Speaker 1: Hi, get everybody on Dan Horde, and thanks for downloading
Speaker 1: the Bengals Booth podcast, the Getting to Know You, Getting
Speaker 1: to Know All about You. Addition, as the Bengals get
Speaker 1: ready for their first head to head meeting with Joe
Speaker 1: Burrow and the other top prospects in this year's draft
Speaker 1: at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis coming up, I'll
Speaker 1: discuss that and much more with my broadcast partner, Dave
Speaker 1: Lappall our topics include Joe Burrow's most recent comments about
Speaker 1: possibly being the number one pick in this year's draft.
Speaker 1: I'll ask Lap if he would vote yes or no
Speaker 1: on the new collective bargaining agreement proposal that the owners
Speaker 1: have approved. And best of all, Lapp will answer the
Speaker 1: questions you submitted on Twitter and Facebook under the hashtag
Speaker 1: ask Lap. That's straight ahead. But first, here's a quick
Speaker 1: reminder that you can have the latest edition of this
Speaker 1: podcast delivered right to your phone, tablet, or computer by
Speaker 1: subscribing on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Spotify, or pod Bean.
Speaker 1: It's the greatest thing since airborne vitamin tablets. As you
Speaker 1: might be able to tell, I'm dealing with a bit
Speaker 1: of a cold and whenever I have one. One of
Speaker 1: my strategies for fighting it is putting Airborne brand vitamin
Speaker 1: supplements in grapefruit juice. It's basically a big vitamin C cocktail.
Speaker 1: Does it make medical sense, I don't really know, but
Speaker 1: it seems to work for me. So the next time
Speaker 1: you have a nasty cold, try Airborne vitamin tablets in
Speaker 1: grapefruit juice. It tastes good too. Now let's get to football,
Speaker 1: where it's time to ask lap Lap. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you are familiar with this, but there was recently
Speaker 1: a twenty eighth amendment added to the Constitution which dictates
Speaker 1: all Bengals podcasts must begin with a discussion of Joe Burrow.
Speaker 1: Here's what I want to start with today. Joe Burrow's
Speaker 1: recent comments to the Fort Worth Star Telegram when he
Speaker 1: was there to accept the Davey O'Brien award, which included
Speaker 1: a Rolex watch. By the way, that was nice. When
Speaker 1: asked about being drafted by Cincinnati, here's what Joe Burrow
Speaker 1: had to say, quote, I am blessed to be in
Speaker 1: the position I'm in. If they select me, they select me,
Speaker 1: I'm going to do everything in my power to be
Speaker 1: the best football player that I can be. That all
Speaker 1: sounds good, But he also said, I'm not exactly sure
Speaker 1: what the question was. I do have leverage. They have
Speaker 1: their process and I have my process. So what did
Speaker 1: you make of those comments? They were they were kind
Speaker 1: of North and South Bowl a little bit, you know,
Speaker 1: the first comment, obviously, I was impressed by, you know,
Speaker 1: he's a competitor. In talking with his teammates that were
Speaker 1: down at the Senior Bowl, particularly the offensive lineman from LSU,
Speaker 1: that's all they said was, you know, cold blooded competitor um,
Speaker 1: but in all the right ways. You know, no, uh,
Speaker 1: nothing negative, all positive and how he led and uh
Speaker 1: and how he set goals and achieved his goals and
Speaker 1: everything that went along with it. And so I'm thinking, well,
Speaker 1: here's a guy that with all the people saying, you know,
Speaker 1: oh Jesus Cincinnati Bengals two and fourteen a joke. You know,
Speaker 1: why would you who would want to play for that
Speaker 1: football He made it sound like he wanted to be
Speaker 1: part of the solution and turnaround, and you know, a
Speaker 1: guy part of it would be the next chapter of
Speaker 1: the Joe Burrow Made for TV movie and that you know,
Speaker 1: comes out of nowhere, because I'm looking at uh, I'm
Speaker 1: looking at all these publications before the twenty nineteen seasons started,
Speaker 1: Joe Burrows not even talked about. I mean, he's not
Speaker 1: even discussed Day two pick. Yeah, day two pick, and
Speaker 1: his LSUS not even in pick to be in the
Speaker 1: in the playoffs, you know, I mean, the LSU's not
Speaker 1: talked about. Joe Burrows not talked about. You know, it's
Speaker 1: Joe Brady's not talks about. And it is a storybook
Speaker 1: deal what they did, you know how, and they've all benefited.
Speaker 1: Joe Brady is now an offensive coordinator Carolina Panthers, Joe
Speaker 1: Burrow is about to be the first pick of the
Speaker 1: NFL draft, and it would be the next chapter of
Speaker 1: that story. I think, why not take a guy, you know,
Speaker 1: the the come from nowhere Heisman Trophy winner who had
Speaker 1: the most prolific quarterback season the history of college football
Speaker 1: on all levels every way you measure it. It was unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Never had even come close to having a season like
Speaker 1: Joe Burrow head. So why not the next step go
Speaker 1: to the National Football League, take a two win team
Speaker 1: to nine or ten wins and make him playoff competitive
Speaker 1: and be part of the solution. I like that. I
Speaker 1: like that that part of it. You know, he has
Speaker 1: his leverage. What is that? I don't know. I really
Speaker 1: can't figure it. The leverage is you don't play for
Speaker 1: a year. And I don't see the Borough family, the father, mother,
Speaker 1: two brothers that played at Nebraska, one played safety, one
Speaker 1: played linebacker. Football family to the nth degree. I don't
Speaker 1: see that a guy who came from that environment with
Speaker 1: a mindset to sit out a year. He's also going
Speaker 1: to be twenty four this year. Yeah exactly. I mean
Speaker 1: the clock's ticking, you know. Um, I just I guess
Speaker 1: that's what he's talking about. I don't know. He might.
Speaker 1: He may have been in an off in a very
Speaker 1: very far stretched way talking about well Eli Manning. He
Speaker 1: dictated where you know, he went. John Elway dictated what
Speaker 1: happened with him in terms of the draft. Um, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: that did happen. John Elway had baseball as leverage, correct
Speaker 1: it went and played minor league organization. Yeah right, he
Speaker 1: was in the Yankees organization and a good prospect, you know,
Speaker 1: could have maybe played, maybe made the major leagues as
Speaker 1: a baseball player. Joe Burrow was an All State basketball player.
Speaker 1: I mean, what is the NBA bound doubt it? You know, so,
Speaker 1: I mean I don't understand you know that that leverage
Speaker 1: part of it, that that he's talking about, other than
Speaker 1: you know, just uh, just maybe letting in a way,
Speaker 1: letting other teams know, look, go ahead and trade for me.
Speaker 1: You know, if you're thinking about making an offer, go
Speaker 1: ahead and make an offer to the Bengals, because you know,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to establish as much leverage as I possibly can.
Speaker 1: Instead of coming out and saying, you know, I want
Speaker 1: to be a Cincinnati Bengal. I look forward to be
Speaker 1: in a Cincinnati Bengal. That's what everybody in Bengaledon wants
Speaker 1: to hear. He's not going to say that, you know,
Speaker 1: because you know what if it's traded, you know, now
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, Well I really did want to
Speaker 1: be a Bengal, but now I'm glad to be a whatever.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can you can rationalize it that way.
