Speaker 1: Be Around the NFL Podcast have terrible English accents? Disagree?
Speaker 1: Welcome to another edition of the Around the NFL Podcast.
Speaker 1: My name is Dan Hansas, and I'm joined in a
Speaker 1: room filled with heroes. Mark Sessler, Chris Westling, and Greg Rosenthal.
Speaker 1: What is up? Boys? Hey? Dan? What does day show up? Day?
Speaker 1: What's that smile? Mark? You gotta smile on your face.
Speaker 1: You are Once we get through this production, a few
Speaker 1: other circus acts, we are on to the end of
Speaker 1: the week. You know, a week A week from tomorrow,
Speaker 1: west is on a plane to Tybee. A week from tonight,
Speaker 1: who after the Shield wins? Next week, Keisha and I
Speaker 1: hop on a plane and get out of incredible dedication
Speaker 1: to the Diamond Um. And on Friday show, we're gonna
Speaker 1: have a little wedding spectacular connected to the Chris and
Speaker 1: Lakisha nuptials coming up um next weekend. So we're all
Speaker 1: very excited for that big show. Today. Hey, doing great,
Speaker 1: I'm doing great. The beard is still here, it's looking good.
Speaker 1: It's happening. It's it's gone past the point where it's
Speaker 1: a lazy thing and it's now actually, oh yeah, there's
Speaker 1: some pruning going on happening uh not really, Yeah, a
Speaker 1: little bit in the neck. It's moved into like movie
Speaker 1: roll beard like you needed to you needed it for
Speaker 1: a role, and so you grew it and it looks great.
Speaker 1: I checked with Keisha, you know. She she thought it
Speaker 1: would like mess up the wedding pictures. That's and she
Speaker 1: she said no, she she liked it. And yeah, this
Speaker 1: this Will Brinson character got after me on Twitter thinking
Speaker 1: it was like some sort of savvy move that like
Speaker 1: I was asking your knowing she would say yes to
Speaker 1: like seem like I was a good guy. But that's
Speaker 1: not true. If Action Jackson told me to shave it,
Speaker 1: I'd shave it to tomorrow. Him boss, Henry Hodson behind
Speaker 1: the glass. We're gonna get to him in a couple
Speaker 1: of minutes. Um about an overseas situation, which she is
Speaker 1: an expert in all matters overseas as an England native.
Speaker 1: But since you're here and you have a headset on
Speaker 1: your thoughts on Greg's beer, I like it. It's pictures
Speaker 1: of it, but um, it makes Greg look kind of
Speaker 1: older and wiser, which was yeah, yeah, okay, So a
Speaker 1: lot to get to today. Chris Westling wrote a banger
Speaker 1: Top ten NFL offenses. Um, you can get that at
Speaker 1: NFL dot com slash Westling and we're going to kind
Speaker 1: of go through the list. That's fun. Also, our old buddy,
Speaker 1: are you kidding me? Connor Or who wrote a banger
Speaker 1: for Sports Illustrated UM and the Monday Morning Quarterback Gang
Speaker 1: the decline of the Alliance of American Football. So we'll
Speaker 1: get Connor on the horn. But but before that, we'll
Speaker 1: do news. But before that, I wanted to. It's been
Speaker 1: a while. Uh, it's time for me. And you know,
Speaker 1: I use you guys as as really a think think tank.
Speaker 1: With this some NFL slogans, I'm gonna pitch slogan slogan ideas.
Speaker 1: Got new slogan ideas. I bet they're good. I hope
Speaker 1: you're paying her at this point. Her the great Sydney
Speaker 1: Carlson last it. I'd assume they knew on Mount Rushmore.
Speaker 1: I am attempting to get her paid as of, like
Speaker 1: as of after you asked now he is now, I mean,
Speaker 1: have your belly last. But yes, I got her paid previously.
Speaker 1: I told her that I will get her paid for this.
Speaker 1: There is a paperwork issue if you really want to
Speaker 1: since we're talking about it. Um. I managed to get
Speaker 1: her paid for the last UM song she did, and
Speaker 1: she never did the paperwork. So it's like, I gotta,
Speaker 1: I gotta help her along together. He's doing it for
Speaker 1: the love of but I'm working with her together the
Speaker 1: conversation because what a jingle. She does, great work. Last
Speaker 1: it all Right, here we go again. These are pitches
Speaker 1: for the NFL. Uh launching slogans that will grow the game.
Speaker 1: First one, I'll start skin cells, no doubt about that.
Speaker 1: So we lean into it, Greg skin cells, skin cells.
Speaker 1: I thought you meant, like, you know, the cells, you know,
Speaker 1: like Hans cells. Yeah, I thought was about the human body,
Speaker 1: like the real DNA stuff. No, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: sex cells. Just trying to avoid the three letter word.
Speaker 1: But anyway, here we go. The NFL get a load
Speaker 1: of the bodies on these hunks. Yes, no, maybe, so
Speaker 1: be honest, I don't think that's bad because you know,
Speaker 1: one of the things that separates the NFL is it's
Speaker 1: popularity across gender. You know, I feel like real wide
Speaker 1: net with everyone and and a wide variety of bodies, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, whatever you're into, you would find someone to
Speaker 1: your like, you know, imagine and men too. I mean,
Speaker 1: no one talks about the male form more than Dan Hanzas,
Speaker 1: so a lot of fans out there. It covers a
Speaker 1: whole mess of demographics, alright, I know West Lakes in
Speaker 1: I got to comment on that, all right. So you
Speaker 1: always got to keep an eye on the next generation.
Speaker 1: So and I'm not talking about Generation X or the
Speaker 1: millennials or the real young kids. So, um, how about
Speaker 1: the youth? Hey, kids watch football every Sunday or we're
Speaker 1: taking your dad. I find that fear is a very
Speaker 1: strong motivator in the young ones. It feels a little
Speaker 1: heavy handed and slightly machia valium for kids. Also like
Speaker 1: exceptionally cruel for kids who've already lost their father, right,
Speaker 1: some kids don't have the father is not at home.
Speaker 1: So it's adds to the mystery of what doesn't hit everybody.
Speaker 1: But if I just said you know your loved one,
Speaker 1: it maybe doesn't land with anybody. You're basically hitting intact
Speaker 1: family structures where it counts. Not sure we need to
Speaker 1: play hardball with four year olds. You'll have kids one day.
Speaker 1: You'll understand they'll be fans for life. Finally, oversees a
Speaker 1: massive still we've done so much great work overseas the NFL,
Speaker 1: but still largely untapped market, huge potential. We welcome officially
Speaker 1: Henry Hotchen, Vice President of International here an NFL Media.
Speaker 1: You can see the Hollywood sign from his office. What's up,
Speaker 1: Henry hight Dan. I'll tell you what that your first
Speaker 1: slogan there reminds me when I very first started working
Speaker 1: for the NFL. I worked for a team called the
Speaker 1: London Monits in NFL Europe, and they had a slogan,
Speaker 1: I'm really not kidding, which was come and watch fifty
Speaker 1: two men bashing their helmets, which, um, the London Monits
Speaker 1: closed down shortly after that. It wasn't a successful slogan.
Speaker 1: Yeah you know, it was a little wordy, Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: a mouthful there. All right, So this is what I
Speaker 1: was thinking for this one, Henry, And since you are
Speaker 1: the VP of International, you let me know. This is
Speaker 1: kind of a mad libs Hey insert country here, quit
Speaker 1: and then a disparaging play on words connected to that
Speaker 1: country's most popular sport something something NFL example, Hey England, England,
Speaker 1: quit flopping on the pitch, Come play some real football?
Speaker 1: How about that? Now about hey India, drop the cricket
Speaker 1: bat pick up a pig skin. Yeah. I mean there's
Speaker 1: there's like three hundred years of history there that that
Speaker 1: you're asking them to essentially dispose of for your game.
Speaker 1: Time for change, Yeah, time for change. Hey, Japan, enough
Speaker 1: with the sumo wrestling. I don't know another thing that.
Speaker 1: I mean, no, I don't. I would just flatten note
Speaker 1: to all of those. Really, yeah, I thought one of
Speaker 1: those would connected. I think I like the anti flopping message.
Speaker 1: That's the anti flopping one. I can I can kind
Speaker 1: of get behind, but I'm not sure you have to say,
Speaker 1: like everyone drop it now, now get down with this instead.
