Geoff Schwartz Is Smarter Than You - Wide Receiver Contract Demands, NIL Ethics, and Predicting Prospects' Ceilings

Episode Date: April 20, 2022

Geoff is back with Gabe to break down the sudden rush of top wide receivers seeking new contracts after Davante Adams and Tyreek Hill inked mega deals. Also, Gabe is troubled by the latest developments on college athlete NIL deals, and Geoff struggles to reason with why a. team would draft a quarterback in the first round this year. Plus, Geoff continues his. NFL draft coverage by setting some expectations of best and worst case scenarios for some of this year's most controversial prospects.As always, make sure to rate this episode if you enjoyed, and follow the pod to get notified when a new episode drops each week. Be sure to tune in next Tuesday to hear the whole team make their picks in the Geoff Schwartz is Smarter Than You Mock Draft Spectacular. Got an idea who your team should take? Tweet @geoffschwartz with your thoughts.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

It's Wednesday, April 20th. I'm Jeff Schwartz alongside Gabe Gillen. This is Jeff Schwartz of Smart on You, powered by the Varsity Podcast Network. The wide receiver market is out of control in the NFL. We will have a discussion on name, image, and likeness in college football and everything else that we can get our hands on when it comes to the National Football League or college football.

Maybe we'll have an XFL talk. Maybe not. We'll see. Happy 420, everyone. We had a little discussion beforehand about this national holiday. You participate. Good for you. If you don't, good for you. But I'm glad you're here, everyone. Gabe, how are you? I'm great. And yeah, I don't take you for a 420 celebrator. That doesn't seem like your style. No, it's not. It's not. What's funny is because i went to oregon everyone thinks i just smoke a bunch of weed i do not um my thing with it is not that i'm against it i have no problem with it it's i feel like i eat enough already if i was high i eat even more and that

would not be good for my body like if i just had the the the munchies like all day because i was smoking weed or even at one point night whatever it whatever it was. But I will say this, though. The older I got in the NFL, the more I realized the guys used it for pain management, right? Because Vicodins and Oxys, they're not good to be on long term, and they're very addictive. And the older I got, the more I realized that a lot of players were taking it to help them sleep and recover. And I'm glad the NFL laxed a lot of the rules because it's a much better way to reduce pain than popping some pills. So I'm glad the NFL moved away from it.

I think college sports doesn't even test for weed. I have no idea if college sports does at all. But it's much better than hard pills and prescription drugs. Much better. Go with what the earth provided you people. So you know what? If that's your thing today, if you live in a state where it's legal, have some fun. Get ready for some interesting football conversation.

Because here's a few guys who might be participating in the festivities of 420 because the ideas they've got are stoned right now. The wide receiver market is baked, man. Everyone involved in the wide receiver position in the NFL this offseason is acting like a crazy person. A few guys got paid a whole bunch of money, set some new records at the position, and now everyone who's ever caught a football thinks they need a brand new deal. According to several reports, Adam Schefter, namely Debo Samuel, AJ Brown and Terry McLaurin are saying they will not participate in on field workouts with their seasons with their

teams this offseason until they get new deals. Now, none of these gentlemen are up for a new deal. They've just seen Tyreek Hill and Devante Adams get some some big money and they're thinking well if I kick up a fuss I'll get paid too they're all great players but dude when does this stop like I thought the money was guaranteed why are we tearing up contracts what is this it's the new wave right and the new wave to Gabe is to then put it on Twitter I'm taking Tennessee out of my bio you guys know when I'm upset with y'all I'm'm going to take you out of my bio. That's what mature adults do, right? They remove someone off their social media bio, and that shows the Tennessee Titans or

Blue Duck Media that I am serious about a race. That tells everyone I'm not, I'm, it doesn't do anything, right? It's so childish, so immature. So the three wide receivers, Terry McCorn, A.J. Brown, and Debo Samuel. Look, let's start with Debo because I think he's, you know, he kind of just emerged into the last season. He was drafted in 2019. In 2019, he had 961 scrimmage yards.

In 15 games, 11 he started. 2020, he was a little beat up. He played in five games, started five games, played in seven total, 417 total yards. Then last year, he had 1,700 total yards, almost 1,800 total yards, right? We know what he did out of the backfield as a running back, but also obviously as main position at wide receiver. But it's about like 13 games, Gabe, of his career

that he's had where he's been this guy that we saw at the end of last season, where he's a dual threat guy had where he's been this guy that we saw at the end of last season, where he's a dual threat guy, where he's the Niners' best running back and the most explosive wide receiver. I get what the Niners are saying. Yeah, we're not paying you yet, buddy. Like, can we get one more year of this first? Can we get a little bit more of this before we decide to give you $20, $25 million?

And look, Christian Kirk's deal with Jacksonville didn't help anyone. Kind of got everyone to this point of overpaying these guys. And Devonta Adams, obviously, deserving. Tyree Hill deserving of their deals. But, you know, to me, Deebo Sam was not there yet. Is he good? Yes, very good. But if you're the Niners, I've got to see more than 13 games of this, right? Like, you've got to give me more than that.