Speaker 1: I know all Bengal fans would love to see him say, look,
Speaker 1: no matter, I'm fine, I'm I want to be a
Speaker 1: Cincinnati Bengal. They've had a great quarterback history and tradition there.
Speaker 1: I want to add my name to that list of
Speaker 1: great quarterbacks with the Cincinnati Bengals. That's exactly what bengaldu
Speaker 1: would like to hear, but they're not going to hear it. Well,
Speaker 1: maybe they could hear it at the combine. He's scheduled
Speaker 1: to do a news conference on Tuesday, I believe. But
Speaker 1: let's talk about the count the scouting combine, which gets
Speaker 1: underway this weekend and runs all of next week with
Speaker 1: the drills in prime time for the first time. So
Speaker 1: if you want to watch guys in primetime running the
Speaker 1: forty and doing the bench press, you're gonna have your
Speaker 1: chance this week. But this will also be the Bengals
Speaker 1: opportunity to sit down face to face with forty five
Speaker 1: players for eighteen minutes apiece. And I've got to assume
Speaker 1: that Joe Burrows on that list be the first opportunity
Speaker 1: to do that with him. Normally, the player is trying
Speaker 1: to impress the team. Do the Bengals need to impress
Speaker 1: Joe Burrow with their vision for his future? I think so.
Speaker 1: I think it would be if I were Joe Burrow.
Speaker 1: The first question when they say you know, they're fire
Speaker 1: questions at Joe Burrow and then probably at the end,
Speaker 1: if there's time, they say, do you have any questions us?
Speaker 1: My question would be, if I'm Joe Burrow, what's your plan?
Speaker 1: You know, how do you how do you foresee what
Speaker 1: changes will be made in terms of personnel, philosophy, or
Speaker 1: whatever the case may be to turn around a two
Speaker 1: win team. I'm not the If you think drafting Joe
Speaker 1: Burrow solves all your problems, I'm here to tell you
Speaker 1: they probably don't. What else are we talking about? That's
Speaker 1: what I would ask, you know, I would put on
Speaker 1: my humble hat. You know, I have confidence in my ability,
Speaker 1: but me single handedly is not going to take a
Speaker 1: team from two wins to ten wins. What else are
Speaker 1: we talking about? And I do think, you know, they
Speaker 1: should have some sort of an idea or some sort
Speaker 1: of a plan to present him, because he's going to
Speaker 1: sell them very quickly on his personality. I mean, I
Speaker 1: think they already know enough, so I think I think
Speaker 1: that interview session is going to be a lot different
Speaker 1: than just about all the others. I think all the
Speaker 1: others are going to be more fact finding. He is
Speaker 1: so overexposed at this point. I mean, everybody knows everything
Speaker 1: about Joe Burrow's life. His football life is private life,
Speaker 1: every aspect of the Joe Burrow story. So yeah, I would.
Speaker 1: I would. I would get to the next level of um,
Speaker 1: you know, drilling down as quickly as I kid could
Speaker 1: with Joe, and I would. I would see, um, you know,
Speaker 1: with his football acumen. You really you and Joe Brady connected.
Speaker 1: What was it? What were the things that made your
Speaker 1: season so successful? Put up on the grease board here, things,
Speaker 1: you know, concepts that you guys implemented, things that you
Speaker 1: were looking for at all times. Tell us what the
Speaker 1: Joe Burrow season was like, you know, as you were
Speaker 1: preparing for an opponent and maybe taking through certain things
Speaker 1: and games and all that sort of thing. Just to
Speaker 1: confirm his football IQ, which everybody says, as you know,
Speaker 1: Suma cum laudy. So he's he's a football menza and
Speaker 1: he processes quickly. So I think they'll get through that
Speaker 1: pretty quickly too. But I do think, I do think
Speaker 1: the future plan is big for both parties. I did
Speaker 1: a rant on last week's podcast, first talking about how
Speaker 1: Joe Burrow had never said specifically that he didn't want
Speaker 1: to play for the Bengals, but then the second part
Speaker 1: of my rant had to do with this notion that
Speaker 1: he shouldn't want to come to Cincinnati, and I want
Speaker 1: to follow up on that because it continues to bother me.
Speaker 1: If those stories had been done in the late nineteen nineties,
Speaker 1: they would have been harder to refute during the so
Speaker 1: called lost decade. But you can't go to the playoffs
Speaker 1: six times in a seven year period by sheer luck.
Speaker 1: Can't be done in the NFL. I think Marvin Lewis
Speaker 1: deserves a lot of the credit for helping the Bengals
Speaker 1: modernize their organization. I think Duke Tobin is largely done
Speaker 1: an excellent job as a GM without having the title
Speaker 1: of GM. Why is it that two thousand and nine
Speaker 1: to two and fifteen doesn't seem to exist for so
Speaker 1: many of the national football commentators. Yeah, they look at
Speaker 1: it as, you know, as the anomaly of the blip,
Speaker 1: you know, the it just it's a unicorn. It doesn't belong,
Speaker 1: you know, And and I can see that for a year.
Speaker 1: But when you're to the point where you're you know,
Speaker 1: perpetually at five straight you know, six out of seven,
Speaker 1: that kind of thing now becomes you know, very significant.
Speaker 1: And of course everybody is going is and should give
Speaker 1: Marvin Lewis a lot of credit. I mean, he was
Speaker 1: there for sixteen years and made seven playoffs. Almost half
Speaker 1: of his coaching career he was in the playoffs for
Speaker 1: the Cincinnati Bengals. That's that's a record. I mean, five
Speaker 1: playoff appearances in a row as a record. But you know,
Speaker 1: people don't even talk about that. What they talk about
Speaker 1: is the last playoff win January nineteen ninety one. And
Speaker 1: you know, it's such a long drought. As every organization
Speaker 1: will tell you, it is hard to make the playoffs hard,
Speaker 1: and you know equally or even more so to win
Speaker 1: a playoff game, and that can be attested to obviously
Speaker 1: by this franchise. But to make the playoffs five years
Speaker 1: in a row, only a handful of teams, you know,
Speaker 1: organizations have done that. It's it's not like half the
Speaker 1: franchises in the National Football League. I think it's maybe,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe more a little more than a handful,
Speaker 1: like six, I think of maybe done. It got into
Speaker 1: the playoffs five straight seasons at any time. So um,
Speaker 1: it's it's not it's not something to take lightly, but
Speaker 1: I think you know the easy um comment on that
Speaker 1: is everybody's saying that was Marvin Lewis. Marvin Lewis is
Speaker 1: now at Arizona State. Marvin Lewis isn't part of the
Speaker 1: Bengals organization anymore. So, UM, it's almost like, you know,
Speaker 1: Bill Belichick, Tom Brady? Is it? Is it? Tom Brady?
Speaker 1: Is it Bill Belichick? You know? Is it the Cincinnati Bengals?
Speaker 1: Is that Marvin Lewis? You know, you take Marvin Lewis
Speaker 1: out of the picture, what else is? Uh? Where's where's
Speaker 1: the light? Uh? In the Bengals organization. It's going to
Speaker 1: lead them out of the darkness currently with the two
Speaker 1: and fourth record, you know. So that's what that's what
Speaker 1: you know, I hear from a lot of people. We'll see,
Speaker 1: you know, and Marvin did do a great job of bringing,
Speaker 1: you know, the exposers that he had with the Baltimore
Speaker 1: and Pittsburgh and those organizations. He did bring, you know
Speaker 1: a lot of that outside ideas and ways of doing
Speaker 1: things to the Cincinnati Bengals. Zach Taylor has had exposure
Speaker 1: multiple places himself, you know, Miami, LA, a college scene.