Speaker 1: All right, maybe you have a more nuance take on
Speaker 1: how to grow the game. Um, speaking of which, I
Speaker 1: whant to get a plug in here, Mark Henry, because
Speaker 1: there's something big going on over in London this September
Speaker 1: the NFL Academy tell us about it. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1: So you guys, if you you know you've this year,
Speaker 1: hopefully you're going to go to a game in fact,
Speaker 1: we look at that. That's that. I don't know if
Speaker 1: that for sure, but you've seen there. Yeah, let's let's
Speaker 1: make that happen. First of all, but you've seen their
Speaker 1: games in London. You guys have been to events in
Speaker 1: London as well, you guys would I think the start
Speaker 1: action last year for the NFL kickoff party and and
Speaker 1: so the NFL has just launched an academy in London
Speaker 1: and the the goal is to get more British players
Speaker 1: ultimately or international players into the NFL by getting kids
Speaker 1: who are really into football at young age about kids
Speaker 1: at a young age who are into football, to get
Speaker 1: them playing and to be part of this academy which
Speaker 1: has been launched in in partnership with Tottenham, who, as
Speaker 1: you guys know, and hopefully this will be the game
Speaker 1: that we get you guys to. Tottenham now has an
Speaker 1: NFL stadium, Tottenham Hotspur and and and the NFL are
Speaker 1: going to share a stadium and so they're going to
Speaker 1: have this academy and bring kids in from the age
Speaker 1: of sixteen to nineteen. And a lot of soccer clubs
Speaker 1: in in the UK will have academies which teach the
Speaker 1: sport but then also continue their education as well. So
Speaker 1: the goal is kind of give them this education, character
Speaker 1: education and then football on top of it, and ultimately
Speaker 1: to to get some some British players into the NFL
Speaker 1: about the idea that England proud soccer heritage, football heritage.
Speaker 1: I haven't won the World Cup in many, many, many
Speaker 1: many years. The idea of you're now going to siphon
Speaker 1: some of your best talent to a different football backfire.
Speaker 1: Uh No, I think it could. I think it could
Speaker 1: be played. In fact, it might help more than your slogan.
Speaker 1: That might be the thing that that I mean builds
Speaker 1: the NFL. That and West has talked about some of
Speaker 1: the rugby players that have recently trying. Christian Wade is
Speaker 1: with the Bills. There's a couple other guys, guy called
Speaker 1: Ales Gray with the Falcons. So there's a there's a pipeline.
Speaker 1: But we're getting players right now who are like in
Speaker 1: their twenties much easier to start playing football and have
Speaker 1: a chance you or get him a sixteen and then
Speaker 1: they get played college football. So that's that's really the part.
Speaker 1: But won't like the guys like Jed I especially that'll
Speaker 1: have an impact done kids seen seeing him, speaking of
Speaker 1: which he was out there you know, promoting this. There's
Speaker 1: a bunch of we gotta get him back in the
Speaker 1: NFL team out come up a little bit later in
Speaker 1: today's show. There you go. I think he'll be back
Speaker 1: pretty soon. But yeah, there's a bunch of Actually this
Speaker 1: it's some really good Patrick mahomes O b J A
Speaker 1: couple other guys are joining in to help promote it
Speaker 1: as well. So good exciting, Henry. And that's a direct
Speaker 1: reflection of the work you're doing getting those big fish.
Speaker 1: Like I think if it as we what percentage would
Speaker 1: you say, because there's obviously there has been significant growth
Speaker 1: in terms of the international players. It's not like an explosion,
Speaker 1: but it's significant over the last five years. Like, how
Speaker 1: much percentage credit do you take for that? Um? I
Speaker 1: mean it's as I said, it's a team effort. Everyone
Speaker 1: is involved and the cool thing is that the play
Speaker 1: is a one part and then then at least are
Speaker 1: like fans who get to watch these guys and a
Speaker 1: number to plug anymore. Now you have to give us
Speaker 1: a number of your personally responsible for these and this
Speaker 1: includes mobio morea sports I would say, I would say
Speaker 1: less than the percentage of of gs in your name.
Speaker 1: Woll that's anywhere below sixty. Yeah, that's that's pretty good,
Speaker 1: all right. And speaking of Mobio, next time we do
Speaker 1: a Mobio update. Maybe you'll sit in again, Harry. You
Speaker 1: know what, maybe I'll bring mobile with me. Then you
Speaker 1: can look him in the eye you as you updates.
Speaker 1: It's a negative thing, it's not critical. If you can
Speaker 1: set it up. We would love to have him on
Speaker 1: the podcast. Absolutely, Henry, Thank you very much. It's been
Speaker 1: a pleasure. I want to get any other plugs and
Speaker 1: to use no no for me, it's a thrill just
Speaker 1: to beat my favorite podcast out there. And now I
Speaker 1: get to be and see my friends hard at work
Speaker 1: and Erica as well as friend. Let's get some food. Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's do it. Okay, Friday, Actually, Greg and I having
Speaker 1: lunch on Friday. You guys are will welcome to John
Speaker 1: if you'd like to. Is that okay? Great? Please? I
Speaker 1: assumed it's it's the Friday afternoon lunch even you all right? Well,
Speaker 1: thank you? Well, no, I know you don't like food,
Speaker 1: so could we could just call it. I don't have
Speaker 1: it delivered to my office the way that you do,
Speaker 1: So all right, let's do some news by heck bye.
Speaker 1: I'm not throwing any shade on Larry. I'm just simply
Speaker 1: saying what we're saying about death as a talent Remember,
Speaker 1: Larry Fitzgerald had to be talked out of retirement. Am
Speaker 1: I correct? Right? Larry Fitzgerald is like a Vince Carter.
Speaker 1: He might make the whole of Fame because of the
Speaker 1: longevity and the way he was willing to keep playing
Speaker 1: without being an m d P kind of level guy anymore.
Speaker 1: Set up the best part, and that was from first
Speaker 1: take um Max Kellerman, one of the army of people
Speaker 1: over there apparently don't know anything about football, but they
Speaker 1: talk about it. Um thrown it out there that Lara
Speaker 1: Fittshell would only make the Hall of Fame because of
Speaker 1: his what's the number? What is the term that we
Speaker 1: use for that for numbers that you just build over
Speaker 1: time compiler as a compiler, Lara fitz pilot kepad. Take
Speaker 1: also to take from Steve Smith, who likes to make
Speaker 1: things up that Larry Fitzgerald had to be talked out
Speaker 1: of retirement. Steve still technically Steve Smith, where does he
Speaker 1: get this information? He just makes it up? I mean
Speaker 1: hete news flash all generalists. Sports programming is garbage, like
Speaker 1: every show where where the hosts have to try to
Speaker 1: bridge and like they know something about the NBA, baseball,
Speaker 1: the NHL, soccer, everything and have an opinion on it.
Speaker 1: You know more than them about your favorite sports. Like
Speaker 1: so why listen to not a sneaky shot at Mike
Speaker 1: and the Mad Dog, who I would consider generalists, I
Speaker 1: I would agree. I mean, no, you know what they
Speaker 1: do they admit because they were not good about certain
Speaker 1: like Mike new baseball, football, basketball, and then the Horses,
Speaker 1: Bad Dog Tennis, mad Tennis baseball. Yeah that's a little different.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing though, even now, like in my
Speaker 1: in their best sports, they're gonna be bad compared to
Speaker 1: like someone that covers the sport year round. Um all right,
Speaker 1: let's get into the news life friends, the first ballot
Speaker 1: Hall of Famer. Let's get into the news. By the way,
Speaker 1: this is uh. We're taping this Wednesday morning. Tuesday at
Speaker 1: midnight Eastern was the deadline where if a free agent
Speaker 1: was signed, um uh, the team that he was leaving
Speaker 1: could get uh compensatory pick. That no longer is the case,
Speaker 1: So that opens up, um well, hypothetically the floodgates for
Speaker 1: all these notable veterans UH to get signed. As of
Speaker 1: right now, I don't think anybody has come off the board.
Speaker 1: I will let me throw some names out there. Well,
Speaker 1: I think we're going to mention him, but um, but
Speaker 1: that came before all that the official signing hadn't come.
Speaker 1: I got you. Here are some remaining free agents that
Speaker 1: our name brands on some level that don't have jobs
Speaker 1: right now. J G I as we just brought up,
Speaker 1: Michael Crabtree, Corey Legit and Dominan Sue, Ziggy Anza, Moe Wilkerson,
Speaker 1: Derek Morrigan, Jamie Collins, Mo Claiborne, Eric Berry. Um, those
Speaker 1: are all guys that can potentially help teams. Some of
Speaker 1: those guys might not have anything in the tank. They
Speaker 1: might be just name brands. I didn't even mention Dez Bryant,
Speaker 1: but um, anybody you guys want to connect a player
Speaker 1: to a team that makes sense to be a prediction,
Speaker 1: and Dominican Sue and Titans makes some sense. They drafted
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Simmons in the first round because he's coming off
Speaker 1: an a c L injury. He might not be ready
Speaker 1: for Week one, and the Titans defensive line coach Terrell
Speaker 1: Williams was Sue's position coach in Miami for three years,
Speaker 1: so there could be a fit there and can't wait there.
Speaker 1: So you just rebuild that monstrous Dolphins defense from a
Speaker 1: few years ago. I think Eric Berries had um a
Speaker 1: tough realization this offseason in terms of the contract that
Speaker 1: he thought he might get in free agency, and so
Speaker 1: he's gonna have to accept something at some point. The
Speaker 1: Cowboys are the only team that have showed interest in him.