A.J. Brown, to me, in that offense, why are you paying a wide receiver all this money, right? I mean, it's a run-first offense. I'd argue you should pass the ball more, but their offense is predicated on Derek Henry running the football. So the idea that you should pay a wide receiver $25 to $28 million doesn't really jive with that offense. And then Terry McLaurin's the guy I feel like you should pay almost, right? I mean, like, he is that good of a wide receiver

and to help out Carson Wentz and whatever future quarterback you have, he's been the most productive of any of these three guys as far as just kind of his draft slot and where I think he projects out the rest of his career. You know, he's had a thousand yards

the last two seasons and that's with what, Taylor Holinsky and Ryan Fitzpatrick and just who, Alex Smith for a little bit of time, I think. Maybe 2019. I forget if Alex Smith played that year or not. But Terry McLaurin is legit. Like, I think they should pay him.

But again, are you paying him $28 million? No, I don't think so, Gabe. And that's the problem is the money's gone so out of hand in some of these positions that teams are apprehensive about doing so. Because wide receiver to me is a luxury position, right? You need to have quarterback, wide receiver, defensive end, cornerback all stitched up. And then you get yourself the high-priced wide receiver. Like, that's not an item that you pay for unless you have those positions squared up,

in my opinion. So I get why all teams are being hesitant and look i have no problem with the players not going off season program like whatever baker's not going either that's your it's voluntary you don't have to go pat mahomes i think i saw that the chiefs are letting pat mahomes stay away for two weeks like you don't it's voluntary and teams have gotten used to not even having it 2020 and last year was a very condensed one so whatever sit out i don't care the twitter stuff is very immature but i get why the teams aren't paying these guys okay but it's not just the

guys i named it's also deontay johnson and obviously dk metcalf would like some new deals like of course and and all these guys just anecdotally are like second round guys like it just seems to me that on the one hand everyone's like i need a new deal and i want guaranteed money and i want them i want more money than the guy that just got signed made because i'm worth it but as soon as i feel like i'm not getting enough then forget this contract tear it up it means nothing to me it's like i don't follow this logic fellas and i'm pro player get what you can get sit out if you're allowed to sit out i don't care yeah take the owner's money f them pro tom brady but i just i don't get it it's like what do you want you're you're holding out to get a new deal with guarantees in it but you aren't willing

to honor the guarantee yeah you're right about that i mean look as soon as guys feel like they're not they're not worth enough they want more money and um if n NFL teams didn't give out more money when players bitched, there wouldn't be the money to give out. But they do, right? They give in. And part of that is leverage the players have. Part of that is maybe some public pressure to pay these guys. If NFL teams just said, hey, we're not going to pay you.

Like you have a five-year deal. We're not paying you until the end of your fifth year. Certainly within their right, but it puts them in a bad light with other free agents. If other teams want to go there and they say, hey, man, they're not redoing guys' contracts when they become more valuable, when they have performed more than their current deal.

And that's the problem I think teams run into is that if they stopped redoing deals when a player outplayed his current deal then i think phrases were looked at in a negative light and say we're not going to come here because we know that if we get a five-year deal we got and we've outplayed that three years later we're not getting new money and i think i think players would stay away from teams that did not participate in kind of the renegotiation when a player feels that they've they've earned the right to do that yeah i guess i mean it's a it's a you never know it's such a different business because

my my dad has been in business for for many years he's been executive and he's a consultant and and we had we've had so many talks about business because he'll tell me something and it's not his fault at all but he'll be like you know tell me something about a contract or something like this not doesn't work that way in the NFL, man. Like the business, like what you've done in your career, it's just not the NFL. And kind of to your point, right, in your business, right? Like you have a contract. I have a contract.

I have a contract with two companies. I can't just be like, yo, I want a new deal. I'm holding out my services. They'll just fire me. like yo i'm gonna i want a new deal i'm holding out my services don't just fire me like just like so it's it's a lot different um than a regular business and part of that is the leverage the players have and part of it is just there's a lot more money in these businesses and teams don't really feel a hit if they re-sign a player at times um and it's just a lot different than anything else all right and so it's hard to fathom

when you sign a deal and a year later, you're like, yeah, I'm not doing this deal anymore. Give me more money. Cause you can't do that in almost any other job. No, you can't. And so, and how about this? Like, cause again, I I'd love for all these guys to get paid lots and lots of money. I, I don't care. I, the owners, I'd love for them to just give out their money to these young guys who are fun to watch on the field. But, like, we have to use some common sense. And I think the common sense that probably some more of these guys should apply to their situation is this. Do we honestly think that Devonta Adams and Tyree Kill, who played for arguably the two best quarterbacks or most wide receiver friendly quarterbacks of the last 20 years,

arguably, of course, people are going to throw a few other names in the list do we really think that their stats are going to go up that their next contract is going to be even of course not like so at some point don't don't you in every profession just have to acknowledge a pretty good situation and realize hey debo like maybe playing under Shanahan's system is like kind of as good as it gets. Maybe you should just try your best to continue to sign here for more and more money. Again, I think it depends on every situation. It's different, right? That context.

