Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots February 6, 2019 - Post-Super Bowl Crossover

Episode Date: February 6, 2019

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Welcome everybody to a very special Locked On Podcast Network crossover event. This is Mark Schofield joined by Brad Motter of Locked On Rams and we figured having talked about Super Bowl 53 twice before we might as well talk one more time sort of put a nice bow on Super Bowl 53 or a bow on it. Maybe it's not a nice bow for Rams fans, but we figured we would do it up in style. So, Brad, my friend, how are you? And I guess the first question is, how are you and Rams fans doing? You know, we're hanging in there. And I needed this, Mark.

I needed closure. I needed to talk to you. I needed to kind of spit back and forth with, you know, the Patriots side of things. Because obviously out here in Rams Nation and kind of on Rams Twitter and interacting with all of our fans, you get our side. You know, we understand where we're coming from. I wanted to kind of kick it back and forth. And overall, I think we're doing better. I think obviously you get to the highest point of the mountain

and you don't succeed. There's going to be some letdown there. But, you know, kind of as we briefly spoke off air was just the nature of this game. It wasn't a blowout. It wasn't a dramatic, dramatic play at the very end. It wasn't a, you know, game-ending field goal to kind of rip it from our hands.

It was, you know, a defensive game. I almost said ugly game because that's what we've heard so much about from the national media is people that didn't have a horse in the race. They were kind of like, man, this is boring, but it was a defensive battle. I will say that the Patriots seemed to basically hold power in this game throughout. It just seemed like the Rams never got clicking. At least, you least. Tom Brady was able to move the football. They did have a missed field goal. They did punt enough as well to kind

of make a case that it was an ugly game on that side. But overall, here we are and we're kind of looking forward, but I'd love to kind of get a back and forth with you and kind of talk about the game and just break it down a little bit. Yeah, and I think we could sort of start big picture. And you mentioned the phrase, you know, ugly game, and we have heard a lot of that in the media. And, you know, you and I, we obviously had sort of some interest, some, you know, rooted interest in this game. But I think I can kind of admit, I don't know if you're on the same page or not,

but in a sense this was kind of an ugly game. It was a defensive game, you know, and I think that, I think that we could talk about what the Rams did on defenses. I don't think that's getting enough credit. But it was kind of an ugly game, wasn't it? Yeah. I mean, if you're talking about the two Super Bowl records that the Rams come out of this game with, and they both involve punting, then yeah, you're not really excited about what happened. Obviously, Johnny Hecker with the longest punt in Super Bowl history, which I think was about 65 yards. And then we also set a record for punting on our first seven possessions of the Super Bowl, which has never been done before in the Super Bowl.

So yeah, when you look at those two stats alone, if you kind of handed me that on a note card the day after and said, hey, here are your two records, I would have been like, oh crap, this is going to be a really boring game. So, yeah, there were parts of it where you just couldn't really get going and get excited. I mean, I was at a bar with mostly Rams fans, but we did have a little section of Patriots fans. But the bar seemed – I had a photographer from the LA Times come up to me,

and he's like, is this normal for a Super Bowl? And I was like, what do you mean? He's like, that no one's making noise? And I was like, yeah, well, there's nothing to get excited about right now. There were no really big plays. And when we did, and I think when we hit that tying field goal, the placement bananas and this guy that was kind of there just to watch a Super Bowl, didn't really have an interest in either teams,

and just said, man, you kind of reacted like you guys just won the whole thing. And I was like, you know what? When you get three points and you haven't had any points already, it's time kind of reacted like you guys just won the whole thing. And I was like, you know what, when you get three points and you haven't had any points already, it's time to celebrate. So you're right, there was definitely, you know, I can imagine being, you know, a non-fan of either of these teams and watching this game and kind of finding it hard to get into it. But yeah, the defensive, you know, the defensive play on both sides of the ball

was good, and you can say it was offensive struggling and, you know, couldn't get their offense in flow, but that was due to the part of the defense making it tough on both sides of the ball. Yeah, and I think that had this game turned out differently, say Cooks holds on to one of those throws, or the Rams come out on top of this game, I think for me the main storyline,

and it probably would have been nationally as well, is the job that Wade Phillips did did because I think that's sort of getting glossed over and what happened in this game there's so much attention on you know Sean McVay saying he was out coached the job of Bill Belichick and Brian Flores did but Wade Phillips did just as good a job against Tom Brady they gave up the one scoring drive but other than that Brady seemed confused at times with how they were rotating their coverage and spitting their safeties at the snap. And I thought Wade Phillips did just as good a job. They just gave up the one touchdown drive. Yeah, it's tough when you're on the losing side and you do well, but the other part of your team