Speaker 1: I know they signed Georgia Loco, that should not prevent
Speaker 1: them from maybe signing Berry in the future, and I
Speaker 1: would think they'll still give him a little extra guap
Speaker 1: than any other team out there. I mean, what about
Speaker 1: John Dorsey. With Jabrill Peppers out the door, they haven't
Speaker 1: really filled that they have. They have some veterans there,
Speaker 1: but there's those are guys get like Zeianta can help
Speaker 1: a team if he's remotely healthy. Jamie Collins can help
Speaker 1: a team. He's not like gonna change your roster, but
Speaker 1: he can play snaps still, maybe the Chief they've got
Speaker 1: these lumbering linebackers like Anthony Hitchens and Reggie Raglan. You
Speaker 1: need a little more athleticism and that Morris Claiborne could
Speaker 1: definitely help the Jets they choose to bring him back.
Speaker 1: He's twenty nine now, He's always battingly battling injuries and
Speaker 1: he's not healthy, but they are very thin at quarterback.
Speaker 1: And remember they gave Trueman Johnson a ton of money
Speaker 1: last offseason and he was a bust. To just assume
Speaker 1: that he will get back on track would not be wise,
Speaker 1: so they should have something. This, by the way, is
Speaker 1: a is a thing for almost the first time, this
Speaker 1: post compensatory pick deadline. This has existed for years, but
Speaker 1: no one was ever paying attention to it before, and
Speaker 1: NFL teams weren't really other than the Ravens and the
Speaker 1: Patriots and a few others weren't smart enough to really
Speaker 1: pay attention to it before. And now I think it's
Speaker 1: become a thing where these players are better than the
Speaker 1: normal crop. Like the comp pick deal started to get
Speaker 1: written about, and there were features written about how Baltimore
Speaker 1: and New England dealt with the different again getting two
Speaker 1: more thirds next year. I think it's a good way
Speaker 1: to do it. Moving on, uh, Jason Pierre Paul is
Speaker 1: having another um off the field issue that could really
Speaker 1: haunt him. This time it was a single car accident
Speaker 1: that he was involved with in Florida. It's led to
Speaker 1: a neck injury and Tom Pellicero, NFL Network reported on Tuesday,
Speaker 1: he'll get a second opinion on the injury, but it
Speaker 1: doesn't sound great. He's seeing a bunch of doctors and
Speaker 1: if he does need surgery, and we're hearing um talk
Speaker 1: out there that this is gonna be a potential extended absence,
Speaker 1: it would likely lead to a five to six month recovery,
Speaker 1: could knock him out for most of the two thousand
Speaker 1: nineteen season. Um there is some hope. Pellisera reports that
Speaker 1: he would not require surgery and could be ready for
Speaker 1: Week one, but that potentially uh could be overly optimistic.
Speaker 1: We'll have to see how it plays out West. How
Speaker 1: big a loss would that be for a Bucks team
Speaker 1: trying to get on track. It's a huge twelve and
Speaker 1: a half sacks last year, and you look behind him,
Speaker 1: Shaq Barrett, Carl Nassib, even a guy like Noah Spence
Speaker 1: who fell out of favor with the last coaching staff.
Speaker 1: You wonder where that pass rush is gonna come from.
Speaker 1: Those guys might be good for six or seven sacks apiece,
Speaker 1: but not double digits. And I think you wonder if
Speaker 1: will they go through with cutting Gerald McCoy If they
Speaker 1: also was Jason Pierre Paul. Yeah, I this injury really
Speaker 1: made me think about his Star Cross career. Of course,
Speaker 1: losing you know, his his finger in the Firecracker accident.
Speaker 1: If you had told me after yeah, if you had
Speaker 1: told me after eleven, when he was a first team
Speaker 1: All Pro and to me was maybe the best player
Speaker 1: on a on a super Bowl champion team in terms
Speaker 1: of like the course of the entire season, that he
Speaker 1: was going to be a Hall of Famer. Like I
Speaker 1: always said, Yeah, that that's kind of what I'm expecting
Speaker 1: or not. You know, he's a twenty two year old,
Speaker 1: so he's kind of I would I don't want to
Speaker 1: say a disappointing career, but it's you. You thought at
Speaker 1: that point he was gonna be like a much bigger
Speaker 1: figure throughout this decade than it really has been. I
Speaker 1: know some people are asking, what, because there's not a
Speaker 1: lot of details about the single car accident, what does
Speaker 1: that mean it is possible to get into a single
Speaker 1: car accident. I can tell you from personal experience. I've
Speaker 1: known Mark for like eight and a half years. I've
Speaker 1: been in a car with him behind the wheel once
Speaker 1: and it was a drive from NFL Network to a
Speaker 1: local tavern that was about a mile away. And that's
Speaker 1: the only time I've ever seen twice because I once
Speaker 1: dropped you off to pick your car up about two
Speaker 1: and a half blocks from here. How did you do? Um?
Speaker 1: I thought he hit a curb. Maybe No, I did
Speaker 1: not at once and did just find we did get lost.
Speaker 1: It's I think it shows a level of of self confidence. Actually,
Speaker 1: how you own this. Most people, if you're not a
Speaker 1: good driver or whatever, you're trying to hide behind that,
Speaker 1: but you know who you are. It's it's and at
Speaker 1: this point it's not going to get any better. So
Speaker 1: and yeah, like an ability to recognize one's limits. You
Speaker 1: don't even try to drive you like, it's not my thing.
Speaker 1: I don't do it. It is a crystal clear limit. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: Greg mentioned Jared Velder. The Patriots will sign the veteran
Speaker 1: offensive to tackle pretty nice money one year deal up
Speaker 1: to six and a half million. What does that mean.
Speaker 1: It's probably like a million and a half base salary.
Speaker 1: Better be for this guy. Um. Anyway, I'm just saying
Speaker 1: he's up to. It's like, okay, if he starts sixteen games,
Speaker 1: that's probably his up to. And but there's no chance
Speaker 1: he or there shouldn't be much of a chance he is.
Speaker 1: Well that that's why I brought this up. He turns
Speaker 1: thirty two. He's a journeyman lineman. The Patriots said, let's
Speaker 1: get him in here. Uh what's your pea scale on
Speaker 1: the Pat's offensive line right now in front of a
Speaker 1: soon to be forty two year old quarterback. Oh, very low.
Speaker 1: I think it's the greatest. The best offensive line in
Speaker 1: Patriots history is returning four of five starters. They they
Speaker 1: do have to replace their left tackle, but they're replacing
Speaker 1: him with the first round pick was coming off a
Speaker 1: major injury, but their first round pick from a year ago,
Speaker 1: and they drafted another guy in the third round. I
Speaker 1: do think vel Dear may sense because it's why it's
Speaker 1: incredibly thin. After that they have like no veterans, uh
Speaker 1: if it's thin, and also it's onely untested unknown uh
Speaker 1: quantity at left tackle? Yeah that hashtag Dante Scarnecia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you have a first and a third round pick there.
Speaker 1: You know. Conjuiced? Is that the is he related to
Speaker 1: the other conjuiced from the Browns? David David? They also
Speaker 1: someone named Tyree St. Louis. I like people whose last
Speaker 1: names doublest city names. It's not often always fun, always fun.
Speaker 1: Moving on, UH, we haven't touched on this. I'm just
Speaker 1: curious everyone's thoughts on it. Levian Bell, of course sat
Speaker 1: out all of the last season with the Steelers of
Speaker 1: our contract dispute, UH, and then signed a huge deal
Speaker 1: in free agency with the Jets, but has opted not
Speaker 1: to take part in the voluntary workouts with the Jets,
Speaker 1: instead training with his own people doing his thing. He's
Speaker 1: gotten criticized, UM, I guess on social media for it,
Speaker 1: and probably on shows like uh First Take, But he
Speaker 1: wrote on social media on Monday, when it's time to
Speaker 1: play football, I gotta stick to the formula that I
Speaker 1: know works for me to be the best player I
Speaker 1: can be. I'm not just trying to win football games.
Speaker 1: I want a ring West. Would this annoy you? It
Speaker 1: doesn't annoy Adam Gaze, he says, Would it annoy you
Speaker 1: if you were the head coach, I'd be slightly annoyed
Speaker 1: because of the deal he signed. And you want him
Speaker 1: to come in and send an example. UM, I would
Speaker 1: look at this slightly different from the Jaguars, where I've
Speaker 1: ripped on Jalen Ramsey because they have a leadership vacuum
Speaker 1: there and he's supposed to be the best player on
Speaker 1: the team. I'd like to see him send an example
Speaker 1: left Bell. I think this will probably be a non
Speaker 1: issue by September. I feel like it's either not voluntary
Speaker 1: in the sense that if you don't show up, the
Speaker 1: media around it turns it into something where then it
Speaker 1: becomes a social media thing where lev Bell has to
Speaker 1: deal with it everyone else does. This does feel a
Speaker 1: little different to me in the one sense it unless
Speaker 1: he was going to do the most extra thing ever,
Speaker 1: which what I would totally applaud to sit out the
Speaker 1: entire season for more money from the Jets is like,
Speaker 1: why not get in there with your teammates and make
Speaker 1: a good first impression? Would it kill you that much?