Speaker 1: You know, it's he has he has I'm sure some
Speaker 1: ideas as well. So we'll see how his are implemented.
Speaker 1: I'm not the only person annoyed by this thought process
Speaker 1: that the Bengals are completely incompetent. The current players are
Speaker 1: getting ticked off about it now as well, Tyler Boy,
Speaker 1: Joe Mixon, and Auden Tate among others tweeting about it
Speaker 1: this week. Do you think that the proving people wrong
Speaker 1: thing is going to become a motivator for this year's team?
Speaker 1: Players always look athletes always look for the chip to
Speaker 1: put on their shoulder, and this one is not a chip.
Speaker 1: It's the old two by four. Yeah, I mean, guys.
Speaker 1: One thing that guys have that ascend to this level
Speaker 1: of professionalism in terms of sports or anything really, any
Speaker 1: any um you know, job that you try to you
Speaker 1: seek to try to improve yourself on and be the
Speaker 1: best you can be, is pride. You know, these guys
Speaker 1: have big time personal pride, and they feel like they're
Speaker 1: being personally attacked, even even if it's just it's when
Speaker 1: they see Cincinnati Bengals, they see themselves, I mean that
Speaker 1: it's it's you. I mean they're just totally tied together,
Speaker 1: So they feel like they're being attacked by people, not
Speaker 1: just organizationally or coaching staff board. It's like me, I'm
Speaker 1: being attacked and my teammates are being attacked. So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna come to the I'm going to come to my defense.
Speaker 1: I'm going to come to my teammates defense. And the
Speaker 1: best way to do that is to is to shut
Speaker 1: The best way to shut people up to win football games,
Speaker 1: to play better. So I do think there's a big
Speaker 1: chip there, and I do think guys that will be
Speaker 1: part of their motivation. There's no about it. They have
Speaker 1: plenty of material for a bulletin board. In fact, they
Speaker 1: could fill a bulletin board. There would be a city
Speaker 1: block big. There's all kinds of stuff out there. Man.
Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the big breaking news in
Speaker 1: the NFL. We interrupt the Joe Burrow portion of the
Speaker 1: show to get to this. The owners have approved a
Speaker 1: new collective bargaining agreement. Now it goes to the thirty
Speaker 1: two player reps. They have to approve it by a
Speaker 1: two thirds majority, and if that happens, then it goes
Speaker 1: to the roughly two thousand players as a whole. They vote,
Speaker 1: and then it would just have to pass by a
Speaker 1: simple majority, and that would mean ten years of labor piece.
Speaker 1: Some of the things that are in there. It calls
Speaker 1: for the possibility of a seventeen game regular season that
Speaker 1: would apparently kick in as soon as twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1: It calls for an expanded playoff field, one more playoff
Speaker 1: team from each conference that could actually go into effect
Speaker 1: this year if this gets approved quickly. There's some other
Speaker 1: stuff in there that benefits the players, like a bigger
Speaker 1: share of the total revenue pie. If there's a seventeen
Speaker 1: game schedule, they could make five more billion dollars over
Speaker 1: the next ten years if this thing gets approved. Here's
Speaker 1: my question for you, if you are an active player
Speaker 1: right now, based then what you've read and heard, would
Speaker 1: you vote yes or no? I would vote yes because
Speaker 1: I think I think a lot of the things that
Speaker 1: they're addressing in there. The big money players are going
Speaker 1: to say no. J. J. Watts already come out absolutely no.
Speaker 1: He's got hundreds of millions of dollars in the bank.
Speaker 1: This All they have to do is have fifty one
Speaker 1: percent of the rank and file of the players vote yes.
Speaker 1: Five percent of the players get humongous money. They're talking
Speaker 1: about on that seventeenth game, capping a quarter million bucks
Speaker 1: for that game. You know, well, there'll be five percent
Speaker 1: of the players that have a real problem with that
Speaker 1: because they make a lot more than that, which is
Speaker 1: incredible two hundred and fifty thousand dollars per game, Oh
Speaker 1: my god. But a big number of people over fifty
Speaker 1: percent would be like, yeah, I do that seventeenth game
Speaker 1: and get that get that extra money. I mean, my
Speaker 1: career is is it going to be well I even
Speaker 1: get vested? Will I be around long enough to be vested?
Speaker 1: I mean, the number of people that are fortunate enough
Speaker 1: to play, you know, ten years or more in the
Speaker 1: National Football League's not a huge number. It's two thousand
Speaker 1: players to begin with, and then the players are making
Speaker 1: this humongous money. Is five percent of those two thousand players,
Speaker 1: it's it's not you know, you know, you're talking seventy
Speaker 1: guys maybe you know, or you know, not even that
Speaker 1: sixty some odd guys. So it's not. I think I
Speaker 1: think it would be the tail wagging the dog if
Speaker 1: those sixty five people determine the fates of all those others,
Speaker 1: you know. So I think it's going to pass, and
Speaker 1: I think it probably should. And because there's a lot
Speaker 1: of things I mean they're talking about with the seventeenth game,
Speaker 1: they're talking about bringing more people off ir the's more
Speaker 1: more readily. They're talking about activating an extra linement offensive
Speaker 1: linement on game day. So so seventeen it's like, okay, well,
Speaker 1: we don't want teams limping in, gimping to the playoffs.
Speaker 1: We still want it to be good football. So they're
Speaker 1: saying that the practices is going to be a lighter
Speaker 1: you know, workload is going to be a big factor
Speaker 1: with this. With the seventeenth game, um, I think I
Speaker 1: think it'll quickly go to eighteen because seventeen that odd number.
Speaker 1: Where's that game going to be played every other every
Speaker 1: other season? You'd have an extra home game than other teams.
Speaker 1: I think it's going to be a neutral site where
Speaker 1: they're trying to you know, generate some interests as the
Speaker 1: next NFL franchises, have teams go there and play wherever
Speaker 1: they may be around the country. And then world international, Yeah,
Speaker 1: go to Mexico. You're even talking Brazil, you know, London. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's a great idea rather than having a
Speaker 1: team in London. Didn't use that seventeenth game to play
Speaker 1: a bunch of games over there and then a handful
Speaker 1: of others in Germany, Mexico, Canada, whatever they're talking. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, and make it more of an international, international scope.
Speaker 1: And why would you do that? Dollars? I mean, that's
Speaker 1: that's the bottom line. It's it's all about the dollars.
Speaker 1: And really, uh, it's it's a brilliant move to try
Speaker 1: to get this collective barring a riem and done because
Speaker 1: the next network contract is twenty twenty one. So if
Speaker 1: they have this in place, we have more revenue for
Speaker 1: you more you know, um, not more, we have more
Speaker 1: inventory for you that needs more revenue for us. Um.
Speaker 1: You know. The extra playoff game. Could it be a
Speaker 1: Monday and night football game? That would make the Monday
Speaker 1: night football package much more lucrative, you know, And and
Speaker 1: the extra playoff game that's just that's just two teams.
