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Speaker 2: All right a day later, but never a dollar short.
Speaker 2: John Middlecoff, former NFL scout. We do our fifty minutes
Speaker 2: to an hour.
Speaker 1: Chop it up. And even though this is the NFL's offseason,
Speaker 1: there's all sorts of news going on. DraftKings released, it's
Speaker 1: NFL win totals. There's a couple of weird ones. God,
Speaker 1: did Kirk Cousins get respect? The Falcons are ten and
Speaker 1: a half that is ultimately Vegas and DraftKings telling you
Speaker 1: Kirk Cousins is a very good capable quarterback in this league.
Speaker 1: Ten and a half, by the way, is the same
Speaker 1: number for Josh Allen and the Bills, and Joe Burrow
Speaker 1: and the Bengals and Tua and Mike McDaniels. So I
Speaker 1: think it's funny. There's just there's certain people in every
Speaker 1: industry that are way more respected than the public understands.
Speaker 1: John Middelcoff, the former NFL scout three and out that
Speaker 1: of all the draft Kings, unders and overs Falcons, ten
Speaker 1: and a half was like, holy crap. And most I mean,
Speaker 1: they do have a good old line for Kirk, but
Speaker 1: I think Kirk Cousins is way more respected in the
Speaker 1: league than he is outside of the league.
Speaker 3: Well, think about it. The previous year, right, they won
Speaker 3: thirteen games, they were in the playoffs. They started slow
Speaker 3: this year, but they were coming on. He was playing
Speaker 3: his best football that they would have been a clear
Speaker 3: factor to make a wild card. I mean he's proven.
Speaker 3: I mean, if he's healthy in the team solid, he's
Speaker 3: a playoff. Might not win in the playoffs, but he
Speaker 3: can get you there. Which let's face it, ninety percent
Speaker 3: of owners would sign up for a heartbeat just to be,
Speaker 3: you know, playing football in the middle of January. I
Speaker 3: think people, you know, obviously you want to win the
Speaker 3: Super Bowl. All these teams just want to make the playoffs,
Speaker 3: right in football a lot like March Madness. It's not
Speaker 3: a seven game scenario. The Giants were not as good
Speaker 3: as the Minnesota two years ago, but they beat them,
Speaker 3: and they played in the second round and then they
Speaker 3: got their breaks beeat off by the Eagles. You just
Speaker 3: got to get to the dance. And then we saw
Speaker 3: the Giants win two Super Bowls as wildcard teams. They
Speaker 3: went on the road. Football is kind of unique that way. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And also to give you a double shot of Kirk
Speaker 1: Cousins value the Vikings despite a loaded offensive roster, I
Speaker 1: think what's considered one of the sharper offensive coaches, the
Speaker 1: Vikings are only a six and a half win team.
Speaker 1: Well that's Kirk Cousins and we both like Sam Darnold athletically,
Speaker 1: but they're telling you there's a gap of like three
Speaker 1: to four games between Kirk Cousins and Sam Darnald. So
Speaker 1: if you just look at the over unders on the
Speaker 1: Falcons ten and a half Viking six and a half,
Speaker 1: and we know the coach with Minnesota in an offensive
Speaker 1: pivoting league is a really effective coach won a game
Speaker 1: without a practice with Josh Dobbs. The Vikings are one
Speaker 1: of the more talented teams in the league offensively six
Speaker 1: and a half wins, so that doubles down on Cousins
Speaker 1: is viewed inside analytics, Vegas draft kings the league much
Speaker 1: higher value than everybody outside of the league.
Speaker 3: Well of all the guys right not making huge money
Speaker 3: or a young player who's going to ascend to make
Speaker 3: a lot of money like a CJ. Stroud. Sam Darnold
Speaker 3: either is going to set himself up to be a
Speaker 3: starting quarterback for the foreseeable future if he has a
Speaker 3: good year and he's successful, or he's just going to
Speaker 3: be a lifetime backup. I mean that's because he's going
Speaker 3: to get judged. I mean, even if they end up
Speaker 3: drafting JJ McCarthy, he's going to start. It'd be hard
Speaker 3: for that guy to beat him out come Week one.
Speaker 3: But if he plays well, and they're definitely people to
Speaker 3: play well with right at wide receiver. But if it
Speaker 3: does not go well, like his days of ever being
Speaker 3: discussed anymore, and I'd be done holding on as well.
Speaker 3: Not that I have much stock, but I haven't sold
Speaker 3: at all, that's right.
Speaker 1: I feel the same way. So Jmac on our show
Speaker 1: today that heard FS one brought up a really interesting point.
Speaker 1: He's very good at this because he's got a lot
Speaker 1: of contacts with agents and stuff. So here's Jim Harbaugh
Speaker 1: just continually saying JJ McCarthy's the best player in the draft.
Speaker 1: I mean, this guy's unbelievable. Well, as he brought up today,
Speaker 1: Minnesota is poised to move up every rumor on every board.
Speaker 1: As Minnesota's moving up, they've accumulated two first picks. Well,
Speaker 1: they don't want to move up to first, second, or third,
Speaker 1: probably because then you'd have to give up multiple ones,
Speaker 1: you know, for a college player. But you could move
Speaker 1: up to five with the Chargers and probably get JJ
Speaker 1: McCarthy because we don't believe unless the Giants move up
Speaker 1: spots to go to Arizona spot. It really is very nobody.
Speaker 1: Chicago's not given up their pick. I don't think Washington's
Speaker 1: given up their pick.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: New England's open for business at three, but I think
Speaker 1: there's some misgivings. Would Jade and Daniels size some of
Speaker 1: his style of play to put him up in New
Speaker 1: England in that weather? My guess is so j Max
Speaker 1: said what they're doing basically is Harbaugh is saying how
Speaker 1: great McCarthy is, because if you like JJ McCarthy, he'd
Speaker 1: be a reach at one, two or three, but at five,
Speaker 1: if he is a reach, it's not a huge reach.
Speaker 1: If he's projected to be nine, ten, eleven, twelve. And
Speaker 1: all Harbaugh is doing is saying, oh, this guy's great.
Speaker 1: He wants you to spend more to get his fifth pick.
Speaker 1: And I thought, yeah, that's exactly what he's doing right well.
Speaker 3: Adam Peters told the local guys today they're not open
Speaker 3: for business. They've listened, but they were never open.
Speaker 1: That's Washington's GM.
Speaker 3: That's Washington's GM. I do think the Patriots saying that
Speaker 3: here's the problem for the Chargers. Ideally they would love
Speaker 3: to do that deal right eleven twenty three, Maybe next
Speaker 3: year's too big hole kind of help reset their roster money.
Speaker 3: Austin for the Arizona Cardinals GM said we have flagshing
Speaker 3: lights open for business, right flashing lights. Girod Mayo said,
Speaker 3: within the last twenty four hours, we're open for business too.
Speaker 3: If teams trade up before the Chargers, it takes two
Speaker 3: to tango. Teams often say hey, we wanted to move
Speaker 3: back or we wanted to move forward. We couldn't get
Speaker 3: a yes on the other end of the line. What
Speaker 3: if quarterbacks and teams trade either the Patriots take a
Speaker 3: guy or trade back, and the Giants and the Vikings
Speaker 3: take three to four. What happens to the Chargers if
Speaker 3: they get stuck there? Because I have a hard time
Speaker 3: colin envisioning them. And I know these wide receivers are
Speaker 3: viewed very highly, and I know they just got rid
Speaker 3: of to google Jim harboss history and his GM just
Speaker 3: came from the Ravens. They would much more be inclined
Speaker 3: to take a lineman that's more of their style high
Speaker 3: in the draft. But they already have a left tackle
Speaker 3: googling alt he's only played on the left side. I
Speaker 3: think it's a little rich for the Oregon State guy
Speaker 3: who's more of a right tackle potentially. Yeah, they already
Speaker 3: have two defensive linemen, but you could always take a
Speaker 3: defensive lineman. I don't think there's a guy I viewed
Speaker 3: as a number five overall pick in this draft at
Speaker 3: that spot. They could get stuck pretty quickly. Now they
Speaker 3: could just take a wide receiver. Do you envision a
Speaker 3: Ravens GM and Jim Harbaugh taking a wide receiver with
Speaker 3: a film so I can't. I can't.
Speaker 1: So I have envisioned if they got If the Chargers
Speaker 1: got Minnesota's picks and it was two firsts, my first
Speaker 1: thing I envisioned would be they moved back to like
Speaker 1: what is eleven or twelve?
Speaker 3: What are the Vikings eleven?
Speaker 1: Yeah, my takeaway is that they would take the Oregon
Speaker 1: State tackle at eleven, maybe a bit high, but he's
Speaker 1: a bruiser and they could also use him on the
Speaker 1: interior of their issues. And then I think their second
Speaker 1: pick would be a defensive tackle from like Texas or
Speaker 1: one of the big interior alignement right tackle, defensive tackle.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, that's exactly now. And then they'd go
Speaker 1: get a center. They got two fourth round picks, They're
Speaker 1: going to get a center of the third or the
Speaker 1: fourth round. That's what Jim wants to do. He wants
Speaker 1: to get big. You know, George Young, the legendary Giants
Speaker 1: GM used to always say, what in doubt, go big
Speaker 1: that heart. That's how Harbaugh and Baltimore and the Harbaugh's draft,
Speaker 1: they just go big a lot. Hell, I can make
Speaker 1: an argument. Zay Flowers is the first home run wide
Speaker 1: receiver hit that Lamar Jackson's had. Where you're I mean
Speaker 1: Odell didn't make any impact. Mark Andrews has been ready
Speaker 1: the start of the receiving game. So yeah, I'm with you.
Speaker 3: And they took him in the twenties, yes, right, the Ravens,
Speaker 3: the Helodinadas, those types they take higher. Ronnie Stanley, Zay
Speaker 3: Flowers are are they taking even though Moliku neighbors and
Speaker 3: Roma Dunes? They are viewed as top ten? Marvin Harrison.
