Speaker 1: Be Around the NFL Podcast The Big Bad Blogger Boy.
Speaker 1: Welcome to another edition of the Around the NFL Podcast. Today,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be your host, Greg Rosenthal, Dan hands this
Speaker 1: out uh for the show alongside Mark Sessler and Patrick claibn.
Speaker 1: It's been a long time since I did this little introduction.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm not really totally sure I remember the words.
Speaker 1: That last part is the most important part. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: you questioning yourself, but you nailed it as always. Greg. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, Greg, I think there was one show that
Speaker 1: you were hosting where you called me Matt, So I
Speaker 1: think you're off to already a better start than than
Speaker 1: that episode was. Yeah, it's gonna be a loose show.
Speaker 1: Dan Wren's a tight ship. He's you know, he's the
Speaker 1: host with the most and m We're just gonna talk
Speaker 1: about stories from this week. It's you know, we're we're
Speaker 1: all getting ready for a little summer break a little bit.
Speaker 1: Shows are going to be a little less often after this.
Speaker 1: The NFL teams are about to go on summer vacation. Um.
Speaker 1: It's got that last day of school type feel vibe
Speaker 1: this week, except for for Claibon, who's wearing a tie
Speaker 1: right now, and I think is working very hard throughout
Speaker 1: the summer. So I'm sorry for the previous thirty seconds.
Speaker 1: It's okay. I recognized that, you know, I am not
Speaker 1: the protagonist of reality and other people's circumstances are different
Speaker 1: than mine, and I appreciate it. I'm glad you guys
Speaker 1: get a little bit of a break. Like. I'm not
Speaker 1: vindictive about it, you know. Well, I mean there would
Speaker 1: have been we were in personally, we were heading close
Speaker 1: towards like rebellion territory if we didn't get like a
Speaker 1: little bit of time here. So although we have two
Speaker 1: shows coming up next week to set out the schedule early,
Speaker 1: we're back next Tuesday and Thursday, I believe, so we'll
Speaker 1: have a little bit of a break, a sixth day break.
Speaker 1: We still got two shows this week, two shows next week,
Speaker 1: and then I think we go once a week and
Speaker 1: we go dark, uh for a little while. And um,
Speaker 1: you know, it's stuck in my head. When we were
Speaker 1: in person, Sessler, Dan said like the juice cleans Cessler
Speaker 1: is not not his favorite Sessler, but at least you
Speaker 1: know which I think it was a little harsh, but
Speaker 1: it at least like on on screen the juice cleans.
Speaker 1: Cessler might be my favorite Sessler. Sessler looks primed, he
Speaker 1: looks jacked, he is the color is good, the shirt sunbottoned.
Speaker 1: You know you look prime Cessler right now. So it
Speaker 1: might be my favorite Sessler. I like we're going with this.
Speaker 1: I will say that, Um, there's been a huge shift
Speaker 1: in this house. I don't know if it's the same
Speaker 1: in your houses, but you know, the l A weather,
Speaker 1: l A regional weather has some hyped up a bit,
Speaker 1: and it's boring to talk about whether, but I will
Speaker 1: just say that one of the reasons I think I
Speaker 1: have a bit of a rosier glow is that it's
Speaker 1: like I'm sweating. It's hotter than a like a cannon
Speaker 1: ball shot into my face right now. So yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: great weather or historic drought that's gonna cause wildfire and
Speaker 1: untold damage to our state. You who can say? But
Speaker 1: it is it is nice. Much much as Robbie Anderson's
Speaker 1: at about Sam Donald this week that there's an aura
Speaker 1: a glow. I see it on Mark. I see the
Speaker 1: energy ready to explode from him. Uh in a positive way,
Speaker 1: not like Mark's gonna you know, sabotage a shipping lane.
Speaker 1: I see it as is a good thing, like Mark's
Speaker 1: gonna hug some people and it's good. So this is
Speaker 1: more legit potentially than the Donald glow comments which I found.
Speaker 1: You know, variable Barn's gotta like it too. I think
Speaker 1: someone's gotta like this good looking sesslor not that he
Speaker 1: is an high apathy. I would categorize it as high apathy. Uh, Clay,
Speaker 1: that's a perfect transition. Because today's show again, we're gonna
Speaker 1: talk about some stories this week. They would normally be
Speaker 1: the news items, but instead we're just gonna make that
Speaker 1: the segment. We're gonna throw out some things that happened
Speaker 1: this week. Uh, and we're gonna just declare as a group.
Speaker 1: I guess, um whether we care or not, do we
Speaker 1: care or not? Does it matter or not? And uh,
Speaker 1: we'll move on and why not? Like that's a fine
Speaker 1: place to start. Wasn't planning on talking it. But do
Speaker 1: you think Sam Donald's rosy glo? Oh do we care
Speaker 1: about that? Patrick Clavon, You know that Robby Anderson says
Speaker 1: he's got an aura, he's got a he's got a
Speaker 1: different vibe about him. I care enough to make jokes
Speaker 1: about it because I think it's funny because it goes
Speaker 1: to so much of the way I think about sports,
Speaker 1: and the way that we turn it into like a
Speaker 1: cartoon is to say, like, oh, this person is summoning
Speaker 1: the strength of the door, right, he's gonna wield the hammer. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm glad Sam is happy. I'm glad the vibes are good. Now. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't know if that makes him a better football player,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I guess in the grand scheme of things, no,
Speaker 1: if we're saying doesn't matter his disposition, no, Uh, what
Speaker 1: matters is is he a better football player? Yeah. I
Speaker 1: mean it's like Robbie Anderson and Sam Donald, they've seen
Speaker 1: some things, having been part of that Jets wreckage. I mean,
Speaker 1: I do think there's probably something to the fact that
Speaker 1: they're simply happier. Um. I gave Robbie Anderson a little
Speaker 1: bit of credit for, you know, we're killing these players
Speaker 1: understandably for the endless tropes. This was a little bit.
Speaker 1: This wasn't a Weather Warren trope the same way that
Speaker 1: you normally hear about quarterbacks. I mean, we're talking auras,
Speaker 1: we're talking clothes. Um. This is also a player that
Speaker 1: did not know the Panthers mascots. So I'm not sure
Speaker 1: how dep dug to create this narrative, but I I'd
Speaker 1: enjoyed it to some degree. Yeah, I like it. I
Speaker 1: mean when you yeah, when you can go from gaze
Speaker 1: to uh, Joe Brady and Matt Rule, who I think
Speaker 1: are gonna kinna help Sam Donald out. Not sure about
Speaker 1: that offensive line in Carolina. PFF did like an offensive
Speaker 1: line rankings going into the season. Steve Palazalo, I never
Speaker 1: know how to say his last day, and he they
Speaker 1: had him thirty and you look at it and it's
Speaker 1: not great. I wasn't planning on doing Donald, but that
Speaker 1: seems like a fun place to start. We are going
Speaker 1: to give some book recommendations. By the way, at the
Speaker 1: end of the show, you know, Mark Mark suggested that
Speaker 1: I like that it's summer reading time, and so that's
Speaker 1: how we're going to close the show. But let's go
Speaker 1: to a bigger item of news this week, which is
Speaker 1: all these mandatory mini camp holdouts, which is the only
Speaker 1: time you can use the word hold out until training
Speaker 1: camp because they are required to be there and they
Speaker 1: can be fined if they are not there, and Xavian Howard,
Speaker 1: the Dolphins corner back, was a surprise absence this week. Uh,
Speaker 1: he wants a new contract. That's what Brian Flores, the
Speaker 1: Dolphins head coach, alluded to, and he called a quote
Speaker 1: unique situation when it came to Howard. Do we care
Speaker 1: about this one? Mark? I mean, I think it's something
Speaker 1: to monitor. It doesn't sound like it's it's like super
Speaker 1: cantankerous based on what Flora said, and he was kind
Speaker 1: of veiled in his comments. But this is a player
Speaker 1: that just signed a new year, a new deal, a
Speaker 1: massive extension, and now wants more money. It kind of
Speaker 1: reminds me of when we talked about Stephon Gilmore on
Speaker 1: UM Monday was that I I don't know what did Monday
Speaker 1: like that. You know, when he signed his deal, the
Speaker 1: deal look great, but then even a couple of years later,
Speaker 1: your fall down on that list of who's getting paid
Speaker 1: at cornerback and he's behind his teammate Byron Jones, which
Speaker 1: I think maybe could be a little bit a little
Speaker 1: bit of just I want to be heard. I want
Speaker 1: to have some money moved around. I don't want to
Speaker 1: be locked into this from now until the end of time.