didn't do well. And then, like you said, Sean McVay comes out in the press conference and says, I got out coached. So now the storyline goes, he hand-fed that to them as well as what they wanted to write about anyway. So it goes back to all those storylines you built before the game. Tom Brady, a.k.a. the GOAT. Again, you're talking about Wade Phillips and how he set up a defense against Tom Brady. He didn't have a great Super Bowl, to be honest. I mean, he had enough to win it. But the narrative is you step back and you look at the big picture,

and I can't argue with that, right? The guy's been there nine times. Now he's going on to his second hand with rings. So, I mean, yes, he is probably the greatest quarterback of all time in the NFL. But he didn't really play that way in the game. Wade Phillips, you talked about it, doesn't really get a lot of credit. But when you lose, there's not a lot of highlights to be had, but we definitely talked about it on our podcast yesterday. We give away game balls. We also do a thing called play action balls where it's like,

it's a real play action. You think you get a game ball and you pull it back. It's a play action game ball. So it goes to the negative side of things, but our defense definitely got our game ball because you're right. They were able to really keep this team in it through three and a half quarters. I mean, holding Tom Brady to three points. Obviously we talked about the missed field goal, but other than that,

you know, the first possession of the game is first pass of the game is contested highly and then picked off. They just could never build off of what the defense was bringing and put points on the board. But you're right. I mean, this defense and what Wade Phillips did definitely, you know, under exposed in this, in this, you know,

post media Super Bowl attention, but they did a great job. And if it's something that Rams fans could really build around and get excited about, it's this defense closed the season on a different level. And yes, we didn't win, but you know, our offense was what got us there. Our defense is what really got us to the Super Bowl. And then they couldn't really put it together. We always talked about three phases of football. We saw some phases of football contribute. We had our special teams did pretty well. Obviously we had a missed field goal at the very end of the game, but yeah, everyone did well except for that offense. But if you kind of flip the script and you look at it from Tom Brady's perspective and we talked about him being the goat in the in the overall aspect of things you know looking at that offensive performance and how they did uh they didn't have to do too much they did

just enough uh you know if this is another matchup do you think that would have been enough to to get a Super Bowl or is that kind of you know Tom Brady would have done what he needed to do I don't know that's a tough question to answer because again with that Rams defense the way Wade Phillips was able to sort of scheme things against Brady and sort of take away some of the pre-snap looks and pre-snap identification cues that McDaniels likes to get Brady in terms of motion and stuff you know I think a lot of credit has to go to this defense and you'd think you know against a different defense against a different defensive quarter it might have had a better game but you know you mentioned sort of

the idea that the Rams defense kept this team and kept that team in this game and it was a similar sort of feeling with Patriots fans I mean over in the lockdown Patriots slack channel the entire game it was okay every time the Patriots got the ball it's like offense you guys have to do something here I mean this defense they're not going to hold them to zero points or three points. They're not going to shut them out. Like, you got to do something. And it was just a weird game in that sense. And, you know, the Patriots did have that one drive.

But other than that, it was just like sort of pulling teeth for both of these offenses. And I think in a sense that sort of contributed to a lot of the national discussion, which was this was a boring game to watch. But there were two sort of great defenses going at it. I'd like to think that Brady would have done better, but who knows? And to me, there were times when he just seemed off. I mean, he was missing some throws. And part of that was, of course, influenced by the pressure and Aaron Donald and guys up front getting after him. But it just seemed like both offenses were off.

And maybe it just goes to the point that we were kind of making here both of these defenses did a great job and it's unfortunate one of these defensive coordinators had to lose and you know it was Wade Phillips because he did a great job but just not the best offensive game I think no I totally agree with you and actually I want to ask you a couple more questions about that defense what we're going to do is we're going to step aside, get a break, get a couple words from some of our sponsors. We'll be right back on the other side. Locked on podcast crossover Super Bowl edition right after this. Hey there, Pats fans.

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All right, we are back. Wednesday edition of Locked On Patriots, Locked On Rams. I'm Bear Motter. We've got Mark Schofield with us. Really excited that we made it through the season. We made it to the pinnacle of what NFL football is. The Patriots, obviously, we all know, came through with another Super Bowl ring. They are actually out there doing their Super Bowl parade right now.