For Tyreek Hill, for example, okay, he's won a Super Bowl. He is on his way to a Hall of Fame career. He feels he's underpaid in Kansas City. Yes, the money was good. He wants great money, right? He wants to be compensated to what he deserves, which we all want in life. Again, I'm new into the media,

but every time I do a deal, I'm happy with it, but I always want more, just like everyone else does, right? You always want more money. And even if you're happy, I'm happy where I work. I love doing this podcast. I love my other jobs, but You always want more money. And even if you're happy, I'm happy where I work. I love doing this podcast. I love my other jobs, but I always want more money. And if I get an opportunity to do that, I hope one day to do what Tyreek Hill did. Make globs of more money doing the exact same job.

But he already has that Super Bowl championship, right? He already has that legacy in Kansas City. So I understand him wanting to chase the money. There are other guys, to your point, I think think that they don't realize the position they're in. Like Devonta Adams has never won a championship, right, in Green Bay. He has the best chance to win one in Green Bay instead of Vegas. And he could have stayed in Green Bay. And I get maybe Aaron Rodgers gone after a year or two, and you have to kind of restart. But he's not winning a championship in Vegas. And so he had an opportunity to be in Green Bay

and make the exact same money or close to it and be a legacy, right? Win a championship in Titletown. But he chose the money. So those are kind of two different situations, right? Where they're both sort of the same age player, but one kind of has a legacy set in Kansas City already and now just kind of chase more money.

Where one, Devon Adams is a great football player, but he doesn't have that championship legacy in Green Bay yet. He won't get in Vegas. They're not winning a championship. And we've never seen him without Aaron Rodgers. So we have no idea if, you know, he's getting 17 looks a game

and if every ball is going to be thrown right into his hands ever again. You know, I mean, obviously he's a good player. And we saw Tyreek Hill was good with Alex Smith. Tyreek Hill seems like he has physical gifts that very few people have. DK Metcalf, I would put in the same category. The rest of these guys are obviously good players

in great systems. It's funny, they put out a video today, the Dolphins did of Tua throwing Tyreek Hill a pass. It was like five yards, like five air yards, and people just murdered the tweet. They're like, see, see, five air yards. It was like such an off-season thing to tweet out, like a great like hype video.

Here's our quarterback. Here's our new weapon. And people just shuttled over it. Yeah. All right. Well, so listen, these guys are all doing this to earn, you know, life-changing money for their families and good on them for getting as much as they can.

And now that is the same at the college level because we've lived through a full year of NIL. We're heading into the next season of NIL. It's a more evolved business. Forget about the impact it has on players. Great. Again, give these young guys more money, change their lives at 18 instead of making them wait until they become pros, I'm all for it. But it's getting a little weird now. There's a tweet that Andrew Brandt put out. He follows this side of the industry well. I just want to read it to you and get your reaction because it made me feel a little icky and I can explain why. Here's what Brandt said. Heard from a longtime NFL agent this week, RENIL. He said, quote, Andrew, we used to have to fund these kids for years until their NFL contract. Now the school boosters do it. It's saving us so much money. It's awesome. That's an agent talking

about how they used to fund college players. Now they don't have to because NIL stuff takes care of it. I feel weird about that. Do you? This is a much larger discussion that we can get into but i was talking with uh with an agent um a couple months ago about just general bs conversation um catching up and whatnot and we were talking about the current landscape of of his job and he mentioned that you know players are asking for a lot of money to sign like i need x amount of money to hold me over till the start of the season. And that was not the case when I was playing. That just didn't happen.

You just, players didn't do that. And so now, players are getting so much money with name and likeness, they're probably not asking the agent for as much money. So I get what Andrew Brayn is saying, right? Like, they have money now. They're not asking for X amount of money from an agent to sign with them.

But the broader discussion to be had here about NIL is the pushback we're getting from Lincoln Riley, from Nick Saban, from other coaches. So there's two things happening right now, Gabe. Name and likeness, we talked about this. It happened, was approved last summer, right? So forever. If you were an NCAA athlete, you could not profit off your name and

likeness. So if I had a podcast, per se, in Oregon, I could not make a single dime off that podcast. Not allowed. Now it's allowed, okay? So there's two different avenues for name and your likeness. One is just that, right? I have a podcast. I have a clothing line.

I have a million TikTok followers. I'm going to partner with a brand, right? I'm going to partner with a brand. I'm going to have a sponsor. I'm going to tweet things out. I'm going to get paid for engagement. They kind of what influencers do. I'm a, I'm a, I'm a USC guy. I'm getting a car from, you know, local car dealership. I, I, you know, Caleb Williams at USC now, right? He has a beats by Dre deal. He has a, he's part of a real estate fund, which is kind of an odd NIL to be part of, but whatever. He's got a water companies

partner with, right? Those are traditional marketing, advertising avenues that we see a lot in life. Then, and this is what is frustrating a lot of other people now, and of course it was going to be this way, is it's explicitly being used for recruiting now and buying players where it was not beforehand. So what's happening is these groups of boosters

are forming collectives. So let's say that, you know, it's me, you, Matt, Nick, Hank, Paige, whoever else, like everyone in the company at Blue Duck puts our money together and we have a Blue Duck collective and we go out and we're at USC, let's say, and we go, hey, we like you, we're giving you a million dollars to come to USC. let's say, and we go, hey, we like you. We're giving you a million dollars to come to USC. That's what's happening all over the country. Very recently, there was a story that came out of assumed it was Tennessee that's paying a player $8 million, a quarterback, a junior right now

from Southern California who committed Tennessee. They're giving him $8 million. Now, it's not just one lump sum. It's over a couple years. Oregon just landed a recruit. They were bidding with USC on it, and I've heard some numbers about what he's getting. And the article that Stuart Mandel put out today,

if you want to check it out on The Athletic, talked about, you know, three-star D-line, we're getting $500,000, okay? And this is not what NIL was intended for, but it was always going to happen. It was a matter of how are they going to make it legal to pay players? Because guess what? They've always been paying players, right?