Speaker 1: You know that If they do that, the extra playoff game,
Speaker 1: I think is going to be a no brainer. I
Speaker 1: think that's now the seventeenth game. There may be a
Speaker 1: little bit more, a little bit more push and pull
Speaker 1: on that because you know, you're talking about player safety
Speaker 1: and how are we going to address that? And that's
Speaker 1: the biggest thing supposedly for CTE Concussion Protocol blah blah,
Speaker 1: So that that's gonna that's gonna get a little bit
Speaker 1: of a pushback. And I do see them going from
Speaker 1: seventeen fairly quickly to eighteen, and they're they're asking permission
Speaker 1: to go to seventeen and asking permission to go to eighteen. So,
Speaker 1: like you say, probably it won't happen in the twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two maybe not even twenty twenty or twenty twenty
Speaker 1: one season, maybe twenty twenty two for the seventy seventeenth game,
Speaker 1: and real quickly it may be they may say, Okay,
Speaker 1: we'll do the seventeenth game in twenty twenty two. In
Speaker 1: the eighteenth game would be in twenty twenty three, if
Speaker 1: they have all that time maybe to get ready for
Speaker 1: I could, I could see them. Odd number is weird
Speaker 1: to me, that odd number. I think I think it's
Speaker 1: a scheduling nightmare. My guess though on that, and I
Speaker 1: could be wrong, is that you know they'll go to
Speaker 1: seventeen for a while. You think I just have a
Speaker 1: hard time because that's going to be the sticking point
Speaker 1: because of health concerns. Will you accept another game of punishment?
Speaker 1: To your body. I just think it would maybe even
Speaker 1: the entire ten year term before they can then try
Speaker 1: to sell them on eighteen. Really. See, I was thinking
Speaker 1: the other way. I was thinking that if they get
Speaker 1: seventeen in, because ultimately I think they'd like to go
Speaker 1: eighteen and two. I mean I think that's the as
Speaker 1: in preseason two, right, Yeah, eighteen and two, and then
Speaker 1: everybody will have more combined workouts, two organizations getting together
Speaker 1: a training camp, and getting more workload done, you know,
Speaker 1: heavy workload done. That way, I could see that happening,
Speaker 1: and it would be controlled. Obviously, it wouldn't be as
Speaker 1: tough on bodies as even preseason games, which are very
Speaker 1: limited in terms of participation by players. But the preseason games,
Speaker 1: as we know, they've become a joke. I mean, there
Speaker 1: are teams in the NFL that don't play it their
Speaker 1: starters at all in the entire preseason, not just the
Speaker 1: fourth third preseason game. I mean play players just the
Speaker 1: third preseason game. Those starts for over half. They're not
Speaker 1: doing it at all. They're not even having guys out
Speaker 1: there getting any any work in the preseason, so it's
Speaker 1: become kind of a farce. So I could see them
Speaker 1: trying to go you know, to eighteen and two at
Speaker 1: some point in time, or at least having a phraseology
Speaker 1: in the collective barring agreement that at any time during
Speaker 1: that ten year timeframe, we can bring the eighteenth game
Speaker 1: you know, to the table for discussion instead of you know,
Speaker 1: locking having that off the table as such for a decade.
Speaker 1: So the new league year begins on March eighteenth, so
Speaker 1: it sounds like they're trying to get this thing done
Speaker 1: by then so that some of this stuff can go
Speaker 1: into effect right now. And if you're trying to get
Speaker 1: the players to vote yes, that's a big carrot to dangle.
Speaker 1: The salary cap will go up, could help current free agents.
Speaker 1: The minimum salary is going to go up by one
Speaker 1: hundred thousand bucks. I mean, if you if you want
Speaker 1: the rank and file to approve the thing by one
Speaker 1: vote as a majority, things like that are going to
Speaker 1: get that lower tier that you were talking about to
Speaker 1: say yes. Yeah. I mean if if if sixty six
Speaker 1: percent two thirds of the if the hum of the
Speaker 1: player reps pass it, I think they're gonna get fifty
Speaker 1: one percent of the players very easily. I really do.
Speaker 1: Um So, I think the player rep. The conference calls
Speaker 1: that are going to be going on today are going
Speaker 1: to be very interesting. Um, you know, and they're gonna
Speaker 1: they're gonna have calls to to all of their teammates.
Speaker 1: I mean, the telephone company is gonna be busy. There's
Speaker 1: gonna be some lines. They are gonna be having some
Speaker 1: having some issues. But uh because and I can see honestly, UM,
Speaker 1: guys at their homes with their player up speaker phone
Speaker 1: the wife right there, are you kidding me? We're taking that?
Speaker 1: Are you kidding me? My husband? He might not make
Speaker 1: the team. Honestly, It's it's like you have to as
Speaker 1: a as a player rep. You have to sell the
Speaker 1: benefits of everybody's situation is different, and you have to
Speaker 1: kind of mollify everything for each case you know of.
Speaker 1: And I'm not going to tell you to play a
Speaker 1: seventeenth game. What right do I have to do that?
Speaker 1: But here's reasons why, here's reasons not to you decide.
Speaker 1: And I'm telling you pressure married married players crossed the
Speaker 1: picket line faster than the guys that are single. There's
Speaker 1: no doubt about that. When you have veteran players crossing
Speaker 1: the picket line, every one of them has a wife
Speaker 1: and kids, every single one of them. All. Right, before
Speaker 1: we get to this week's ask Lap questions from people
Speaker 1: on Twitter and Facebook, I want to cover one more
Speaker 1: topic and this has to do with a great Q
Speaker 1: and A that Paul Dayner Junior did on The Athletic
Speaker 1: with Zach Taylor. And there was one thing in there
Speaker 1: that made me think that Zach Taylor might be listening
Speaker 1: to our podcast, because you said quite a while ago
Speaker 1: that training camp was not physical enough this year in
Speaker 1: an effort avoid injuries. There just wasn't enough contact. So
Speaker 1: here's what Zach Taylor said to Paul Dayer this week. Quote.
Speaker 1: The bottom line is we have to have the mentality
Speaker 1: that we are going to be more physical. That starts
Speaker 1: in training camp the first day you put the pads on.
Speaker 1: It is almost word for word for what you were saying. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's a factor. And in this collective bargaining
Speaker 1: agreement that we're talking about, they specifically address minimizing, diminishing
Speaker 1: the amount of contact you know, at training camp. So
Speaker 1: but what you can do, I would do, you know, heartily,
Speaker 1: I would do with full effort. I think that there's
Speaker 1: there's no substitute for it. I just it's it's hard
Speaker 1: to ramp it up, and particularly if you're going to
Speaker 1: start cutting down preseason games, it's hard to ramp it up.
Speaker 1: And I think maybe doing something with other teams like
Speaker 1: I talked about before, you know, where you bring up
Speaker 1: people together and you have one on ones. After a while,
Speaker 1: you a training camp, like I knew Eddie Edwards every move,
Speaker 1: you know, and it was like, I'm not saying it
Speaker 1: was easy to pass protect Eddie Edwards, but it was
Speaker 1: much easier week three than it was week one when
Speaker 1: it was like, oh man, what's he going to be doing?
Speaker 1: You know? And everybody has moves that they do better
Speaker 1: than others and favorite moves and just getting an exposure
Speaker 1: to different stuff because you can you can you can
Speaker 1: fall into a little bit of a trap. You can
Speaker 1: lull yourself into a yeah, I'm ready to go, and
Speaker 1: all of a sudden you go against a dude that's
Speaker 1: got some stuff like, man, I haven't seen that before.