Speaker 3: I just I have a really hard time. Now. Maybe
Speaker 3: Marvin Harrison, he's seen him up close and personal, Maybe
Speaker 3: he feels very comfortable with that player. But I can't
Speaker 3: imagine that's what they want to do. But I can
Speaker 3: already envision them getting stuck because if if a quarterback
Speaker 3: goes one, two, three, four, whether that's trade ups, obviously
Speaker 3: Arizona would have to trade back. But let's say the
Speaker 3: Patriots even stay there. What if there's no one to
Speaker 3: trade with the Chargers?
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I so today the New York Giants Amara
Speaker 1: family said that they can draft a quarterback at number six.
Speaker 1: The Mars said they will allow the GM and the
Speaker 1: coach if they think it's necessary. Nice of them, nice
Speaker 1: of them to say you can draft a quarterback, so
Speaker 1: I think they will. I could see the Giants actually,
Speaker 1: you know my guess, I don't know. If I knew
Speaker 1: Jade and Daniels in that weather, I would much rather have.
Speaker 1: So don't we both agree it's going to go Caleb
Speaker 1: Drake May one and two. Do we agree with that?
Speaker 3: Plasarrow said today from the league meetings that he's heard
Speaker 3: a lot of JJ McCarthy with Adam Peters. And when
Speaker 3: you think of Adam Peters's history, right even recently, they
Speaker 3: won a lot with Jimmy Garoppolo and then they had
Speaker 3: immediate success with Brock Purty. Now, obviously these two guys
Speaker 3: are two of the best. I mean, Brady's the best
Speaker 3: player ever in Peyton mannings the top five quarterback. He
Speaker 3: was around those guys in Denver and then New England,
Speaker 3: so prototypical, and the one guy that he completely whiffed
Speaker 3: on with the group was Trey Lance. So I wonder
Speaker 3: if they're more inclined. I heard Drake May for but
Speaker 3: then when I saw that, I don't think that's just
Speaker 3: getting thrown around because if JJ could go four, what
Speaker 3: the hell's the difference of taking him too. If people
Speaker 3: like him at four or five, it's not crazy to
Speaker 3: think someone would like him at two. Write the same
Speaker 3: pick essentially, So you either think the guys that started
Speaker 3: quarterback and a high level or not.
Speaker 1: Right, here's you, as a former NFL scout with the Eagles,
Speaker 1: take me inside. So I got into this thing today.
Speaker 1: I said, Denver's in a weird spot. So are the Raiders.
Speaker 1: Gardner Minshew and Aidan O'Connell can't be the future in
Speaker 1: that division, all right, But what if you have bon
Speaker 1: Nicks at let's say twenty four, your scouts say, we
Speaker 1: think he's the twenty four to the best player. Do
Speaker 1: I take him? Now? It's quarterback, and I do believe
Speaker 1: I'm willing to reach at pass rusher or quarterback receiver.
Speaker 1: I won't because there's a glut of talent. There's not
Speaker 1: a glut of receiver quarterback talent annually in this league.
Speaker 1: Max Crosby fifth round is a complete outlier. Brady in
Speaker 1: the sixth round outlier. So what do you do if
Speaker 1: your scouting department says, listen, we have him like twenty
Speaker 1: four to twenty five, and we've got the eleventh or
Speaker 1: the twelfth pick of Denver and the Raiders, And I mean,
Speaker 1: what do you do? What's the discussion in the draft room.
Speaker 3: I saw a quote today from Joe Shane the Giants
Speaker 3: GM and he said, what makes it very unique at
Speaker 3: the quarterback position? And Chris Ballard talked about this forever, right,
Speaker 3: everyone always wanted me to take a quarterback. Well, if
Speaker 3: I don't like the guy at pick eighteen or fifteen
Speaker 3: or twenty, just because he's quote unquote falling, it's not
Speaker 3: a defensive lineman or a wide receiver or a defensive
Speaker 3: back that I can mix in. He can just ultimately
Speaker 3: become my nickel corner or you know, he didn't turn
Speaker 3: out to be a tackle, but he can be my guard,
Speaker 3: or he can be my run stuffing defensive tackle. Even
Speaker 3: if it clearly was the wrong pick, he can still
Speaker 3: quarterbacks bat he's awful and he just doesn't play right.
Speaker 3: So I think it gets very tricky that just because
Speaker 3: a guy quote unquote falling, guys that falling and then
Speaker 3: are picked, it's because that when Aaron Rodgers fell to
Speaker 3: the Packers, they liked him a lot. Same with Jordan
Speaker 3: love Right, he felt other teams didn't like him, but
Speaker 3: they valued him and they took him. So I think
Speaker 3: of a quarterback as quote, you know, if bo Nick's
Speaker 3: there in the mid teens, you either like the player
Speaker 3: or you don't at that value. And if you don't,
Speaker 3: you know, if you're unsure. I would never pick the
Speaker 3: quarterback because that's where you get in these positions where
Speaker 3: you're kind of stuck. Where even these other the Chargers
Speaker 3: wide receiver last year was a disaster. Well you know
Speaker 3: it's like, well, maybe we figure something out, maybe becomes
Speaker 3: our third wide receiver. Maybe there are a couple of
Speaker 3: things he can do well for quarterback. He either can
Speaker 3: play or he can that's right, and that's why JJ McCarthy.
Speaker 3: I looked at some of their athletic testing numbers. Alex
Speaker 3: Smith was taller. I think there are a lot of
Speaker 3: similarities with Alex Smith. And once Alex got real coaching
Speaker 3: Andy and Harbaugh, he was a really solid court Never
Speaker 3: Josh Allen or Mahomes, but he was damn good. You
Speaker 3: could make the playoffs with. And I think and just
Speaker 3: because a guy has a high physical ceiling Jayden Daniels,
Speaker 3: there's no guarantee. So you have to like the guy,
Speaker 3: and then you have to be able to everyone puts
Speaker 3: the comps always like this guy's the next Patrick Mahomes.
Speaker 3: I've been watching football for thirty years. I've seen one
Speaker 3: Patrick Mahomes. Remember when Draymond was drafted for five straight years, like,
Speaker 3: this guy's gonna be the next Draymond. There hasn't been
Speaker 3: a Draymond since. But no one ever wants to comp like,
Speaker 3: you know what, this guy might be Alex Smith, because
Speaker 3: everyone always wants the guy to be a higher in
Speaker 3: the first round. Sure you can do that with mid
Speaker 3: round picks, but no one ever comps like, yeah, I
Speaker 3: think this guy's a third wide receiver. Well we're taking
Speaker 3: the guy at twenty, Like that's a problem. So I
Speaker 3: think you got to be very careful with quarterbacks high
Speaker 3: in the draft. That's why I think teams get very
Speaker 3: comfortable when a guy falls to the second You've seen
Speaker 3: a lot of success stories Matt Schob, Derek Carr, Jimmy Garoppolo.
Speaker 3: There's a lot less pressure. You don't have to play
Speaker 3: him right away. Let's face it, in modern day football,
Speaker 3: if I draft a guy Raiders Denver in the top fifteen,
Speaker 3: no one wants to see Gardner, Minshew or whoever the
Speaker 3: Denver Jared sid him for long. Might give me a
Speaker 3: game or two, but just throw the other guy, and
Speaker 3: that sometimes can just get yourself in a massive, massive problem.
Speaker 3: Twy JJ McCarthy makes sense for Minnesota. They don't have
Speaker 3: to throw him in right away. Lamar Jackson back in
Speaker 3: the day with uh Baltimore with the Ravens, they had
Speaker 3: Flacco right so't he didn't start until the middle of
Speaker 3: the season kind of got to ease in. Even brock
Speaker 3: Perty now he was a seventh round pick, but he
Speaker 3: wasn't forced into action right away. Some of these guys
Speaker 3: get forced into action. I don't care who you are.
Speaker 3: As a young person, your confidence is very, very brittle.
Speaker 3: I mean, you saw Bryce young. He has another year
Speaker 3: like that, it could just ruin his career, right. We've
Speaker 3: seen it happen at what Alex Smith overcame with Nolan
Speaker 3: and Singletary is one of the greatest accomplishments I've ever seen.
Speaker 3: Most guys, it just ends them, right. But he didn't
Speaker 3: break and then Harbaugh kind of resurrected him. So I
Speaker 3: think that you have to be a realistic with your
Speaker 3: expectations at quarterback. But no, it's it's very black or white.
Speaker 3: There's no like, well we can mix this guy in
Speaker 3: twenty five snaps. And that's where I think you get
Speaker 3: into a lot of problems with the position.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, if you will with a quarterback at
Speaker 1: the twelve spot, you're just you just wasted a pick.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's one thing if you trade a first
Speaker 1: round pick like the Rams had done for years to
Speaker 1: get you know, Jalen Ramsey and good players. It's another
Speaker 1: one you don't have it because you whifted on a quarterback.
Speaker 1: It's just hard to overcome the you know, they there's
Speaker 1: the Dion Sanders thing is interesting. Like listen, Colorado football
Speaker 1: has been irrelevant outside of the Bill McCartney days most
Speaker 1: of my life. There was the Eric b Enemy. There
Speaker 1: was that four or five year run when they just
Speaker 1: got a lot of LA kids and they were fun
Speaker 1: and they were it was really really a really interesting
Speaker 1: program for about five years. And so when Dion got
Speaker 1: the job, you know, my take is he'll make them
Speaker 1: interesting and he'll recruit. But I wonder if he's doing
Speaker 1: a disservice to his son. So he's talked about this
Speaker 1: whole My son doesn't want to play in cold weather. Well,
Speaker 1: shit in January. Take out Miami and domes. You know,
Speaker 1: twenty seven of the thirty two teams are cold. You know,
Speaker 1: it's you know, there's more Detroit. Thankfully he's in a dome.
Speaker 1: In Minneapolis. Minnesota is in a dome. But there's just
Speaker 1: a lot of cold weather football. I mean, the Chiefs,
Speaker 1: the Bills, the Ravens, the Patriots, the Seahawks for a while.
Speaker 1: The Niners can be very cold in January December. They've
Speaker 1: dominated most of the last twenty five years of NFL football,
Speaker 1: twenty seven years Pittsburgh. I think Shaduur Sanders is really interesting.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't take him over Caleb or Drake may, but
Speaker 1: I do think there's an argument I could take him
Speaker 1: over Jayden Daniels when his dad says there may be
Speaker 1: an Eli Manning situation. Boy, my takeaway is Elway was
Speaker 1: probably the greatest quarterback prospect ever. That's why he's even
Speaker 1: referenced today. Eli Manning's brother Peyton won the MVP the
Speaker 1: year he's coming out, so there's a oh, oh, here
Speaker 1: we go. Peyton now is the best young quarterback. Let's
Speaker 1: get his brother. There was a lot of leverage the
Speaker 1: Shaduur Sanders, even with Diana's a dad, have any leverage
Speaker 1: to do that.