Speaker 1: How long are these ots go up there for a
Speaker 1: couple of days and not and just don't make this
Speaker 1: a story. But he may be thinking his training regiment
Speaker 1: may have him thinking completely different. I don't know what
Speaker 1: he's not worried. Give him the bet of the dad.
Speaker 1: He's a multiple time All Pro, he has a system.
Speaker 1: I don't argue. I don't think it's anything to care about.
Speaker 1: But then it's annoying to me that it's a story
Speaker 1: because every person that doesn't show up to these things,
Speaker 1: it becomes a story. So leave it alone. Then people
Speaker 1: got to realize Levian Bell, it's one of the best
Speaker 1: running backs the last twenty years. It's like the lack
Speaker 1: of respect for him just when you talked about like
Speaker 1: people think he's over the hell, he's twenty seven years old.
Speaker 1: Give me a break, He'll be fine. Last football game
Speaker 1: was that Jaguar's playoff flows. I got some breaking news.
Speaker 1: Devon and Yanni coroduced not only are they not related,
Speaker 1: but Yadney said, everybody keeps asking me if we were related,
Speaker 1: but I don't even know who he is. Little he,
Speaker 1: little he, And if you look at this, the skin
Speaker 1: the skin tone, nobody should have been asking him, um,
Speaker 1: if they were related. Oh that's not always necessarily an indicator.
Speaker 1: That's true. Conclusions, that's fair. But it's a pretty dramatic difference.
Speaker 1: I mean, but it doesn't matter how much of a difference.
Speaker 1: It makes sense that we asked the question, but in person,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I also had no idea what Yadney
Speaker 1: could used to look like. I mean, I'm saying if
Speaker 1: you're in person, and I let me just say that,
Speaker 1: although the bar has not been raised in terms of
Speaker 1: the level of importance to the NFL world, I do
Speaker 1: believe you're breaking news. Um in breaks here are getting
Speaker 1: more entertaining, and that's the most important. There was a
Speaker 1: while they were they were just completely superfluous, and now
Speaker 1: there's a Now there's actually have to talk about off them.
Speaker 1: So bravo. Thank that's what's happening in the news, all right.
Speaker 1: Chris Westling wrote a banger. Oh my goodness, he wrote
Speaker 1: a banger. Uh. It is called the NFL's Top ten Offenses.
Speaker 1: What does the J stand for Christophe J. Westling? I
Speaker 1: don't know. I thought in the rundown I put Christophe J.
Speaker 1: Westling's top offense rankings. I can't remember what your middle
Speaker 1: name was, so I just guessed Jay. But am I wrong?
Speaker 1: Robert Christoph R. Westling? Okay, well we like to say
Speaker 1: Christopher R. West Christoph's not that that's a French that's
Speaker 1: the French uh pronunciation. Um, so you wrote a banger.
Speaker 1: This is one of your pieces you do every year,
Speaker 1: and uh as always great work. Clearly a man that
Speaker 1: put in the effort and did the work, did the research,
Speaker 1: and you broke it down by you know, positions, quarterback room,
Speaker 1: the backfield, receiving corps, offensive line, uh and giving out
Speaker 1: letter grades and nice rundowns. And at the top of
Speaker 1: the list you have New Orleans Saints. And let me
Speaker 1: say that I am a little bit surprised because you've
Speaker 1: been beating the drum a little bit about your and
Speaker 1: you wrote about this in the piece. Um, you were
Speaker 1: a little worried about Drew Brees, how he performed down
Speaker 1: the stretch, Um, And now this is about spinning forward.
Speaker 1: I guess you're not too concerned ultimately that Brees is
Speaker 1: not a guy in decline at age forty. Well, this
Speaker 1: is much less about the Saints and much more about
Speaker 1: the fact that everyone has questions. Every team asked questions,
Speaker 1: and maybe the Colts have fewer questions. But you know,
Speaker 1: but that's a big question around that offense. But I
Speaker 1: my guess is that Drew Brees was hiding an injury
Speaker 1: for six weeks and it's not really that he's fallen
Speaker 1: off a cliff. We don't know the answer to that,
Speaker 1: but on all of these so every team has questions,
Speaker 1: and every fan base has come at me this week saying, well,
Speaker 1: this is the best case scenario for our team, they
Speaker 1: should be the top ten. Well, I did that for
Speaker 1: thirty two teams. You did that for one. First of all,
Speaker 1: I looked at some scenarios for every team and had
Speaker 1: those debates already with myself. All these teams have questions.
Speaker 1: The Saints question to me is I have to I
Speaker 1: have to come up with some conclusion. And my conclusion
Speaker 1: is Drew Brees probably played through an injury and is not,
Speaker 1: in fact a terrible quarterback right now. You know, he
Speaker 1: also had some moments there in the Eagles game, in
Speaker 1: the Rams game, and terrible seems strong. I do think
Speaker 1: it's natural to expect him his arm, which this has
Speaker 1: been a question for five years, whether his arm is
Speaker 1: falling off, and he always has great numbers throwing the
Speaker 1: ball down the field. But I think it's like Tom Brady,
Speaker 1: like we should be expecting Tom Brady and Drew Brees
Speaker 1: to fall off. It's outrageous that they haven't that much.
Speaker 1: And Brady has, I mean, that was the worst offensive
Speaker 1: season he's had and that the Patriots offense has has
Speaker 1: had in many more than a decade. Name another offense
Speaker 1: with three MVP candidates. I mean, that's why they're number
Speaker 1: one on this list. They've got Kamara, they got Michael Thomas,
Speaker 1: and they got Drew Brees. The Chiefs used to be up.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah. I think when you in the coaching
Speaker 1: staff and the system to me is like almost as important,
Speaker 1: not as important as the players, but the track record
Speaker 1: that they have. They're the team. You know, we talked
Speaker 1: about like writing teams and pencil for the playoffs. They're
Speaker 1: the team you can just write in in pen as
Speaker 1: a top five or six offense. Like there's almost there's
Speaker 1: so little chance that they're just gonna fall off a
Speaker 1: cliff mark Ingram to Latavius Murray to you, is that
Speaker 1: that's sound great? A significant Um? I would call it
Speaker 1: fairly significant. But I also think that Jared Cook is
Speaker 1: a major upgrade over who played tight end for them
Speaker 1: last year, so they sort of balance out in my mind.
Speaker 1: Let's move on number two. Unless you got the Cults
Speaker 1: not a surprise. This is a big fan of this
Speaker 1: Colts team and where they're headed. Um, Greg, do you
Speaker 1: have any reservations about this indie team or is it
Speaker 1: let it rip and see how they score? You know,
Speaker 1: after no, I don't. I was a little surprised they
Speaker 1: got up to number two. But then I see what
Speaker 1: west is point that there's that there were very few
Speaker 1: teams that were just that you couldn't make the case.
Speaker 1: So to me, they would be in the next they
Speaker 1: would be one of the next five or six teams,
Speaker 1: and I wouldn't have argued. And after going through the rosters,
Speaker 1: I agree with West. I showed a little too much
Speaker 1: disrespect earlier in the week on this YouTube hit that
Speaker 1: we did. People should check out Worst the First. I
Speaker 1: don't know Erica, not yet, but it will be just like,
Speaker 1: just go onto YouTube every twenty five minutes or so
Speaker 1: until then and right Worst the First. Uh? And and
Speaker 1: you thought I didn't show enough respect to not just
Speaker 1: kind of put the in your right. Their roster has
Speaker 1: almost no holes in it top to bottom. After doing
Speaker 1: the projected starters exercise on them, they should be absolutely
Speaker 1: the favorite in the n f C South. And it's
Speaker 1: because the offensive line to start is maybe the strength
Speaker 1: of the team, which is a shocking thing to say
Speaker 1: about the Colts. I can't wait to see what when
Speaker 1: Chris Pallert focused on the offensive line, frog on defense
Speaker 1: and now it's like what went wait till he uses
Speaker 1: a draft two to hit specifically offensive skill position players.