Speaker 1: How do I just what do I do to come
Speaker 1: back that? What's my counter to that move? Man? That's
Speaker 1: a pretty good move. So there's no there's no basically
Speaker 1: replacement for repetition against it. You know, you just can't.
Speaker 1: You can't, like you know, mentally mental telepath. You put
Speaker 1: it in your head, it just doesn't happen. You have
Speaker 1: to go out and do it and wrap it. So yeah,
Speaker 1: it'll be interesting to see. And I don't think Jim
Speaker 1: Turner will have any any problem or a coach East
Speaker 1: under the defense. I don't think there'll be uh, there'll
Speaker 1: be any problem with you know, picking up the tempo. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, with the upfront guys all right. Time to
Speaker 1: hear from Bengaled them via the hashtag ask lap. Got
Speaker 1: some great questions from the audience a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: ago the last time we did that, So here we go.
Speaker 1: We got a bunch of them today from Dale. The
Speaker 1: Bengals don't typically cut players, but after going two and fourteen,
Speaker 1: do you think they will change that philosophy and in
Speaker 1: turn also be more aggressive in free agency? They very
Speaker 1: well could. You know, there's there's some people you know
Speaker 1: that are are potentially uh being considered to be let go.
Speaker 1: There always are, you know, every year, and I could
Speaker 1: see that happening this year, you know, Cordy Glenn. In
Speaker 1: my mind, it has to be the number one, number
Speaker 1: one candidate for that it would free up free up
Speaker 1: additional dollars. There's there's other guys you know, on the roster.
Speaker 1: We could probably go through a Litanya guy. So you
Speaker 1: do you have to h you know, you have to
Speaker 1: consider that opening up more dollars that would allow you
Speaker 1: to go ahead and attack free agency with more gusto
Speaker 1: and maybe in bigger numbers in free agency, not necessarily
Speaker 1: creating dollars to sign this one free agent for megamegadollars.
Speaker 1: That's a fifty fifty proposition. But um, you know, in turn,
Speaker 1: like for example, if I could move Corty Glenn's salary
Speaker 1: and have money where I could go sign two veteran
Speaker 1: linebackers in free agency? Heartbeat done? Where do I? Where
Speaker 1: do I sign to get that thing accomplished? I do
Speaker 1: that yesterday? So I think those kind of things are
Speaker 1: probably on the table. Drake Kirkpatrick's name comes up quite
Speaker 1: a bit as a potential cap casualty. What do you think? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that one's that one's interesting, you know, I mean it's
Speaker 1: um uh is it to the point where and when
Speaker 1: I if my name were ever brought up as a
Speaker 1: cap casualty? The first thing I would do if I
Speaker 1: really liked the organization and want to stay, I'd have
Speaker 1: my representational I would have back in the day. I
Speaker 1: would have gone into the club and said, you know,
Speaker 1: let's let's rediscuss what what what kind of value do
Speaker 1: you think I have? And if it doesn't fit with
Speaker 1: what you think you present, go ahead and let him
Speaker 1: do it. But if there's if, if you're real with yourself,
Speaker 1: you know, and and they're a real with them with
Speaker 1: what they're thinking, um, you can you can redo a deal.
Speaker 1: You guys have done that, and I think it's intelligent
Speaker 1: to do that, honestly. So, UM, I think I think
Speaker 1: camp or cap casualty sounds so severe. There could be
Speaker 1: a lot of massaging though, you know, massaging with players
Speaker 1: and um and and just see where see where it
Speaker 1: all all shakes out, see what happens, all right. I'm
Speaker 1: combining the next two from Chris and Steve Oh. Chris,
Speaker 1: if the Rams don't resign Andrew Whitworth, what are the
Speaker 1: chances that the Bengals would offer and that he would
Speaker 1: be interested? And then from Steve Oh, what about Whitworth
Speaker 1: at right tackle and moving Bobby Hart to right guard? Well,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not sure. You know. Then then then
Speaker 1: it's like, what do you do with a guy like
Speaker 1: Fred Taylor, you know who who basically has shown I
Speaker 1: thought Fred Taylor Johnson, excuse me, Fred Johnson's Fred great
Speaker 1: running back Jacksonville Jaguar, Fred Johnson, who made himself some
Speaker 1: money last year. I thought, you know, I thought he
Speaker 1: performed pretty well. Very athletic guy. Um, former basketball player.
Speaker 1: You know, it's just kind of scratching the surface of
Speaker 1: what his you know, abilities are. Um. So I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure at this stage of the career they
Speaker 1: made they made a determination that Andrew wit Worth um
Speaker 1: was was at the end of his career a few
Speaker 1: years ago, to bring him back. Now, if the team
Speaker 1: that he did excuse me, that he did sign with
Speaker 1: no longer has interest, I'm not sure they bring him back.
Speaker 1: You know. At that point, Um, it's like, you know,
Speaker 1: when Max Montoya was done, they didn't bring Max Montoya back.
Speaker 1: They made an error, and you make mistakes, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes you don't guess right, you don't project it right.
Speaker 1: Everybody does. It happens, and Max went on to great
Speaker 1: years with the Raiders, and you know, they didn't bring
Speaker 1: them back to Cincinnatione's done with the great years with
Speaker 1: the Raiders. I can see the same same kind of
Speaker 1: scenario in this one, um, and I think that they're there.
Speaker 1: They're they're building their offensive line with with people that
Speaker 1: aren't you know, aren't on putting out on number eighteen
Speaker 1: on their career. You know, they're trying to build their
Speaker 1: offensive line differently than that from Jordan. What compensation would
Speaker 1: you predict for potential trades for Andy Dalton and or
Speaker 1: Cordy Glenn Boy Andy Dalton? I mean when you look
Speaker 1: at look at what the Ravens got for Flacco, I
Speaker 1: think it was a fifth round pick from the Denver Bronco.
Speaker 1: I think that was a four. Was the four? Okay?
Speaker 1: So in that case, you know, here's the guy that
Speaker 1: was Super Bowl MVP. You know, I had got the
Speaker 1: big contract. But he goes eleven touchdowns no interceptions in
Speaker 1: the playoffs and his team wins the Super Bowl. So
Speaker 1: again people are saying, you know, second round pick, and
Speaker 1: to me, with the glut of free agent quarterbacks that
Speaker 1: you don't have to pay, you don't have to give
Speaker 1: anything for. I mean, this is not a good year
Speaker 1: honestly for to try to trade a quarterback like like Andy. Now,
Speaker 1: is he more valuable to franchises than some of these
Speaker 1: quarterbacks that are on the very end of their career.
Speaker 1: I think Andy's got obviously quite a few years left,
Speaker 1: but still, when you have guys like that in the marketplace,
Speaker 1: it changes the value. So I'd take a four. I'd
Speaker 1: take a four for Andy Dalton, I'd take a I
Speaker 1: don't know. I don't know what i'd take for Corty Glenn. Yeah,
Speaker 1: bag of leats. I don't know. I don't know what
Speaker 1: you know at this point with Cordy if they if
Speaker 1: they can trade Corty Glenn, God bless him. I don't
Speaker 1: know what kind of value he has, you know, league why,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure what they can get for Corty Glenn.