Speaker 1: UM that's you know, and so we monitor it and
Speaker 1: I leave it there. I think I think it matters
Speaker 1: in the sense of what Xavian Howard's golds are long term,
Speaker 1: because I think if if the discrepancy is between the
Speaker 1: twelve million for him this year and the fourteen million
Speaker 1: for Byron Jones, then I wouldn't really be sure what
Speaker 1: he's doing. Um, if I'm not mistaken, he's the second
Speaker 1: highest paid player on the whole team, So I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily think this is as much about I think the
Speaker 1: team's potential outcomes in and he's had a few good
Speaker 1: years in Miami, so I can see from his point
Speaker 1: of view the desire for a long term trying to
Speaker 1: kind of answer to what his career is going to
Speaker 1: be like, because it'd be around a three million dollar
Speaker 1: cap hit if they let him go next year, depending
Speaker 1: on the timing. Um, I'm I'm looking at you know
Speaker 1: the dropped battery charges right, Um, you know he there
Speaker 1: was a domestic battery is arrest and they were then dropped. Um.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if they're a concern for Miami right
Speaker 1: as much as they should concern anybody right when somebody's
Speaker 1: accused of domestic battery. But I think the Dolphins might
Speaker 1: see that as a justification for paying him less, because
Speaker 1: if they were truly concerned, uh, then he wouldn't be
Speaker 1: on the team. Right. So I think the Dolphins, the
Speaker 1: Dolphins would like to pay him less as much as
Speaker 1: you know, any any employer would probably like to pay
Speaker 1: a productive employee less. Uh. And so they see, you know,
Speaker 1: the way that that's playing out. But I really think
Speaker 1: it's just him looking for some sort of long term answer.
Speaker 1: But he got a long term answer. He signed through.
Speaker 1: I think it doesn't matter then next year though, right,
Speaker 1: But they never would because he's a defensive Player of
Speaker 1: the Year candidate last year, who who is you know,
Speaker 1: relatively affordable for a cornerback. He signed like a five year,
Speaker 1: seventy five million dollar country at a time when I
Speaker 1: think they were probably differing opinions on Davian Howard, like
Speaker 1: he's up and down, and like at the time, people
Speaker 1: are like, Wow, that's a really good deal for Howard.
Speaker 1: That's them believing in their young player and and on
Speaker 1: the field last year he backed it up with a
Speaker 1: first team all proceeds. I think it's really unique. It
Speaker 1: matters in the sense of like, any how much can
Speaker 1: any story for the end of felt matter in June
Speaker 1: um because I think it's tricky. I I don't see
Speaker 1: how you gives Amen Howard more money, not just because
Speaker 1: it's a precedent with so many years left on his contract,
Speaker 1: but he signed it two years ago. He signed for
Speaker 1: three or four more years. Since he signed the contract,
Speaker 1: he had that domestic violence arrest. I mean, he he
Speaker 1: was in jail, Like that's significant. How can that not
Speaker 1: I've seen a handful of analyzes on this situation that
Speaker 1: don't even mention that, like, of course that should factor
Speaker 1: into whether you should sign a guy to a long
Speaker 1: term contract. And then in the two years since the
Speaker 1: other year he missed eleven games or seven games, nine games,
Speaker 1: whatever was, he missed more than half the season with
Speaker 1: a knee injury. In so since he signed that contract,
Speaker 1: they got one incredible year one where he was hurt
Speaker 1: and you had this off field issue. But I think
Speaker 1: the main thing is we see this again and again,
Speaker 1: and we're seeing it with Chandler Jones in Arizona. Guys
Speaker 1: hate it when you signed a new player at your
Speaker 1: position to more money, and so he's just pissed that
Speaker 1: he knows he's better than Byron Jones, or at least
Speaker 1: he was, and Byron Jones is right next to him,
Speaker 1: and he's making more money. We see this at our
Speaker 1: workplace sometimes. Absolutely, I'm not gonna name names. It's it's
Speaker 1: at any workplace. I'm not gonna name names. If we
Speaker 1: knew how much everybody was making, I guess we would
Speaker 1: would see it. Sometimes it pops up and you have
Speaker 1: an idea, though, and some people are not happy. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm saying in front of the camera, behind the camera,
Speaker 1: I think this is a universal thing. I'm not. I'm not.
Speaker 1: I once had a terrible UM. It was a job
Speaker 1: where you basically wrote like proposals to get business. This
Speaker 1: was a sort of a startup company up in Malibu. Um.
Speaker 1: Long story short, family owned about twenty employees. But some
Speaker 1: dunderheaded idiot and it wasn't me. UM sent out mistakenly
Speaker 1: the pay the salary of every single person inside the building,
Speaker 1: and like you know, a cornerback room, there were seven
Speaker 1: or eight people that were kind of grinders that we
Speaker 1: would all be looked at in the same role, and
Speaker 1: they all were equally valuable, but one of them was
Speaker 1: getting paid like twice as much as anyone else. And
Speaker 1: one guy who probably just wasn't good at UM fighting
Speaker 1: for himself was getting paid like um someone that had
Speaker 1: been hired from a temp agency. So it caused immediate
Speaker 1: headaches and volcanoes. It was fascinating to watch shout out
Speaker 1: to shout out to that guy, shout out to Comrade Dunderhead.
Speaker 1: I know, like normal and I'm all for normalizing um
Speaker 1: salary and financial talk and money talk. Like in general,
Speaker 1: people get to tow up, you know, people act like
Speaker 1: it's the most private thing in the world. Let's let's
Speaker 1: normalize this. It's just it's just money. Well, we shouldn't
Speaker 1: be all in our feelings about it. Let's stay in
Speaker 1: Miami though for our second the next story, and and
Speaker 1: talk to a tongue of voloa. Um. I feel like
Speaker 1: this happens with one quarterback every year. Jimmy Garoppolo was
Speaker 1: the guy a couple of years ago. I remember he
Speaker 1: threw like six interceptions in one practice. Uh, this time
Speaker 1: it was to throwing five in a monsoon. This, um,
Speaker 1: do we care about two a tongue of viola throwing
Speaker 1: five interceptions in June? Patrick? No, No, like, are we
Speaker 1: extrapolating his his long term career viability based on a
Speaker 1: June practice. People are mannequing. People were just like, I
Speaker 1: don't know this. I think people are looking for reasons
Speaker 1: not to like to a write right now, or to
Speaker 1: like to and like defend that it doesn't mean anything.
Speaker 1: People get in their little corners, including me, Whatever confirms
Speaker 1: your prior's right. That's that's how we handle June in
Speaker 1: NFL training camp news. Right. Um, I don't particularly think
Speaker 1: it matters. Like Brian Flores, I don't think this was
Speaker 1: an excuse what he said, like practice is a time
Speaker 1: to practice, to see what works and what doesn't work. Um.