Speaker 1: But they did grab Paris Campbell. Do you need him
Speaker 1: to be a home run out of the gate to
Speaker 1: maintain looking at their wide receiver, that's the only spot
Speaker 1: I had questions because I know we trust um uh
Speaker 1: the GM's judgment here, but Devin Funches was never a
Speaker 1: breakout guy. You kind of assuming he's gonna take the
Speaker 1: next step in into here. So they were a top
Speaker 1: five offense and waited dvr um And now you add
Speaker 1: Devin Funchis who playing with a more accurate quarterback. I
Speaker 1: think that that is a good fit just because they
Speaker 1: needed a size, physical wide receiver in Indy. I think
Speaker 1: that's a good fit. Paris Campbell, I think as a
Speaker 1: wild card. And then you also have Dion Kane, who
Speaker 1: they absolutely loved last year and I think is one
Speaker 1: of the reasons why they let Ryan Grant go. Why
Speaker 1: don trelle Imman hasn't resigned because they like Deon Kane
Speaker 1: coming off that a c L injury. I think this
Speaker 1: this offense is load it. I think Jack Doyle coming
Speaker 1: off the hip surgery is crucial for them you know,
Speaker 1: like they're counting on him, or they would love to
Speaker 1: count on him. He's gonna play more snaps than Eric
Speaker 1: Gibron if he's healthy, and he's always been a big asset,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't quite the same last year, and he's
Speaker 1: coming off a big surgery. So I think for them
Speaker 1: that's a big question. But the line and Frank Reich
Speaker 1: makes Maybe it's a limited sample tized, but at this point,
Speaker 1: like Reich is right there with me with any offensive
Speaker 1: play caller in the league. Well, and we'll get to
Speaker 1: but Frank Reich is has his name all over this
Speaker 1: this This top ten lists number three the Philadelphia Eagles,
Speaker 1: where he was the form of offensive coordinator. You have
Speaker 1: them at three. You know, this one jumped out of
Speaker 1: me and I would would not question was but you
Speaker 1: have them ahead of the Falcons at four and the
Speaker 1: Rams at five, and then the Chiefs that fall out
Speaker 1: of the top five. You have them at six. Right now,
Speaker 1: Why are you so bullish on the Eagles being a
Speaker 1: truly elite offense in twenty Well, the number one takeaway
Speaker 1: from this exercise this year as opposed to other years,
Speaker 1: is that out of top fifteen offenses in d v
Speaker 1: o A last year. The Colts, Falcons, and Eagles look
Speaker 1: to me like the only ones that can be expected
Speaker 1: to be improved. Everyone else lost too much and didn't
Speaker 1: gain enough. Everyone else has major questions. The Eagles revamped
Speaker 1: their backfield, revamped their wide receiver corps, added to their
Speaker 1: offensive line, get Carson Wentz back presumably healthy. To me,
Speaker 1: they're absolutely loaded on offense. Wentz is kind of the
Speaker 1: Wentz playing more consistently to me, is the key to
Speaker 1: all of that. Because you're right, I think Dallas Godder
Speaker 1: is kind of a sleeping giant there. If he was
Speaker 1: on another team, he might be headed to a Pro Bowl.
Speaker 1: They might have two Pro Bowl quality type tight ends.
Speaker 1: Along with adding d Jackson in some draft picks. I
Speaker 1: love also that you know, two years ago when they
Speaker 1: won the Super Bowl, they had a stocked back field
Speaker 1: with different type of runners, and they have it again.
Speaker 1: I liked for me, I like Josh Adams last year,
Speaker 1: and you have added a guy in essentially Jordan Howard,
Speaker 1: who is a he can do a lot fore and
Speaker 1: Miles Sanders they love. I mean, they may not even
Speaker 1: make the team. Josh Adams at this point. I mean
Speaker 1: he'll be battling for him in smallwood and coming off
Speaker 1: major surgery too. But say, a lot of people thought
Speaker 1: Sanders was the best running back in this class. So
Speaker 1: for the record, Dan totally just flaming your Eagles pick,
Speaker 1: But the rest of us love you as well. I
Speaker 1: don't really care about the numbers besides the away like,
Speaker 1: I didn't really flame him either, but that's fine. Um, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the Falcons at four, that one kind of makes sense.
Speaker 1: And and I guess West You've said that you feel
Speaker 1: that the outgoing offensive coordinator Steve Sarkisian was scapegoat a
Speaker 1: little bit um in Atlanta. Well, in comes dirt Cutter
Speaker 1: to take over that old job again, and maybe there's
Speaker 1: you know, there's a lot of talent there. Obviously, this
Speaker 1: to me, this looks like the best wide receiver corps
Speaker 1: in the NFL. With Calvin Ridley scoring tech touchdowns as
Speaker 1: a rookie, and then you expect him to get better.
Speaker 1: Mohammed Sanu is a really good number two, and they
Speaker 1: have the luxury of using him as a three this year.
Speaker 1: Julio Jones obviously is great. And then you know Austin
Speaker 1: Hooper had a kind of a breakout. You're at tight end.
Speaker 1: I think, if you can protect Matt Ryan, this is
Speaker 1: a great well. They added a ton of offensive linemen
Speaker 1: so everyone So then you're just like, you know, are
Speaker 1: people in Atlanta are certainly thinking, Okay, well that's solved.
Speaker 1: But it's like it's not that easy, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. We we fall into this and I'm guilty
Speaker 1: of it too. Of just like, okay, let's slot in
Speaker 1: that second round guard, he's going to help out, and
Speaker 1: have you know, more times than that he doesn't help out.
Speaker 1: So that's why I was. If I was gonna say
Speaker 1: I was surprised about anything on this list, it was
Speaker 1: that the Rams and the Chiefs were as low as
Speaker 1: they were there. The next two five and six Chiefs
Speaker 1: didn't even make the first here. I would definitely put
Speaker 1: them ahead of the Falcons. I think I would put
Speaker 1: them two in three on my list because I think continuity,
Speaker 1: consistency coaching. They have those, and they and the Chiefs
Speaker 1: specifically have Patrick Mahomes, And to me that that's an
Speaker 1: edge where I would put them right there, maybe maybe
Speaker 1: at the top one and two if I was ranking quarterbacks. Sure,
Speaker 1: but I've made my feelings on Tyreek Hills football ability
Speaker 1: known on this podcast, he is the best most important
Speaker 1: skill position player in the NFL, and I'm not going
Speaker 1: to change that. They were a great offense with Alex
Speaker 1: Smith and that had Tyreek Hill. So I guess we'll
Speaker 1: kind of see, you know, we'll see me Tyreek Hill
Speaker 1: was the m v P like on that team the
Speaker 1: last two years. Stay tuned for the end of the
Speaker 1: podcast to find out if Wes changes his opinion from
Speaker 1: Tyree Hill. How about if he's the number one most
Speaker 1: important skill player, Todd Gurley has got to be in
Speaker 1: that conversation behind him. Absolutely. If Todd Gurley, uh, if
Speaker 1: we turned back the clock a year ago and there
Speaker 1: was no such thing as arthretic knee condition potentially and
Speaker 1: to talk about two running back sets and all this stuff,
Speaker 1: where would the Rams be on this list of Todd
Speaker 1: Gurley had no question marks. If Todd Gurley had no
Speaker 1: question marks, Cooper Cup wasn't coming off in a c
Speaker 1: L and Jared Goff wasn't in an extended slump. For
Speaker 1: the last two months of the season, they've been the
Speaker 1: top two or three, maybe number one girly specific. That's
Speaker 1: why they're not top three because they have sumed too
Speaker 1: many questions, but all those ifs would have put them
Speaker 1: where they were at the mid season of last year
Speaker 1: when they were the premier offense. That that's a lot
Speaker 1: to overcome coming out of this offseason. Yeah, Cup, I
Speaker 1: mean at this point, guys coming off a CLS. I
Speaker 1: know you always say that, but it's not true. It's
Speaker 1: a concern they don't always return as the same play
Speaker 1: off is the bigger concern for me really of all
Speaker 1: three of those, because with Malcolm Brown and Darrell Henderson
Speaker 1: in their offensive line, and Sean McVeigh and whatever, and
Speaker 1: Girly of course, it's not like he's not there. I'm
Speaker 1: not that worried about their running game. But goff, whether
Speaker 1: he's closer to the middle of the NFL in terms
Speaker 1: of starting quarterbacks or what he showed in the first
Speaker 1: five weeks last year, like that to me is the number, Like,
Speaker 1: that's a bigger question. I think that's fair. I think
Speaker 1: it's fair. He's still a really young starting quarterback. I do.
Speaker 1: I think age is more important than we give it.
Speaker 1: That like the fact that him and Baker Mayfield essentially,
Speaker 1: like I do give Golf a little bit of leeway
Speaker 1: there that he's so young, even though he's played a
Speaker 1: lot um and the rest of the top ten mark
Speaker 1: there's one team I know is jumping out to you. Yeah, bro,
Speaker 1: yeah Bro. Let it rip at number seven. I mean,
Speaker 1: I would say I've been reading the Wesleyan lists for
Speaker 1: you know, years and years, and well it's just not hard.
Speaker 1: It's much hard, much harder to write them than read them.
Speaker 1: But the fact that the Browns are number seven and
Speaker 1: literally anything on any of these lists ever, to me,
Speaker 1: I'm not shocked by it by based on what they have,
Speaker 1: I do wonder where you would have put them coming
Speaker 1: out of last year in terms of one through thirty
Speaker 1: two Ballpark pre O, b J pre I guess Kareem Hunt.