It's a matter of making it now legal. And the coach would have a problem with this because what it does, it takes the power away from them and gives it to the collective, right? So let's say that, you know, I am this quarterback who goes to Tennessee, right? And I'm getting $8 million. It's a lot of money i i would feel uncomfortable like if organ paid someone that much money it would be like oh it's a lot it's not my money i get it but you know i'm glad for nico to get the money like i'm not i'm not taking his money away from him but it's like it's a lot

of money to pay a junior in high school like you you need to expect championships and you need to expect, you know, Heisman. Like that's what you're paying for, Tennessee, for this player. But now though, like if you're a coach, if you're Josh Heupel at Tennessee, and let's say Nico's not very good as a freshman,

all right, and you don't want to play him. You want to play someone else. Well, guess who's calling you, right? The freaking collective. Hey man, we paid X amount of money for this player. Put this guy in. And so now you have as a coach, and this is why Lincoln Riley doesn't like it. It's why Nick Saban doesn't like it. Saban, I think is more like, Hey guys, I'm going to, I'm going to beat you with this. Like if we don't get a reins on it, like he did it with the spread offensive.

Hey guys, I don't have to spread offense. All of a sudden he just adopted spread offense and killed everyone. But Lincoln Riley's comments were funny because he just lost an organ recruit uh the day before he made the comments about not liking this system um but uh that's why coaches don't like it it's because it takes the power kind of away from them and and i understand gabe i think it's not talked about enough i know in in other professions people get paid so many amount of years, right? Singers, movie stars, musicians, all that. But this is a lot of pressure, man, for some of these players. You're playing in a high-stake pressure environment already,

and now you're getting paid to do so a lot of money to perform. And we saw last year that, you know, a lot of the higher NIL deal guys did not play very well last year. And I don't think it's, I don't know if it's a trend. It's one year. It's hard to tell if it's a trend.

I want to end with this though. I do a Pac-12 radio show Monday through Friday on SiriusXM, channel 373. It's seven to nine Eastern. I don't promote it often, but go listen. It's a lot of fun.

Me and Sean O'Connell. And the only thing I say at the end of almost any of these conversations is that this started in July. So it's not even been one full year yet. If the Nico deal doesn't pan out, paying 500 grand for a three-star D-tackle, if giving Quinn Ewers a million dollars, if these deals don't work out, they're

not going to be here in a couple of years, right? Like you have to wait three to four years for this full recruiting cycle to understand whether or not it's working and how much you want to pay. So the $8 million might be three in five years or might be 12 if he plays well in Tennessee, right? And the last thing I want to say, too, I saw in the rundown, you're supposed to say this, but I'm going to say it. It's benefiting the teams that already benefit, essentially, right? It's not changing very much. I want to push back a little bit on that.

Tennessee is recruiting better than ever before. Arkansas, man, they got a lot of money in the NIL. BYU has a lot of money. Now, I don't think kids are solely going to commit somewhere for the money. I think there has to be

some promise of things like good football, Gabe. I mean, is a five-star recruit going to go to Rice because they have a bunch of fancy boosters that want to pay

a kid $10 million? Probably not. But, so there has to be a part of like good program. Arkansas had a good year with Sam Pittman. Tennessee had a better year with Josh Heupel. You know, A&M is buying everyone up.

I mean, they had the best recruiting class in the country. So there has to be some winning involved in this. But there are other programs that are not, we would consider playoff type programs that have a lot of money in their booster program and that are trying to get better players in there. So it is benefiting, not like the Little Dogs game or Arkansas, Tennessee or SEC teams, but they're getting a benefit from it. There aren't Alabama. It's not Ohio State.

It's not USC. It's not those type of programs. So it's not a group of five, but it's also, you know, middle and power five. So the power structure might change a tad bit. We'll see in a couple of years. All right. We don't need to prolong it. I guess I just have a couple of questions as follow-up in when this happens and all this money floods into the system and a new industry is built up. And like you said, it's going to take a few years, a few cycles before we even know the flaws. We even know where a little bit of regulation or some new rules would be helpful. It's kind of the wild, wild west right now. mostly working at agencies and in big marketing firms who are capitalizing on this and taking their percentage. And at some point this is going to become their business model and it isn't

going to be about helping kids. It's going to be about, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,

wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,

wait, wait, wait, wait, this exists so we can take our percentage. It, even if it loses its purpose, even if it completely starts to ruin the game,

it will continue because those people are getting rich off of it. And that makes me a little uneasy. Well, if it's not producing championships and Heismans, how are they getting rich off of it? Well, I mean, presumably if you're buying the name, image, and likeness of a college athlete who's a superstar in their market or their state, you don't have to win a championship or a Heisman to be valuable. I'm glad you mentioned that. It is one. It's a good caveat. I,

I, we're getting somewhere that this kind of opens them up for me. So some of the NIL deals that are being, that are out there are exclusive rights. So that's, that's, that's what you're talking about, right?