Is that correct? Yep, they're doing the parade right now. It seems to be relatively tame. Although last I saw, Rob Gronkowski was down to wearing jeans and a police vest. He had gone shirtless for a while. Also interested in some of the guys, David Andrews, also shirtless, the Patriots center. He and Shaq Mason, the Patriots right guard, are tweeting about how much fun they're having. I think that's a subtle dig at Lane Johnson.

The Eagles right tackle said that after last year's Super Bowl that the Patriots don't have a lot of fun. So maybe some pettiness there, but it seems like the guys are having fun. But, you know, it seems like it's crazy in Boston. And you do get the sense like we saw in the send-off rally that there are a lot of patriots fans that think look you know with retirement rumors with gronkowski and other players that maybe this might be the end of the ride and so we want to get there and see that yeah for sure that was the number one question i probably for everyone is okay what's gronk doing right now, right? How many beers has he slammed against his head?

He started with a bottle of wine. And that's kind of impressive in a way because, again, look, I understand, you know, he'd be hammering beers. We all sort of expected that. But to come up with what looked to be just a bottle of red and just drink right from it, I mean, that's a next-level type Gronk. And maybe that's yet another cue that Gronk is sort of easing into life away from football.

You know, he's not going to be hammering course lights left and right. He's going to be more of that, like, sit by the fireplace and sip a nice glass of Merlot or something, which is a side of Gronk that many haven't seen. I do understand that he has shifted to the beers later in the parade, but still, to see him out there chugging a bottle of red was kind of funny. Oh, my gosh. Gronk's growing up on us.

I mean, you just got to think. As you were saying that, it just made me think, like, what's Gronk going to be like at, like, 75, sitting on a rocking chair? He's got to be the craziest old grandpa whenever he gets there. Oh, God. He's going to be the grandpa that's, like, in the backyard, like, trying to wrestle with the kids and you know then you're it's thanksgiving and he's the guy that starts yelling about the

game that's on tv and then passing out early like grandpa gronk sounds pretty cool i would love a reality show that you know at that time in his life grandpa gronk that would be awesome i'm down for that as well and as we talk about just kind of how this thing you of how this thing ages and we left on the other side talking about the defense and how great they did, well, this also marks the end of the Brian Flores era. He has now officially accepted the job down in Miami as the head coach. He put together a heck of a game plan. We're giving the Rams a lot of credit. And at the end of the last segment, we started saying,

hey, both defenses really played lights out, confused the Rams, sent a lot of different zone looks at them when they were expecting more man. Talk to me about where this defense goes next and who's going to kind of fill in that role. And will they be able to kind of get back to this championship form right away? That's a tough question, Barry, because Brian bride floors has meant a ton to this defense over the past season because coming out of super bowl 52 the loss to the eagles a lot of the questions about this patriots team started on the defensive side of the ball could they be athletic enough could they pressure opposing quarterbacks could they be athletic enough at the linebacker spot to cover you know rpo type plays and things like that that we're seeing more of in the nfl and

floor is starting back in preseason and preseason games really showed an aggressive pressure package that the players bought into. Dante Hightower, I remember telling the media back during preseason that he's blitzing a lot. As players, we love it. And so you got that early buy-in from some of the veterans. And that went over the course of the season. They had that loss to Miami where Gronk, of all people, was playing free safety at the end of the game. And they were expecting a Hail Mary, you know, deep throw to the end zone.

And they got something different. And Gronk wasn't able to make the tackle. And that was a bad loss for New England at that moment. And Flores sort of stood up to the team initially and said, that's on me. It won't happen again. And so it seems like Flores is the type of guy that Miami's getting a great, great football mind and a great person. And, you know, Patriots fans are sad to see him go. As far as can they continue that, that's going to be tough.

It seems like Greg Sciano, formerly of Rutgers, Ohio State assistant, it seems like he's going to be, from the reports I've been reading, the new defensive coordinator because while the Patriots usually promote from within, they don't really have somebody that they can put in that spot. They've got a defensive line coach, they've got a cornerbacks coach, and their safeties coach is Steve Belichick, you know, Bill Belichick's son. None of those three have any sort of coordinating experience or play calling experience. They're all on the younger side and so they need to sort of go outside to replace Brian Flores. So it does seem like it's going to be Shiano. We'll see. It's a big question mark. They've got questions, you know, with Trey Flowers.

