm right.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Now you have a chance to really
Speaker 1: provide some clarity there. But Cassius marsh Um, the linebacker
Speaker 1: who also is such a fan of Pokemon that he's
Speaker 1: taken his love to the next level, do you want
Speaker 1: to share a little bit about uh, this piece that
Speaker 1: you've written, because it's very interesting. So yeah, I'm so,
Speaker 1: I'm standing. You can't see behind me as my entire
Speaker 1: Pokemon car collection. It's kind of like stacked at like
Speaker 1: a big tower. Um, I can. I can send you
Speaker 1: a picture afterwards. But we had someone email okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: keep going. And so someone had emailed us at Science said,
Speaker 1: you know, there's a Steelers players thinking about opening a
Speaker 1: Pokemon card store, and there's someone in our off us
Speaker 1: that said that sounds like something that I'd be interested in.
Speaker 1: And then one of our editors said, if Connor doesn't
Speaker 1: do this story, he's going to have a heart attack,
Speaker 1: like he has to do it. Uh, And so everyone
Speaker 1: called me and it was good, everything worked out. But yeah,
Speaker 1: Cashus marsh is incredible. Uh magic the gathering uh savant. Uh.
Speaker 1: He actually his car was broken into and he had
Speaker 1: twenty tho dollars worth of magic the gathering cards stolen
Speaker 1: when he was in Seattle, and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: the community kind of got turned onto the fact that
Speaker 1: he was into it. He became this sort of like
Speaker 1: athletes surrogate for trading card games. And he's like, you
Speaker 1: know what, I love this. I'm gonna open my own
Speaker 1: store in the middle of the pandemic. I don't care
Speaker 1: what's going on. And so I got a tour of
Speaker 1: the store. It's just gonna open. Yeah, cash cards are limited,
Speaker 1: just go open next week and it's legit like he has. Uh.
Speaker 1: It was just like surreal, like all the conversations that
Speaker 1: I've ever had with players about things that they don't
Speaker 1: want to talk about and things that really I don't
Speaker 1: want to talk out either, and then now here I
Speaker 1: am with like an NFL player being like, wait is
Speaker 1: that a Is that a first edition based up Blister
Speaker 1: pack right there? And he's like, oh yeah, that's like
Speaker 1: can can you zoom in on that real quick? And
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, yeah, oh you've all the Team
Speaker 1: Rockets sets. Okay, good, good good, you know, and uh
Speaker 1: so it was cool, but you know, they're really like
Speaker 1: I got to talk to some of the people who
Speaker 1: are kind of steeped in the magic the gathering world,
Speaker 1: and it's a really neat story, like parents are sending
Speaker 1: him thank you's uh for making it seem a little
Speaker 1: more mainstream, a little less like hard quote air quotes nerdy,
Speaker 1: and it does sort of bridge that classic divide between
Speaker 1: the jock and the nerd. And I do think that
Speaker 1: there is like a cool thing that he's doing there.
Speaker 1: There is sort of like a you know, another step
Speaker 1: toward acceptance, if you if you will. I think also
Speaker 1: like I mean, if I were to pick an NFL
Speaker 1: player that would be operating in Pokemon realms, uh, Cassius
Speaker 1: Marsh wouldn't be the first. He's uh. He's like a giant,
Speaker 1: muscle bound figure with uh. His both arms are canvas
Speaker 1: with tattoos from shoulder to wrist, and here he is playing.
Speaker 1: It's not a child's game at all. I guess it's collectors.
Speaker 1: I don't know how to describe it. You do it
Speaker 1: better than you send cards to my kids. They still
Speaker 1: remember you for that. M that's right. I'm uh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm cool in that way. I like you
Speaker 1: are still still collecting, still still trucking. I like this
Speaker 1: quote from marsh All, of this stuff, it's art for
Speaker 1: the new generation. These cards are similar to buying Picasso
Speaker 1: their high end collectibles, high end art. A lot of
Speaker 1: these pieces are extremely rare. Some of these sports cards
Speaker 1: are one of one. It's like getting a personal piece
Speaker 1: from a famous artist. It's just in its infancy right now,
Speaker 1: do you have what kind of value do you have
Speaker 1: in that room here in right now? So I I
Speaker 1: started clearing out stuff that I had additional, um, additional
Speaker 1: things of during the pandemic, and uh, I was able
Speaker 1: to sell cards for a pretty decent amount of money. UM.
Speaker 1: And I posted my entire collection and then I immediately
Speaker 1: like yanked it back off the bay because I was like,
Speaker 1: you know what am I gonna do? Like, you know,
Speaker 1: my kids aren't gonna care about this, And then I
Speaker 1: was like, but what if they do? And like so
Speaker 1: I all of a sudden like grabbed it, grabbed it
Speaker 1: and took it down offline. But it's it's fun, you know.
Speaker 1: That's that's something like got into when I was a
Speaker 1: little kid, hardcore. And then cash Is March and I
Speaker 1: were talking about this. You go to college and you
Speaker 1: give everything away because you think God if anybody finds
Speaker 1: out that I do this, they're gonna make fun of me.
Speaker 1: And then you get to your dorm room and everybody
Speaker 1: has a game boy, Like there was ten people on
Speaker 1: my floor that we're all playing Pokemon, and I was like, wait,
Speaker 1: this is okay, Like why did I why did I
Speaker 1: get rid of this? And uh So after once you
Speaker 1: have like a little bit of disposable income, you get
Speaker 1: back into it a little bit just to sort of
Speaker 1: have something to do help your zone out. Excellent, check
Speaker 1: it out. Um. You can go to Conor's Twitter page.