So some of them are, some of them aren't like the, the one in Tennessee is exclusive rights. Like you, they, they own his Nil deal as entirety of his time in tennessee so yes the value of that could extend over eight million dollars if they win a championship but if they don't gabe probably not like that's the thing like the winning has to happen for the value to exceed the money they're paying in my in my opinion i could be wrong but that's what it feels like to me yeah but that's like making you know early stage investment in some

tech startup like a small amount of money might make you into a billionaire if the app hits you know if you go give the kids who make facebook 10 million bucks 15 20 years ago now you're multi-billionaire like that's that's what they're betting on with kids and oh hey i'll put a million dollars into this fund and and maybe this kid has the kind of success we hope for but i gave 20 different kids this money if one of them cashes i'm rich and that that's going to become the norm and that makes me worried i don't really know why yet i just can tell that the people are going to get taken advantage of one day from this. Do you – so you're a USC guy.

If you heard that USC was paying some – the Malachi Nelson who they got to come in next year, 2023. I think he's the number one player in the country. Would it bother you if you heard he got $3 million to go to USC? I didn't want a championship. I didn't say any of this bothers me. I said, it makes me uneasy because I can see that this is going to head to some strange places and we don't have enough information yet to know how to protect the athletes. I think this was done under the sort of shroud of good for athletes. And I think it's quickly become, yes, good for athletes, but also good for an industry. And industry usually wins out. So I don't have an issue with it right now.

I just anticipate feeling weirder and weirder about it as we go along. I talk about this every day on the radio show because that's the big topic, you know, the transfer portal too. Yeah, it doesn't. Paying a 17-year-old $8 million, yeah, doesn't make me feel great. Like, I know what Oregon, I think I know what Oregon just gave this five-star offensive lineman. I mean, it's not worth, no one's willing to report it yet

because no one really knows the exact number. We've just been told rumors. It's a lot of money. I'm like, all right. Like, the article I keep referencing had a three-star D tackle, got $500,000. But it's not my money. And again, I think I just have optimism, maybe foolishly, that this will even back out in a couple of years. And we just won't see this amount of money in the collective part.

won't see this amount of money in the collective part. We're still going to see Paige Beckers and Olivia Dunn and a lot of the Olympic sport athletes and college basketball athletes make their money traditionally, right? But I think that this collective thing, I think in a couple of years, they'll taper out. I think so. Okay.

What about this sort of other way of it's being done, this kind of a backdoor? So let's get away from football for just a second. We saw this deal with John Daly's kid, right, who's a golfer. He's probably very good. And they're getting some sort of NIL deal with like Hooters as a sponsor. And that's sort of funny, I guess, given John Daly's brand. But like, again, I'm sure the kid's great.

I'm sure he's marketable whatever but this is obviously sort of like a backdoor into a deal with getting john daly on board right and so play that out one day arch manning is coming along like are you paying for arch manning or the manning family like what what where's the money going and who what are you really hoping to get out of it if you're a marketer that maybe, but I'm starting to feel like it's strange. Yeah. But I mean, if, you know, I mean, I don't know if this is a great example, but like I can understand people being friendly to me that, so I'm friendly to my brother for

them. Like I, that's sort of, I mean, that's sort of the same thing, right? I guess I'm just not getting paid. No one's paying me to be their friend to get close to Mitch. But, like, that's maybe part of it, right? Okay, I get Arch Manning. Oh, and then I get the Manning family to come to all my games. And I get the Manning family to be in our stands.

And maybe they're wearing an Alabama hat. And I get to use that. Yeah, I mean, that's part of it, I'd imagine. The player's good. Arch is good. But I imagine they also want the family with them. Yeah. Yeah, like I said, there may not be any bad side to this. It may all be upside. It just, it seems a little weird. I saw a take from Florio who you, uh, who you tend to disagree with,

but he said basically, and he's been saying this for a while. I just want your updated thoughts on this. Basically no players should attend the draft unless they're being paid. They shouldn't just be actors in a reality show unless they get something out of it. Do you agree with that? I mean, I get the premise, but the thing about it, Gabe, is that I don't think the attendees view it that way. I don't think they view it as I need to get paid to do this because they all go. They all want to go.

I think they like just being part of the process. I can understand if – actually, I have a friend, one of my former agents, Mike McCartney, who represents Aiden Hutchinson and Icky Iguanu. And they might be, like, the first. I don't think he represents Icky himself, but his agency does. And, you know, he's going to the draft for the first time ever in Vegas in a couple of days, or next week, I should say, right?