Speaker 1: But if somebody throws something out there, I would pounce
Speaker 1: on that, whatever it is. From a Twitter follower who
Speaker 1: goes by overly optimistic Bengals fan, do you envision the
Speaker 1: Bengals using more heavy personnel in dynamic ways? You know
Speaker 1: it's they've got uh. You know, we just talked about
Speaker 1: Fred Johnson and in the athletic ability that he has,
Speaker 1: and he was the he kind of advanced from the
Speaker 1: third tackle in packages to let's put him at left
Speaker 1: tackle at the end of the season, see if he
Speaker 1: can play. I can see it. I can see them,
Speaker 1: you know, utilizing more of that heavy, heavy personnel. You know,
Speaker 1: they've they've they've got some athletic offensive limit. I Prince
Speaker 1: is another guy from Ohio State that they're you know,
Speaker 1: they're going to try to develop a little bit that
Speaker 1: they picked up, you know, awful waivers so during the
Speaker 1: course of the season. So uh yeah, I mean I
Speaker 1: do think that with Isaiah Prince and with Fred Johnson,
Speaker 1: you've got two guys that it's almost like you had
Speaker 1: your draft early, you know, and you you picked up
Speaker 1: guys that that have shown they can play in the
Speaker 1: National Football League. So it's not like, man, you know,
Speaker 1: can they or can't they? Now I think Fred has
Speaker 1: shown more than Isaiah has obviously at this point. But
Speaker 1: Isaiah's I think somebody that you can work with. Um,
Speaker 1: so it's gonna yeah, it's gonna be interesting. I could
Speaker 1: see him doing that. I could see them going heavy
Speaker 1: personnel creatively, UM seeing Fred maybe even being a threat
Speaker 1: catching the football with an out for one pass. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh they jumped them. I mean they covered the
Speaker 1: big boy. They blanketed him. So you know, obviously, um,
Speaker 1: he's not a he's not a secret. He's not a
Speaker 1: surprise that that he played basketball and he's athletic and
Speaker 1: all that. So yeah, it'll be interesting that what kind
Speaker 1: of packages they can they can do there and you know,
Speaker 1: Joe Mixon, Giovanni Bernard all the running. I'm sure they'd
Speaker 1: love it, you know, to run behind h extra big
Speaker 1: body mass type guys like that from Mark Well. The
Speaker 1: next generation of the Brown family run the franchise differently,
Speaker 1: and do you have any feel for what they'll do
Speaker 1: as the stadium lease expires in twenty twenty six. Um,
Speaker 1: I think the next generation has been largely running in
Speaker 1: the Bengals organization for a while. You know, Mike Brown
Speaker 1: is eighty four years old. I think the day to
Speaker 1: day operation and decision making is already in the in
Speaker 1: the lap of Katie and Troy Blackburn. Um. Now Mike
Speaker 1: is heavily involved in terms of they don't do anything
Speaker 1: without informing him. I'm not saying that he's involved in
Speaker 1: the process, but he's not spearheading the process like he
Speaker 1: once did. He has handed off a lot of those
Speaker 1: duties and responsibilities already to Katie and Troy, so um,
Speaker 1: you know they've been doing it for a while, you
Speaker 1: know as well. It's not like it just happened, you know,
Speaker 1: last week. It's been a number of years, a good
Speaker 1: number of years now, and uh and I think it's
Speaker 1: probably increasing, you know, on a on a year by
Speaker 1: year basis, which is more than an understandable as far
Speaker 1: as the least the stadium lease man that that that one,
Speaker 1: that one kind of scares me a little bit because
Speaker 1: as the league continues to be extremely popular, some city
Speaker 1: is going to throw some crazy deal out there that
Speaker 1: you wonder, how can you turn it down? So that
Speaker 1: that's that's my big concern is as this juggernaut continues
Speaker 1: to grow fourteen billion fifteen billion dollars and well revenue
Speaker 1: industry of the National Football League by twenty twenty six,
Speaker 1: it may be closer to twenty billion or more, some
Speaker 1: cities gonna say I want a piece of that. I
Speaker 1: want to I want to get on in that action.
Speaker 1: And you know what, how will Cincinnati battle that or
Speaker 1: counter that or what kind of offers will be made
Speaker 1: that that is a little bit of concern. Of mine
Speaker 1: for sure, all right? Another combined question from Paul and Christian.
Speaker 1: Paul asked what would the Bengals accept to trade out
Speaker 1: of the number one overall pick? And then Christian asked,
Speaker 1: did the Achille Smith offer back in the ninety nine
Speaker 1: draft have any effect on accepting or rejecting offers in
Speaker 1: relation to dealing the number one overall and I guess
Speaker 1: we should go back and discuss the ninety nine offer
Speaker 1: from the Saints. They wanted Ricky Williams. The Bengals had
Speaker 1: the number three overall pick. The Saints offered all of
Speaker 1: their ninety nine picks rounds one through seven. They had
Speaker 1: the twelfth overall pick that year, plus their number one
Speaker 1: in two thousand, plus their number one in two thousand
Speaker 1: and one, plus their number two in two thousand and two.
Speaker 1: So that was three number ones, two number two's, and
Speaker 1: a three, four, five, six seven. All things changed for
Speaker 1: the number three pick in the draft, which the Bengals
Speaker 1: turned down and took a Keiley Smith. The Redskins took
Speaker 1: a slightly watered down version of the Saints offer at
Speaker 1: number five overall, but in any case, getting back to
Speaker 1: the question, what would the Bengals accept in order to
Speaker 1: trade the number one overall pick this year, and did
Speaker 1: what ultimately turned out to be a bad decision affect
Speaker 1: them going forward? You would think. So I couldn't believe
Speaker 1: they didn't pull the trigger on that trade. And you know,
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people in the organization couldn't
Speaker 1: believe that they didn't pull the trigger on the trade.
Speaker 1: And obviously, hindsight is it should have pulled the trigger
Speaker 1: on the trade. And if the Miami Dolphins are willing
Speaker 1: to give up their whole draft, which includes three number
Speaker 1: one uh and and every other pick, I mean, how
Speaker 1: do you how do you not take that? That's that's
Speaker 1: remarkable to me. But um, I guess part of the
Speaker 1: feeling that that you have to deal with at that
Speaker 1: point is if they're willing to give up all that,
Speaker 1: why am I trading that pick? Now? The Bengals didn't
Speaker 1: have interest in Ricky Williams that Mike Dicker was like,
Speaker 1: this is what I want, this is what I need, this,
Speaker 1: this is this is the final component I'm missing. This
Speaker 1: is the piece I don't care about all the other stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm good with him. It elevates us to whatever level. Um,
Speaker 1: if if the Dolphins do offer the motherload of three
Speaker 1: first round picks. Party has to say, you know, what
Speaker 1: do they see in Joe Burrow that we don't necessarily
Speaker 1: And if if they were to do that now, I
Speaker 1: don't see him doing it because I think they're gonna
Speaker 1: draft to A and I think they're gonna have a.
Speaker 1: They feel like they're going to have a guy who
Speaker 1: may be the best quarterback in this draft if if
Speaker 1: he heals. But how do the Bengals, how do the
Speaker 1: those drafts too, thinking that he may have to miss
Speaker 1: his rookie year. How many number one picks have they
Speaker 1: had that have missed their whole rookie year the last
Speaker 1: four No, but you look at you look at TWA
Speaker 1: being so beaten up and having so many injuries. The
Speaker 1: greatest player in Bengals history, who's in the Hall of Fame,
Speaker 1: didn't play much at USC. It was like he's not available.