Speaker 1: Easiest way to find it um at c O N
Speaker 1: O R O r R. What a name it is?
Speaker 1: Also and it's on SI dot com. All right, let's
Speaker 1: stand is that's solve your science fiction issue here have you? Well,
Speaker 1: I still don't know what they are. I don't know
Speaker 1: like what Pokemon is like a cartoon, but it's like
Speaker 1: a like an are the aliens or what? I still
Speaker 1: don't really know what they are. And the magic there's
Speaker 1: there's wizards involved in stuff. So I don't but I
Speaker 1: don't judge. I just don't understand it. It's a world
Speaker 1: that's strange to me. Like when I was in college,
Speaker 1: I had a a roommate. He was a senior. It
Speaker 1: was the first place dorm I got put into. So
Speaker 1: it was just a mix of guys. And he would
Speaker 1: have like dungeons and dragons battles with these other guys,
Speaker 1: and they all looked like Gareth from the UK Office.
Speaker 1: Like I was like, all right, well, that's a whole
Speaker 1: thing that I'm not really plugged into, but I know
Speaker 1: it's got popularity. I would say that pokemon are more
Speaker 1: like animals that you would encounter uh in the wild
Speaker 1: and then domesticate, and then they help you along your
Speaker 1: adventure uh to uh fame and prominence, but also self discovery.
Speaker 1: That would be the best way that I would get
Speaker 1: I like that. I mean, that's interesting. All right, let's
Speaker 1: get into uh. Let's move on now. And Greg, like
Speaker 1: I said, you've been busy. You've been pounded out bangers.
Speaker 1: That's what you do, You pound out bangers from your
Speaker 1: little home office behind closed doors. And um, let's let's
Speaker 1: dig into let's you made it sound so weird that
Speaker 1: and like animals, you meet in the forest and they
Speaker 1: advance your life along. A lot happening here, a lot
Speaker 1: of it just sitting on the couch in the main room. Really,
Speaker 1: you know, you pound out bangers in the main couch. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: with just the madness going around me. There's something about
Speaker 1: like sitting back here, like at a desk, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: when you're not podcasting, that feels like it's too much,
Speaker 1: like it's even it's too close to go into the office.
Speaker 1: I'd rather just sit on the couch. All right, I'm
Speaker 1: with you. All right, let's get into it. We'll start
Speaker 1: with some We're gonna get to some cuts, some surprise cuts.
Speaker 1: Um but um. And it should be known by the
Speaker 1: way that we have a little bit um of an
Speaker 1: issue here because Greg has been writing about this stuff
Speaker 1: on our website for years. Connor does the same thing
Speaker 1: for s I that means double the double the power.
Speaker 1: But there can only be one that truly sits the
Speaker 1: top the throne as the true master of this type
Speaker 1: of article. And and Mark is going to let us
Speaker 1: know who that is at the end of the show.
Speaker 1: Perfect Um. Anyway, let's start with the two tho um
Speaker 1: NFL franchise slash transition tag Primer Colin, who are the
Speaker 1: no brainers? Debatable candidates? Headlines I never did a headliners
Speaker 1: sometimes I guess it's it's s c O. But there's
Speaker 1: a lot anyway. Um, all right, Greg, let's start with
Speaker 1: the no brainers, and UM, it should be known. Everybody
Speaker 1: should be aware that just because the team tags somebody
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that player is gonna play for the team. UM.
Speaker 1: So I'm curious Greg setting it up that way. You
Speaker 1: have dac A top the list, Allen Robinson wide receiver
Speaker 1: the Bears, Chris Godwin wide receiver of the Bucks, uh
Speaker 1: Teller Moten of the the Panthers, Moton Moten, the tackle,
Speaker 1: Kenny Golladay wide receiver, Lions. Okay, of those guys, who's
Speaker 1: the most likely or who are the guys you see
Speaker 1: there that could get moved you think, and who's definitely
Speaker 1: playing for their team. Ian's putting out a little bit
Speaker 1: of like watch Allen Robinson possibly get traded or maybe
Speaker 1: Gola Day, Like doesn't really make sense for them to
Speaker 1: be paying sixteen million dollars when they're rebuilding, so they
Speaker 1: could be possible trades. But it gets to the point of,
Speaker 1: like all these teams that are people spend so much
Speaker 1: time in January of like, these are the free agents
Speaker 1: we want to get and a lot of them. Are
Speaker 1: these three receivers, you know, Robinson, Godwin and Golladay, and
Speaker 1: none of them are gonna be available except maybe in
Speaker 1: a trade that's gonna cost a lot. And I've been
Speaker 1: saying up the list, you know, the free agency list,
Speaker 1: and man, I think it's bad this year. Usually I'm
Speaker 1: kind of pumping it up, and especially at receiver, it's bad.
Speaker 1: So maybe some team I would give up a nice
Speaker 1: pick for Allen Robinson and give him money. I would
Speaker 1: give up a second round pick at the least, So
Speaker 1: I think the Bears could get something. But the most
Speaker 1: likely outcome is they're all with their teams and they're
Speaker 1: all staying put because like, letting go of good guys
Speaker 1: is stupid. Allen Robinson seems, you know, there's a continued
Speaker 1: streak of um. He seems a little disenfranchised, and I
Speaker 1: don't blame him. I would love to see Allen Robinson
Speaker 1: with a functional quarterback for the first time in Earth history.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure it's happening with the Bears, or I
Speaker 1: am sure it's not happening with the Bears all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, then he'll just end up back in Jacksonville.