Speaker 3: Well, I think both those guys said it when they
Speaker 3: were established as the number one pick going into the draft.
Speaker 3: You know, this guy still has another year of college
Speaker 3: where let's face it, anyone that watched the second half
Speaker 3: of Colorado football, it was a fucking disaster.
Speaker 1: His last four games he had six touchdowns.
Speaker 3: He was not very good. Now, his first couple of
Speaker 3: games were pretty remarkable. It fell off a cliff. Obviously.
Speaker 3: He doesn't take, you know, an NFL scout to watch
Speaker 3: his physical talents. Right, he can run, he's got a
Speaker 3: big arm, but by no means if you just pulled
Speaker 3: NFL gms that watched him on tape, would they say
Speaker 3: he's some lock top pick. Deon's one of the greatest
Speaker 3: prospects of all time as well. And he you know,
Speaker 3: he was in one of the great drafts with like
Speaker 3: Barry Sanders and Jim Kelly made I forget exactly now,
Speaker 3: that was way before him, but whoever his draft was
Speaker 3: was incredible. In the Derek Thomas and I remember Dion
Speaker 3: had a famous story about someone wanted him to take
Speaker 3: a cognitive test and he asked them what pick you're taking.
Speaker 3: It was like the Giants and they were ninth. He's like,
Speaker 3: I'm not going to be there. I mean, Dion had
Speaker 3: a lot of leverage because he was an all time
Speaker 3: great prospect. Let's just let's just see how these guys.
Speaker 3: We don't even know what position Travis Hunter is gonna play.
Speaker 3: Is he a dB or a wide receiver? Right? I
Speaker 3: mean he eventually has to establish a position to play
Speaker 3: in the NFL. He's not gonna go both ways. Well,
Speaker 3: so to put this pressure, and I understand he's like
Speaker 3: a father. He basically is a father to Travis as well.
Speaker 3: I have no problem having confidence, like these guys are
Speaker 3: gonna be great NFL players. He's gonna have a big season.
Speaker 3: But to make that statement already, let's face it kind
Speaker 3: of puts a bad taste into everyone's mouth coming in there, because,
Speaker 3: like you said, one, you end up whether you're playing
Speaker 3: in La San Francisco or Green Bay, you end up
Speaker 3: playing cold weather games all the time, right with cross rivals,
Speaker 3: even teams in your own division end up being cold.
Speaker 3: The playoffs turn cold on the road. He plays in Colorado,
Speaker 3: right now, it's not. What's the weather right now in
Speaker 3: Denver probably thirty five to forty degrees. So I understand
Speaker 3: that you know he's a Texas Florida guy, but I one,
Speaker 3: we just have this guy's not Caleb Williams or Trevor Lawrence.
Speaker 3: He got everyone's universally agree that he's some elite.
Speaker 1: Player Lway, Luck, Trevor and Caleb. Going into the season.
Speaker 1: We're a unanimous MVP. Schauduur, isn't I think people forget
Speaker 1: this if you take Jordan Addison out of the equation
Speaker 1: sc pittsburgh s seed to the Vikings the last two
Speaker 1: years without an elite offensive teammate, he had ninety three
Speaker 1: touchdowns Caleb Williams and ten picks. Those are in And
Speaker 1: this year was the best the PAC twelve's been in
Speaker 1: my adult life. I mean it was really as good.
Speaker 1: I mean Arizona was good. I mean Oregon, Washington it
Speaker 1: was excellent.
Speaker 3: Washington State was solid, cal was frisky.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So it's like, guys, come on, what are we
Speaker 1: talking about here? Utahzo was good. So I like, I
Speaker 1: can like Shaduur Sanders. I don't think he's close to
Speaker 1: the power thrower of Caleb Williams. I mean, and both
Speaker 1: had bad offensive lines this year. Look at the numbers,
Speaker 1: I mean down the street should and I liked him
Speaker 1: against TCU. The more I saw of Shaduur, the less
Speaker 1: I liked him.
Speaker 3: That's probably I mean, I think, if you had to
Speaker 3: go off today, Travis Hunter is a better prospect than
Speaker 3: Shador Sanders. Now, obviously that can change, and he plays
Speaker 3: the most important position. But there are gonna be a
Speaker 3: lot of eye I mean, there were a lot of
Speaker 3: eyeballs on him at least early once they started being
Speaker 3: terrible people you know, fell off. But I think this
Speaker 3: year and it's gonna be fascinating. Let's face that he
Speaker 3: plays in a crappy conference. I mean, I would imagine
Speaker 3: the Big twelve of now the four, the Big ten
Speaker 3: in the SEC. I would say the ACC is going
Speaker 3: to be viewed as better than the Big twelve going
Speaker 3: into the season. So he you know, when it all
Speaker 3: said and done, what if he's kind of playing nobody's
Speaker 3: and he's not that great again? I mean, are we
Speaker 3: talking about some for sure top ten pick. I'm not
Speaker 3: saying that he can't. He could be the number one pick,
Speaker 3: but he also could be a second round pick. There's
Speaker 3: just no I would not put the rubber stamp right
Speaker 3: now he is some lock top ten pick. That's just
Speaker 3: not the way it works. And things change. Think how
Speaker 3: often JJ McCarthy wasn't viewed as a top ten pick
Speaker 3: coming into the season. Hell even after the season. I
Speaker 3: don't think universally the average person would be like, that's
Speaker 3: the top ten pick. Now he's gonna go like top five. Yeah,
Speaker 3: Jayden Daniels kind of have the Joe Burrow ascension. No
Speaker 3: one was talking about that guy, Whin's the Heisman. Now
Speaker 3: he's talked about Bo Knicks. I mean think things change
Speaker 3: very rapidly in football with the prospects at the quarterback position.
Speaker 3: So if they're going to talk a big game, which
Speaker 3: Deon does because Dion can back it up, I think
Speaker 3: sometimes he talks for his kids. And you know last
Speaker 3: year that Colorado State situation talking before the game before
Speaker 3: what happened was best player got destroyed, ruptured a kidney,
Speaker 3: and like almost died on the field. So DEM's coach now, right,
Speaker 3: he's not the player. So you put this added pressure
Speaker 3: on him, and he'd say, well, they have pressure no
Speaker 3: matter what because of my name and that's true, but
Speaker 3: I think this is another level. I mean, that's gonna
Speaker 3: be a major talking point all next fall.
Speaker 1: So they're at the league meetings. The hip drop tackle
Speaker 1: was banned. The defensive players are objecting to it. It's
Speaker 1: very hard for a smaller player to tackle a big player.
Speaker 1: Puts the defense at a further disadvantage. I don't think
Speaker 1: the league cares. Also, yeah, yeah, it means more passers
Speaker 1: to the tight end. And my takeaway is they're going
Speaker 1: to throw the ball to the pigs.
Speaker 3: More.
Speaker 1: Replay assistance will now be permitted to change incorrect calls
Speaker 1: for roughing the passer and intentional grounding. People could argue, God,
Speaker 1: that's too much complexity to the replay system. I actually
Speaker 1: like that none of these. None of these bothered me.
Speaker 1: I don't think you know one of the things that
Speaker 1: has changed in football and for the better. People often
Speaker 1: say they like defense, they like their team having a
Speaker 1: good defense. They don't really like defense. So if I
Speaker 1: said to you the Super Bowl was nine to six
Speaker 1: or twenty eight to twenty seven, fans would take the ladder.
Speaker 1: People love defense when it's theirs, but people fans will
Speaker 1: watch any great offense. It doesn't matter. If it's the
Speaker 1: greatest show on turf, it's Mahomes in his biggest year
Speaker 1: with Tyreek, and so I think the league's very clearly
Speaker 1: saying we're trying to keep the players healthy. We're gonna
Speaker 1: lean offense. It's good for fantasy, it's good for TV.
Speaker 1: Almost everything to me is just safety or TV product.
Speaker 1: That's how I view all these rule changes.
Speaker 3: Well, my initial reaction is I don't think it's necessary
Speaker 3: because I think the defensive player, you know, the pure
Speaker 3: football element. If I'm trying to get most guys are
Speaker 3: not Ray Lewis, Patrick Willis and Brian Urlacker that can
Speaker 3: form tackle anybody in space. I'm doing whatever I can
Speaker 3: to get Christian McCaffrey, Alvin Kamara, or Travis Kelsey to
Speaker 3: the ground. Well, who did I just name? Besides the quarterbacks,
Speaker 3: the most famous players in the league have the ball
Speaker 3: in their hand. They want Deebo, Samuel, Alvin Kamara, Christian McCaffrey,
Speaker 3: Saquon Barkley. They don't want him to get injured. Right,
Speaker 3: those are the people for fantasy football. People watch the
Speaker 3: casual fan, which the NFL has more of. They want
Speaker 3: to protect those guys. So I think it's just simple.
Speaker 3: Do they truly care about safety? I don't think they
Speaker 3: even did it with the head. They just didn't want
Speaker 3: to get suit anymore. It was all a cover your
Speaker 3: ass move, and that's been regulated out of the game, right,
Speaker 3: there's no people don't launch themselves anymore. The quarterback, and
Speaker 3: you've been saying this forever. The quarterback's the most important
Speaker 3: position for all of us fans to watch. No one
Speaker 3: wants to watch the Bills play the cheeks. We'll two
Speaker 3: backup quarterbacks even if we get mad on ridiculous roughing
Speaker 3: the pastors. The intention is to keep those guys safe
Speaker 3: and that I understand that this one. I'm not going
Speaker 3: to freak out until I see the way they call it,
Speaker 3: because as a defender, the overwhelming majority of players are
Speaker 3: just trying to get the player to the ground, right.
Speaker 3: No one's trying even the guy that hurt Mark Andrews.
Speaker 3: Obviously he was not trying to injure him. And I
Speaker 3: think this is where the players have been saying this forever.