And, like, I might ask him,? And like, I might ask him like, hey, what do you, like, do you think they should be paid? I should probably ask them before this, but I don't think, I think they just, they like going. I think it's like cool to go to it. I don't think the 800 cent

wants to be paid to be there. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm sure you take the money, but I don't think there's a demand. I get what Florio is saying, but I don't think there's a demand by the people involved to get paid. No, but as soon as somebody does get paid to be there, it's going to become the norm.

And maybe that's good, too. I don't really know. I just think that some of this stuff plays itself out over the course of a few years. And I think we're going to I can anticipate us having a big problem with where this got to in three or four years. And maybe now would be a good time to pause and anticipate those problems. But let's talk about the draft because we just brought up the draft. Our buddy Trey Wingo put out a tweet that caught my eye. He said, drafting a quarterback in the first round is sure sign of long-term success, right? Wrong. Just two of the 35 quarterbacks drafted in the first round from

2005 to 2017 are still on the team that drafted them. Patrick Mahomes and Aaron Rodgers. So basically the two best quarterbacks of the last 20 years are the only two first round quarterbacks who still play for the team that drafted them in the last 20 years. I take from that drafting a first round quarterback is much riskier than people realize. And this year is not the year to take that risk. This class ain't great. No, it's not a

great class we we're lucky enough to talk to nate tice and lance zerline in our last episode about this class i'd recommend checking that out because nate watches all those guys so does lance they grade them all and everything first i'll just address the tweet you need a first round quarterback to probably win a super bowl outside of tom brady and there's some rarities like Russell Wilson. But it seems to me that you don't need him to be on the team that got drafted by him, right, with what happened with Stafford. I just think, Gabe, forever, if you drafted a player early in the draft, you stuck onto that player no matter how good or bad he was

for the length of that deal because you were concerned about your image and how people viewed you and getting fired. And now with a lot younger general managers, they don't care anymore, Gabe. Like if you're bad in year one, Josh Rosen, you're out. Bye. Don't care. Moving on from you, right? Gabe, there has not been a time that a player like Baker Mayfield has ever been let go by a team after the start of his career he's had. Like, the Browns are like, yep, we've seen enough.

We're moving on. And teams are just so willing now to just pull the plug on players that they don't think can win him a Super Bowl because look at the players that we think can, right? Mahomes, Herbert, Allen, right? Like he's big, strong Stafford, right? Big, strong arm type of guy. And if they don't have that, I think, I think teams are just like, all right, well, we, we, we tried, didn't work out. Let's just move on. Yeah. Well, so you mentioned Baker. I, uh, I have to wonder then, wouldn't getting Baker in your system for a year give you a much

better chance right away? And if he can be good with your coordinator and your receivers, you can get Baker at a discount and you still get a number one overall type quarterback, but you don't have to use the pick and you can probably sign him for less than the guy would cost you in the future. So shouldn't Baker be the quarterback that people are seeking out, not some guy from Liberty or Pitt? It's a great question. Here's the best answer I think I can come up with, is that the top of Baker Mayfield right now is better than any of the guys you're going to draft, right? Right now it is. draft right the right now it is but i think teams will convince themselves that malik willis or desmond ritter or sam howell or kenny pickett can be better than baker mayfield ceiling i'm with you

i think mayfield ceiling is probably where these quarterbacks are at unless one of them just happens to just be great out of nowhere almost essentially so but if you're carolina like you're at six you want a quarterback i would i mean baker is better than i think any of the options that they're going to have but then they don't want to pay me 18 million dollars a year that's part of it too right the contract value of a quarterback in the first round compared to the value baker mayfield you just get more value drafting the contracts apparently don't mean anything. If one of these guys has a good year or two, he's going to blow up his contract and demand more anyway.

So what the hell does it even matter? I mean, fair enough, but you can't do your deal after three years. So if you get a quarterback who hits in the first three years, you don't have to restructure him. You don't have to pay him more money. All right. Well, listen, you took us to where I wanted to go next. Instead of doing our normal moving the line segment where we do the over-under game, I think we're going to do a few more of

these ceiling and floors with some draft prospects. You mentioned one or two of them. I want to get into a few more. So let's do that after a quick break. We'll be right back. All right. Hey, Jeff, we're back. Time for you to make us a little smarter on the draft so you know we talked for a minute earlier about the top couple of quarterbacks in here so I want a ceiling and a floor for Malik Willis and Kenny Pickett because I think people are being outrageous with their analysis of these guys what's outrageous outrageous about the analysis? I mean, I'm hearing Malik Willis described as a magician. People are comparing him to Patrick Mahomes. Oh, no. I mean, it's just, it's nonsense.

I never even heard of the guy before a few weeks ago. I didn't know his school played football. Like, what's happening? So, you know, I think Nate Tice put it well. Like, he has the best ability to probably be special, but also the best ability to be a bust. Like he's six feet tall, which is not ideal height for a quarterback.