Speaker 1: The circle of life. It always drops you back off
Speaker 1: in in northern Florida. I mean, if he gets paid. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he seems to be. He's the one that seems to
Speaker 1: be trying, it's grease the skids to get out of town.
Speaker 1: He's doing like pot different podcasts and he's making it
Speaker 1: pretty clear. Yeah. We we mentioned on this podcast a
Speaker 1: few weeks ago that he's been dropping all sorts of
Speaker 1: hints into social media about where he might want to
Speaker 1: end up. Um, all right, you have the category say yes,
Speaker 1: what does that mean? Exactly great? It's just I think
Speaker 1: it was like an Elliott Smith reference from like eight
Speaker 1: years ago that just thought of apathy has just stayed
Speaker 1: there forever. But you know one of the all time
Speaker 1: Elliott Smith songs. Okay, and of that of that category, Um,
Speaker 1: what's the name that jumps out to you? That's a
Speaker 1: kind of an interesting uh um case. Aaron Jones. I
Speaker 1: think the more I thought about it makes sense to
Speaker 1: keep for eight million dollars, which would be the franchise
Speaker 1: or less on a transition tech. This is another one
Speaker 1: where a little people around the league are like thinking,
Speaker 1: I just assumed he would be gone and they would
Speaker 1: let him go. But that would annoy little people. I
Speaker 1: don't know that. What is I caught that too? Yeah,
Speaker 1: just me, you know, people like me a little catcher. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: they that they don't think it makes sense to actually
Speaker 1: let him go. Aaron Rodgers would be piste connor. You
Speaker 1: don't want to piss off Aaron Rodgers. Like why not
Speaker 1: keep Aaron Jones for eight million dollars for one year?
Speaker 1: I think that's a bargain. If you make Aaron Rodgers mad,
Speaker 1: you're not going to get yelled at. It's like it's
Speaker 1: the it's the fear of what is going to happen,
Speaker 1: Like you're gonna make him mad, and then you're not
Speaker 1: going to hear anything. And then like a month later
Speaker 1: you go to dinner at his house and the meal
Speaker 1: is totally poisoned, you know. And that's like the kind
Speaker 1: of person he is. And so yeah, I would a
Speaker 1: percent like to keep Aaron Rodgers happy. And it totally
Speaker 1: makes sense. If you look at where running back contracts
Speaker 1: are headed, he could almost be getting sixty more than
Speaker 1: that on the open market if a team, you know,
Speaker 1: if there's a team that is going for it quote
Speaker 1: unquote this offseason, Like I could see him being a
Speaker 1: twelve million dollar a year, player for two for one
Speaker 1: or two years, um and so eight million makes a
Speaker 1: ton of sense to me. He cares if you drafted
Speaker 1: his replacement already, you're gonna need three or four good
Speaker 1: running backs. The Athletics field Kapedia believes Aaron Jones could
Speaker 1: get up to fifteen million in a free agency per season.
Speaker 1: Have we have there been enough running back deals that
Speaker 1: have blown up in recent years that that market is
Speaker 1: not going to materialize for Jones. I know he's a
Speaker 1: special player. Well, I know he's a very good, slash
Speaker 1: great running back. But is he a special running back
Speaker 1: that would get that kind of money? I think? I
Speaker 1: think so. It only takes one team and we've seen
Speaker 1: that time and time again the whole like running backs
Speaker 1: are gonna get paid because it's all gone poorly, And
Speaker 1: now even the Panthers are maybe trying to trade Christian McCaffrey.
Speaker 1: Like that's all true. But everyone got paid, like Mixing
Speaker 1: got paid, Camara got paid, Derrick Henry in his own
Speaker 1: way got paid. Like if you're that good that you
Speaker 1: usually do so getting like a one year contract seems nice.
Speaker 1: They have their cap issues, that's the problem. But they're
Speaker 1: gonna cut some players. They're gonna cut Preston Smith. They
Speaker 1: think they've already cut Um, a couple of players like
Speaker 1: Christian Kirksey, and then you find a way to keep
Speaker 1: the guys you want. So the Packers, you are in
Speaker 1: one world, are going to get J. J. Watt, but
Speaker 1: move on from one of the two past rushers they
Speaker 1: got and in the off season a couple of years
Speaker 1: ago that had become incredibly expensive for them at this point,
Speaker 1: I think so, I think I possibly play J. J.
Speaker 1: Wattt running back to replace ar that it could be okay,
Speaker 1: that would be a great experiment just to line him
Speaker 1: up back there for a whole year, and I would
Speaker 1: love just to see what his numbers would be like.
Speaker 1: Does he run for five yards? I mean, do we
Speaker 1: have a little bit of a test case with Derek Watt?
Speaker 1: You know, as you know been in the league for
Speaker 1: a while. You know what, You've said it yourself. Why
Speaker 1: are you picking up I'm not. I'm just saying he's
Speaker 1: a running back. Watch that we've seen, you know, fullback.
Speaker 1: I guess, uh, what would J. J. Watt's longest run
Speaker 1: by over the course of a year, eight yards? I
Speaker 1: don't see that happening. Although I mean you need like
Speaker 1: four smaller as Greg would say, little people, at most
Speaker 1: four of them to drag him down. I would. I
Speaker 1: would compare his output on a game by game basis
Speaker 1: to what Levyan Bell did with the Jets. A lot
Speaker 1: of one to two yard runs and maybe a nine
Speaker 1: yard or when the in the crowd had like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: he's we I was putting together, like I said, that
Speaker 1: free agency list and I'm doing the running backs or whatever,
Speaker 1: and I'm thinking like, oh, was Levyan Bell's career over?