Speaker 1: And if if you know you're picked off five times,
Speaker 1: yeah that congrats. Maybe Xavian Howard and Byron Jones and
Speaker 1: maybe everything's working back there. Maybe we take the positives
Speaker 1: from that. Um. But I don't see it as some
Speaker 1: sort of strike against Tah that that he's stoleing picks
Speaker 1: against his what what was a good defense last year
Speaker 1: in practice? Well, I mean also it happened in like
Speaker 1: a driving rain storm there there with like two inches
Speaker 1: of rain were dumped on that part of Florida yesterday.
Speaker 1: And you know this is coming. Just what the Beat
Speaker 1: reporters said and sort of a chill out, please chill
Speaker 1: out everyone that they were like intentionally unfurling like passes
Speaker 1: deep down the field into tight windows to kind of
Speaker 1: just you know, show aggression. The other thing I'd say
Speaker 1: is George Godse and Eric Studsville, who you know because
Speaker 1: their co o c s get a little bit heat
Speaker 1: on this show. And I think it is a tv
Speaker 1: D scenario. Um, But Myles Gaskin said, it is a
Speaker 1: new playbook. It's a totally new playbook. This isn't to
Speaker 1: a you know, gaining more comfort from the playbook from
Speaker 1: last year. It's sort of the opposite of that. And
Speaker 1: I think that's flown under the radar just a little bit. Um.
Speaker 1: I have a no problem with these quarterbacks going out
Speaker 1: and having like one day like that where a certain
Speaker 1: statistical category gets jacked up. I mean, we complain all
Speaker 1: the time about Beat writers giving us too many detailed
Speaker 1: stats from a pad list or you know, super basic practice.
Speaker 1: Well then we can't you know, be jumping out of
Speaker 1: windows when this occurs. Yeah. I used to right uh
Speaker 1: these articles during o t A mini camp season and
Speaker 1: it was like a huge paragraph on each team, like
Speaker 1: which players were rising and falling. This was especially did
Speaker 1: as a road world when I was doing more fantasy,
Speaker 1: but I did it here too, and I and I
Speaker 1: see it happening quite a bit still, especially in fantasy.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if I'm right or I'm just
Speaker 1: like lazy, but I have come to the conclusion there's
Speaker 1: there's literally nothing you can draw from on field play
Speaker 1: in O t s and mini camps, nothing other than injuries,
Speaker 1: like nothing in terms of performance and and evaluation and competition.
Speaker 1: And Belichick and Flora's talk about this pretty often that
Speaker 1: this is teaching time, This is teaching and installing, and
Speaker 1: competition starts the first day of training camp. That's when competitions.
Speaker 1: Coaches will also say that the one like the groups
Speaker 1: you can't even judge at this time of year, or
Speaker 1: offensive lines and mostly defensive lines. So it's like we're
Speaker 1: talking about a quarterback throwing interceptions when like the reason
Speaker 1: he's going to be held up right is hard to
Speaker 1: determine in in in early June, So I totally sail
Speaker 1: it down the river. I would just if if you're
Speaker 1: going to report the interceptions, right, just give us some
Speaker 1: some context, right, for reaching, like like maybe a graph
Speaker 1: on each pass, like what was the average depth of target? Well,
Speaker 1: what's the circumstance with regards to the pressure of wind rate.
Speaker 1: I don't know if we're gonna if we're gonna draw
Speaker 1: stuff from it, then you just need to give us
Speaker 1: everything it does. It does get to what to a
Speaker 1: struggle in which was you know, deep throws and that
Speaker 1: they're gonna have to improve them that And I think
Speaker 1: mark your point is really good about that. It's a
Speaker 1: new offense. It is a little bit of a concern
Speaker 1: like if you're a third year player on the Dolphins,
Speaker 1: this is your third offense, or if you're Invante Parker, um,
Speaker 1: it's about your seventh offense. And it's and it's your
Speaker 1: third and three years and your I projected four either
Speaker 1: rookie or second year starters on the offensive line. So
Speaker 1: it's a young team. The Dolphins have this way of
Speaker 1: I think the last under florists looking like a hot
Speaker 1: mess in the off season, and I thought was like
Speaker 1: one of the worst rosters in the league going into
Speaker 1: each of the last two seasons, and and then they're
Speaker 1: way better than the sum of their parts. So I'm
Speaker 1: giving a little bit of credit to the process that
Speaker 1: they'll they'll make it look better florists and greer then
Speaker 1: it seems to look on paper, but it is a
Speaker 1: lot there are there are a tricky team to evaluate
Speaker 1: with with again, as Mark pointed out, to two offensive coordinators, right,
Speaker 1: so so maybe two offensive just in this year, right
Speaker 1: because we don't we don't know who's calling. It's some
Speaker 1: kind of imagine it's really one of the two that's
Speaker 1: leading the way, but I don't know who that was
Speaker 1: if that weren't the case, or like, you just it's
Speaker 1: like the way that their personalities mingle matters. I mean
Speaker 1: one if one of them is sort of like likes
Speaker 1: to quietly take credit for everything. It's like the guy
Speaker 1: that wants to be in Tua's ear on the sideline
Speaker 1: with the other guys probably doing way more. Dudesville who's
Speaker 1: been around for twenty years and his beloved as he's
Speaker 1: usually running backs coach and like is known. You know,
Speaker 1: I don't know what happened here, but this is one
Speaker 1: of those things that Floris took from Belichick that he
Speaker 1: that's like, don't take that from Belichick. Like Flores probably
Speaker 1: has it in his mind that he wasn't even defensive coordinator.
Speaker 1: When he was the defensive coordinator, I don't think anyone
Speaker 1: remembers that. Like when he was calling those plays in
Speaker 1: the Super Bowl, he wasn't He didn't even have the title,
Speaker 1: they didn't have one. Then the Patriots also went co
Speaker 1: coordinators at one point, and then they went to no
Speaker 1: coordinators in variety of years. So it's a silly thing
Speaker 1: to take from Belichick, but I don't think it's that
Speaker 1: huge of a deal. Let's go to Minnesota, where I'm
Speaker 1: gonna just tip my hand here. I think this was
Speaker 1: probably the biggest story of the week, which which tells
Speaker 1: you it wasn't like a massive week. But Danielle Hunter
Speaker 1: uh signed a new deal with the Vikings right after
Speaker 1: we taped on Monday, and then right on the back
Speaker 1: of that, Sheldon Richardson returned to Minnesota where he was
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen, I believe, for one year and played
Speaker 1: pretty well there. So the common nation of those two stories,
Speaker 1: to me, I think are significant because this this contract
Speaker 1: thing happened with Hunter even before he heard was out
Speaker 1: for last season, so it had been kind of sitting
Speaker 1: there for a while, and so they moved up some
Speaker 1: guaranteed money, and more importantly to him, they'll make him
Speaker 1: a free agent after this season, or they'll pay him
Speaker 1: twenty million dollars in two So either way he'll either
Speaker 1: have his freedom or he'll have his money. And between
Speaker 1: those two guys, it it helps what to me was
Speaker 1: the biggest weakness on the Vikings defense, which was their
Speaker 1: defensive line. Um, they might play a little more. Three four,
Speaker 1: they get Michael Pierce back from opting out. They signed
Speaker 1: Dalvin Tomlinson, they had they added a lot of people
Speaker 1: in the secondary, including Bashad Brelan recently that one slipped
Speaker 1: under the radar. They've got Patrick Peterson, they got Davier.
Speaker 1: I kind of suddenly am thinking the Vikings defense, which
Speaker 1: was a hot mess last year and was the biggest
Speaker 1: reason why they didn't make the playoffs, it was not
Speaker 1: the offense should go back to what they normally were,
Speaker 1: which was very good under Mike Simmer got topped. And
Speaker 1: even then if they were a topped in defense, and
Speaker 1: suddenly you're like, Okay, maybe the Vikings are back in
Speaker 1: the playoffs. Do you agree, Cleava? I do, and I
Speaker 1: think in the way that it happened, right, the rapidity
Speaker 1: in which it's like, oh yeah, this is oh okay,
Speaker 1: They've got Richardson Daniel Hunter's back. Um, it shows a
Speaker 1: clarity of purpose. There's no you know, wishy washy will
Speaker 1: will wait and see, like this is what the brass wants,
Speaker 1: this is what Zimmer wants, and he's gonna get it.