Speaker 1: Later part of the year, they were still an interesting,
Speaker 1: productive offense, but middle of the pack. I actually feel
Speaker 1: like this number seven is conservative. I did too, um.
Speaker 1: I I see them as easily top five potential, and
Speaker 1: I think coming out of last year they were a
Speaker 1: top ten offense and waited d V d v O A,
Speaker 1: which weighs the end of the season much more than
Speaker 1: the beginning of this season. It's more reflective of how
Speaker 1: how they were playing at the end of the year.
Speaker 1: And I think they already were a top ten offense.
Speaker 1: Thing you had O'Dell Beckham. My concern though, is is
Speaker 1: the offensive line. They did a nice job obviously down
Speaker 1: the stretch with coaching patches. You're still relying in theory
Speaker 1: on Greg Robinson to play left tackle for sixteen games.
Speaker 1: Chris Hubbards no stand out on the right side, So
Speaker 1: when your tackles are potential weak spots and left tackles,
Speaker 1: definitely that's a concern. I just think it's a hard
Speaker 1: ask for the coaching to have to get everyone on
Speaker 1: the same page right away, just because it's a lot
Speaker 1: of new pieces. But I think that will be kind
Speaker 1: of balanced off by Baker Mayfield just getting better. I mean,
Speaker 1: he was a rookie last year. He should This is
Speaker 1: when they should take the biggest leap of his career.
Speaker 1: The Packers cracked the top ten. I I can almost
Speaker 1: guarantee in West and the five or so years you've
Speaker 1: been doing this on the site that this is the
Speaker 1: lowest they've been Because Aaron Rodgers offense is always get
Speaker 1: the better of the doubt that they're gonna soar, But
Speaker 1: now there's a little more doubt. Even with the coaching
Speaker 1: razine change. Uh, but this makes sense back Aaron Rodgers
Speaker 1: put him in the top ten. I can't imagine doing
Speaker 1: this list in future years and not having the Packers
Speaker 1: in the top ten just because they have Aaron Rodgers.
Speaker 1: As long as they have him, they're gonna get respect
Speaker 1: for me. That's true. Now, if you think about it, West,
Speaker 1: then we look good. Now we scrolled down at the
Speaker 1: end of this assignment offensive knocking on the door. You
Speaker 1: think about it, What does it mean really just to
Speaker 1: throw a team on there? What is it? You know,
Speaker 1: how does it affect you personally or listeners or people
Speaker 1: you consider friends. Would have really really hurt? Would it
Speaker 1: really like bothered you just to throw the Jets on
Speaker 1: there solely for me, like as like a Dan, thanks
Speaker 1: for being a good friends. Here your your groomsmen. I'm
Speaker 1: just I'm gonna throw them on the knocking on the
Speaker 1: door just because I like you. Well, that would have
Speaker 1: been so hard. That's a fair question, and I appreciate
Speaker 1: you asking that, But for honesty's sake, they were not
Speaker 1: like the final cut. I mean, you have a Tennessee Titans,
Speaker 1: their their quarterbacks throwing eighteen touchdowns in the last twenty
Speaker 1: three games. Uh, you know, their third eye. I mean,
Speaker 1: if there's one fan base that that come and I
Speaker 1: and I don't even disagree because I think they have
Speaker 1: to fall off at some point. But the Patriots, for
Speaker 1: all the struggles that they had ended you talked about
Speaker 1: waited d v o A. For offense, I mean, they
Speaker 1: ended up top four in the league last year. They
Speaker 1: were a top five offense overall. They've they've been a
Speaker 1: top five offense I think for ten straight years. So
Speaker 1: even though going into the season the rosters got some issues,
Speaker 1: it's good on the line, it's pretty good in the backfield.
Speaker 1: I think Brady is still an asset. It's a type
Speaker 1: of team that maybe not September, but I kind of
Speaker 1: expect them to be a top ten offense in the
Speaker 1: long run. It you know what I mean, I mean,
Speaker 1: I get it. Nobody everybody thinks the Patriot can just
Speaker 1: keep losing guys and getting older and they'll never suffer
Speaker 1: any consequences. I know that's the feeling everybody here. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't have that. I think I've said the opposite.
Speaker 1: I think I think the receiving corps is atrocious. I
Speaker 1: think for them falling off to eight or nine offense
Speaker 1: is kind of dramatic and changes the way that they've
Speaker 1: they've been if they don't have Josh Gordon. You're right,
Speaker 1: the Whiteouts are are pretty rough and their quarter back
Speaker 1: is another year older and already defined last year. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Dan likes that. At least it's happening. Um, good stuff, West, Great,
Speaker 1: thanks UM NFL dot com slash Westling. I just thought,
Speaker 1: you know, wait a minute, Um, all right, it is
Speaker 1: now time one of our favorite people, Um from the
Speaker 1: Around the NFL podcast, Long Rich History. Uh, a former
Speaker 1: colleague of ours, A man who um has one of
Speaker 1: the more popular enduring segments on this show. Or are
Speaker 1: you kidding me? Where he grinds you know what's grinding
Speaker 1: his gears? Well, that's not what today is going to
Speaker 1: be about. Today is about a piece he wrote, a
Speaker 1: long form about the rise, the curious rise and rapid
Speaker 1: decline of the A A F. It's a great piece,
Speaker 1: getting a lot of good buzz about it. So let's
Speaker 1: talk to him. Connor or welcome to the Around the
Speaker 1: NFL Podcast, wolos Connor, Hey Connor, that was fun. It's on.
Speaker 1: You're it? Well, I mean I think so you like,
Speaker 1: do you answer robot calls that way? So you you
Speaker 1: thought it was probably the NFL calling. I know. I well,
Speaker 1: actually that I called somebody else from a Culver City
Speaker 1: number for a story like two days ago, and I
Speaker 1: didn't I didn't know if when whenever you guys give
Speaker 1: me a time, I'm always like, is it eastern or not?
Speaker 1: And so you know, I just kind of roll with it.
Speaker 1: I'm more excited about what Culver City number you were calling.
Speaker 1: Finally doing that Amber THEO Harris profile. Maybe Uh. All
Speaker 1: I can say is watch out, guys, you know, look
Speaker 1: look out. Yeah, sounds which wouldn't surprise me. Connor, and yes,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. Good to have you back, because
Speaker 1: you know, there's a term in the industry about owning
Speaker 1: a story, Connor owning this a a F story, And
Speaker 1: it's a good one to own, and it's a great piece.
Speaker 1: If you go, um, look at look it up. It's
Speaker 1: in Sports Illustrated, it's online. Um, the Rise and Fall
Speaker 1: of the a A F. What is the actual headline
Speaker 1: I should have that it's a bad job. I made
Speaker 1: the spectacular, the curious rise and spectacular crash of the
Speaker 1: Alliance of American football. Um, it's like a book title,
Speaker 1: and you do a great job kind of giving the
Speaker 1: the story behind it. Um, what would you say, what
Speaker 1: is like the overall thesis at the end of when
Speaker 1: you have to kind of um put a bow on it.
Speaker 1: What this story is ultimately about. Uh, you know, it's
Speaker 1: a it's about a bunch of people who like who
Speaker 1: love football. Um. You know football players, staffers, ticket sales people. Um,
Speaker 1: that sort of got sucked into this pipe dream. Um.
Speaker 1: Uh you know by this guy who promised them that
Speaker 1: they had three three years worth of funding and uh
Speaker 1: promised him that they would have jobs. And then all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, eight weeks into of their inaugural season. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the lead just shuts down. And you know,
Speaker 1: from beginning to end, there were just so many pitfalls
Speaker 1: from their initial funder is uh is now about to
Speaker 1: be on trial for bank fraud um and may have
Speaker 1: like toppled the cryptocurrency industry. And then um, you know
Speaker 1: there's their second funder, the owner of the Carolina Hurricanes,
Speaker 1: a hardcore business guy who didn't share their vision. And
Speaker 1: so obviously when profits started running out or you know,
Speaker 1: the profit margin is in, Um, he just decided to
Speaker 1: shut the league down. So it was it was crazy.