Speaker 3: Once they cut the quote unquote head hunting, they go
Speaker 3: after the knees. Well, what pays the Bills for these guys?
Speaker 3: They're lakes and so we've seen a lot of knee
Speaker 3: injuries because guys get their kne He's blown out. It
Speaker 3: happened to the taller players like Gronk forever. So listen,
Speaker 3: I think they they overreact to stuff like this. And
Speaker 3: the writing was on the wall a couple of weeks
Speaker 3: ago when they were all openly talking about in the
Speaker 3: league office. I would imagine a lot of coaches don't
Speaker 3: like it. But as we've seen, they don't give a
Speaker 3: shit what the coaches think, you know, So this is all,
Speaker 3: like you said, it gets back to the TV. It's
Speaker 3: why whenever you see these rules, ninety percent of the time,
Speaker 3: the coaches would always vote no. They have no power.
Speaker 3: It's just the league, the owners and the money, which
Speaker 3: then the coaches and the players all benefit from. But
Speaker 3: some of these rules back to remember the CBA. There's
Speaker 3: no practice anymore. Well, yeah, that limits the development of
Speaker 3: young quarterbacks and offensive linemen. But Roger Goodell and his
Speaker 3: team is not thinking about that. They're just thinking about
Speaker 3: revenue growth, revenue growth and safety. They've kind of figured
Speaker 3: out a formula and safety, so for the offensive players.
Speaker 1: You know, it's interesting. I've always had kind of a
Speaker 1: theory about what I do is that if I get
Speaker 1: new information, change my opinion. And I'm not your classic journalist, obviously,
Speaker 1: I'm not a boots on the ground guy. But I'm texting,
Speaker 1: texted NFL two NFL gms today about something so and
Speaker 1: you have the same content contacts and the same kind
Speaker 1: of effort.
Speaker 2: Is that we're both.
Speaker 1: Seeking information constantly and sometimes I just get new information.
Speaker 1: And I was very cool on Ryan Poll's you know
Speaker 1: former offensive lineman the Bears GM a Vilas Jones pick.
Speaker 1: I could not stand at number three. I just thought
Speaker 1: it was a complete with and I thought they just
Speaker 1: didn't do their homework or their sec scout didn't do
Speaker 1: their homework because at sc he couldn't track the ball.
Speaker 1: He was a returner.
Speaker 3: Max.
Speaker 1: I didn't love the Chase Claypool move, but I understood it.
Speaker 1: Mooney was a smaller player, Chase was a big body,
Speaker 1: had a great rookie year. Distracted player didn't work. But
Speaker 1: I got to tell you, as a former offensive lineman,
Speaker 1: I think he's put some effort into draft capital, and
Speaker 1: I think their left tackle and right tackle can both play.
Speaker 1: They had another tackle they moved inside. They've saved his
Speaker 1: career I thought the Dj Moore move, Keenan Allen, DeAndre Swift,
Speaker 1: Gerald Everett, I've got to be honest, I did not
Speaker 1: a year ago. I did not trust Ryan Poles the
Speaker 1: GM of the Bears. But I've got new information. The
Speaker 1: other thing they're doing, which the Steelers aren't. The Steelers
Speaker 1: and the Bears are defined defensively. They're cultures. I mean,
Speaker 1: outside of Bradshawn Ben and some talented receivers, it's a
Speaker 1: defensive culture. He is saying, No, that's not what we're
Speaker 1: gonna do here. We're gonna spend money on offense. That's
Speaker 1: what the Rams do, the Browns are doing, That's what
Speaker 1: the Chiefs are doing. It's the opposite of the Steelers.
Speaker 1: So I find over the last two weeks when he
Speaker 1: went and got Keenan DeAndre Swift, good pass catching running back,
Speaker 1: twenty five year old kid, good player, not a great player,
Speaker 1: good player, and then Gerald Everett with Cole Kamet, those
Speaker 1: are functional, smart players. I've got to be honest. Between Caleb,
Speaker 1: who I really like, between these offensive pieces, I almost
Speaker 1: feel like I've got new information. I think I think
Speaker 1: the Bears got the GM right. How is he viewed
Speaker 1: inside the league.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, I think he had what has potential
Speaker 3: to be one of the great moves in the history
Speaker 3: of the league in that trade that he made last
Speaker 3: year with the Carolina Panthers, right, because for a while
Speaker 3: looked like he was going to be defined on some
Speaker 3: of his worst moves that was early on. I mean,
Speaker 3: that Chase Claypool move was pretty embarrassing because his pick
Speaker 3: ended up being really high, and I think the Steelers
Speaker 3: ended up drafting Joey Porter Junior, who's a really high
Speaker 3: end play. I mean, that pick at the high at
Speaker 3: the beginning of the second round is very, very valuable.
Speaker 3: But that Carolina Panther trade, I mean truly was a
Speaker 3: game changer. And if Caleb he does not have to
Speaker 3: become Patrick Mahomes, if he just as a top ten
Speaker 3: NFL quarterback, which would be probably the best quarterback in
Speaker 3: the history of the franchise, it would change their franchise forever.
Speaker 3: And he took advantage of a team and an owner
Speaker 3: who was desperate and cleaned up right, and he also
Speaker 3: added one of their best players who was under contract
Speaker 3: in Dj Moore. Because my first thought last year when
Speaker 3: they traded for Swam, I'm like God, that's a little much.
Speaker 3: Well then they immediately got him. They started winning games,
Speaker 3: their defense was better, so their draft pick actually ended
Speaker 3: up not as bad. They got him under contract and like,
Speaker 3: actually that aged pretty well. I had to kind of
Speaker 3: eat that. I was like, well, that's not as crazy
Speaker 3: as it looked. So yeah, when you work for Andy
Speaker 3: and Veitch and John Dorsey, he was around a lot
Speaker 3: of high level people for a while, and I think
Speaker 3: it's fair. I'm sure you would agree, and you've done
Speaker 3: this just like most people. Every human being makes bad
Speaker 3: business decisions. Most people's are not public as a GM.
Speaker 3: Every move you make is very public, right, so you're
Speaker 3: gonna have bad ones, but it doesn't have to define
Speaker 3: you if your great moves are awesome. Joe Douglas has
Speaker 3: had some really good moves for the Jets, but his
Speaker 3: quarterback moves so far have just not worked out, and
Speaker 3: it's going to ultimately get him fired if they don't work. So,
Speaker 3: if you figure out the quarterback situation, which they are
Speaker 3: primed to do in Chicago, all these other kind of
Speaker 3: they're not even antler moves because they were kind of big,
Speaker 3: have a chance to. If DJ Morris is in the
Speaker 3: pro Bowl for a couple of years, and Sweat's a
Speaker 3: pro bowler. I mean, we're gonna talking about this guy
Speaker 3: like a top ten GM and if he can get
Speaker 3: the Bears as a winning operation. Now, as a GM,
Speaker 3: you're also very dependent on your head coach. There is
Speaker 3: no great general manager that doesn't either have a good
Speaker 3: de great head coach. So you don't once the season starts,
Speaker 3: you're not implementing anything. You're not with the player, you're
Speaker 3: not doing anything. Really, Chris Verry, Chris Balar gets a second.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Chris Balard's reputation is going to improve over the
Speaker 1: next two years because of Shane Steichen.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean he has might have the next Kyle Shanahan, right,
Speaker 3: So it's gonna it's gonna change his life, right, it
Speaker 3: already did this year. The quarterback got hurt. We're all like, oh,
Speaker 3: culture screwed. All of a sudden, they're in the playoff
Speaker 3: Mixed Week seventeen with Gardner Minshew, So there's a lot
Speaker 3: of pressure on Eberflus And most GMS get two coaches,
Speaker 3: so this was kind of a packaged deal. Pollyan, remember
Speaker 3: was involved with the hiring of these guys. He was
Speaker 3: definitely Eberflus. So if this doesn't work out, you get
Speaker 3: another one. You gotta get it right, because if he
Speaker 3: gets it right with Caleb and the player, he could
Speaker 3: be viewed as an elite guy. But if he doesn't
Speaker 3: a lot like the quarterback position, just because you have
Speaker 3: a good quarterback, if your coach isn't good enough, you're
Speaker 3: gonna be in trouble. I think the pressure on Iberflus, Sirianni,
Speaker 3: and McCarthy because of their markets, because I mean it's
Speaker 3: the Cowboys. He has no years left on his contract.
Speaker 3: They almost fired Siriani like two months ago. Those guys
Speaker 3: are going to be in their own little stratosphere and
Speaker 3: the way we talk about it. But I think eber
Speaker 3: Flus that the pressure starts immediately because of their roster,
Speaker 3: because of the talent, and because they have a quarterback
Speaker 3: that we've been talking. It happened in Jacksonville right part
Speaker 3: of Urban Meyer. Obviously there was a lot going on,
Speaker 3: but like you got handed Trevor Lawrence, So to me,
Speaker 3: the pressure gets multiplied by like ten. You know that
Speaker 3: Frank Reich, all of a sudden, we draft this guy
Speaker 3: at number one, we trade our franchise. I gotta fire you.
Speaker 3: It's not where that adds an element of pressure with
Speaker 3: the high quarterback pick, or it makes you Demiko get
Speaker 3: the guy right, like god, Dimko's a shooting rocket ship.
Speaker 3: Now he might he would have been probably saw it.
Speaker 3: He would have figured out because Demko's pretty special. But
Speaker 3: I don't know. I mean, Lose looks like he's changed
Speaker 3: his look feels a little younger, and.
Speaker 1: He noticed that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so his team's good. I mean, there's no disputing
Speaker 3: the roster talent is I mean, Keenan Allen's are real.
Speaker 3: They have multiple receivers, they have a tight end, they
Speaker 3: got some good they have picks. The thing, it's not
Speaker 3: like they just got Kleb then it'll pick again until
Speaker 3: the second round. They have the ninth pick in the draft,
Speaker 3: so the ability to either trade back or take a player.
Speaker 3: Imagine if they get that right. So they have this
Speaker 3: really talented roster on paper already, and they had Caleb
Speaker 3: Williams and player X. If that guy becomes an immediate
Speaker 3: impact player, we're talking about this team as a wild card.