Speaker 1: And so I think, right, um, you can see that
Speaker 1: there is this cohesion among the coaching staff in the
Speaker 1: front office with regards to one like we you know,
Speaker 1: who knows what the future holds, but this is what
Speaker 1: we're doing. And I like that. I can't see a
Speaker 1: negative to that. Yeah, I mean, Rick Spielman, the GM
Speaker 1: does not turn out a lot of like low level rosters.
Speaker 1: If anything, He's been, if if not, like a superstar,
Speaker 1: has been extremely consistent. And they just they had PFF's
Speaker 1: worst pass rushing group a year ago and it showed
Speaker 1: they just sell the bodies. And so you know, I think, like,
Speaker 1: h Daniel Hunter, if he, if he is able to
Speaker 1: become what he was before, is one of the best
Speaker 1: in the league. You got Stephen Weatherly, Um, Sheldon Richardson
Speaker 1: I thought played pretty well for the Browns and was
Speaker 1: a bit of a surprise departure I know that they're
Speaker 1: trying to change their scheme up just a little bit,
Speaker 1: and maybe he didn't quite fit in UM but but
Speaker 1: on top of just the player, uh, that was the
Speaker 1: one move that they've pulled off where teammates were agitated
Speaker 1: because they loved Richardson. So you know, I know he's gone,
Speaker 1: he's he's moved around from team to team a bunch,
Speaker 1: but he was popular there and they liked him in
Speaker 1: Minnesota too, and they're bringing him back, So I don't
Speaker 1: hate that. I think the ones who punch changes their
Speaker 1: defense quite a bit. Yeah, the Browns did not help
Speaker 1: Richardson max his money this year with the timing, so
Speaker 1: he got paid. I think it's with and you know,
Speaker 1: incentives and stuff over for like about four million, and
Speaker 1: he's better than plenty of defensive tackles who signed for
Speaker 1: more money. He's the perfect kind of veteran sign He's
Speaker 1: very much the in dominant Sue type signing, but a
Speaker 1: few years younger where it's like, hey, you just signed
Speaker 1: a guy who can play seven hundred snaps for you
Speaker 1: basically know exactly what you're getting, which is solid production.
Speaker 1: Like you know, he's not gonna be a superstar. But
Speaker 1: you just plug them in and they needed that. And uh,
Speaker 1: I was looking at this roster they've I we talked
Speaker 1: about the Vikings. I did the Mina Kimes podcast with
Speaker 1: Lenny this week. People should check out. They drafted eleven
Speaker 1: players this year, including eight in the first four rounds.
Speaker 1: Half of those guys were on defense. I don't know
Speaker 1: these defensive guys. They were third and fourth rounders. But
Speaker 1: it's like, I'm not gonna pretend I have some hot take,
Speaker 1: but it's like if you hit on a few of
Speaker 1: these and a few of the ones on offense, and
Speaker 1: they signed guys in numbers. Uh, in the secondary where
Speaker 1: they just have like six cornerbacks who have played or
Speaker 1: can play. Cam Dancer was a rookie for them. That
Speaker 1: was pretty good. I don't know. I I think they
Speaker 1: could be dangerous, especially in a division that Aaron Rodgers
Speaker 1: might not be involved. And let's let's stay in that
Speaker 1: division and talk um Bears this week. Matt Naggie seems
Speaker 1: to doing the rounds this year. Seems to be in
Speaker 1: a really good mood, so that's good. I'm happy for him.
Speaker 1: You know, he sometimes he seems to really go up
Speaker 1: and down with his mood, but it seems like a
Speaker 1: happy I'm just saying, as coaches go, he seems either
Speaker 1: to kind of really hate the media experience or seems
Speaker 1: like a totally cool guy. He's in totally cool guy mode.
Speaker 1: And he was talking with Chris Collinsworth this week on
Speaker 1: Collinsworth Podcast. Let's listen to that. But I do have
Speaker 1: to ask this one question. Is there a possible scenario
Speaker 1: where Justin Fields plays on opening Night? No? I mean
Speaker 1: Andy is our starter, and again I can't predict anything.
Speaker 1: You know that that's you know how it goes. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's so many things that could happen between today and
Speaker 1: that week one, but that's Andy is our starter and
Speaker 1: and Justin's our number two, and we're gonna put We're
Speaker 1: gonna stick to this plan. It doesn't matter. Mark Cesler,
Speaker 1: you made the best facial espression of the three of us.
Speaker 1: Do you get there? Well, I mean, I guess the
Speaker 1: one thing if you're matten Egg, maybe you're going back
Speaker 1: to the blueprint the Chiefs used with Patrick Mahomes, where
Speaker 1: you know, if you take a look at Chicago's early schedule,
Speaker 1: maybe he's just sort of saying I don't want to
Speaker 1: put all this on a rookie because they have the Rams.
Speaker 1: Then okay, the Bengals fine, but the Browns, Ravens, Raiders, Packers, Bucks, Niners,
Speaker 1: and Steelers before the buy. That's essentially going through a
Speaker 1: playoff field in the NFC and a f c um
Speaker 1: that said Mattegi was hired to do one thing to
Speaker 1: manage the quarterback position, to manage how you move from
Speaker 1: player A to b um, from a you know, a
Speaker 1: group of nobody's to a Justin Fields who he's going up.
Speaker 1: He's gone out of his way to compliment in high order.
Speaker 1: I mean, he seems to love Justin Fields. So I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is more of a protection thing.
Speaker 1: I don't like it at all. Um, would you treat
Speaker 1: that said he you're going to treat your offensive line?
Speaker 1: A rookie blows up in August and absolutely dominates, so
Speaker 1: we're not ready for for him to be out on
Speaker 1: the field. It's just sort of like an it's the
Speaker 1: quarterback position, and I think, actually it's the wrong way
Speaker 1: to deal with quarterbacks. Ue, but I am sitting here.
Speaker 1: It's his prerogative. But but he's leaning into it hard. Um.
Speaker 1: When it felt like it was going to be the
Speaker 1: first non frustrating Bears off season in a while. UM,
Speaker 1: I find it to be. It's just pressing a little
Speaker 1: too hard. Why do you have to say any of
Speaker 1: this because of the circumstances, right? Um? If if he's
Speaker 1: Andy Reid and he has the job security of an
Speaker 1: Andy Reid, uh, and Andy Dalton becomes Alex Smith, right
Speaker 1: that the twenty whatever version of Alex Smith, then yeah,
Speaker 1: you have the luxury of of going with the starter. Um.
Speaker 1: But the best way, the most important job for a
Speaker 1: lot of coaches and gms is to keep their job.
Speaker 1: And in the best way for Matt Neeggie to keep
Speaker 1: his job and maintain his importance is to start Andy
Speaker 1: Dalton untild that circumstance becomes untenable and then start justin fields.
Speaker 1: So I don't think it matters because, um, we could
Speaker 1: say that with any particular rookie quarterback, in any starting scenario, UH,
Speaker 1: the coach many times is going to do what's necessary
Speaker 1: to keep his job, especially if he's not coming in
Speaker 1: with a rookie quarterback. UH. If you are a holdover
Speaker 1: from a quarterback who didn't succeed UH in your system
Speaker 1: and a new quarterback comes in by virtue of the
Speaker 1: Denver Broncos choosing not to draft that quarterback. Then you
Speaker 1: you have this opportunity to protect yourself. And so I
Speaker 1: see it as whenever the circumstances changed, that's when we're
Speaker 1: gonna get justin Fields. Regardless of how Matt Neggie responds
Speaker 1: to the dulcet tones of Chris Collinsworth, who sounds like
Speaker 1: a pitch shifted Jack Collinsworth to me, I'm looking a different,
Speaker 1: uh voice on his podcast. You're saying it's it's more sultry,
Speaker 1: it's a little sexier, which I don't think we can
Speaker 1: all appreciate. He Hey, Matt, now that matters, That take matters.