Speaker 1: That was crazy? Like that was fast. It happens really fast.
Speaker 1: Like Levan Bell, who I thought was almost a bargain
Speaker 1: for the Jets, Like, I think there's a pretty decent
Speaker 1: chance his career is over. I don't know, it's just like,
Speaker 1: don't don't have your kids to be running back. But
Speaker 1: he was so selfless to take the year off and
Speaker 1: and for all running backs, uh, you know, nothing but
Speaker 1: praise he came. Yeah, he came. He went away for
Speaker 1: that year and he came back a different guy. It
Speaker 1: just it wasn't there anymore a third of the guy.
Speaker 1: You could say that all right on the before we
Speaker 1: move on to surprise cuts, Greg so on the Leaning? No,
Speaker 1: is that an Elliott Smith song as well? No? No,
Speaker 1: that's just like you know the Lean, Yes, the Lean? Now? Oh, okay,
Speaker 1: is that? What is that? You have Shaquille Griffin Griffin
Speaker 1: the cornerback for the Seahawks of the time, popitalist, Matt
Speaker 1: Milano the linebacker for the Bills. You've got a couple
Speaker 1: of linemen for the paths. Uh tell us about this listen?
Speaker 1: Is there anyone you would disagree with? Connor? Especially if
Speaker 1: you have a list that like Curtis Samuel is a
Speaker 1: guy I think we'll get paid a lot. Joe Tuney
Speaker 1: is gonna get paid a lot. There's a chance. I
Speaker 1: think Bill Belichick will just eat the poop, as you
Speaker 1: would say, Dan, and just paid Joe Tuney like eighteen
Speaker 1: million dollars a year because he just feels like dumb
Speaker 1: for letting him go and having tagged him and not
Speaker 1: signing him to a long term deal a year ago.
Speaker 1: Otherwise he's gonna be like incredibly rich Joe Tuney. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't even think it's a sandwich prop Greg. I
Speaker 1: think if he's not on the Patriots that think the
Speaker 1: Jets would go all out for him because they were
Speaker 1: ready to make the move last year, and then Tuney
Speaker 1: was a surprise. Uh tag. I think some of them
Speaker 1: are interesting, like if you look in New Orleans at
Speaker 1: like Hendrickson and how insane their cap situation is, and
Speaker 1: it just it just goes to show that we are saying,
Speaker 1: right now, oh, this team will not use the salary cap.
Speaker 1: This team will not sign a guy to a end
Speaker 1: fifteen million dollar deal. And then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: like there's just this switch that flips, and it teaches
Speaker 1: us all what we learned every year is that none
Speaker 1: of our understanding of the cap is even close to
Speaker 1: what it needs to be, and it's all mysticism and
Speaker 1: it's just an excuse for teams not to pay players.
Speaker 1: And then as soon as you go well, and then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you have twenty million dollars in
Speaker 1: cap space and you don't know how it happened, and
Speaker 1: like field Yates tweets, well, it was just a series
Speaker 1: of small corrections in the back end of the deal.
Speaker 1: If you you know, five cents here and there, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you have a hundred million dollars
Speaker 1: in cass. That was not a Field Yates impression. That
Speaker 1: was like a please feel I'm a big fan of yours.
Speaker 1: Don't don't think that I was making fun of you.
Speaker 1: But I would say it's just more like it's that
Speaker 1: and it's not just Field. It's like anybody who's corner
Speaker 1: it is a corner of his. Yeah that it would
Speaker 1: it be. It's sort of a collective voice of anybody
Speaker 1: in that corner who really nails the deep minutia of
Speaker 1: of contract. Mickey him as is the king of that.
Speaker 1: The Saints, I think there is something to that Connor
Speaker 1: that like they're trying harder. Yeah, shuffling. It's the same
Speaker 1: thing with the rant. Every year we hear the rant,
Speaker 1: all the all the rams they've given it up. There
Speaker 1: goes their window like that they're in salary cap how
Speaker 1: It's like, no, you can if you especially if your
Speaker 1: owner has got enough money and to figure it out
Speaker 1: to just give people cash up front and keep just
Speaker 1: spreading out to the future, like it's always the spaceship
Speaker 1: is always going up. You can find a way. It's
Speaker 1: like your neighbor who you have said this on another
Speaker 1: podcast before, but like you're looking around and You're like,
Speaker 1: I've sneakily googled how much you make? How is your
Speaker 1: house so much nicer than mine? You know? And you
Speaker 1: just start like and you just start like looking around,
Speaker 1: and then it's just like, well, if you reverse the
Speaker 1: mortgage and then you triple the mortgage, and then you
Speaker 1: have mortgage, you know, and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: they gave me a check for eighty million dollars, and
Speaker 1: it's like, how the how the hell does that work? Wait?
Speaker 1: How do you know how much your neighbors make? There's
Speaker 1: a lot happening there. Connor, Oh boy, do we want
Speaker 1: to get curious? We're all curious. Uh, we're all reporters here.
Speaker 1: You're a you're a Yeah, you're a journal We haven't
Speaker 1: been doing great journal work lately, or at least aggressive
Speaker 1: journal work. But so is it? Go you find their
Speaker 1: tax reports or something? Is that what you do? Take
Speaker 1: us through it? Go ahead? Nobody's listening. Go ahead. I
Speaker 1: would just say that anything is possible if you put
Speaker 1: your mind to it, and if you're connected to the internet.