Speaker 1: Well, I I if I was Chicago, I'd trade down
Speaker 1: at nine.
Speaker 3: I really would.
Speaker 1: Again, you're in a we've talked about the Chargers and
Speaker 1: the Giants. I think those positions like five and six
Speaker 1: are too rich for some of these quarterbacks.
Speaker 3: Nine.
Speaker 1: You know, if somebody wants to go Raiders eleven to nine, that's.
Speaker 3: Different than eleven. Denver sitting right there too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I could see where the Bears move down
Speaker 1: just three spots. Because this draft, I've been told, has
Speaker 1: eighteen first round players. It's usually about fifteen to sixteen.
Speaker 1: This feels like eighteen or night. The UCLA end is
Speaker 1: kind of the end of perceived first round talent, you know,
Speaker 1: the end of the first round, Those last eight to
Speaker 1: nine picks, it's no man's land. Everybody would rather have
Speaker 1: top of the second picks. But I've heard the UCLA
Speaker 1: rush end is probably in that small group of last
Speaker 1: considered elite start day one players be very productive. So
Speaker 1: I do think the Bears are in a good spot.
Speaker 1: Jalen Johnson the corner, Montese Whatt defensive line. I would
Speaker 1: think if they've got two receivers. Now, my take was
Speaker 1: their offensive moves in free agency signaled that that number
Speaker 1: nine pick is going to go defense. They got to
Speaker 1: get Ibra flu something, right. You can't just keep saying
Speaker 1: I got receivers. I got tight ends, and for the record,
Speaker 1: I think they probably they probably need I mean, if
Speaker 1: you look at that position, there's a verse from Florida State.
Speaker 1: They could probably use another rush end.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you could take the Bama pass rusher as well.
Speaker 3: You could take one of those two guys for sure.
Speaker 3: If you get stuck. The one thing with Chicago, you'd
Speaker 3: say that division. Detroit kept their offensive coordinator, who I
Speaker 3: think a lot of people view as the lynchpin of
Speaker 3: that operation. So they're gonna be good again. The talent
Speaker 3: on that roster is not really debatable. It's top five
Speaker 3: to six in the NFL that the Lions roster, And
Speaker 3: like most people, it's hard to bet against the Packers
Speaker 3: if Jordan Love is going to be a good player,
Speaker 3: So it's it's like it's going to be easy for
Speaker 3: them right that they're playing. And if Minnesota is just
Speaker 3: a credible operation with a lot of good talented players,
Speaker 3: it's going to be a challenge. And even if Caleb
Speaker 3: is really good, it's the NFL is hard. I mean,
Speaker 3: Peyton Manning set a record for interceptions this rookie year.
Speaker 3: So it's it's just the pressure that comes along with it. Now, Caleb,
Speaker 3: like you know, a lot of guys in recent memory
Speaker 3: has been under the spotlight. He's used to it, he's
Speaker 3: used to getting paid, so the money shouldn't overwhelm them.
Speaker 3: But there's when's the last time the Bears had this
Speaker 3: much pressure slash interest going into probably fifteen plus years ago.
Speaker 1: When's the last time they had this much offensive talent?
Speaker 1: When's the last time the Bears had a legitimate star
Speaker 1: number one receiver and a legitimate star number two receiver
Speaker 1: that's just not that you know, and a star quarterback.
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell you the last time he had Jay Cutler.
Speaker 1: Didn't he have al Seon Jeffrey?
Speaker 3: Yeah, he had Alshon. They had Brandon Marshall for a minute,
Speaker 3: they had those two guys. They were solid, they were
Speaker 3: a real team, and that's kind of what this. But
Speaker 3: Jay by that time was a veteran player played Okayleb's
Speaker 3: been in Lincoln Riley's offense. There is a little bit
Speaker 3: of a jolt, you know, yet Waldron runs more of
Speaker 3: the Shanahan operation. There's time to just get used to
Speaker 3: playing in a system where you're probably under center a
Speaker 3: little more now. Part of it is as an offensive coordinator.
Speaker 3: You're not going to force him to do things he
Speaker 3: doesn't want to do, but you also have to kind
Speaker 3: of find a middle ground. So I'm fascinated. I Like
Speaker 3: you said, Ryan Poles, I give him an a plus.
Speaker 3: For about the last twelve months, he's been kicking ass
Speaker 3: and taking names.
Speaker 1: No, I think he's done a really good job. And
Speaker 1: that's just one of the things I believe to be true.
Speaker 1: Like I never understood Lessen. You could criticize me all
Speaker 1: day long, but it's like I changed my position all
Speaker 1: the time because I get new information. The other thing
Speaker 1: I think is funny about being in a public job,
Speaker 1: whether you're a quarterback or a mayor a talk show host,
Speaker 1: things that looked like a hot take end up not
Speaker 1: being a hot take. I mean, if I'd told you
Speaker 1: a year before it happened, Kevin Durant's going to go
Speaker 1: to the Warriors, he'd be like, well, you're talking about
Speaker 1: Oklahoma City is a finals level team. And you know,
Speaker 1: if you'd just said, you know, Sean Payton's going to
Speaker 1: take that Denver job. I mean, I remember when he
Speaker 1: took it. I was he wouldn't talk to me the
Speaker 1: last couple of days when the rumor got out, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, he wanted the Chargers job. He didn't want
Speaker 1: that Russell Wilson thing. That's not gonna There are so
Speaker 1: many There are so many situations that I would have
Speaker 1: said ten years ago it's a hot take, Like I
Speaker 1: didn't get JJ McCarthy at all, and then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, I got two people from the combine. One said, yeah,
Speaker 1: we just talked to him at the whiteboard. She was unbelievable,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, that's what I heard about
Speaker 1: Baker before he went one. And then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I saw twenty one extra pound show up. So the
Speaker 1: JJ McCarthy stuff is kind of one of these. If
Speaker 1: you'd have said it a year ago, there's gonna be
Speaker 1: a wild pursuit of JJ McCarthy to be a top
Speaker 1: five quarterback. A year ago, I would have been like,
Speaker 1: you're out of your mindy sky.
Speaker 3: A year ago, I would have said, watching the Penn
Speaker 3: State game four months ago, like you're nuts. The Ohio
Speaker 3: State he played, He made some plays against Ohio State
Speaker 3: in Alabama. Too great that. But here's the thing. When
Speaker 3: you draft a guy, you're not really just thinking about
Speaker 3: Week one, right, you're really thinking about twenty twenty seven,
Speaker 3: twy twenty eight, two thousand and thirty. You're thinking about
Speaker 3: him being your quarterback for a decade plus. He just
Speaker 3: turned twenty one years old. For example, Will Levis is
Speaker 3: going to be twenty five, right, so it's like the
Speaker 3: age matters. What he was asked to do matters. I
Speaker 3: saw John Lynch talk to the press today and he's like,
Speaker 3: he's like, you know, I wanted to go to the
Speaker 3: USC Pro Day and he's like, one of my main
Speaker 3: sky like, don't waste your time. Go to the Michigan
Speaker 3: Pro Day. They have eighteen players we ain't taken Caleb.
Speaker 3: Go watch the talent. So he played on a team
Speaker 3: Colin that is gonna set potentially the NFL record for
Speaker 3: players drafted in one individual draft. They already set the
Speaker 3: combine record that they set six offensive line only five
Speaker 3: guys can play. I don't even know how that's possible, right,
Speaker 3: but that shows you. It's like USC Matt Castle's getting drafted,
Speaker 3: He's not even taking a snap. Shows you the talents
Speaker 3: at a different level. Well, when I out talent, most
Speaker 3: people I don't need to be playing like Lincoln Riley
Speaker 3: and that you know, try to score forty five points.
Speaker 3: That's not how hardball's ever played. So I think you start,
Speaker 3: you know, judging him on the context of everything and
Speaker 3: character and all the intangible stuff. Let's face it, it doesn't
Speaker 3: matter as much as the other positions. Jalen Carter has
Speaker 3: a ton of red flags. He's a six foot five,
Speaker 3: three hundred and twenty pound interior rusher. He was never
Speaker 3: falling out of the top ten if a quarterback had those.
Speaker 3: I don't care how talented he is. He's not getting drafted.
Speaker 3: I yeah, he's just not so wide receivers, defensive lineman
Speaker 3: people are ye. I will figure it out. Well, quarterback matters.
Speaker 1: Marvin Harrison Junior, I think benefits from his dad's very
Speaker 1: sort of quirky personality. His dad, you know, it's very
Speaker 1: well known.
Speaker 3: I've never even heard the guy talk his dad or
Speaker 3: Marvin Harrison Junior.
Speaker 1: So it was very well under I mean I had
Speaker 1: a source tell me, I've had two sources, once when
Speaker 1: he was playing and once recently talking about Marvin Harrison's dad.
Speaker 1: Like he didn't like after practice. Sometimes he wouldn't shower
Speaker 1: in the facility. He would literally go home. He didn't
Speaker 1: hang out with the players. So he was an odd ball. Like,
Speaker 1: first of all, he only played on one side of
Speaker 1: the field with Peyton Manning. He was sort of kind
Speaker 1: of a rigid, rigid personality. There was the story about
Speaker 1: gun charges, Philadelphia murder. I mean, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: shit out there. So his son doesn't goes to the combine,
Speaker 1: he won't talk, he won't do a pro day, he
Speaker 1: won't go to the combine. And my takeaway is, well,
Speaker 1: his dad, you can watch him play. He just doesn't
Speaker 1: look like anybody else. I love Roma Dunza, but he
Speaker 1: didn't have quite the explosiveness. The kid out of LSU
Speaker 1: is good. He didn't quite have you know. Harrison's just
Speaker 1: he's like Calvin Johnson, I just don't see any holes.
Speaker 1: And the truth is Ohio State does good job with
Speaker 1: receivers and his dad is probably given him all sorts
Speaker 1: of insight. So it's funny about like people are getting
Speaker 1: caught up in hair Marvin Harrison and they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: he doesn't talk, it's odd. I'm like, that's dad that
Speaker 1: I mean, people, Marvin Harrison. There's a thirty for thirty there, Like,
Speaker 1: I mean, I know everything about Randy Moss. I know
Speaker 1: a lot about Calvin Johnson, who's a pretty reticent guy,
Speaker 1: doesn't talk. I don't know anything about Marvin Harrison's. There's
Speaker 1: two great thirty for thirties that have never been done.