Speaker 1: He he wants I've probably told this story before. We've
Speaker 1: done this podcast so long, but he wants pre taped
Speaker 1: a weekly question for this this digital fantasy show I
Speaker 1: hosted in around two thousand seven called The Fantasy Fix.
Speaker 1: And you know, but he did it all in one
Speaker 1: one take, like in September, and we just taped the
Speaker 1: question for the whole year. But it would really crack
Speaker 1: us up because we would just watch this tape and
Speaker 1: it would be him for three minutes going, hey, Tiffany
Speaker 1: and Greg like, who do you think's better this I
Speaker 1: can't Wow, it's really falling apart my who do you
Speaker 1: think's better this week? Uh? Frank or or Tatum Bell?
Speaker 1: And then then it would just like get him going
Speaker 1: into the next one for three minutes straight. I really,
Speaker 1: that's my favorite cons Worth memory. That's you guys gave
Speaker 1: such great answers. Mine is short. No not. I think
Speaker 1: this is all nonsense. And the only reason it it
Speaker 1: um caught fire as much as it did on Twitter
Speaker 1: was and I don't want to call the person out.
Speaker 1: I don't know who remember who it is. They paraphrased
Speaker 1: it wrong. I was in the aggregating game a long
Speaker 1: time and they they aggregated it in paraphrase that as
Speaker 1: Naggy said, there is no scenario where Dalton could be
Speaker 1: the backup week one, which Collinsworth, by the way, is
Speaker 1: has self interest. He's calling that game. He's like, please
Speaker 1: give us justin fields, and we all do because we
Speaker 1: all want to watch that game with and yes, he
Speaker 1: started the answer by saying the word no to like
Speaker 1: a yes or no question, but then he went into
Speaker 1: a whole spiel about well, you know how it is,
Speaker 1: I can't predict anything, things change, UH in the meantime,
Speaker 1: Chris and I can't say what what they would be,
Speaker 1: but you know, here's the plan. One of the things
Speaker 1: that can change is Justin Fields is awesome in August
Speaker 1: and Andy Dalton is not. And that's it's like why
Speaker 1: these coaches have to answer these questions. But I really,
Speaker 1: I truly think it means less than nothing. Of course,
Speaker 1: it's the plan. It's the game that you have to
Speaker 1: play publicly. I also think it's funny that in some
Speaker 1: other UH interviews that he's had, he also makes it
Speaker 1: very clear that Nick Foles is the number three and
Speaker 1: as no chance to move up to number two. It's
Speaker 1: it that's kind of funny to me too, like if
Speaker 1: like he's doing this to like protect Dalton's ego and
Speaker 1: what they promised Dalton. But he has no problem saying like, sorry,
Speaker 1: falls man, I know you were a Super Bowl MVP,
Speaker 1: You've been in the league twelve years. There's actually absolutely
Speaker 1: zero chance that you could even move up to number two.
Speaker 1: That's I don't even know what he's doing on the
Speaker 1: I think that's just like, you know, keep them safe
Speaker 1: inside like a carton or a crate until we trade
Speaker 1: him somewhere for like a late pick for a team
Speaker 1: that gets, you know, a ravaged by quarterback injuries. I
Speaker 1: like to hear that at least he's flexible naked. I mean,
Speaker 1: if this changes, then change with it. Because you mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know, career security, Clayband. But I mean if fields,
Speaker 1: like we're blowing people away visually and played really well
Speaker 1: out of the gate, that's job security right there. I mean,
Speaker 1: you guys made the right choice for a change, and
Speaker 1: you're coaching them up. Um. I just find it to
Speaker 1: me a little bit like, I know, so we tweeted
Speaker 1: out QB once we've got a stick with that now,
Speaker 1: I mean that's that's was on a social media operative.
Speaker 1: Like it's just let's be flexible and really here please. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I uh, I don't know about I don't know about
Speaker 1: the Bears. And you're right to Clayburn, like the Broncos
Speaker 1: not taking fields and it's funny because they were there.
Speaker 1: They were far from the only team that could have
Speaker 1: maybe used the quarterback to pass on them. You know,
Speaker 1: the Panthers, Panthers, you know, the Dolphins, you know technically
Speaker 1: could have you know whatever, There could have been other
Speaker 1: teams that have done it. But the Broncos are the
Speaker 1: one team because I think they have a a Super
Speaker 1: Bowl ready roster if they had like a great quarterback
Speaker 1: where you are going to be thinking like Wow, the
Speaker 1: hype would be out of control if they had Justin
Speaker 1: Fields right now on that roster, but they don't. And yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's what I'm always gonna come back to because
Speaker 1: as much as we launched Chicago for for taking Justin Fields,
Speaker 1: my thing is, if you think that he's gonna start
Speaker 1: for you right for the next ten to twelve years, uh,
Speaker 1: why wait till eleven? Yeah, I think it might be like,
Speaker 1: let's see how that Rams defense is looking week one.
Speaker 1: If it looks like it did a year ago, maybe
Speaker 1: Dalton can be the sacrificial lamb and we go week
Speaker 1: to Justin Fields. He's got to look good in camp.
Speaker 1: To let's go to one guy who has been with
Speaker 1: the same in the same uniform, Raiders uniform his whole career.
Speaker 1: You know, they changed it up when they moved to
Speaker 1: Vegas a bit. Uh, and he says, uh, he doesn't
Speaker 1: ever want to play in a different uniform. Derek Carr
Speaker 1: went as far to say as uh, he thinks he
Speaker 1: would retire before he would play in a different uniform.
Speaker 1: That's loyalty. Do we do we care about this? I care.
Speaker 1: Derek Carr is threatening to retire in the event that
Speaker 1: the Las Vegas Raiders trade him. That's what I'm hearing.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, you can. You guys can float these constant
Speaker 1: trade discussions every single year, or I can just say
Speaker 1: right now, if you trade me, I quit. I will
Speaker 1: not play for any other team. I'm tired of this
Speaker 1: constant discussion. I see it as mattering because I think
Speaker 1: he might do it like I think, I think he
Speaker 1: would shut it down, perhaps just out of sheer spite
Speaker 1: for this constant conversation that he's been a part of.