Speaker 1: He's a great player, but hellie, I mean, so many
Speaker 1: teams took him off the board. You know, I told
Speaker 1: the story about Parcels with the Giants. They would not
Speaker 1: put him on the board and he was infuriated and
Speaker 1: they just I mean, Anthony was off of more boards
Speaker 1: than he was on and the Bengals make the pick,
Speaker 1: turns into you know, mister durable I mean totally available.
Speaker 1: So his run of bad luck happened in college, Billy Price.
Speaker 1: You know, all these guys that we're talking about that
Speaker 1: the Bengals have had first round the one starts forty
Speaker 1: eight straight games, one starts fifty straight games in college,
Speaker 1: and can't get to training camp in their rookie year.
Speaker 1: So it's weird. You know, maybe maybe you don't draft
Speaker 1: the healthy ones through college because they're gonna get hurt
Speaker 1: in the NFL. Maybe the ones that have gone through
Speaker 1: the injury deal, you know, maybe the football gods say, yeah,
Speaker 1: you've paid your price, You're gonna have a great NFL career.
Speaker 1: Ross though, No, John Roski, JOHNA. Carter, I mean very
Speaker 1: first preseason, you know, in his first preseason up there
Speaker 1: in Detroit. You know, you look at the first pick
Speaker 1: of the draft, Um, you know, kid John of Carter
Speaker 1: with with an injury like that a devastating and that
Speaker 1: and that's the thing that muddy is this whole deal
Speaker 1: is is you know, the injury. Nobody's an injury south there,
Speaker 1: you know, and it's like you can't put your you
Speaker 1: can't put your hat on and prognosticate injuries when they're
Speaker 1: gonna car As we said, you know many times you're
Speaker 1: one percent at injury risk, one percent of every play,
Speaker 1: one hundred percent of all players on the field. That's
Speaker 1: just the nature of the beast from j T. Who
Speaker 1: will the Bank will select at number thirty three, that's
Speaker 1: the first pick in the second round, or will they
Speaker 1: trade up or down? Well, I think that they will
Speaker 1: take the best defensive player that's on the board. I
Speaker 1: really believe that after taking Joe Burrow, I think they
Speaker 1: feel like, you know that that's obviously going to upgrade
Speaker 1: them offensively in their minds at that point in time,
Speaker 1: and then they'd probably at the next pick go go
Speaker 1: for the best defensive player. And they do have I
Speaker 1: mean it could be at any any of the three levels.
Speaker 1: Their their defense could could take an infusion. So I
Speaker 1: think whoever that is, you know, whoever slides to that
Speaker 1: thirty third pick. Now the question is about the trade,
Speaker 1: and we've talked about this, you know, the thirty third pick,
Speaker 1: the sixty fifth pick that every round when they have
Speaker 1: the first pick of that round, they're gonna get phone
Speaker 1: calls because people are going to redo their boards quickly.
Speaker 1: In some you know, after day one, first round, everybody
Speaker 1: does their boards. First pick of the second round, that's
Speaker 1: the Bengals, second and third round, even the third round.
Speaker 1: Shuffle your board quickly, and you're gonna have to do
Speaker 1: it to her. You're gonna have to, you know, have
Speaker 1: it almost done. The last two or three picks, doesn't
Speaker 1: affect it or not. And okay, boy, that guy slid
Speaker 1: out of a second. He's there at the very top
Speaker 1: of the third first pick. Bengals get calls. Then after
Speaker 1: the third round, another whole night and the next morning
Speaker 1: to reshuffle your board for the draft hits again. And boy,
Speaker 1: there you are at the first pick of the fourth round.
Speaker 1: So they're gonna have a lot of phone calls, a
Speaker 1: lot of draft conversation activity with every pick. So I
Speaker 1: could see them, I could see them really almost maybe
Speaker 1: with the thirty third pick, I could see them probably
Speaker 1: trading down more so than giving up a high pick
Speaker 1: every round to move up into the bottom end of
Speaker 1: the first round. I could see them getting capital with
Speaker 1: that thirty third pick, and then you know, moving around
Speaker 1: up or down later. But I'm not sure that thirty
Speaker 1: third pick with the you know what, the fifty fifty
Speaker 1: fourth or whatever it is, sixty fifth, the next pick
Speaker 1: in the third round, taking those two to move up,
Speaker 1: or mortgaging next years. You know, we'll do this thirty
Speaker 1: third pick and the fourth round pick of you know,
Speaker 1: two twenty one. I don't see them doing that as
Speaker 1: much as maybe trading back. I'll make the call right
Speaker 1: now they are trading down in the second round. I
Speaker 1: just see, you know, the first round comes to an end.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of great talent left in the Bengals think,
Speaker 1: you know what, we want more picks. We've only got
Speaker 1: one in every round right now. This is our chance.
Speaker 1: Who knows, maybe at another second rounder, certainly you could
Speaker 1: probably get an extra third round or if you trade
Speaker 1: down a little bit in the second round. I think
Speaker 1: that's going to happen. I really do. And if we're saying, okay,
Speaker 1: take the best defensive player available with a thirty third pick,
Speaker 1: if there's you're looking at your board and there was
Speaker 1: a run on the offensive side of the football and
Speaker 1: there's a bunch of defensive players left, you'd be happy
Speaker 1: with the thirty three trade back and getting multiples. You know,
Speaker 1: hit every position, hit two of the three position levels,
Speaker 1: you know, with picks and or if a wide receiver,
Speaker 1: It's like, I can't believe that dude's still there. You know, Um,
Speaker 1: maybe you can pick him up, you know, if you
Speaker 1: don't trade back too far. So it who knows, but
Speaker 1: I agree. I think in the early stages of the draft,
Speaker 1: they'll be trading back first and second round, if there's
Speaker 1: any trades. Won't obviously can't trade up any higher than
Speaker 1: number one, but you'll be trading back in the first,
Speaker 1: trading back in the second, and then after that potentially
Speaker 1: potentially moving up. But I could I could even see
Speaker 1: trading back in the third round, trading back in the second,
Speaker 1: getting additional picks, trading back with your first pick of
Speaker 1: the third round if you've got an additional third, moving
Speaker 1: back and getting another third in the four I could
Speaker 1: see him playing that game pretty much, you know, the
Speaker 1: domino effect all the way down every round the draft.
Speaker 1: Next question from John Well, the Bengals pick up job
Speaker 1: on Ross's fifth year option. If not, well, they select
Speaker 1: a wide receiver in the first three rounds. I don't
Speaker 1: see them picking up you know, John Ross's option unless
Speaker 1: he has a Pro Bowl year. They have to make
Speaker 1: the decision by March or by May fifth. No, let's say,
Speaker 1: I don't see how they can project to pay him
Speaker 1: fifteen million dollars on this year's salary cap. There's no way.
Speaker 1: I just don't see it. So yeah, I mean I
Speaker 1: think I think that if there were a receiver, this
Speaker 1: is such a receiver, um plentiful draft, They're gonna take
Speaker 1: a receiver. It's just a question of how high. Just
Speaker 1: a question of how high, and um, you know, I
Speaker 1: don't I don't see them picking up John Ross's his option.
Speaker 1: I just now if he has an unbelievable uh you
Speaker 1: know last season, Um, you know, maybe at that point,
Speaker 1: good for John, he's got leverage, But how much more?
Speaker 1: How much more would they pay him than fifteen million
Speaker 1: dollars for the for the first year of the following contract.