Speaker 1: So we'll leave it at that. I feel like that's
Speaker 1: a comfortable way I will say. Speaking of journals, this
Speaker 1: one line from Greg. I was my favorite line in
Speaker 1: this entire article. The Associated Press reports that Matt Milano
Speaker 1: will test free agency COMMA and who am I to
Speaker 1: argue with such a monolith? This continues a b line
Speaker 1: of Greg's habits, still constantly bury the Associated Press whenever
Speaker 1: he has that's not a burrier. What is the problem
Speaker 1: with the Associated I don't know this at all. We
Speaker 1: all have little biases that come out in our writing,
Speaker 1: and for Greg it's it's usually you're target at the AP.
Speaker 1: I don't even know what this is all about. I
Speaker 1: don't know how your words, but well, the monolith part,
Speaker 1: it just like when it's something it feels like, okay,
Speaker 1: well that's just a fact. There's no they are. They
Speaker 1: are the Associated Press. They cannot get it wrong. Who
Speaker 1: who would we be to argue with that? If you're
Speaker 1: talking about way back in the day not wanting to
Speaker 1: use our AP articles. I mean, that's just because I
Speaker 1: liked Mark Sessler and Connor Or and Chris Westling and
Speaker 1: Dan hanss Is writing so much no order. I just
Speaker 1: remember when I came to the NFL, It's like you'd
Speaker 1: see all these AP articles on the front page. It's like,
Speaker 1: what are we doing here? Let's justify our paychecks. Mark
Speaker 1: was the master of UH. If anybody has ever read
Speaker 1: an Associated Press article, right, it comes with the dateline
Speaker 1: and then the long M dash and then the date Yeah,
Speaker 1: the dateline in parentheses and then the long M dash
Speaker 1: and then the A P and then it gets into
Speaker 1: the news. And when I first started working at NFL Network,
Speaker 1: Mark used to send And it's a tradition that I
Speaker 1: carried on UH to s I and I've got tweaked
Speaker 1: out a few teammates from time to time where he'll send,
Speaker 1: like UH an a p R. He'll work up like
Speaker 1: a four hundred word AP article and he would send
Speaker 1: it in our chat client of like, you know, Mark
Speaker 1: Sanchez arrested in high high octane you know, car Chase
Speaker 1: Sting or whatever, and like, but it looks so official
Speaker 1: because it's got that AP attachment on it, and so
Speaker 1: you know, I UM, I did one not too long ago.
Speaker 1: I texted all my coworkers and I just said, oh
Speaker 1: MG and all caps, and I sent it to our
Speaker 1: group chat and then I did an a P out
Speaker 1: of New Orleans that Cooper Manning had been arrested for
Speaker 1: embezzling like millions of dollars um and and trying to
Speaker 1: like corner some like rubber market or something like that,
Speaker 1: and like they're like, oh my god. And the editor
Speaker 1: was like, all right, you know, let's uh, let's start
Speaker 1: mobilizing on this. You know, you're hoping to cause like
Speaker 1: sheer panic. It's not gonna last for more than four seconds,
Speaker 1: but you just want that four second panic mode. You
Speaker 1: also don't want it to get out the door and
Speaker 1: get kicked upstairs, because then you have a problem. You know,
Speaker 1: that's true. It's like a very fine line, the needle
Speaker 1: of a threat. All right, let's uh, let's swing to
Speaker 1: the UM cut Candidates two thousand twenty one A f
Speaker 1: C slash NFC Cut Candidates Colin Viable Releases and Potential
Speaker 1: Surprises by Greg Rosenthal. Um. Right at the top on
Speaker 1: the A f C side of things, you got von Miller.
Speaker 1: And it's kind of crazy to think about von Miller
Speaker 1: being elsewhere, but he gets paid a very high salary.
Speaker 1: He's not the same guy he was. Potentially, he's coming
Speaker 1: off a season that he had missed due to injury,
Speaker 1: and he's got some off the field stuff. Greg. It
Speaker 1: all feels like it's adding up to um a end
Speaker 1: of the road with Denver. The has logic. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think even before he got hurt and before the off
Speaker 1: the field stuff, they might have found it hard to pay,
Speaker 1: you know, to not try to save eighteen million against
Speaker 1: the cap. He seems like one of those guys though,
Speaker 1: that could have a nice little late season run, I
Speaker 1: mean late career run that he will have interests. Like
Speaker 1: usually these big name guys, they get overrated in free agency.
Speaker 1: You know, Connor thinks so like the big names, but
Speaker 1: he seems like he could actually make a difference at
Speaker 1: some point. Still. Yeah, I mean he's one of those
Speaker 1: guys that still the game plan would be dictated to
Speaker 1: to you. And even if that's all you bring to
Speaker 1: the table, you are handing your defensive coordinator more tools
Speaker 1: in the tool belt, which I think is a valuable commodity.
Speaker 1: Greg Mark, what are you seeing here? Um? That jumped
Speaker 1: out to you. You know the thing, it's not so
Speaker 1: much about a specific player, but watching what the Eagles
Speaker 1: and Saints are doing. The Eagles, Um, Greg, you mentioned
Speaker 1: like multiple wide receivers, and by the time the article
Speaker 1: was up, you were correct on ah Sean Jeffrey you're
Speaker 1: correct onto Sean Jackson and there could be more. Um,
Speaker 1: zach Ertz is someone that could go. And I just
Speaker 1: sort of like the Eagles are gonna look so different.
Speaker 1: But we talked about the cap not mattering and all
Speaker 1: this other business. Um. I do think it matters if
Speaker 1: you're the Saints because I can't remember a team and
Speaker 1: quite the fix that they're in and just how different
Speaker 1: these two teams could look next season. The Chiefs are
Speaker 1: another one, like they're two tackles Mitchell Schwartz and Eric Fisher.