Devin McCourty was hinted at perhaps he'd retire before the Super Bowl. And so it's going to be interesting to see, you know, how that pans out. From where I sit, though, one of the questions that I think Rams Twitter has sort of been struggling with over the past couple of days is Jared Goff, you know, because it did seem like Flores had a great game plan. Belichick had a great game plan to sort of confuse him at timesff, you know, because it did seem like Flores had a great game plan. Belichick had a great game plan to sort of confuse him at times, like you said, played more zone than they might have expected. They did that thing where they had two defensive play calls. And so they would show one look and after the helmet radio cut off, switch into something else. So Goff had to make some adjustments at the line of scrimmage. Where are Rams fans sort of sitting on

the Jared Goff question right now? Because it seems like there's a little agitation perhaps. Yeah, I think we're definitely on the wall with the Jared Goff question and we're leaning towards, you know, we trust the guy that we got and we're excited about his future. You know, he's still, this is going into his, you know, now is going into his fourth season. This was his third season that he reached the Super Bowl. And there's a lot of hype and expectation that comes with the number one overall pick. And not only just the number one overall pick, but one that they gave away four or five draft picks to move up and get him. I mean, it's even a little extra there that we gave away a lot to move up and go get this guy.

So the pressure there is definitely a lot for him. But it's tough for me because he did not play well, right? But over the season, I thought he played tremendous. I mean, I thought he had a huge jump from last year to this year, as far as how comfortable he looked. There were times where, you know, just like every quarterback, if you go and break down every quarterback throughout the year that you're going to have your bad games or your stretches of where you look a little uncomfortable or you're getting pressure on you and you're making bad decisions. But overall, I mean, I think he had six interceptions all season,

seven interceptions all season. You know, if you look at him and Tom Brady stat-wise through the 2008 season and you took away the names at the top, it'd be tough to figure out who's who. And it really wouldn't matter because they were almost identical. So stat-wise throughout the year, I think he did really well. He played a great game, I thought, in the New Orleans game, which was encouraging on the road. Super Bowl, he just came out. And if it goes into what McVay is saying and saying he didn't call the right plays and they expected more man and he came in prepared for something a little different and then didn't adjust as well, then that's where I think we got to go,

okay, he's young. We need to continue to groom him. If he can stay with McVay and McVay continues to add pieces around him to kind of grow, then I think we have something that is really going to be a great quarterback in the future. I know the kind of the national media about him is he's kind of boring. He just doesn't show a lot of emotion. He doesn't have a ton of exciting plays. He's got a big arm and can throw it down the field. But I think from our perspective, you know, these days you get a lot of rookies that come in like, you know, Lamar Jackson and even looking, you know, at Patrick Mahomes and what he did in his first season, how he just has that wow factor about him and that superstar level of attraction that he gets. And Jared Goff just doesn't have that. It's not the style of quarterback he is.

So I think over time, he's going to continue to find his fit in the NFL as far as where he sits, as far as, you know, I don't think he's an elite quarterback. No, by any means, not at this point. But I do think he is near the top tier. I think he's on that second, that first, second level of quarterbacks on, you know, where his potential is. He's got a lot of growing to do.

I think he's going to come into it. If we have the same conversation five years from now, I think I'm going to have a lot different of an answer. These games do help getting there. I mean, he said it after the game, kind of his press conference about getting to this moment. He's definitely going to learn from it and grow. So I feel very comfortable with Jared Goff

as quarterback of the Los Angeles Rams, especially when you tie him in to a guy like Sean McVay and the offensive mindset that this team is going to have moving forward. We've got a lot of pieces around him that are going to help, I think, continue to build that offensive line. Andrew Whitworth, we're not sure what he's going to do retiring, but it is. It's kind of a, we feel like we're constantly defending Jared Goff and we don't have a bunch behind us to say, look at all this flashy film I can show you. It's not. That's not the style of quarterback he is, but I think LA is going to be just fine with Jared Goff moving forward. So you don't kind of put yourself into that camp, which I've seen over the past couple of days, which is, you know, maybe the Rams might be that first team to say, we got the

rookie quarterback, it worked, but we're going to just, you know, get ourselves a new rookie quarterback and move on from Jared Goff rather than give him the sort of extension and big time contract that he might be due for in a year or two. Now that is a different question. Oh, okay. Okay. And let me break that one down because I, at this point, almost can't put anything past the Rams organization. Les Snead has been so creative with how he's developed a roster.