Speaker 1: Anyway they pay him less. Yeah, I mean, it's like
Speaker 1: you'd have a bonus, you know, if you if you
Speaker 1: get a second body of the apple, there's a bonus
Speaker 1: and all that, and it's all pro rated. But the
Speaker 1: actual contract maybe he might get depending on the bonus,
Speaker 1: he might get close, but you're not going to be
Speaker 1: paying him the average of the top five salaris of
Speaker 1: his position the first year of a contract extension if
Speaker 1: he does have a great year. So I just there's
Speaker 1: no way they're going to pick up that fifteen mil.
Speaker 1: There's no way. Here's a quick reminder that he was
Speaker 1: taking one pick before Patrick Mahomes. But we move on
Speaker 1: to Tyler. What are your thoughts on linebacker Akeem Davis
Speaker 1: Gaither a player that you saw in person at the
Speaker 1: Senior Bowl. Yeah, I was very impressed with him. He
Speaker 1: can flat out pick him up and put him down.
Speaker 1: The dude can run. You know, not a big linebacker
Speaker 1: six two two fifty. You know you think, okay, you know,
Speaker 1: could he even play? Does he have the coverage abilities
Speaker 1: of like a big safety. Yeah, he does. He can
Speaker 1: run and um, everything that I gathered watching him on
Speaker 1: the field, Um, he has a good He had a
Speaker 1: good rapport with his teammates. Seemed like he was not
Speaker 1: one of these uh you know guys. It was difficult
Speaker 1: to deal with in terms of other players him thinking
Speaker 1: he was too cool for school. None of that. My
Speaker 1: understanding is that he was very good in the classroom.
Speaker 1: So on a lot of levels, I like him, and
Speaker 1: I would think Darren Simmons would like him as well.
Speaker 1: A guy like that would would upgrade you know, his
Speaker 1: special teams obviously as well. So I think he's good value.
Speaker 1: I think he's got significant value. He was. He was
Speaker 1: one of the guys that, you know, I thought of
Speaker 1: the handful of linebackers for North and South in the
Speaker 1: Senior Bowl, he was somebody that jumped out at me
Speaker 1: a little bit for sure. All Right, we'll do a
Speaker 1: couple more hashtag ask Lap questions from Steven. The Bengals
Speaker 1: switched blocking schemes about midway through the season, which helped
Speaker 1: the running game. Should they stick with those changes or
Speaker 1: should they go back to the initial scheme and find
Speaker 1: players that fit. I think that if the guys that
Speaker 1: finished the season are pretty much the guys that are
Speaker 1: starting this one, I think you stay with the continuity
Speaker 1: of that what worked. You know, to me, it's the
Speaker 1: last thing you want to do is if you and
Speaker 1: and it definitely it definitely fits. You're not going to
Speaker 1: have a guy that you're going to throw in there
Speaker 1: that is going to be a big athletic stiff, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean, everybody that they've they've got in camp right
Speaker 1: now has the athleticism to do the things that we're
Speaker 1: talking about, the gap scheme, where you know, you block
Speaker 1: down your pull linemaner in space instead of just inside
Speaker 1: zone and outside zone where you're just trying to mall
Speaker 1: and mash people. So m I think with the personnel
Speaker 1: that the reason they made the change was adapting their
Speaker 1: scheme to fit their personnel. So if their personnel doesn't
Speaker 1: change drastically, why would you change away from anything that
Speaker 1: had worked so well the last five games of the
Speaker 1: year second half of the season, there were six in
Speaker 1: the NFL in Russian the last eight games of the year,
Speaker 1: the last five I think it was even better than that.
Speaker 1: So I'd stay with what was working, that's for sure,
Speaker 1: and then just keep building on it and go from there.
Speaker 1: All right, final ask lap question. This is from Jared
Speaker 1: Will the Bengals have new uniforms this year? And I
Speaker 1: will twist that slightly and say and ask should they
Speaker 1: have new uniforms because Chris Simms keeps making this thing
Speaker 1: that just to change the mojo, got to change the helmet.
Speaker 1: It's time to try try something different to change the mojo. Well,
Speaker 1: I know the last time the change was made, we
Speaker 1: went to the Super Bowl. That was the eighty one season,
Speaker 1: they made the big change and put stripes on the helmet, and, um,
Speaker 1: you know the initial reaction by everybody, including players in
Speaker 1: the team. Oh my gosh, man, we look like we're
Speaker 1: literally at the zoo. I mean, this is like we
Speaker 1: better play. Well, these are a little bit dicey. I
Speaker 1: mean it was, it was. It was a big, big,
Speaker 1: bold move that Paul Brown made. But he always liked
Speaker 1: the rams, you know, helmet with that with that logo,
Speaker 1: so he wanted to go more in that direction and
Speaker 1: have something like there's no doubting who that football team is.
Speaker 1: When you see that, you know exactly who it is.
Speaker 1: And and it panned out, definitely panned out. Um, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I don't know how drastic a change, uh
Speaker 1: that would be talked about, but maybe, you know, maybe
Speaker 1: something to just I think I think any edge that
Speaker 1: you can try to find, whether it be psychological, physical,
Speaker 1: whatever it is, as long as the players believe it,
Speaker 1: the players are buying it, I'm good with it. You know,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter, I guess what. Whatever. The only people
Speaker 1: that it matters um the final. In the final, when
Speaker 1: you melt it all down and boil it all down,
Speaker 1: the guys were in the uniforms and going out there
Speaker 1: and playing for the City of Cincinnati and for their franchise.
Speaker 1: Here's the uniform change I want to see. I want
Speaker 1: there to be a number nine with a Burrow on
Speaker 1: the back of it. Yeah, I like that. I like
Speaker 1: that call. I do. I think, you know, the more
Speaker 1: I the more I see him, and the more varied
Speaker 1: environments I see him in, I like him more and more.
Speaker 1: You know, I think I think the one thing that
Speaker 1: he seems to be everybody has different personalities, even even
Speaker 1: these people that are interviewing him, some of them just
Speaker 1: looking for as much dirt and as much and he
Speaker 1: handles it all very well. You know. He might give
Speaker 1: him just a little, but he doesn't go overboard. You know.
Speaker 1: I think he's intelligent, extremely intelligent, and I think he's
Speaker 1: a He's a natural born leader of men. I mean,
Speaker 1: guys grab a tate toward him. I don't I have
Speaker 1: not heard one person after their first and counal with
Speaker 1: Joe Burrow say I don't know about that guy. I mean,
Speaker 1: he sells you. He sells you fast. Appreciate the time,
Speaker 1: thanks buddy, my pleasure, sir. Anytime that's going to do
Speaker 1: it for this episode of the podcast. Next week, Lap
Speaker 1: and I will head to Indianapolis for the Scouting Combine
Speaker 1: where Joe Burrow, Zach Taylor, and Duke Tobin are all
Speaker 1: scheduled to speak. On Tuesday, we'll have some good material
Speaker 1: and next week's show. And if you haven't done so already,
Speaker 1: don't forget to subscribe on iTunes, stitch, your Google Play, Spotify,
Speaker 1: or pod Bean, and if you have a minute, give
Speaker 1: it a rating or share a comment. Those five star
Speaker 1: ratings help more Bengals fans find our podcast. I'm Dan
Speaker 1: Horde and thanks for listening to The Bengals Booth Podcast