Speaker 1: You could cut them, but there it's all like cutting
Speaker 1: guys that you would want to cut anyways. In the
Speaker 1: Saints case, they there, it's just like not resigning Um
Speaker 1: Trey Hendrickson and Marcus Williams maybe, but they Yeah, they're
Speaker 1: among the teams of the Patriots I would throw in
Speaker 1: there as a team that's kind of like look incredibly different.
Speaker 1: I've heard some like zach Ertz trade talk and feels like,
Speaker 1: just like good luck with that. I'm not sure they're
Speaker 1: going to be able to get anything or get anyone
Speaker 1: to pay eight million dollars to zach Ertz after he
Speaker 1: had like three hundred yards and give up a draft
Speaker 1: pick for him. But like some of these teams that
Speaker 1: the Washington football teams, another one that feels like a
Speaker 1: year late of Rivera coming there that they could just
Speaker 1: blow up a machine Land and Collins, Alex Smith. It's
Speaker 1: awkward to cut Alex Smith. They know they don't want to,
Speaker 1: but that's probably coming like it does feel because of
Speaker 1: the cap stuff. Like Connor said, people will just use
Speaker 1: it as an excuse to like release a ton of players,
Speaker 1: especially this year. There's you know, the it's amazing the Eagles,
Speaker 1: that Super Bowl team is basically gone, like they're totally
Speaker 1: wiped out at this point. And Earth's, you know, he's
Speaker 1: interesting to me, and I know people that watching Eagles
Speaker 1: very closely, We'll tell you that he was not a
Speaker 1: guy that was resembled the playmaker and the guy that
Speaker 1: caught the game go ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter
Speaker 1: of the Super Bowl. He doesn't seem like that guy anymore.
Speaker 1: But you know, guys like Earth's and Anthony Barr who
Speaker 1: you have on your list as a potential surprise cut
Speaker 1: of the Vikings Chandler Jones, I would hesitate unless the
Speaker 1: team is having really um really difficult times with a
Speaker 1: cap and they need to find ways to get under
Speaker 1: and that certainly is the case this year with the
Speaker 1: cap going down, which was not something anybody could have predicted.
Speaker 1: But when you have impact star players are coming off
Speaker 1: a year or they just weren't physically right, uh, that
Speaker 1: it could end up blown up in your face if
Speaker 1: they get healthy and get back to their old ways
Speaker 1: on a new team. And it was just like, maybe
Speaker 1: we should have been a little more patient here, especially
Speaker 1: with a realistic length preseason in some way, shape or form, right, Like,
Speaker 1: you know, some of these guys don't panic Mark. You know,
Speaker 1: Mark does not want to see that preseason. Neither do I,
Speaker 1: so neither does any of us. Really, I gotta get
Speaker 1: out of it. I'm an outlier there now you're not.
Speaker 1: You're not, but it was your corner. I need to
Speaker 1: I need the preseason. I need to be at a
Speaker 1: Banal Jets minicamp practice in in April just to get outside.
Speaker 1: I gotta do it. I need to be there. So
Speaker 1: we all must suffer through. You know, we throwing the
Speaker 1: whole and that's five weeks. The Green and White scrimmage, practice,
Speaker 1: White Scrimmage, the Snoopy Bowl. Dan, how can you come on.
Speaker 1: You know, let's they discontinue that, I believe, which is
Speaker 1: really a shame because it's it's cynical people like the
Speaker 1: Mark Susslers and the Greg Rosenthal's that probably caused the
Speaker 1: MetLife Inc. To put the trophy away for good instead
Speaker 1: of one game. That's one game that I did that
Speaker 1: I did um celebrate, I mean until you know Mark
Speaker 1: Sanchez had what was it just collar bone snapped like
Speaker 1: in the fourth quarter of the Snoopy Bowl. Totally it
Speaker 1: was a shoulder injury. Was a shoulder injury that I mean,
Speaker 1: my AP report was not far off on Mark Sanchez
Speaker 1: that day followed the infamous bloodied Eli Manning from the
Speaker 1: Super Bowl. Do you remember the Snoopy Bowl? Do you
Speaker 1: remember that when Eli Manning was sacked by Calvin Pace
Speaker 1: and there was blood flying from his nose. And then
Speaker 1: the next year Rex Ryan put it on the cover
Speaker 1: of the game notes before the Super before the Snoopy Bowl.
Speaker 1: That was like the great like one of the great moments.
Speaker 1: It's funny how like how small um and silly things
Speaker 1: can get and how high school things can get in
Speaker 1: the NFL when you cover it as closely as we
Speaker 1: have for years that year was yes, after the Giants
Speaker 1: I believe it won a Super Bowl or maybe not,
Speaker 1: but it was two thousand nine actually, and the new
Speaker 1: MetLife Stadium was opening and the Jets and Giants had
Speaker 1: both footed the bill for it together, and the Jets
Speaker 1: were no longer a tenant, and there was this idea
Speaker 1: like who gets to play the first preseason game in
Speaker 1: the new stadium. And it was such an issue between
Speaker 1: the Jets and Giants that they were like, we need
Speaker 1: to move up the Jets Giants preseason game from Week
Speaker 1: three to week one, so they so both organizations get
Speaker 1: to have the honor of playing the first game at
Speaker 1: MetLife Stadium. How stupid is that sometimes that you could
Speaker 1: proudly say that you were the first team to play
Speaker 1: in the ugliest stadium. There's no replacing the moment, where
Speaker 1: as a fan, um, you walk through the parking lot
Speaker 1: that was the old stadium to the stadium that seems
Speaker 1: exactly like the old stadium and was made forty years ago,
Speaker 1: yet it's just like brand new. You can't replace the
Speaker 1: chills that that come about mat Life Stadium is like
Speaker 1: if you're a baseball fan, um, when the White Sox
Speaker 1: built their replacement for Comiskey Park in the early nineties,
Speaker 1: and it was a very traditional like seventies eighties style stadium.