Speaker 1: I mean, we don't know if Derek Carr internally is
Speaker 1: the guy that's saying and telling people closest to him,
Speaker 1: I want to play till I'm forty, which you've heard
Speaker 1: from like eight other quarterbacks at this point. Is he
Speaker 1: that guy? I mean it's a bit of a severe
Speaker 1: kind of like, um, you know these things don't work
Speaker 1: in relationships. Ultimatum. So if you're telling the Raiders like
Speaker 1: I'm your starter and if you feel displeased with my play, um,
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna retire. It's like, okay, but I don't
Speaker 1: think he'd ever actually do that, because you're leaving a
Speaker 1: tremendous amount of potential money on the table unless you
Speaker 1: kind of are done with football at some point or
Speaker 1: this to me felt like a quarterback who's always playing
Speaker 1: from behind um with the fan base, a big chunk
Speaker 1: of the fan base with the media, Like I've been
Speaker 1: hard on Derek Carr, but like, honestly, he played pretty
Speaker 1: well last year in some tough situations. He's not always
Speaker 1: you know, had the easiest environment. He he does what
Speaker 1: even if he if he performs beyond X actations, he's
Speaker 1: always sort of this person who's viewed is not good
Speaker 1: enough for John Gruden, not quite what the Raiders want
Speaker 1: because they're going after Tom Brady. You know, you're thinking
Speaker 1: they might go after someone like maybe they'd go after
Speaker 1: Aaron Rodgers. They try a trade for someone else, there's
Speaker 1: always another quarterback um lingering in the imaginative distance. And
Speaker 1: Derek Carr never seems to make anyone happy enough. And
Speaker 1: he he said as part of these comments that people
Speaker 1: don't know how close he is with John Gruden off
Speaker 1: the field, which I thought I thought was interesting and
Speaker 1: maybe that relationship has gotten better and better. Um, he said,
Speaker 1: I'm a Raider for my entire life. I'm gonna root
Speaker 1: for one team for the rest of my life. It's
Speaker 1: the Raiders. I feel so strong in my I don't
Speaker 1: need a perfect situation to make things right. I'd rather
Speaker 1: go down with the ship. It does feel like one
Speaker 1: of those things that happens um in sports. I guess
Speaker 1: probably more than most industries, but maybe others that like,
Speaker 1: you are loyal to your employer until you realize how
Speaker 1: uh disloyal they are to you. Because I just the
Speaker 1: Raiders aren't going to be loyal to Derek Carr the
Speaker 1: second that his performance drops, So he I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't put too much stock into the retirement there, because
Speaker 1: Derek Carr can make a great living and play football
Speaker 1: for another decade, whether it's starting back up, whatever it's
Speaker 1: going to be in the long run. Um it is uh.
Speaker 1: It is fascinating though that they've had like this, this
Speaker 1: run together. He does seem like one of those guys though,
Speaker 1: Um that like was really mad at Kevin Durant for
Speaker 1: leaving the Thunder You know, that's like very loyal, lloyal
Speaker 1: wants his players to be loyal to their teams even
Speaker 1: though they're not necessarily loyal to him. So he's not
Speaker 1: going to be like doing the Russell Wilson um, let's
Speaker 1: leak to the media things if he if he has
Speaker 1: a great season and like wants to get a bigger contract.
Speaker 1: His contracts coming up fairly soon, by the way, Derek Carr.
Speaker 1: But as Mark said, he doesn't have the public capital
Speaker 1: to do that because people are always getting at him
Speaker 1: just for being Derek Carr. Like, he's been pretty good.
Speaker 1: But so I I at least including me, I'll say myself,
Speaker 1: I've never I never was totally a believer, and I
Speaker 1: think he's improved every year with Gruden. Uh and he
Speaker 1: is an asset now for sure. I think he's a
Speaker 1: top top twelve. Of course I think he is too.
Speaker 1: But I mean, we're in a league where unless you
Speaker 1: have one of those top five guys, it's totally fair
Speaker 1: game to be looking around, to be thinking about we
Speaker 1: could draft someone, and he's just always someone you never
Speaker 1: how often do we think, like, hey, they have Derek Car,
Speaker 1: they're good for the next four or five years. No
Speaker 1: one thinks that he'll be supplanted. He'll be replaced by
Speaker 1: someone soon, right, Jimmy g got replaced. Maybe wouldn't have
Speaker 1: if he had stayed healthy, but he's kind of a
Speaker 1: similar tier. Well, we'll see whoever the next quarterback is.
Speaker 1: Right when it's when it's Aaron Rodgers or Tom Brady
Speaker 1: like okay, Like, yeah, I can't be too mad about that.
Speaker 1: Russell Wilson, Yeah, I also can't be too But once
Speaker 1: you get into like maybe below that tier, um, then
Speaker 1: then you start to get your feelings hurt. I do
Speaker 1: want to point out, though, if Derek Carr was a
Speaker 1: free agent, I heard this discussion somewhere else. I forget
Speaker 1: like trying to guess what he would make, and you
Speaker 1: know it was it was somewhere in between that like
Speaker 1: unbelievable backup and like quality starter level, which is like
Speaker 1: twenty four is the bottom of that, and and I thought,
Speaker 1: that's crazy. I think Derek Carr would make over thirty
Speaker 1: million dollars a year because exactly her Cousins is the
Speaker 1: is the perfect example. Kirk Cousins, when he actually was
Speaker 1: a free agent and any team could sign him, got
Speaker 1: got thirty million because there was a competitive services for
Speaker 1: him and I think Derek Carr would be as attractive
Speaker 1: or more um as Cousins was as a free agent.
Speaker 1: So you know, you don't have to retire Derek. You
Speaker 1: can you can keep playing. Let's uh, let's finish with
Speaker 1: one more sort of holdout. Jamal Adams was excused from
Speaker 1: mandatory minicamp um, so it's not a holdout. But Pete
Speaker 1: Carroll did allude to the contract negotiation taking place between
Speaker 1: the two sides as being a factor and why he's
Speaker 1: not there, and he said, um that they've been making
Speaker 1: that they've been doing good work on Jamal Adams contract
Speaker 1: and that he thinks they're going to get there. I
Speaker 1: think this does matter because Carol saying that publicly was
Speaker 1: more important than Adams not being there. It basically said
Speaker 1: that it's it's a matter of time. This thing is
Speaker 1: going to be signed before training camp starts, and Jamal
Speaker 1: Adams will very likely be the highest paid safety in
Speaker 1: the league, topping Justin Simmons Denver Mark. What do you think?
Speaker 1: I mean? I feel like it was all predestined when
Speaker 1: they gave up multiple first forum and kind of said
Speaker 1: he's the cherry on top of our our Super Bowl roster.
Speaker 1: That's how we see ourselves. I mean I love that
Speaker 1: they're aggressive. You know why when that deal initially happened,
Speaker 1: I killed the Jets for one thing, not being able
Speaker 1: to hold on two star players. But looking and what
Speaker 1: they've done since, Um, where I was incorrect or where
Speaker 1: I should have been a little bit different in my
Speaker 1: view of that was that he wasn't going to stick
Speaker 1: around with the Jets. They got a ton of value
Speaker 1: for him, and they found a buyer who bought at
Speaker 1: a high high value. I mean, it's like incredible what
Speaker 1: they what they now have to deal with because they
Speaker 1: have no choice but to pay Jamal Adams a huge
Speaker 1: amount of money. So why haven't Mini camp what he
Speaker 1: is some sort of a non contact injury that takes
Speaker 1: him out of the of the of the deal for
Speaker 1: six months. Just keep them in ice and bring him
Speaker 1: back because you're forced to pay him now. I don't
Speaker 1: like that for Seattle a whole lot. I like the player. Um,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of drama that comes with him, but
Speaker 1: I just feel like they have zero leverage. They have
Speaker 1: no the the the opposite of leverage. Yeah, I also
Speaker 1: see it as not mattering. Um, I think Jamal Adams
Speaker 1: would play with an amputated foot. Um, I think him
Speaker 1: missing a few days of mini camp is it going
Speaker 1: to be a long term problem? And like Mark said, Mike,
Speaker 1: you've said correct, Um, when you make the trade, you've
Speaker 1: already made the investment. Uh, It's just it's just a
Speaker 1: matter of time before you get pinned to paper. And
Speaker 1: so I just see this as um dotting dotting of
Speaker 1: eyes and crossing a tease. And it's not really gonna
Speaker 1: hurt Jamal Adams and his ability to play football. He's
Speaker 1: not going to forget right they they can find him,
Speaker 1: and they're not going to because he's excused. And then
Speaker 1: the fines in training camp really get aggressive. So skipping
Speaker 1: this week is is one of the only levers players
Speaker 1: have left to pull, like a Stefan Gilmore or Howard
Speaker 1: or Adams. Uh, it gets harder to do when it
Speaker 1: comes to training camp. Dwayne Brown, by the way, they're
Speaker 1: left tackle, also said he wants a new contract um
Speaker 1: and he has one year left on his deal. He
Speaker 1: was at mini camps, so this really UM isn't a
Speaker 1: huge deal. But I wouldn't be surprised if they give
Speaker 1: him an extra year or two on his contract because
Speaker 1: he's still playing at a really high level, kind of
Speaker 1: on the Andrew Whitworth plan. Okay, that was fun. You know,
Speaker 1: I think we settled it. We settled what matters. What doesn't.