I mean, even look, going back to the beginning of the season, we just paid Aaron Donald record-breaking money, and he was looking to getting Khalil Mack. He looked at how could I trade and go get Khalil Mack. You know, went and got Talib, Peters, trading away draft picks, went and took Brandon Cooks from the New England Patriots with a draft pick. The draft history that he has as far as trading up and down and being aggressive there also shows that you don't know

what the heck he's going to do. If he sees an opportunity to get better at his organization, and then you're right, we got to sit down at one point and figure out, hey, look, Jared Goff, like I just said isn't the the superstar of the league but he also is in that upper half echelon of quarterbacks that do deserve money and this year or you know these day and ages that if you're up there it doesn't matter you know what your record was the year before you kind of play off of you know i'm a good quarterback someone else is going to pay me this money there's another franchise out there that will pay me this money. This is my market value. Either

you're going to pay it or you're not. And I think that's where the Rams and hopefully Jared Goff can get together. And I don't want to say find a friendly LA number for us so we can continue to build because he's earned his money if he can continue to play this well. But it is a little scary to think like how much money how much time will we invest into a quarterback when these day and ages you can tell by how often quarterbacks come out of the draft and you know you can maybe get someone in free agency or there's an opportunity if you have money and if you want to go for it there are going to be some quarterbacks out there especially young ones as you talked about getting some of these i mean what mahomes

was middle of the draft 14th pick or something like that. I mean, not saying you have to even go spend a number one on it, but there's opportunity to get a quarterback and then do that, that route that we did, which is pay a quarterback cheaply, and then be able to spend a lot of money, give us an opportunity to get Aaron Donald and Cleo Mack. I know that's out the door now, but that contract gave us the opportunity to look at that. So, you know, with that being said, I don't know what the heck Les Snead's going to do. If I'm him, yes, I think you feel good about Jared Goff and you want to get him a contract. Do I want him to be a top three quarterback making money? I don't think so.

I don't know if that's where his market value would be for me. So I think that comes down to less need trying to figure out. It's almost like going on a car lot and getting a car. How good of a deal can you get? That 2001 Jeep looks great with low miles, but can you get it at the right price? Jared Goff, I think definitely is worth a pretty penny, but not breaking SportsCenter, jumping into the Tom Brady's and the Drew Brees' and that type of money. Yeah, I think that's a great answer. And it's probably a great point to sort of hit pause for a second because we've sort of teed up the next sort of discussion, which I think is what the future might look like for these teams.

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something that you would never give your mother? That's enclosedlingerie.com with the code PATRIOTS for $35 off the best gift ever. Mark Schofield, Bear Motter, doing a little Super Bowl 53 sort of recap crossover show. And we just sort of teed up the discussion for what 2019 might look like for these two teams. And so Bear, I'll sort of ask you first, you first, where do you think the question marks are around the Rams headed into next season? And how do you think they sort of view the needs that they might have or how they enter this offseason? What are they looking to do, do you think? Yeah, I think it starts on the defense side of the ball for us. Edge rusher,

linebacker, I think is going to be the first two that you'll hear every Rams, you know, fan or even in the organization. I wouldn't be shocked if that's the way that would lead that draft board. But then you also got to think about, oh, line depth. You know, we don't know what Andrew Whitworth and Sullivan are going to do. Two of our older guys on the line. Sullivan gave no answer to that after that Super Bowl kind of even lent to the fact of maybe this is it. But, you know, I think as we kind of play this out, figure out who they're targeting in a free agent,

because if they can go get an edge rusher, I know Clowney's out there. I know there's a couple linebackers out there as well. So maybe if they go and do what they've done in the past and pick somebody up that's already shown and proven worth in the NFL with some experience, then that would be a great direction, and that kind of switched up the draft. But I think definitely you're going to be looking at edge, linebacker, O-line. We can even talk about a backup quarterback, as we just talked about Jared Goff.