Speaker 1: Michael Jordan's Wizard years they were.
Speaker 3: That won't get done yet.
Speaker 1: It was as show and Michael won't let any of
Speaker 1: that stuff out. And the second one is Marvin Harrison
Speaker 1: in in Indianapolis. I mean he was, I mean it was,
Speaker 1: he was on the team, but players would tell you
Speaker 1: he just wasn't one of the guys like at all.
Speaker 1: So that's his son. So I'm like, I kind of
Speaker 1: chalk it up to like fatherlike son.
Speaker 3: Yeah. One thing I saw with textan around. You know,
Speaker 3: I don't know if Marvin Harrison was gonna run like
Speaker 3: four four five yeah, and if you run four five two,
Speaker 3: you know, when we're talking about the elite of the elite,
Speaker 3: Larry Fitzgerald, the Julio Jones. Julio Jones ran like a
Speaker 3: four four to four with a broken foot. Remember at
Speaker 3: his pro day. You know, the Calvin Johnson's of the world,
Speaker 3: he's not quite that. And his dad's like, none of
Speaker 3: this stuff matters, just it doesn't matter. So he's not
Speaker 3: doing any of it. He's at any other position, or
Speaker 3: I mean at the quarterback position, it would be weird.
Speaker 3: Like even Caleb threw at the Pro day right, which
Speaker 3: I give him credit because when you work out at
Speaker 3: a pro day, who doesn't help Brendan Rice? It helps
Speaker 3: your teammates. Marvin Harrison's in his own little world. No
Speaker 3: one cares if wide receives are in their own little world.
Speaker 3: You watch wide receivers during contract negotiations in the NFL.
Speaker 3: It's always a big hooplaw. It's just not like that
Speaker 3: at other positions. So you know, you talk to people
Speaker 3: in the NFL, they don't all believe that Marvin might
Speaker 3: be the best prospect in this draft, the kid at LSU.
Speaker 3: But he's got some off the field questions. Rome is
Speaker 3: probably a little safer, bigger. But is he as fast
Speaker 3: is he is Chris? You know, it depends who you
Speaker 3: talk to. Where all these guys are getting drafted somewhere
Speaker 3: between six and twelve, So I mean, at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, that's the other thing that bothers me.
Speaker 3: Like he fell in the draft, he went seventh or ninth.
Speaker 3: You know, it's not falling in the draft. Quarterbacks push
Speaker 3: guys down. Offensive linemen push guys down. If you get
Speaker 3: drafted at eleventh overall, you're you're pretty highly viewed in
Speaker 3: NFL circles. I think it's safe to say.
Speaker 1: So. One of the things John Middlecalff three and n
Speaker 1: former NFL scout. One of the things people come up
Speaker 1: to me all the time when I mentioned my podcast
Speaker 1: or they asked me about the volume. And you've got
Speaker 1: a lot of fans out there. And one of the
Speaker 1: things that I think is strength is your a very
Speaker 1: relatable guy. You like your vodka, you like your gambling.
Speaker 1: You know, you're just like a relatable guy. You like
Speaker 1: your golf. I want to talk about the show Hey
Speaker 1: o Tani story because my takeaway and I know it
Speaker 1: came off as sort of maybe callous, but as long
Speaker 1: as he didn't bet baseball, I don't care. First of all,
Speaker 1: our life experience is shape us. My first job out
Speaker 1: of college was Vegas. I just knew gamblers. It didn't
Speaker 1: mean anything. I didn't think they were bad people. I
Speaker 1: mean people are doing things on Wall Street with my
Speaker 1: four oh one K. I have much greater concerns that
Speaker 1: what they're doing in a sports book at the Hilton.
Speaker 1: The second thing is when you're young and you're making
Speaker 1: a lot of money, and like I'm not talking like
Speaker 1: a million dollars, I'm talking like Mahomes show. You have
Speaker 1: people that are really doing a lot of your work
Speaker 1: for you. You're not doing your books, you know. I
Speaker 1: mean everybody in Hollywood, even even be actors, they have
Speaker 1: entertainment attorneys and accountants. Shohetani is not looking at his
Speaker 1: checking account like the rest of us are, Like he
Speaker 1: has no IY. He may have multiple checking accounts in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles to avoid taxes. You know, you've got LLC's
Speaker 1: es corpse. You're doing whatever you can. Now he's a
Speaker 1: he's an employee, so there's limitations on what he can do.
Speaker 1: But you know you're all trying to in California with
Speaker 1: thirteen and a half percent you know, state taxes to
Speaker 1: avoid it. This part, I totally believe he's not watching
Speaker 1: his checking account like that money is going to his attorneys,
Speaker 1: it's going to his stock portfolio. I heard when Tiger
Speaker 1: Woods was in his prime, he was sending a check
Speaker 1: of And I'm not just like twenty million a month
Speaker 1: to his financial advisor like they just off the top,
Speaker 1: twenty million, two hundred and forty million dollars. It was
Speaker 1: something something absurd like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah it was. He was making one hundred million dollars
Speaker 3: a year. So if you yeah it was he million
Speaker 3: dollar check or ten million dollar check, it's not that crazy.
Speaker 3: Maybe it was.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was twenty million dollars a year off the top,
Speaker 1: just went to the market. It was some absurd amount.
Speaker 1: And you know you're not You've got people that do this.
Speaker 1: I can buy Otani saying, listen, man, he's a friend.
Speaker 1: I have a checking account. I gave him, you know,
Speaker 1: I it's like power of attorney. I allowed him to
Speaker 1: take some stuff out because I just I'm busy, and
Speaker 1: it goes sideways fast. That's a lot of money. If
Speaker 1: you're drawing stuff out of Otani's account and it's seven
Speaker 1: million dollars your thing and I'm taking four. Granted he
Speaker 1: doesn't have a clue, which he doesn't. I can buy
Speaker 1: that Otani didn't know and feels completely burned by a friend.
Speaker 1: I can buy that, can you.
Speaker 3: Yeah? I actually played golf last week with a guy
Speaker 3: that owns a big insurance company in Boston, and he
Speaker 3: has actors and major League Baseball players, basically their life
Speaker 3: insurance accounts. And he said he's never talked to one
Speaker 3: of them. He just was on the phone getting business
Speaker 3: with one of the He wouldn't tell me the name.
Speaker 3: He's like, you know rules, but one of the main
Speaker 3: actresses in Hollywood, and he talked to the person that
Speaker 3: runs all of her money and all she has to
Speaker 3: do is say yes or no and they'll do it.
Speaker 3: And that he runs the point she's not checking or
Speaker 3: checking account every day, like you said, like me right,
Speaker 3: So to me, I think there's twofold on this one.
Speaker 3: The overreaction that gambling. I grew up around. My dad
Speaker 3: was a farmer and knew a lot of people that
Speaker 3: risked a lot in business, and that was their mentality,
Speaker 3: and they gambled a lot. I've been around a lot
Speaker 3: of gamblers my entire life. People have been gambling since
Speaker 3: the history of time. It's got to be one of
Speaker 3: the longest running professions in the world. People have been
Speaker 3: doing it well before any of this stuff existed, goes
Speaker 3: back to the nineteen early nineteen hundreds. Was sports right,
Speaker 3: think about some of the scandals. So this reaction of like,
Speaker 3: well this is getting crazy this is Michael Jordan. One
Speaker 3: of the things we've he's known for is he's gambled
Speaker 3: all the time. So how it's this notion that guys
Speaker 3: don't think like that? Now? He denied it today. He
Speaker 3: claimed that he knew nothing about it, right, And I
Speaker 3: heard you say if he had done it, as long
Speaker 3: as he's not betting on his team to lose, which
Speaker 3: I understand, I don't even think would be that big
Speaker 3: a deal if he was gambling one year, gambling on
Speaker 3: football or EPL soccer, who cares? And two it's very realistic.
Speaker 3: He just signed a seven hundred million dollar contract where
Speaker 3: he was cool getting twenty million dollars over the next
Speaker 3: ten years. Does that not show you how rich the
Speaker 3: guy is? Yeah, name me another human you know, I
Speaker 3: like Warren Buffett that would agree to mean.
Speaker 1: People forget how much money like Kobe Bryant made in
Speaker 1: Turkey or Brad Pitt made overseas, Like American audiences have
Speaker 1: no idea when you're George Clooney, your Brad Pitt, Denzel Washington,
Speaker 1: you're making thirty million dollars a year. Leonardo DiCaprio, European commercial,
Speaker 1: go to you go to Italy, and Leonardo DiCaprio is
Speaker 1: like commercials in Italy. Kobe Bryant made a fortune in China,
Speaker 1: in Turkey, so can you imagine what shoe O Tani
Speaker 1: makes in Asia.
Speaker 3: Well, it's reported that it's sixty million this upcoming year.
Speaker 3: It easily could be way higher. I remember when Hadeki
Speaker 3: Matsiyama won the Masters and Paul Aisinger is like, he
Speaker 3: might be the next billion dollar athlete, just Japanese golfer. Right,
Speaker 3: there's a small percentage. Remember Yao Ming we talked about forever.
Speaker 3: The Asian market is huge one like they were very close.
Speaker 3: Clearly they'd known each other for a while. Not crazy
Speaker 3: that he stole. I think it's crazier than a bookie.
Speaker 3: I'm fascinated by this bookie to be able to run
Speaker 3: lines at four point five million dollars, Like how you
Speaker 3: have the ability to run a line of credit like
Speaker 3: even Vegas? Right, a big money guy, I mean a
Speaker 3: million dollar line of credit for a super rich guy
Speaker 3: with a company that's worth hundreds of month. That's pretty big.
Speaker 3: So you're getting lines of credit this guy must I'm
Speaker 3: fascinated by this whole bookie. When it all comes out,
Speaker 3: this operation probably pretty big, which probably hints why the
Speaker 3: FEDS were after this guy. Maybe some Hollywood guys, but
Speaker 3: one I just don't really care. And my first reaction
Speaker 3: is I just want to see this guy play now.