He has a good arm, but like his offense in college was pedestrian. He didn't make a bunch of NFL throws in college. Yeah. Great character, great leadership skills. Everyone likes him as a person, but you know i'd

rather have kind of a douchebag that was a good quarterback than someone i liked it was terrible right like that's you know obviously your your favorite quarterback is that way so i i think he has a he's a huge boomer bust potential i i i would not feel comfortable drafting almost any of these guys in the first round like to be your franchise guy i just couldn't do it all right so we're gonna say maybe a high ceiling extremely. It doesn't feel like first round material to me. Let's go to some defensive ends or pass rushers that feel like they have very high ceilings and very high floors. Trayvon Walker and Kayvon Thibodeau. I know you like them both. People seem to love Walker all of a sudden. Where are you on that? Yeah.'s it's really interesting about this um he he he had nine sacks in three years at georgia and if you look at pro football focuses numbers pass

rush uh win rates he's at 10 all right so he's a very raw pass rusher he's very good against the run he's very athletic he checks all the athletic boxes and and and the physical boxes good motor good kid all that stuff. But lack of production. And people use that, people are making excuses for him like other players they don't make excuses for. So what I'm hearing is, well, Georgia didn't ask him to do that very much. Georgia didn't, he played in this team-ass defense. He didn't get up the field. All right, great.

But still, where's the production at, right? Because Georgia had other defensive linemen that you were doubling. Like, you weren't doubling. You weren't doubling Walker. And just there's, where's the production at? And alongside of him is Kayvon Thibodeau from Oregon, who is 6'3.5", 255, best first step of any of the defensive ends. Has a lot to work on with his hands and his hand usage.

And when we hear about Kayvon Thibodeau, who was productive in college, who had a pass rush win rate of 24%, is all we hear about, oh, he's a bad character, too arrogant, doesn't love football enough. Well, I'm like, watch the film. Watch the film of him play. At Oregon, he was asked to drop into coverage 8 to 10 times a game. He was asked to play Sam Linebacker, to play inside on base defensive downs.

Why don't we use those excuses for him? Why is it only for Walker? He gets to, oh, Georgia's defense. Oregon was asked to do the same thing at Oregon. He wasn't a full-time pass rusher. So I think that Walker has all the athletic upside to be great, Gabe, but I just don't know. We haven't seen the production.

It would be unheralded for him to be drafted one overall with the lack of production. And then Kevon Thibodeau, it's interesting. For weeks, everyone kind of crushed him, and now it feels like everyone thinks he goes no lower than four to your Jets. Don't call them my Jets. They're not my Jets. And that gets me to the next one. The player I've seen linked to my former Jets most often is my guy Drake London from USC.

Ended his season with an injury, but everyone knows he's awesome. Him and Garrett Wilson seem like the two top wide receivers. So give me kind of a ceiling floor check on those guys. Yeah, I really like Drake London, man. Dude, his ability to just get up in the air and catch the ball. Oh, dude, it is awesome. And, you know, he didn't run a 40. I'm not really worried about that.

I just think that his ability to climb high and just make your quarterback happy by making him right by catching the ball. I mean, he was U.S. He had 88 catches at USC in probably seven games last year. And then Gary Wilson is just probably a more complete just route runner and athlete than Drake London is, but no one has better hands than London. So I think that it depends on what you want in your offense and what you have. Like if you are a team that already might have some speedy guys,

you might go Drake London and just have a big, huge possession wide receiver. Now the concern is that big USC wide receivers have not done very well in the NFL. Um, and so there's a concern, I think just that that's been issue, but I think Drake London is special. I watched a lot of him in, in, in the pack 12. He'd be a great fit anywhere. He is special. There's no question. I hope for his sake, he does not end up on the jets or he will never get his career started correctly. Let's go with a couple guys I know a little less about. You laugh, but it's the truth.

A couple guys I know a little less about, Devin Lloyd, N'Kobe Dean. Give me ceiling and floor on those guys. So Devin Lloyd is out of Utah. He is a physical freak at linebacker. He's tall but lean. And, dude, he can rush the passer. Utah put him down there sometimes.

He had some really super athletic interceptions. He caught a ball against Stanford. We just jumped up in the air and picked off an interception at the line of scrimmage. Returned it for a touchdown. Not the best in coverage quite yet. But he is the perfect Belichick linebacker. Like versatile. Can rush the passer., be in the box. People even have put him to Seattle to fill Bobby Wagner's role.

I'm not sure he's quite as physical as Bobby Wagner is, but he's just kind of a do-all. And then N'Kobe Dean is on the smaller side, I think 5'11", 6 feet tall. Dude can run. Can run. There's a clip of them in Georgia and Michigan in the semifinal game where the Michigan has a wide receiver, a running back, I think just kind of

orbit motion around the quarterback. So he runs, he motions in and the snap, he goes behind the quarterback and they throw him like a little swing pass. And then Kobe Dean runs with the running back and man coverage and makes the play for tackle for loss. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. But just the size is concerned with you i think both are going to be really

good pros for many years devin lloyd can do more than dean can like he's not michael parsons but he can rush the passer like that utah used him like that last year okay that's good analysis sounds like pretty high ceiling for both uh tyler linderbaum this is like now we're getting into the dork territory, but where I think you can really dork out. So some people are calling him the best center prospect they've ever seen. You know, like a center can make a world of difference for you. You would probably tell me that's the case.

How high is this guy's ceiling? Yeah, you know, he's an undersized center. You know, it's like, you know, going to be 285, 290 pounds, but super quick, super explosive. When he gets his hands on you, man, you're done. I think the concern with him, obviously, is the size issue. Teams can scheme up ways to put bigger players on him, but it doesn't bother Jason Kelsey or Ryan Khalil or Jeff Saturday.