Speaker 1: And then a year later or two years later, Camden
Speaker 1: Yards shows up, as Connorwell knows, and that started the
Speaker 1: craze of the retro ballpark and people realizing, oh, we
Speaker 1: could like imprint our personality and make it like this
Speaker 1: like special place to go see a game. And the
Speaker 1: White Sox were like, what the hell, we don't get
Speaker 1: to be a part of this. Like I feel like
Speaker 1: that with a lot of these NFL stadiums that opened
Speaker 1: that when the Jets and Giants did their facility and
Speaker 1: at the time a lot was made of it. Then
Speaker 1: there's a billion dollars and all this stuff like um,
Speaker 1: or maybe that was Geral World, but um that all
Speaker 1: the new stadiums are coming out now and we're gonna
Speaker 1: be working at the new Rams Chargers facility once this
Speaker 1: COVID thing wraps up. Um. It seems like these statiums
Speaker 1: are really cool now and like they like when we
Speaker 1: went to Minneapolis for that Super Bowl, Like that's an
Speaker 1: amazing building. Uh with the vikings anyway, we digress. The
Speaker 1: architect like somebody that I had talked to you with
Speaker 1: the background and design once and not really in football,
Speaker 1: was like, did they realize that the most iconic skyline
Speaker 1: in in the country is like literally five minutes that
Speaker 1: way and they just they just they just directed the
Speaker 1: steel wall in front of it so that they would
Speaker 1: see it. You know, visionarias Conner visionarias. It feels like
Speaker 1: us swinging a miss um. Anyway, Greg, before we go, well,
Speaker 1: let's put our focus where it needs. Anything else you
Speaker 1: wanted to kind of highlight here and of course go
Speaker 1: to NFL dot com slash Rosenthal to check out his
Speaker 1: writings in a more in depth way. But names that
Speaker 1: jump out to you that would be surprises, but also
Speaker 1: there it makes sense at something now. I was surprised
Speaker 1: how much Cowboys fans think Jalen Smith might get cut.
Speaker 1: That does not seem like a Jerry Jones move to me,
Speaker 1: to like admit a mistake two years into a into
Speaker 1: a Monster extension. But I think that's kind of the
Speaker 1: levels of Jalen Smith's struggles last year, Like if they're
Speaker 1: gonna cut them, maybe they do it in August. John
Speaker 1: Smokey Brown h there's an old West favor. He's something
Speaker 1: to keep an eye on. I think the bills like
Speaker 1: wanna get aggressive and maybe need to open up some
Speaker 1: cap space to do that. And I like John Brown
Speaker 1: a lot, but he might be one guy who loses
Speaker 1: his job because of that. Connor you had your own list.
Speaker 1: Do you anything like Greg has mentioned here or that
Speaker 1: you've seen that you disagree with vehemently and you have
Speaker 1: to call his competency into question. The only thing that
Speaker 1: I disagree with is that it wasn't up at eleven
Speaker 1: thirty last night when I was trying to finish. And
Speaker 1: sometimes you just you know, you don't copy, but you
Speaker 1: just make sure that you have everything kind of double check.
Speaker 1: You double check your work. And you know, after getting
Speaker 1: two kids to bed, you just you know, two kids
Speaker 1: under the age of two, you just don't feel like, uh,
Speaker 1: you don't feel like being all that creative, you know,
Speaker 1: So take a peek, take a peek, just you know,
Speaker 1: it's like a cross cross checking makes sense. That's that's
Speaker 1: largely what it is. Yeah, and less plagiarism. Who would
Speaker 1: you take a peek? Ye? Right, I don't know if
Speaker 1: those things were up. Yeah, I definitely look at like
Speaker 1: the free agency list before I sent in my one,
Speaker 1: just to make sure I didn't miss people. I don't
Speaker 1: know if there were other tag primers. I guess I
Speaker 1: didn't check that out. But you check out like the
Speaker 1: local guys who've really got, you know, the inside scoop
Speaker 1: on the ravens and the little people. Of course, the
Speaker 1: little people you ask around a little bit. You just say, hey,
Speaker 1: is this stupid? I mean, do you think to yourself, Greg,
Speaker 1: what would Dan and Mark do in this situation? Who
Speaker 1: would they be zero in on? No, it's funny because
Speaker 1: good response. It's funny because Greg you you called out
Speaker 1: damage checks sources on our last podcast, Like, I think
Speaker 1: I know Greg's sources too, but I will not call
Speaker 1: them out. I know who's I know his birdies. Well
Speaker 1: there was multiple this time, but yeah, some are you know,
Speaker 1: insiders at our company. Certainly I'm not giving anything away there,
Speaker 1: but but but others as well. All right, good stuff, good,
Speaker 1: good stuff. You've said it all, Connor, I thank you
Speaker 1: for it. Yeah, this was fun. We went so long.
Speaker 1: You have to grab your power chord in the middle
Speaker 1: of the last segment. How is my transition? I've been
Speaker 1: like I've been infamous for this now, like throughout COVID
Speaker 1: For some reason, I just don't bring it with me
Speaker 1: when I go down to the basement to do this.
Speaker 1: And um, before every show when we do our podcast,
Speaker 1: our producers like, do you have your power chord? Uh?