Speaker 1: Clayburne's got like a news hit coming up in about
Speaker 1: ten minutes. Do you need to go Patrick, We're good,
Speaker 1: We're good. Okay, So we're gonna wrap up this this
Speaker 1: summary show, um with some book recommendations. You know, I
Speaker 1: threw one out out of the blue apparently last week,
Speaker 1: not understanding what this some our last segment was going
Speaker 1: to be in our Pride episode. But Mark thought that's
Speaker 1: would be this would be a fun way. It's summertime.
Speaker 1: Maybe you have a little more time. You're going to
Speaker 1: the beach, that's a thing, and we're gonna throw out
Speaker 1: some some books. We like to wrap up the show
Speaker 1: and go on for a long weekend. At least for us.
Speaker 1: Clay Brown is gonna be grinding what you want to start? Mark,
Speaker 1: since this was here, either I can I can throw
Speaker 1: one out there. I sell it buying books, um, when
Speaker 1: it comes to reading them at this stage in life,
Speaker 1: that's not been enough and so successful there, but I
Speaker 1: got this book, um room to dream put in front
Speaker 1: of the camera. There it is uh, David Lynch, the
Speaker 1: director and artist David Lynch. It's like an autobiography. But
Speaker 1: why I think it's amazing and I'm only about forty
Speaker 1: pages into it, is that he co wrote it with
Speaker 1: this um writer, Christine mc kenna, and she goes and writes, like,
Speaker 1: let's say there's twenty there's twenty chapters that go through
Speaker 1: his life. She did a ton of research, interviewed hundreds
Speaker 1: of people. She'll write the chapter about David Lynch from
Speaker 1: age born to age seven, and then Lynch in the
Speaker 1: next chapter comes back and basically read not rewrites it,
Speaker 1: but he writes his version of it, um because invariably
Speaker 1: it's gonna be different than your research and who you
Speaker 1: talked to. It was just his p o V. So
Speaker 1: the whole book is going through his whole career that way. Um,
Speaker 1: he's number one an awesome writer. She is too, but
Speaker 1: his the way he thinks, in the way he remembers
Speaker 1: um stuff Like then you go watch his films and
Speaker 1: it's like, this is one of the more unusual individuals
Speaker 1: out there and people don't know he did like Twin
Speaker 1: Peaks he did, Uh you know a bunch of stuff.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's he's also on Mulholland Drive, like memorable
Speaker 1: movie going experiences of my life is driving like spooky
Speaker 1: l A streets and uh like where I saw some
Speaker 1: of the scenes, like the Pink's Hot Dog stand was
Speaker 1: right near the movie theater. I saw that and I
Speaker 1: was just like, oh my gosh. Yeah. So you know,
Speaker 1: I like to recommend a book that I've only also
Speaker 1: read thirty something pages of which you know had happened
Speaker 1: from here on out. But there you go. So you're
Speaker 1: just throwing out one. Oh I came up with two
Speaker 1: big of a list here. Oh, I just didn't want
Speaker 1: to know. That's good Clayton for later. But okay, clay Um,
Speaker 1: I don't have a substantial list. I probably could crank
Speaker 1: out a couple, um, but the uh, I've been really
Speaker 1: big into historical materialism. Uh. This this past a few months, UM,
Speaker 1: starting with W E. B. Two Boys is Black Reconstruction
Speaker 1: in America, which takes a materialists look back at the
Speaker 1: circumstances leading up to the Civil War and and throughout
Speaker 1: the reconstruction era before it was it was violently put
Speaker 1: down uh and set us on the path that we
Speaker 1: are today. So that that was a that was a
Speaker 1: good book for me, got into it with a reading
Speaker 1: group and it spawned other readings. Uh. So that led
Speaker 1: to a productive summer of learning, right, which is uh
Speaker 1: not summer, I guess spring. I don't know what days
Speaker 1: are anymore, and it's all kind of the same. And
Speaker 1: audio books are crucial for me, right because between the
Speaker 1: kids and everything, you can't you can't have your attention
Speaker 1: divided too much before, especially the larger one tries to
Speaker 1: destroy some object or himself or his little sister. So yeah,
Speaker 1: the audiobook of Black Reconstruction was good. H. Then there's
Speaker 1: Black Jacobins. I guess there's a theme right, which chronicles
Speaker 1: the Haitian Revolution, uh by C. L. R. James. It
Speaker 1: was a great book as well if you're into write
Speaker 1: a view of history and circumstances and you want to
Speaker 1: have a better understanding past like these people were mad
Speaker 1: at that at those people, right, and you want to
Speaker 1: get into the economic circumstances. Uh. Those are two really
Speaker 1: good books for me. Number First of all, Um Claibon
Speaker 1: had a the briefest stop at Dad's summit of anyone,
Speaker 1: and uh, I only bring this up because I feel
Speaker 1: I feel I don't know if it was your pain,
Speaker 1: but I empathize with your situation, Clayland, because I have
Speaker 1: been there. You came to the party, you were aggressive
Speaker 1: in hoping to um take care of a how old
Speaker 1: your daughter want? Yeah? Okay, so she's one and Malcolm
Speaker 1: is four, but he's he's such a substantial four, but
Speaker 1: he is, he's a lot. And you yeah, and you realized,
Speaker 1: I don't know how long it was, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: long that Nope, not worth it. It might have been
Speaker 1: a half hour. It was I I did. I've done
Speaker 1: the exact same thing multiple multiple times. You got to
Speaker 1: pull the ripcord sometimes and that those I wouldn't even have,
Speaker 1: not not not a cent Like you, You're aggressive, even
Speaker 1: trying the baby part of it, like combining I I
Speaker 1: would sometimes I leave with one minor older. Now and
Speaker 1: it is it does get easier, so that it does
Speaker 1: get easier that I think it doesn't get easy, but
Speaker 1: it gets easier. I think in situations like that, Uh,
Speaker 1: I should read more nonfiction. I don't know. I I
Speaker 1: don't read enough nonfiction. I like reading is really it
Speaker 1: was gonna critique you in the same way. Greg, I
Speaker 1: don't think you've been reading enough nonfiction and let's get
Speaker 1: your act together, please. I almost only read fiction. It's like,
Speaker 1: I didn't really come to reading this aggressively until I
Speaker 1: was about thirty two, so it's never too late. But
Speaker 1: I really found it is the most relaxing, um thing
Speaker 1: I can do. Like it's the best thing I have
Speaker 1: for mental health. I have never had a religion, but
Speaker 1: I think it's the closest thing I have to a religion,
Speaker 1: where like it just chills me out, it gets and
Speaker 1: I think it's because it takes you out of your
Speaker 1: own head. That at least for me, and it's nice
Speaker 1: to get. You know, the same thing with a great movie,
Speaker 1: but it takes you out of your own head. Goes
Speaker 1: into someone else who said, because we're football though, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna throw out a couple of football books. Um, it's
Speaker 1: been a while since I read these, but I just thought, uh,
Speaker 1: and I've probably done it before on this show, but
Speaker 1: I don't care. Bringing the Heat by Mark Bowden is
Speaker 1: maybe my favorite season in the life book ever. The
Speaker 1: same guy wrote this book Black Hawk Down, which became
Speaker 1: a big movie, but before that, he wrote a season
Speaker 1: in life about the Randall Cunningham Jerome Brown Eagles, and
Speaker 1: it's so awesome. I've read it more than once. It
Speaker 1: really holds up and he really goes in and the
Speaker 1: characters on the Eagles team are awesome. Similarly, uh, there's
Speaker 1: this book A Few Seconds of Panic by Stephan Fatzis
Speaker 1: where he was in the Broncos training camp in two
Speaker 1: thousand six, kind of doing this George Plimpton paper lion
Speaker 1: thing where he got to practice with the kickers all
Speaker 1: the time and eventually got to like, you know, kick
Speaker 1: during some inter squad scrimmage or something at practice. But
Speaker 1: it's there's so few books that have like a real
Speaker 1: inside look at what a team is like now. And
Speaker 1: this is Jake Cutler's rookie year, so it's Jake Cutler
Speaker 1: versus Jake Plumber. There's Mike Shanahan being very Mike shanahany
Speaker 1: and like sort of dominating an entire organization. There's Brandon
Speaker 1: Marshall as a rookie. Javon Walker's there, and and it's
Speaker 1: a lot of time with the kickers and punters too,
Speaker 1: which is a fun world. And that is a really
Speaker 1: fun read. And then to go really old school and
Speaker 1: see like what the NFL was like the last season
Speaker 1: of We View Bank by Paul Zimmerman. Who have who
Speaker 1: have brought up before Paul Zimmerman, But this is uh
Speaker 1: one of Joe Namath injured seasons in New York and
Speaker 1: he's you know, on the plane with them the whole time.