People call him Jeff Saturday. I think he's a good football player. Ceiling, I don't know. Is he going to be an all-pro? I don't know. I think you put him in day one, he starts for you. It's that simple. Isn't center the position?

You mentioned Saturday, and I've talked to him a little bit over the years. Part of his success is that he actually was able to bark back at Peyton Manning. Knew football as well as Peyton Manning, saw the field like Peyton Manning and could challenge him and sort of captain the line for him. Is that true? Is that like why a center is so important? Well, I mean, I don't think the idea of barking back at Peyton Manning is the reason why, but I think knowing the offense as well as the quarterback is super important, right?

Because you can help them, you know, set the protections and whatnot, and kind of be their eyes and ears when they're looking at coverage issues or similar to a wide receiver, right? So I'm not sure that screaming and yelling at the quarterback is a quality, but knowing what you're doing, you're feeling confident enough to say, hey, Peyton Manning, you're fucking wrong. That's that confidence because of film study, that's what you need for sure, yes. All right. And so maybe he has that.

So two other linemen that people have their eye on, Charles Cross, Trevor Penning. I don't know a damn thing about him. I'm sure you do get into it. Trevor Penning is out of Northern Iowa. He is 6'7", 325, can dunk a basketball, super athletic. He just loves football. He's just kind of these meatheads.

You know, smaller school, obviously, so a lot to work on with technique, especially pass protection, but just a big, physical, tough guy. He doesn't get any lower than 17 for the Chargers. The Chargers would love it to have him at right tackle. Charles Cross, Mississippi State. Both guys part of Big Boys Club, by the way. Be out on Sunday, 7.30 p.m. Eastern on digital channels for Fox Sports. And he'll be out next week on FS1 for a couple of dates.

So it'll be fun to watch. You'll be able to catch all that. And so Charles Cross, Mississippi State. Here's my concern with Charles. It's really not his fault that I have this concern. So he played the last two years in Mike Leach's air raid offense. And that offense is a lot of pass protection, right? Like 700 pass protection reps in a season.

And we've seen that players in this offense, and again, he wasn't recruited for this offense. He just ended up in this offense with a coaching change. That they have typically not done well in the NFL. We look at Austin Jackson, USC, or Andre Dillard from Washington State with the Eagles or really anyone else from Washington State at certain times. And so I worry about that with Charles. Now, the difference between Charles and Andre and Austin

is Charles is just a better athlete. He has long arms and he's got a good base and he's very good at changing direction without leaning forward and getting kind of over himself. So there are things I really like about Charlie. I think he's a great football player. I think he's the third best tackle in this draft, but there's a concern for me as I always have with air raid guys, the transition process is just going to be really tough for him.

And we'll find out. We'll see. All right. Well, we got a couple more weeks to talk about the draft and then several weeks of fall fallout after it so we'll keep throwing some of these names and other names at you we are doing our mock draft maybe the dumbest mock draft anyone does we will host that uh next monday uh monday into tuesday so stand by for that jeff before you go i just have to get your reaction uh to pat mahomes Coachella outfit.

I refuse to call it a fit because I am a 40 year old man. I don't speak that way. How do you feel about, you know, Pat, Pat Mahomes looking like a weirdo at Coachella? I mean, is that the point of Coachella? I'm going to find his outfit here. What would he wear? I know. Let's see.

Yeah, it is. But you go to like EDM, you go to EDm festivals and sit around on lounge chairs instead of dancing i just wonder if you have any notes on how he's dressed let's see it must be on his wife's profile let's see okay here we go here's her fit oh boy okay so it's right okay so what's that gucci top am i right on that um he's wearing a cross body merce okay a bandana around his neck maybe doubles as a mask i don't know what the policies are in california right now backwards trucker hat with a mohawk it appears jorts versace socks i think it looks like and the shoes i have no idea they're tennis shoes of some sort.

I mean, it's certainly... What's the best way to put it? It's like expensive hillbilly. Is that what we're going with? That's what we're going with, maybe? Yeah, that seems about right. I'll tell you this, though. He at least wore comfortable shoes. That's very smart if you're going to be in your feet the entire time.

I mean, I've rocked a fanny pack in Europe before. I mean, I wouldn't mind the crossbody Merce. It sounds like you're not given this very high grade. I don't dislike it. I mean, I just like, dude, I'm a big fat guy. Like, what am I going to talk about when it comes to, they have a very cute baby, by the way. I see they posted Easter pictures.

I'm on their Instagram looking through their Instagram pictures. Their baby's very cute. I can't pull that off i mean i'm you know i'm i'm at the edm concert with a with a black v-neck on you know i can't pull it off either and new balance yeah we're not the guys to weigh in on fashion we both know that but um i think we've reached the conclusion of this show because we are no longer making anyone smarter about everything no we're not um but next week we will because we're doing a mock draft it's so much fun guys um please rate review subscribe we really appreciate it we're almost at the draft and then all of a sudden we're like at football season right so it's pretty this goes by pretty fast

um all right guys have a great week everyone talk to you guys next week