Speaker 1: Because we need to, like we need to stop pausing
Speaker 1: the show forty five minutes in for you to run
Speaker 1: upstairs and get your power chord. Get another power chord
Speaker 1: would be what I'd say, s I step up to
Speaker 1: the play. Yeah, you gotta put that on s I.
Speaker 1: Speaking of monoliths, come on though, Hey, subscribe new online
Speaker 1: product which is launched. It's great access to some really
Speaker 1: cool stuff. And buy the magazine, you know, like it's
Speaker 1: still like it's great. I was. I was reading it
Speaker 1: the other day and it's just awesome. So I mean,
Speaker 1: unless that's money that you would allocate to NFL media property,
Speaker 1: UM sure. How many covers you up to, Connor s
Speaker 1: I covers which is the holy grail of sports writing,
Speaker 1: um or has been for most of our lives. How
Speaker 1: many covers you got? Too good for you? So that's
Speaker 1: two more than I thought I would ever have. That's
Speaker 1: pretty awesome. Connors just yet another alumnus of NFL Media
Speaker 1: who went on to greater things, and yes, check them
Speaker 1: out at SI dot com. Um, your podcast, I don't
Speaker 1: see you pluging your podcast in your Twitter profile, but
Speaker 1: I assume that's still happening. The weak Side Podcast with
Speaker 1: Jenny brentis. Uh, we just did a really fun season
Speaker 1: wrap up show. Uh. Got some some really good feedback
Speaker 1: from our listeners after, Like, I guess it's like our
Speaker 1: second full season. We have a logo now. Uh, it's
Speaker 1: it's fun. Yeah, cartoon like cartoon depictions of ourselves, which
Speaker 1: means you really have arrived in the podcast landscape. And
Speaker 1: and I feel good about that. Yeah. I think the
Speaker 1: key was getting Brier out of it. You know, it
Speaker 1: was like it was a little bit of a wet
Speaker 1: blanket you just gotta have, like the good you have
Speaker 1: to have it. It's all about vibes. So once you
Speaker 1: got Breer off the pod, I just think why I
Speaker 1: left Albert When we were all in the podcast together.
Speaker 1: It was like making a soup with three really strong ingredients.
Speaker 1: And you know, maybe Albert is saffron or shallots and
Speaker 1: they need to stand on their own. Uh. And so
Speaker 1: obviously the Albert Bruce Show is excellent, so you should
Speaker 1: and now you understand how Jenny and Connor delivered the
Speaker 1: news to Bert that he was no longer on their podcast.
Speaker 1: It's like the uh, the will goo uh poster behind
Speaker 1: you that I Am trying to Break your Heart documentary
Speaker 1: where Jeff Tweedy kicks him uh what's the name out
Speaker 1: of the band and he starts with every circle needs
Speaker 1: a center and uh and it's and it's basically not you,
Speaker 1: you know, uh you it's me, but you do. And
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know why we tend to
Speaker 1: ramble a little bit more when Connor's on, but you know,
Speaker 1: it's a conversation. It's a free flowing conversation we did
Speaker 1: once upon a time. Uh. Go through our Twitter bios
Speaker 1: and then you critiqued each one and I just now
Speaker 1: have to deliver that critique to you, because, um, we
Speaker 1: all love Jenny and you do great work and you're
Speaker 1: a natural podcaster. Just having that your staff writer, it's
Speaker 1: a little bit too minimalist. Let's get the plug for
Speaker 1: the podcast in there, and maybe the podcast numbers, will
Speaker 1: you know, shoot up a little. It's funny. I that
Speaker 1: was my initial banging as he's Greg, as you're still
Speaker 1: just football changed and then you know, that was one
Speaker 1: last great west memory was I didn't look at west
Speaker 1: As before I came on, and then I just like
Speaker 1: unwittingly ripped it to shreds. And then I felt awful
Speaker 1: about it. And then you know, two years later at
Speaker 1: the Super Bowl, I did my list of things that
Speaker 1: I hate, didn't look at his instagram and just like
Speaker 1: ripped it to shreds unwittingly, and I felt, you know,
Speaker 1: he was a good sport about it, but I always
Speaker 1: I felt terrible about that. I think I was like
Speaker 1: all the people who cut their hamburger open and take
Speaker 1: a picture of it, and lest like I love doing that.
Speaker 1: You know anyway, Connor, we really appreciate you've given us
Speaker 1: the time, and yes, you were another favorite of Chris Westlings,
Speaker 1: and that's what we've kind of been doing in these
Speaker 1: shows um since his untimely passing, having some of his
Speaker 1: favorite people on that have been either friends or connected
Speaker 1: to the show or to the company, and you qualified
Speaker 1: as all three. So thank you, buddy uh for coming on,
Speaker 1: share our memories and giving us your you know that
Speaker 1: that Connor sizzle that you always bring. Well, thanks for
Speaker 1: having me on and again, you know, for anybody who
Speaker 1: sees the go fund me for Lakisha and Lincoln. You know,
Speaker 1: anything that you guys can do to help make a
Speaker 1: difference there, um, you know, please continue to do so,
Speaker 1: well said, Yes, check out the go fund me. It's
Speaker 1: um pinned on all of our Twitter pages. All right,
Speaker 1: we'll be back on Thursday with our second episode of
Speaker 1: the week. Uh, thank you everybody for following along and
Speaker 1: we again appreciate all your support uh during this difficult
Speaker 1: time for the show. Uh. This is Dan Hanson signing
Speaker 1: off for a quiet storm for you kidding me? The
Speaker 1: old Boston Rickey, Ali and Red Cool last del Gar
Speaker 1: sac