Speaker 1: I mean for something that only lasted eight weeks, it
Speaker 1: really was like a heavy thing for a lot of people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because I think it like what would what was the
Speaker 1: excitement level just from from Afar and reading your stuff
Speaker 1: and and talking to a few people, I think like
Speaker 1: it's underrated. What an exciting opportunity this was for so
Speaker 1: many people, not just the players of course, but the
Speaker 1: coaches in the front office and the people behind the
Speaker 1: scene who saw the as kind of as as like
Speaker 1: another way into professional football if they weren't in it currently. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I mean if you look at it from the outside,
Speaker 1: like if you got the same sales pitch that all
Speaker 1: these people got, you would be excited, right because not
Speaker 1: only you know, you have guaranteed three year contracts, So
Speaker 1: that's that's like great. I mean you don't get that
Speaker 1: in any other job. And then you know, we have
Speaker 1: this technology, we have you know, tech people from Yahoo
Speaker 1: and Tesla and Lockheed Martin. If we're going to become
Speaker 1: um so tech savvy that the NFL is going to
Speaker 1: want to partner with us, And so you're sitting there
Speaker 1: thinking like, oh, this is a good idea like why
Speaker 1: aren't other people doing this? And you feel like you're
Speaker 1: on the ground floor of something which is a lot
Speaker 1: with a lot of people. Felt like you know that
Speaker 1: this was going to be the next you know, Apple
Speaker 1: or Facebook or this next big startup that they were
Speaker 1: going to be a part of. I thought you blended
Speaker 1: the I guess sort of the tension between the tech
Speaker 1: people in the building for each of these teams and
Speaker 1: the football people in a really in a really um
Speaker 1: interesting way in this story, where there were grumblings at
Speaker 1: times where the actual play caller was get being paid
Speaker 1: less than one of their sort of high octane think
Speaker 1: tank tech guys. But I would read this for Connor
Speaker 1: or the writer because knowing we all know Connor from
Speaker 1: our days of being he's always been remote on sort
Speaker 1: of our chat client with him for hours. You get
Speaker 1: the real Connor, and a lot of it comes out
Speaker 1: in this. I love little tiny nuggets. I'll give you
Speaker 1: a couple one where the team communications app warned a
Speaker 1: player during this whole meltdown about having to pull away
Speaker 1: expensive bottles of Cholula hot sauce out of the dining
Speaker 1: era area. You dig into a Memphis express part of
Speaker 1: the article by hitting on It's so don Delilo to me,
Speaker 1: I know you love like hitting on their hotel room.
Speaker 1: There's so Nesta e s sweets on Old Poplar Pike Road,
Speaker 1: and you dig into what happens at Senesta for like paragraph,
Speaker 1: graph after graph, and it's just a fascinating read but
Speaker 1: interwoven with all of this. And also Charlie Eppersol using
Speaker 1: a quote from get Kevin Garnett, You're waiting for this
Speaker 1: great vote, and the quote is anything as possible. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure Kevin Garnett came up with that, but everything
Speaker 1: throughout this thing, I do honestly feel like this could
Speaker 1: be stretched into a larger We're gonna need an A
Speaker 1: A F book, and we found the guy. The guy
Speaker 1: you've sort of you've laid the groundwork for it. I
Speaker 1: think here about that. So we actually came out with
Speaker 1: um A Part two today and I'll give you, like, uh,
Speaker 1: sort of like a cliff notes to it. One of
Speaker 1: my favorite stories that we found out for the second
Speaker 1: part of this was during their quarterback draft. They had
Speaker 1: an initial draft right where all the team's got the
Speaker 1: chance to UM select the quarterbacks live on CBS Sports Network,
Speaker 1: and so Marshawn Lynch shows up to support his cousin
Speaker 1: Josh Johnson, who ends up getting taken number one overall.
Speaker 1: Charlie ever Saw approaches him and says, Marshawn, would you
Speaker 1: do an interview for the Alliance to help us get
Speaker 1: everything off the ground, And Marshawn says, yeah, sure for
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars. So he writes him a che for
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars and hands it to him, and Marshawn
Speaker 1: says no in quarters. And then so in quarter the
Speaker 1: owner of the Alliance of American Football literally could do
Speaker 1: it to the front desk of the hotel and gets
Speaker 1: twenty thousand quarters delivered to Marshall on Lynch's hotel room.
Speaker 1: He does like a two minute interview that the employees
Speaker 1: that I talked to you said they never even saw.
Speaker 1: And so there goes like down into like the annals
Speaker 1: of history. Uny, Wow, we all love Marshawn Lynch, but
Speaker 1: that sounds like a massive move, like what what is
Speaker 1: he doing? Well, he loves Papa Shot, so now he's
Speaker 1: just like he's just like got the quarters for the
Speaker 1: next two years. I look forward to seeing Connor on
Speaker 1: the the Netflix Firefest version of this whole. There's a
Speaker 1: lot that there's a lot, there are a lot of
Speaker 1: potential revenue streams. I know, we don't want to make
Speaker 1: light of all these people that lost their jobs, but
Speaker 1: this could be a major financial boon for Connor. Two things.
Speaker 1: First of all, cholula very expensive. There's always too little
Speaker 1: in the house at the Handsas house, and it goes
Speaker 1: quickly and you added up over the years. So I
Speaker 1: kind of get it. But the Reggie Fowler, this character
Speaker 1: that proceeded uh dundin um to me when I read
Speaker 1: the piece, and I'm sure this is oversimplifying it, but
Speaker 1: isn't his issues with the law and he got ended
Speaker 1: up getting charged with bank fraud. He's in deep. He's
Speaker 1: in deep do too. Isn't that essentially the turning point
Speaker 1: for this story, when it went from something with promise
Speaker 1: to something that was never gonna make it. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean this is sort of a pivot point where you know,
Speaker 1: some people that I talked to were like, this is
Speaker 1: where they should have just said, you know what, let's
Speaker 1: stop trying to beat the XFL to the punch. Let's
Speaker 1: pause this and let's take another year to get the
Speaker 1: funding part of this, right, but instead that's Firefest. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And and instead it was just like, oh no, I mean,
Speaker 1: let's just get another investor because we already bought all
Speaker 1: the stuff, we did all the stadium deals, so let's
Speaker 1: just let's just barrel ahead with this. And so I
Speaker 1: see that there was an element there of you know,
Speaker 1: we just have to keep going, we just have to
Speaker 1: keep pushing through. And you know, one of the things
Speaker 1: that was interesting to me was half the people there
Speaker 1: are kind of used to this stuff, Like, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know exactly how um aligned those experiences are,
Speaker 1: but in Silicon Valley that's kind of a deal. Right.
Speaker 1: A lot of these tech startups are fly by the
Speaker 1: seat of your pants. One day you have money, one
Speaker 1: day you don't. You just get used to it. And
Speaker 1: so there are a lot of people just sitting around saying, well, okay,
Speaker 1: I mean that's fine. I mean, this is what happened
Speaker 1: to Uber, and so they're fine. And but you know,
Speaker 1: it's so much different. I think when you bring in
Speaker 1: the football aspect of it, and the football people who
Speaker 1: are used to the NFL and kind of the way
Speaker 1: that that it's run there, and then Fowler. Once his
Speaker 1: funds got tied up, Dundon stepped in. He promised the
Speaker 1: two fifty million, and when this all went down and
Speaker 1: went down, you know and public and it was a
Speaker 1: huge fire, fireball of disaster for this entire company. But um,
Speaker 1: Dundon caught a lot of the heat as kind of
Speaker 1: the bad guy. Is that how you read it once
Speaker 1: you kind of dug into it or or was that
Speaker 1: was it already kind of a done deal by that point. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think it's sort of convenient to paint
Speaker 1: him as as the executioner in this. I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: I think that you could look at anybody a top
Speaker 1: that power structure and said, like, you definitely should have
Speaker 1: done this differently. I mean, you know, you should have
Speaker 1: had a better business plan. Um, you should have vetted
Speaker 1: your funders more aggressively. Um. You know, if you're initially
Speaker 1: promising to be this funder, you should know that maybe
Speaker 1: you're getting investigated for bankrupt and you're not going to
Speaker 1: be able to have access to your money. So I
Speaker 1: think there's a lot of different things that that could
Speaker 1: have been done there. You know, some people I talked
Speaker 1: to you said, you know, I don't blame Dundant at all,
Speaker 1: because you know, when you get into this and you
Speaker 1: start to get a look at the books, I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, if you already through seventy million dollars at
Speaker 1: something and it's not working, why would you double that
Speaker 1: or triple your investment when you don't believe that there's
Speaker 1: going to be a return on it. And I thought
Speaker 1: the reporting initially when the whole thing utterly when you know,
Speaker 1: and on to turn on fire and just melted, was
Speaker 1: that Dundin was all after the gambling technology. But your
Speaker 1: article I put that completely to bed, that that, if anything,
Speaker 1: he was ambivalent or disinterested by that side of it.
Speaker 1: And I thought a turning point was when he talked
Speaker 1: to TV people that said the league is gonna need
Speaker 1: to keep paying us money to be on television, that
Speaker 1: he for quite a quite a bit of time that
Speaker 1: he thought. That seemed to me like the point where
Speaker 1: I thought this is not a good investment. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's kind of what you know was pointed to for me.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously, you know, Tom, Charlie, Reggie, none of
Speaker 1: them would talk to us for this story, but um,
Speaker 1: that would sort of that was sort of the sense
Speaker 1: that I got, and yeah, it was interesting. I mean,
Speaker 1: the theory was like, oh, maybe he'll steal this technology
Speaker 1: and use it for the Carolina Hurricanes, or maybe, you know,
Speaker 1: he'll use it as a window to to get into
Speaker 1: the NFL or to get into a seated ownership or
Speaker 1: something like that. But you know what a lot of
Speaker 1: people told me was, you know, if he wanted the technology,
Speaker 1: all you had to do was pay to keep the
Speaker 1: engine years together. Because it doesn't matter whether or not
Speaker 1: you have the source code or the material, it's the
Speaker 1: guys to know how to outrun it and operate it.