Speaker 3: Strauss or Buddy wrote an article I couldn't disagree, more
Speaker 3: like I just think that it was his article basically
Speaker 3: saying that gambling is like I don't want to not
Speaker 3: ruining society, but just getting so aggressive and we're becoming
Speaker 3: numb to it. I say, well, what about alcohol? I
Speaker 3: mean alcohol, you want to It's been a driving force
Speaker 3: in society the history of time.
Speaker 1: Well, here's one of the things. Whenever I see journalists,
Speaker 1: you know, and they can be I think journalists, I've
Speaker 1: said this before my top criticism. They have agendas. Acknowledge it,
Speaker 1: we all do. And secondly, don't be naive. If you're
Speaker 1: going to be a journalist, then be a true journalist.
Speaker 1: Do you know the average bet with DraftKings is four dollars.
Speaker 3: It's hard to.
Speaker 1: Ruin your family if you're betting ten of those a day, Right,
Speaker 1: it's four dollars. I used to work for another gambling company.
Speaker 1: They told me their average bet was four and a
Speaker 1: half dollars. That includes big betters. The second thing, the
Speaker 1: disturbance or distortion rate gamblers is one percent, of which
Speaker 1: every time I read an ad, I have a one
Speaker 1: eight hundred phone number I have to give out. The
Speaker 1: distortion or disturbance rate with alcohol is six percent. Should
Speaker 1: we close all the bars in Chicago? Like and they
Speaker 1: don't read they say please drink responsibly. That's about the
Speaker 1: only warning you get. So my take on this, I
Speaker 1: do both.
Speaker 3: It's not even arguable. Alcohol is way worse for you
Speaker 3: than gambling. I don't care who you are, yeh.
Speaker 1: It's bad for your brain, it's bad for your finance.
Speaker 1: You're bad for your liver, you know. And also when
Speaker 1: you look at gambling, look at the hole the state
Speaker 1: lottery has. Look at how much money people give to
Speaker 1: the state lottery, and the small amount, the small amount
Speaker 1: the public a winner gets back the hold. In gambling,
Speaker 1: I bet fifty bucks in the game, and I don't
Speaker 1: I mean I make a good living. I bet twenty
Speaker 1: bucks in a two three teen parlay the hold on
Speaker 1: a straight bet fifty percent chance I get it back.
Speaker 3: Ethan also defended Otani in the sense that if he
Speaker 3: was gambling, it is complicated. If foreign you come to
Speaker 3: this country and wait, I can I play in Arizona
Speaker 3: it's legal. I come to California, it's illegal. I go
Speaker 3: to Texas, it's illegal. But then I go to Chicago.
Speaker 3: It's like it is kind of complicated, right, So in
Speaker 3: the league's jumped head first into this, and I think
Speaker 3: for the players, the NFL found immediately that it was
Speaker 3: a complicated scenario, and they got really aggressive with the punishment. Obviously,
Speaker 3: you can't cover, you know, gamble on sports. You're allowed
Speaker 3: to gamble on other sports. You just have to leave
Speaker 3: the facility. But it's they jumped so fast, and then
Speaker 3: they expected everyone to follow the rules. But money's all relative.
Speaker 3: I mean, I heard I played golf with a guy
Speaker 3: that caddied at the big country Club in Arizona, and
Speaker 3: he says there are countless gambling games where putts can
Speaker 3: be two to three hundred thousand dollars by the eighteenth toll.
Speaker 3: So money which to that guy, if he's worth five
Speaker 3: hundred millions, no different than if I'm worth one hundred thousand.
Speaker 3: Now I'm betting hundred one thousand dollars A lot of
Speaker 3: money to me. So money four point five million dollars
Speaker 3: sounds a lot of money to ninety nine point nine
Speaker 3: percent of people. To show Aotani. Let's face it, it
Speaker 3: is a tiny, tiny percentage of his yearly income, let
Speaker 3: alone the guy's net worth. Well, if he's even gambling,
Speaker 3: if you want to believe him, I simply don't care.
Speaker 3: I just want to watch him play baseball. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, the greatest basketball player ever in many eyes
Speaker 1: is Michael Jordan, prodigious gambler. The best analyst in NBA
Speaker 1: history is Charles Barkley, noted gambler. Like we think of
Speaker 1: football and gambling, the truth of the matter is basketball players, golfers.
Speaker 1: It's just part of our culture. And I think if
Speaker 1: you look, you know, I'll be honest with you, John
Speaker 1: when I'm out. I've been a public figure for a while, right,
Speaker 1: maybe the thirteenth wrong of a public figure in Los Angeles.
Speaker 3: People know you, Colin, people know you.
Speaker 1: So when I go out, the overwhelming thing people say
Speaker 1: for six months of the year, Hey, what's your blaze
Speaker 1: in five this week? That's what I've been doing that
Speaker 1: for hold on, I've been doing Blazing five for nineteen years.
Speaker 1: So this is not like Draftking sponsors the show. I'm
Speaker 1: pro gram. I've been doing this for everyone. I made
Speaker 1: nothing on it. Now I do DraftKings help support the
Speaker 1: volume and other ventures. But I think you have to
Speaker 1: understand Europe's been way ahead of us on this. And
Speaker 1: people may say, oh, there's just there's ads everywhere. You
Speaker 1: don't have to watch the ads. There's also tire ads,
Speaker 1: mattress ads have dominated sports my entire life. Beer ads
Speaker 1: there's I mean college athletics. There's like hard alcohol ads,
Speaker 1: like binge drinking alcohol. So I'm not just saying this
Speaker 1: because of my relationship, our relationship as a company with this.
Speaker 1: In the end, I think if Ethan Strauss did make
Speaker 1: that argument, and I'm sure he did, that it's confusing
Speaker 1: for Otani. I'm making the argument that when you make
Speaker 1: that kind of money, people are running your bank accounts,
Speaker 1: and I could absolutely you say to yourself, day, four
Speaker 1: million dollars, it's amazing. If you just kept taking out
Speaker 1: twenty grand, twenty grand, you start looking at that account,
Speaker 1: I bet you he doesn't even see that account at all.
Speaker 3: I also think that the overall discussion, I think about
Speaker 3: some people that I'm still friends with, either that I
Speaker 3: grew up with and then that I went to college with.
Speaker 3: One of our binding connections is gambling, and one thing
Speaker 3: A lot of journalists who and people in the media,
Speaker 3: I would say that have the journalistic background that talk
Speaker 3: about this stuff. Wouldn't you say a large percentage of
Speaker 3: them not only have never gambled, but will never gamble.
Speaker 3: That it's not really it's not their thing. It's not
Speaker 3: in their DNA where you said, I'm a normal guy.
Speaker 3: I just do what most people do, like most of
Speaker 3: my friends in life. And I don't mean they gamble
Speaker 3: thousand dollars, but they just don't. I get texts all
Speaker 3: the time during football. Who do you like this weekend?
Speaker 3: You like tonight? I mean, that's just how people discuss.
Speaker 3: And we were discussing. We were talking like that well
Speaker 3: before Draft Kings and these other companies ever came around.
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 1: It's like I was the other night and and I
Speaker 1: went to a Bulls game and I was laughing. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I said, you know, Ann and I got we like
Speaker 1: to have a cocktail, and we'll have a couple of cocktails,
Speaker 1: watch the game in last we're just having a ball together.
Speaker 1: And we went out later that night and I said
Speaker 1: are we the only people in this arena having fun?
Speaker 1: Like everybody else is watching the game, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: we got cocktails, We're having a good time. Thirty percent
Speaker 1: of Americans don't drink. Fifty percent of Americans don't bet.
Speaker 1: I mean Jesus half the men. I mean fifty percent.
Speaker 1: I think it's all the intimacy in America is by
Speaker 1: fifty percent of the men. There's a lot of people
Speaker 1: not gambling, not drinking, not sex. And it's like, thank god,
Speaker 1: I'm on the other side of that.
Speaker 3: Thank God, it's be a shitty life. I don't want
Speaker 3: to know anything about I'll punch you out.
Speaker 1: I've seen your beautiful girlfriend.
Speaker 3: You're in great shape, all right.
Speaker 1: DraftKings did release its win total, so we both talked
Speaker 1: about the power of Kirk Cousins. Atlanta is a shocking
Speaker 1: ten and a half over under and the Vikings, who
Speaker 1: I think are stacked offensively, are at six and a half.
Speaker 1: That's Kirk Cousins. Let me throw another one at you,
Speaker 1: this one. So I when the Jets last year had
Speaker 1: Aaron Rodgers, I said, listen, the history of old quarterbacks
Speaker 1: is they got to have good old lines. Russell Wilson's
Speaker 1: first year in Denver, they didn't. He's stunk. Stafford Rams did.
Speaker 1: Then his third year, I think it was they didn't.
Speaker 3: He struggled.
Speaker 1: Brady's first year in Tampa Exte they had injuries. It
Speaker 1: wasn't as good. You can't have a forty year old.
Speaker 1: That's why Atlanta for Kirk Cousins works. That's a really
Speaker 1: good old line. That's why Jared Goff works. He's younger,
Speaker 1: but great old line. So the Jets have signed some
Speaker 1: kind of like Tyron Smith, who will play about thirteen
Speaker 1: games a year, kid from the Ravens. The Jets are
Speaker 1: nine and a half, and I'm like time out. If
Speaker 1: you look at the AFC, Deshaun Watson's back, you know,
Speaker 1: Herbert's got a legitimate coach. C. J. Stroud is moving
Speaker 1: up fast. Trevor Lawrence will be healthy. You know two
Speaker 1: of Mike McDaniels are going nowhere. Josh Allen now has
Speaker 1: between kN Kaid and Cook has some really nice offensive weapons.
Speaker 1: I look at the Jets and nine and a half
Speaker 1: and I think, boy, you are that's a bad old
Speaker 1: line for an old quarterback of an achilles surgery. I
Speaker 1: said it this year during the season. Aaron being relevant
Speaker 1: in January to me is over. It's nothing against Aaron,
Speaker 1: It's just old quarterbacks and crappy on lines don't work.
Speaker 1: What do you make on No, I would bet the
Speaker 1: under on that all day.
Speaker 3: Well, I've been down on them, but if I wanted
Speaker 3: to make the case, Miami just lost a ton of talent. Yes,
Speaker 3: they had a lot of guys walk out the door.