Sean Mannion, the big story coming into the offseason was when we saw him in the preseason, it was pretty bad. And our big thoughts were, okay, we have everything, everything invested in building around Jared Goff. And if he goes down with even a fluke injury, now we have to put everything over to Sean Mannion and nobody felt comfortable with that. So I think that's going to be something that we'd look at maybe, you know, around the third to sixth round, trying to find somebody that could come in and learn under Jared Goff and also be a little bit more consistent or better than Sean Mannion I don't know if that's what the Rams think they seem to really like Sean Mannion so again we could be wrong there but I think that's kind of a

broad idea of what we can do and then really trying to figure out if you're going to keep Tlaib and Peters long term if Sue's not a part of the deal maybe someone else to the d line maybe a nose tackle someone that can help out with aaron donald uh as well up front so there's a couple options that can go depending on how some of our we've got a lot of people coming off the books here in the off season so they could they could blow this thing up and really go a different direction with free agency and draft or they can keep signing people and bring them back and try to keep the core similar i'm curious to see what Les Snead's going to do. And I guess to kind of flip that back to you, as we talked about, you're losing the D coordinator.

You mentioned even some players talk about retirement. Brady's near the end of his career, I would assume. I know he's got at least two or three left if he's going to 45. But when do you start looking at a quarterback? How does that look as far as moving forward for the Patriots? Yeah, I mean, that's sort of the million-dollar question, and one that I've been asking, it seems like, ever since I started hosting this show before last season,

is when do they look to address life after TB12? I mean, similar to what you were talking about with some of the guys that you have, Whitworth and others, we've got Gronkowski with a decision looming there. He's been hinting about retirement since the last season. You've got Devin McCourty sort of hinting at retirement, and so they might need to replace two of their bigger players, two of their most important players on either side of the ball.

Now, thankfully for New England, the safety class of this draft looks pretty good. The tight end class looks really good, so they might be able to do that. But then you've got two other big decisions. You've got Trent Brown there, left tackle, who came in having been a right tackle with San Francisco. Question marks about whether he could make the switch. Seems like he did. And we all know, look, left tackles get paid. I mean, he's going to get a chance to really secure the bag. You've got two teams in the AFC East and the Jets and the Bills in need of left tackle. So they've both got a ton of cap room. So he might get a big payday. Trey Flowers, you know, probably their best pass rusher this year.

He's an unrestricted free agent, so teams are going to be going after him. I know I've got Cleveland Browns fans that listen to Locked on Patriots, and they're sending me DMs and tweets. Is he on a plane to Cleveland now? I mean, so they're very excited about that possibility. New England faces those four positions that might be now positions of need coming into the draft. Left tackle might be one that can offset with Isaiah Wynn, who they drafted in the first round last year. So they could probably look to slide him in, but they would need to add some offensive line depth because you'd like to have that sixth offensive lineman swing tackle type. So they might have to do something like that. Maybe they address edge rusher via the draft. I know they like that kid from Texas who was at the Senior Bowl,

looks to be a Patriots-type player. Or maybe they just try to get by with the Dietrich Wises and Derek Riverses of the world. And so those are some questions. And, yeah, the life after Brady question because, you know, they drafted Danny Etlin in the seventh round last year. I don't think anybody's looking at him to be the heir apparent. I don't think Brian Hoyer is the heir apparent. This isn't probably the

best draft class to get a guy that can play right away. But where New England, with Brady saying he wants to play a couple more years, and I would say he could get you at least one more beyond that, playing until 43. Again, I'm a couple months older than Brady. I question his ability to do that. But he's proved me wrong before. He's proven a lot months older than Brady. I question his ability to do that, but he's proved me wrong before. He's proven a lot of us wrong before, so who knows? But this might be the draft class where, again, they dip into the quarterback position, say, day three at some point, whether it's like an Easton Stick from North Dakota State or a Brett Rippitt, who I love from Boise State, that type of quarterback, they might do that. So it's

interesting to think about how they're going to approach things. Belichick always does off-the-wall things in the draft. Last year it was they need to get an athletic linebacker, and one of the guys they drafted, Juwan Bentley, is like a two-down thumper type guy. Everybody was like, wait a second, this guy doesn't even – he seems to be like a dinosaur at the linebacker position. He seemed more athletic in the preseason than he got hurt,

but who knows what Belichick's going to do. He's done things like drafted the backup safety from Stanford in the second round, like Jordan Richards, which he did a couple of years ago. So he's always good for some head scratchers, so we'll see. But I think the best way to sort of wrap this up and put a ball on this is, what's the one thing as a Rams fan that you would want to see this team do or you think the team needs to do to get back to this point and maybe get over the hump and perhaps win Super