Speaker 1: And so the fact that he fired all of them
Speaker 1: along with everybody else, you know, leads everybody leads me
Speaker 1: to believe that, you know that that kind of wasn't
Speaker 1: high in this priority. Man, they did the XFL favor.
Speaker 1: Not only did they point out some mistakes that you
Speaker 1: can make and then get out of the way, but
Speaker 1: I think they kind of primed the public. It was
Speaker 1: like a little teaser that the XFL can now take
Speaker 1: advantage of next offseason with with a pretty good broadcast package.
Speaker 1: And you know what, you'd like to think the XFL
Speaker 1: learned from their first attempt that went completely sideways too,
Speaker 1: and and you wrote about this to Connor. A f
Speaker 1: obviously was a failure, and an embarrassing one at that,
Speaker 1: But the on field product was the one thing that
Speaker 1: people weren't really complaining about, which is the first thing
Speaker 1: that usually a startup league like this is going to
Speaker 1: get killed with. So yeah, if the XFL is smart,
Speaker 1: they might be able to follow the path. Or it
Speaker 1: could be one of those things like from Final Destination
Speaker 1: or a movie that where you wake up for the
Speaker 1: nightmare of your own demise, uh, and then you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: now I have to avoid that, or you just have
Speaker 1: the nightmare and then go headlong into it. Either way,
Speaker 1: it was every morning. Yeah, I mean it's really you know.
Speaker 1: I talked to someone who said, and I thought, I
Speaker 1: think it kind of put puts it well as like,
Speaker 1: you know, uh, the first time, you know, they were
Speaker 1: so nervous about the football that they closed off training
Speaker 1: camps to journalists because I didn't want anybody to see
Speaker 1: it in case it was bad. And then when one
Speaker 1: employee got his first look at one of the games, uh,
Speaker 1: he told me that he cried for an hour. He
Speaker 1: was so happy that he literally was crying tears of
Speaker 1: joy for an hour because he said, I did this,
Speaker 1: like I helped put this together and we did it
Speaker 1: because at that point in their mind, it was all
Speaker 1: the all that we were worried about was the football,
Speaker 1: and the football is good, and we have the money
Speaker 1: and we have everything set up and so and we
Speaker 1: did it. And so I think that that's one of
Speaker 1: those things that's like, you know, it sticks with me
Speaker 1: because it's like, wow, I mean, at that point, these
Speaker 1: guys are thinking that they pulled it off, you know,
Speaker 1: and and really that's what everyone was worried about in
Speaker 1: the football gonna be bad, and it wasn't. Yeah, there's
Speaker 1: definitely a sad component to the whole story for sure.
Speaker 1: All Right, The Curious Rise and Spectacular Crash of the
Speaker 1: Alliance of American Football. Check it out s I dot Com,
Speaker 1: also on news stands and Sports Illustrated. Also Connors on
Speaker 1: the mm QB NFL podcast. He did a show about
Speaker 1: this story, and hopefully he's going to do a book
Speaker 1: and a Netflix special. Great job, Conny. We get an
Speaker 1: executive producer cut on it for introducing the idea. Otherwise
Speaker 1: we'll have to go into lengthy litigation. That's up to
Speaker 1: Connor finally kind of before we let you go? Um,
Speaker 1: where are you at on your um rundown of the
Speaker 1: A F I S one greatest films? A few years
Speaker 1: back he told us that you were going to comb
Speaker 1: through the entire list and give detailed reviews. Where are
Speaker 1: we out on that project? I know you've been busy. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I know. I think Mark knows this because I think
Speaker 1: he might be going to see um something as well.
Speaker 1: I'm skipping ahead to a movie that's coming out on
Speaker 1: Thursday that I know it is probably going to be
Speaker 1: number one on the list anyway in a couple of years,
Speaker 1: and that's Detective Pikachu. I don't know how excited everybody
Speaker 1: else is about this, but I am fired up. I've
Speaker 1: had my tickets purchased for weeks. Uh, so I am.
Speaker 1: I'm ready to go. So this is this isn't a
Speaker 1: bit you have had you bringing your kids. Connor is
Speaker 1: an adult Pokemon fan who you know grew up this
Speaker 1: one A lot of people My kids are too, and
Speaker 1: out of the blue. This is how nice Connor is.
Speaker 1: Behind the scene, he was a beat reporter that had to,
Speaker 1: you know, do bad things to other people. I'm sure
Speaker 1: but behind the scenes, he sent out of nowhere a
Speaker 1: box full of his old Pokemon cards to my two boys,
Speaker 1: and our house exploded later. They think the Connor ore
Speaker 1: isn't even they've never met him. They think he's the
Speaker 1: greatest human, much better than their dad. Uh, and so
Speaker 1: Connor a good job. Also, baca Velli and Connor definitely
Speaker 1: sent that knowing that this appearance was coming up and
Speaker 1: then come out. That's how I operate. But I'm serious,
Speaker 1: mean it's gonna be I'm so excited. I'm sure Mark's
Speaker 1: got to go to So maybe we can do a
Speaker 1: little follow up movie review, you know, Mark and Connor
Speaker 1: also one last plug, also just did like a two
Speaker 1: hour podcast on Draft Day, that pilot movie that came
Speaker 1: out like five years ago. So he's obviously he's really
Speaker 1: plugged in on the the higher end of the cinema spectrum,
Speaker 1: as we expect. I thought about Mark a lot. I
Speaker 1: reread his review, his initial review of Draft Day before
Speaker 1: we started it. But do we still have that Let's
Speaker 1: play that at the end of the show. Anybody who
Speaker 1: knows me knows I love drinking in the afternoon and
Speaker 1: watching Draft Day, and so to be able to get
Speaker 1: paid to do that was was was pretty great, very
Speaker 1: good Connor. Always great to hear your voice. You're a
Speaker 1: special man. Miss you guys. All right, Connor or what
Speaker 1: a guy? All right, that's it for today's show. Good stuff, guys.
Speaker 1: Reminder Friday, we have our third show of the week, um,
Speaker 1: and we're gonna get into some wedding related themes. Hopefully
Speaker 1: Colleen Wolf Countie Fox will join us as well. Uh,
Speaker 1: and we will have some Friday fun. Um. So that's it. Erica,
Speaker 1: how you doing. You're coming to the wedding? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I didn't know you were coming to the wedding until
Speaker 1: I heard the conversation earlier. And that is great that
Speaker 1: you're you would what you're what I would call a
Speaker 1: great wild card to have, whether it's a bachelor party
Speaker 1: or at a wedding, because you're gonna mix things up,
Speaker 1: You're gonna have fun, You're gonna bring some life to
Speaker 1: the party. I'm sure that's what West and Lakisha were
Speaker 1: thinking when they sent out the invite. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: so we take it away. All of that is true,
Speaker 1: but I think that Erica is going to be hailed
Speaker 1: as a conquering hero on Tybee it's gonna be like
Speaker 1: Katsukoto coming too to Mexico. It's just gonna be like
Speaker 1: a glorious stomping of Erica. The ownership of the island
Speaker 1: is gonna be too big for you. I don't think so. No,
Speaker 1: we'll be good. Yeah, I can't. I can't outshine you know,
Speaker 1: Keisha and West, So I just would everyone else. Though
Speaker 1: it's interesting that that's what you first thought might be possible.
Speaker 1: I like, well, no, it couldn't be possible. So I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna go. You're gonna wear like a white dress
Speaker 1: with a long train. I don't want to clip your wings. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: you can outshine people. No, I'm just excited to be
Speaker 1: there and to be able to witness it and spend
Speaker 1: the weekend with my favorite boys. Yeah, a lot of
Speaker 1: good feelings. At the end of today's show. Have Sydney
Speaker 1: sing about that, Oh was that annoying when I sent
Speaker 1: you that file? I mean, no, it's fine. She's a
Speaker 1: good singer, isn't it. She's good. You have the ability
Speaker 1: to toy with it, you know, tell it like engineering
Speaker 1: wise to be sound much less attractive to do like
Speaker 1: a reverse auto to No, I would never I'm a
Speaker 1: very good person and I respect talent. And she can
Speaker 1: sing very well, very gritted teeth. All right, that's it.
Speaker 1: Dan Hands is signing off for Quiet Storm, the Mailman,
Speaker 1: the Old Boss, and Ricky Hollywood behind the Glass. Let's
Speaker 1: get that Draft day review at the end of today.
Speaker 1: Show No Til Friday, Full of hot from stock to finish,
Speaker 1: delivers on the great tension of the NFL Draft while
Speaker 1: showing how human the entire process is. Mark Cecla, NFL
Speaker 1: dot com, you're out of your mind. Yeah I am
Speaker 1: having I proved that already