Speaker 3: They also lost Vick Fangio and their defense was already
Speaker 3: in question, and Vic called them out, thinking like no
Speaker 3: one wants to focus. And I think a lot has
Speaker 3: to do with the city they live in. Are they
Speaker 3: about to pay two of forty five to fifty million
Speaker 3: dollars a year? Because if they do, I'm out, And
Speaker 3: so to me, Miami still has some question marks. Even
Speaker 3: if we all agree Mike is a great play caller quarterback,
Speaker 3: I'm definitely not sold on. And defensively, I mean, they
Speaker 3: just lost their best defensive player. He just walked in
Speaker 3: free agency the Patriots. Now the Jets finally beat him.
Speaker 3: I think week whatever, the last week of the season
Speaker 3: have owned The Jets didn't Bill beat him like eight
Speaker 3: straight seasons swept him. Well, Bill's gone. I think the
Speaker 3: Patriots got a couple of years of coming to Jesus,
Speaker 3: and Robert Craft is about to find out what the
Speaker 3: NFL is really like. It could be ugly there and
Speaker 3: then the Bills. Like whenever I see the Super Bowl
Speaker 3: windows closed, I laugh. As long as you have Josh Allen.
Speaker 3: When you have Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Joe Burrow, Patrick Mahomes,
Speaker 3: your roster can be in flux. You got a chance.
Speaker 3: But the Jets did beat them in one game last year,
Speaker 3: so I'd have to look at the rest of their schedule.
Speaker 3: I eight to nine wins best. That's assuming Aaron Rodgers,
Speaker 3: who was facing you, go back, because part of Russell
Speaker 3: Wilson isn't just the last two years. Remember the last
Speaker 3: year in Seattle. So now it's a body of work
Speaker 3: going the wrong way. Aaron, the last year in Green Bay,
Speaker 3: something was off. It might have just been age. In
Speaker 3: the history of sports, most guys at thirty eight thirty
Speaker 3: nine aren't trending the wrong way. I know he's a
Speaker 3: healthy guy. He looks good, but he wasn't quite as fast.
Speaker 3: His arms still there, But a huge part of his
Speaker 3: ability was the ad lib that made him a great.
Speaker 1: Play John the analytics Greg Cosell and Warren Sharp and
Speaker 1: others were on this. Aaron's analytics is he just didn't
Speaker 1: run anymore, like and if he doesn't run, I mean, say.
Speaker 3: What, he's not as fast probably anymore. So he doesn't
Speaker 3: want to risk getting tackled or hit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, old guys don't want to get hit. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, Eli Manning and Brady Mastered get rid of
Speaker 1: it quick or figure out how to roll and not
Speaker 1: get hit. So I don't think Aaron. I also think
Speaker 1: Aaron isn't quite as committed as a lot of the
Speaker 1: young guys that are really bigger, stronger, And I think
Speaker 1: the only way to be good is sort of to
Speaker 1: be focused like Kirk cousins later or obsessed like Brady.
Speaker 1: I don't think there's a way to be casually and Aaron,
Speaker 1: you know, I've heard this from multiple people. Aaron, He's
Speaker 1: not going to sit and watch game film all weekend.
Speaker 1: That's not what he's going to do as a personality.
Speaker 1: He's going to read some things and listen in the
Speaker 1: music and do his own thing. He is not Brady
Speaker 1: on the film. He's not Peyton, he's not Breeze as
Speaker 1: a workaholic. Aaron is one of those guys.
Speaker 3: He had more physical capability than those guys.
Speaker 1: It's like a rock star, you know. The Bonos and
Speaker 1: the bands edges that have survived didn't have long periods
Speaker 1: of drug use, like they took care of their boy,
Speaker 1: they partied, but they have aged very well. The bands
Speaker 1: that didn't haven't. Like I think Aaron didn't quite take
Speaker 1: the same level of care, and I think he's aging
Speaker 1: faster than other guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think if he can't move anywhere remotely like
Speaker 3: he used to, that's the problem. The one thing he
Speaker 3: has going that Peyton lost, Breeze lost rob Their arms
Speaker 3: failed them. You know, Rogers arm is still strong, so
Speaker 3: to me, he's still going to be able to function.
Speaker 3: But I think his day, the day and age of
Speaker 3: him just being some lock elite player, it's been gone
Speaker 3: now for a couple of years, and I just think
Speaker 3: the question now is the pressure on the offensive coordinator, which,
Speaker 3: let's face it, if you just pulled people in the NFL,
Speaker 3: Isnate hack it any good or is he not any good?
Speaker 3: Most people say he's not any good, And then the
Speaker 3: other reason he's there is because he messes with Aaron.
Speaker 3: So is Aaron just telling him what to do? Like,
Speaker 3: there's got to be a little give and take. And
Speaker 3: you saw how many times this year with Aaron shaking
Speaker 3: his head, you know, with play calls when he would
Speaker 3: show up. It's just I think it's got a chance
Speaker 3: to be a pat They do have some players that
Speaker 3: there's no disputing that they have impact players on both
Speaker 3: sides of the ball. But if you can't protect a
Speaker 3: quarterback who now can't really move Jared Goff, like you said,
Speaker 3: can't move, we's got arguably the best offensive line in
Speaker 3: the league doesn't need to move well. If these guys,
Speaker 3: if Smith gets hurt, if Moses gets hurt, if their
Speaker 3: intier offensive line isn't any good, you're sitting duck. Even
Speaker 3: Zach Wilson kept them alive last year because he just
Speaker 3: kind of scramble around. And so yeah, I think the
Speaker 3: Jets are fascinating that division, though. I think I think
Speaker 3: Miami could be in for uh come back to the
Speaker 3: to the the average a little bit, and the Patriots
Speaker 3: are in for real NFL life now. The other thing,
Speaker 3: I saw the Cowboys like ten and a half too.
Speaker 3: That seems a little high. I mean they've lost a
Speaker 3: lot of players.
Speaker 1: So by the way, Niners, Ravens, Chiefs eleven and a half.
Speaker 1: I tend to bet the enders once you get into
Speaker 1: that space. Lions, Packers, Eagles, Bill's, Bengals, Dolphins, Falcons, Cowboys, Falcons,
Speaker 1: the head scratcher a little bit ten and a half,
Speaker 1: Texans Jets nine and a half. I'd buy that with
Speaker 1: the Texans, I don't with the Jets. Rams pull back
Speaker 1: to eight and a half. I think Aaron Donald they
Speaker 1: subtract a win. I thought they would be nine and
Speaker 1: a half ish, Viking's very low, Kirk Cousin's not there,
Speaker 1: and Patriots Panthers at four and a half, Titans Broncos
Speaker 1: five and a half. Again, I do believe with the Broncos,
Speaker 1: I think they're going to draft a quarter and I think,
Speaker 1: to be honest with you, bon Nicks would win immediately
Speaker 1: because I think he's got sixty one starts. I just interview.
Speaker 1: I talked to the kid last week for thirty minutes,
Speaker 1: thirty five minutes on and off the air.
Speaker 3: He's just a grown up.
Speaker 1: He's ready to play NFL football, whether or not you
Speaker 1: think he has this high ceiling. That kid's seen it.
Speaker 1: You know, he said five offensive coordinators in five years,
Speaker 1: and he's worked with all of them. He's gonna work.
Speaker 3: I think adversity has proven to matter a lot with
Speaker 3: a lot of these quarterbacks that have had some struggles
Speaker 3: in college, like Mahomes wasn't winning a lot. Josh Allen
Speaker 3: was told, we don't have scholarships for you, right. Lamar
Speaker 3: Jackson tumbled in the draft. Bo Nick's got his ass
Speaker 3: kicked in the SEC. I mean he was even when
Speaker 3: he transferred to Oregon. So yeah, I'm fascinated by him.
Speaker 3: I think he needs to go to the right spot.
Speaker 3: And Sean Payton, I mean, let's face they're kind of
Speaker 3: desperate right now. I guess they could just kind of
Speaker 3: roll it over a year, But I don't think Sean
Speaker 3: Payton's making eighteen million dollars a year to try to
Speaker 3: win four or five games. Like he's going to try
Speaker 3: to compete immediately in that division now with Harbaugh, and
Speaker 3: it got a lot harder even the Raiders. I don't
Speaker 3: know if Pierce is going to be a great head coach.
Speaker 3: They do have impact players. They're not like an easy
Speaker 3: team to play.
Speaker 1: No, No, They've I've said this for years. The Raiders
Speaker 1: have five or six and they have key positions star receiver,
Speaker 1: rush and left tackle, like if they could get a
Speaker 1: quarterback right. I don't doubt the Raiders because the shit
Speaker 1: at the end of the year, I thought they were
Speaker 1: really competitive, playing with a lot of fire and purpose
Speaker 1: with Aidan O'Connell. So I'm okay with it.
Speaker 3: By the way, I was in the car today and
Speaker 3: it turned you on right as you were talking to
Speaker 3: Mick Cronin about his struggles, and he gave the line,
Speaker 3: I still turn left on Sunset. That's one of the
Speaker 3: greatest lines I've ever heard. I don't think whether you
Speaker 3: win eight games or you win thirty, I still turn
Speaker 3: left on Sunset. That's that's an all timer.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he comes over that hill from Encino. It's a
Speaker 1: left right by the Circular Hotel and you go left
Speaker 1: on Sunset into bell Air, then Beverly Hills, then right
Speaker 1: to UCLA. It's pretty good life.
Speaker 3: I haven't been to every campus in America, but when
Speaker 3: you walk on UCLA's campus there there's got to be
Speaker 3: a short list of campuses compete with that. Oh no,
Speaker 3: there's I don't think there's anything like it.
Speaker 1: God, I mean USC Stanford. You know, there's it's La,
Speaker 1: it's it's the Bay Area. But nope, there's nothing like
Speaker 1: UCLAB ever being to do. John Middlecoff, former NFL scouty.
Speaker 1: His podcast is three and Out, chopped it up for
Speaker 1: a little over an hour this week. Loved seeing you, buddy.
Speaker 1: We'll talk in a week.
Speaker 3: Okay to see you call.
Speaker 1: The volume. Thanks so much for listening. If you've enjoyed
Speaker 1: the podcast, take a moment rate and review