Speaker 1: And it's a great look at what the NFL was
Speaker 1: like back then and really well written. So there's some
Speaker 1: three football books for you. So there's some nonfiction. I
Speaker 1: like that. Yeah, and I do read. I do read
Speaker 1: fiction as well. I got the Zombie Survival Guide in Okay,
Speaker 1: I didn't know is that nonfiction? What is that? I
Speaker 1: guess what is it? It's a go to prepare for
Speaker 1: for the eventual rise of living dead? Right, Okay, you
Speaker 1: did it? Bring up things you wouldn't have thought up
Speaker 1: you honestly, it was helpful for the pandemic, like food
Speaker 1: prep and storage wise. Uh, not as much, right, fending
Speaker 1: off people. But we did see that line of people
Speaker 1: at the gun store right right across the street from
Speaker 1: the network. Uh maybe they were taking it to heat,
Speaker 1: but not me. You had another one, Mark. So the
Speaker 1: other one that I've been reading is this actor Klaus Kinsky.
Speaker 1: Why am I so bad at putting the book in
Speaker 1: the camera? Um? He it's called Kinsky uncut. He is
Speaker 1: an actor that died, you know, some decades ago, one
Speaker 1: of the craziest human beings UM around Warner Herzog, the
Speaker 1: director did. They did a documentary together based on the
Speaker 1: many films together called not My Best Friend but My
Speaker 1: Best Fiend because there were multiple times when Klaus Kinski
Speaker 1: literally was planning to kill Warner Herzog on set. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's some incredible stories. Is German. He's a crazy man.
Speaker 1: But this this autobiography. I don't know why I'm stacking
Speaker 1: autobiographical reads, but UM, you know, you get like fifty
Speaker 1: sixty pages into it and you're like, if this is
Speaker 1: this actually this man's life. UM, I have never read
Speaker 1: any account of one's living this way ever ever before. Um.
Speaker 1: He's a truly strange character. But there are whispers, um,
Speaker 1: and maybe more than whispers that a lot of the
Speaker 1: book is just made up, that he went and wrote
Speaker 1: a huge autobio her feet, but concocted like huge chunks
Speaker 1: of it um as total fiction. That said, you can
Speaker 1: tell that some of it is based in his real Um.
Speaker 1: Experience is in a completely different world than we've ever
Speaker 1: lived in. So if nothing else, it is a gripping read.
Speaker 1: You've suddenly read like thirty one pages and you have
Speaker 1: no idea where the hours have gone. Yeah, it's like
Speaker 1: what's what's uh? Fiction? Non fiction? It blends together for
Speaker 1: real like stuff. Yeah, it doesn't matter. I like the
Speaker 1: like the more recent trend they call like auto fiction.
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, just right about your life and make
Speaker 1: up a few things to make the story better and
Speaker 1: call it fiction and like that. People like like to
Speaker 1: read that. That's basically what fiction has been pretty often anyways.
Speaker 1: All right, um, you don't you have to go Claibroon right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm copying. Okay, so I'm gonna have to throw out
Speaker 1: two more just because when else are we gonna do this?
Speaker 1: Dan'll be back and he'll be like, no books allowed.
Speaker 1: Um all right, Uh, we'll say goodbye to you, Claibon.
Speaker 1: Um all right and see clon. And I just got
Speaker 1: throughout two two quick novels to um Drive Your Plow
Speaker 1: Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga to Court Chick,
Speaker 1: which is one of the great titles ever. Drive Your
Speaker 1: Plow Over the Bones of the Dead. It's kind of
Speaker 1: like a murder mystery where you think possibly animals are
Speaker 1: killing the humans. It's not to give away too much, um,
Speaker 1: but it's it's deep yet a quick read. And the
Speaker 1: other one is called earth Lings by Sayaka Marada, which
Speaker 1: I think Mark would really like, which is really out
Speaker 1: there people that do not think they're from um this
Speaker 1: planet necessarily or they just feel a little out of
Speaker 1: step with what's going on um in Japan, and it
Speaker 1: goes crazy from there. But it's a well I do
Speaker 1: think you have a bit of a special power in
Speaker 1: terms of recommending books to me that I like you.
Speaker 1: You have an incredible batting average, so um, I will
Speaker 1: write that down and it will be a book that
Speaker 1: I'll buy, and then three years from I probably should
Speaker 1: start reading this. But you know, it looks it just
Speaker 1: looks good in the back. I picked those two because
Speaker 1: they're both like not you know, not for you, but yeah,
Speaker 1: they're like two pages or less. I think they're both
Speaker 1: relatively quick reads. Earthlings Yeah by Murata and Drive Your
Speaker 1: Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by recent Nobel
Speaker 1: Prize winner Olga. But it's a fun But that one
Speaker 1: is like she even said was kind of her I
Speaker 1: need money while I'm writing this tone that took me
Speaker 1: eight years to right, and I'm going to take a
Speaker 1: break and write this murder mystery over the course of
Speaker 1: like six months. But it turned out to be like
Speaker 1: one of her best books, and it's like an amazing read.
Speaker 1: That's how I feel about like NFL dot Com articles,
Speaker 1: like in theory, quietly working on something important in the
Speaker 1: background while punching these things out left and right, not
Speaker 1: even left and right at this point that the like, wait,
Speaker 1: what are you the important thing that you're working on?
Speaker 1: Then well, no, that's the part that's missing, unfortunately. But
Speaker 1: I'd like to think, you know, if you whenever you
Speaker 1: like have these, you'd like to think you're working on
Speaker 1: something important. In fact, I've probably even told people that
Speaker 1: at various junctures. Is it true? Not at all? This
Speaker 1: podcast thing? This podcast is important? UM. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you've made it this far, um, you you in this
Speaker 1: deep in the off season, you gotta love this podcast
Speaker 1: or you really love reading. Who really knows. We will
Speaker 1: be back on Tuesday next week, um and uh, hopefully
Speaker 1: we'll have some good stories to tell and hopefully the
Speaker 1: NFL does not explode. In the next day or two.
Speaker 1: As mini camps wrap up, the NFL all the players, coaches, GMS,
Speaker 1: front office. They are taking their only true time off
Speaker 1: of the year through about July four. Then some of
Speaker 1: the people start coming back. The players come back for
Speaker 1: training camp will be around uh next week and throughout
Speaker 1: the off season, but maybe not quite as much. All right,
Speaker 1: let's hit the music. There is until Tuesday. Um Mark
Speaker 1: Sessler was here, Patrick Cleaveland was here. We got help
Speaker 1: from producing justin keep a call