Bowl 54? Man, that's a great question because you felt like they did everything this year to put themselves in that position. And when you don't, when you get there and then you kind of leave flat with what got you there aka the offense a team that scored over 30 points you think you know if someone just jumped in here and said well looking at the game yeah score more points you got to bring in some more offense but i don't think that's the case here i really think to get back there they've got to have consistent o-line play it was something that was really strong for us throughout the season but then also had moments of weakness uh in jared go's spells where he didn't play very well. And even in this game,

it seemed like Jared Goff was running around like crazy back there trying to buy some time to find some receivers. So I think we got to solidify that O-line to make sure we can get back. And then it's also building a consistent defense because all year the offense was fighting to keep our defense in the game. Somehow in the postseasonseason and domic and sue decided to come to live michael brocker's probably played three of his best games in a row uh at the very end of the season and it's just kind of finding consistent play so i think it's really consistency right not not coming into this and coming back with that hang over that super bowl hangover to come out flat next year it's really sticking to what they did and that's sean mcveigh building an offense that can move the football, put up points, working with Todd Gurley, getting him the damn ball a few

times throughout the season, and not forgetting about who got you there, and letting Jared Goff continue to play within what he's capable of. Not saying, hey, I need you to go throw for 350 yards and four touchdowns for us to win this game. Have a balanced offense, and then more consistency on the defense side of the ball, whether that's bringing in some more guys through the draft or even in free agency. We've got plenty of decisions, like you said, on your side of the ball to make. Mark Barron, one of those guys that's going to be making a bunch of money,

but we can get out cheap on him this year. And really trying to find replacements at the linebacker. Is Littleton and Ebelkamp, are those long-time plays for us, or were they kind of patch fill-ins for the year? I think Littleton's a guy that can grow into that role. But, again, it's finding the pieces, whether that's through the draft or through free agency, but just getting some sort of consistent level on the offensive line play and on our defense,

and everything else should hopefully come into circle with the coach, the quarterback, the talented skill position players you have. But it's so much easier said than done for us on this mic. I mean, we're sitting here, you know, in our homes and talking about this and they've got to go out and do it. So one thing to say it, another to go and do it. And I wanted to ask this question the whole time, and you can make this brief to close this out, but this is kind of a long term look as well i saw a lot of debate in the last couple days with julian edelman winning the mvp uh people kind of crowning him into the hall of fame that this is going to staple him into the hall of fame i want to hear your take on that just quickly and your thoughts on that uh looking stat wise i just don't see it at this point i think he's been a part of some really good teams. I think he's been a really key part of those teams.

But I'm curious about what the Hall of Fame would mean if it is more about Super Bowl trophies and MVP trophies. But real quick, your thoughts on Edelman and what his legacy could be long-term. Yeah, it's no surprise. I've been getting this question a lot over the past couple of days given some of the talk that we've heard coming out of Super Bowl 53. And I am the host of Lockdown Patriots. I am a Patriots fan. I absolutely love Julian Edelman. And there's no doubt in my mind that he is a Hall

of Famer for the Patriots Hall of Fame. But I think if you sort of look at his production, you look at what he's asked to do as more of a slot receiver than a pure boundary type guy, it's hard to make the case that Julian Edelman belongs in Canton and deserves a gold jacket because you know you look at productions from guys like Isaac Bruce and Henry Ellard guys more boundary type guys that have put up huge numbers you know they're not in they're on the outside looking in wide receiver wins aren't a stat and yes he's had some clutch plays and clutch, and he's meant a ton to the Patriots, but I don't think that's enough to get him into canted.

And one of the criteria I think people sometimes use when you're evaluating somebody for the Hall of Fame, the Pro Football Hall of Fame, is were they ever the best at their position, the best at what they did? I don't know if you could even make that case for Julian Edelman right now. There are probably some better slot receivers. You could look at the Patriots' recent history say that you know Wes Welker for example you know there were years when he led the league in receptions and there were years where he led the league in yardage and you know that's probably more of a hall of fame type case for Kenton than a Julian Edelman

and so I think this is one of those recency bias moments particularly come out of a Super Bowl when in the wake of that game there wasn't much that people wanted to talk about anyway given how that game played out you know maybe johnny hecker might have had the best game out of anybody on the field and so with that adam schaefter tweet and the idea that you know you should start measuring edelman for a jacket right now as big a patriots guy as i am and as much as i love julian edelman i don't know i'm not sure he gets into canton into the pats hall of fame yeah I think that's gonna happen but I don't think he's you know he's getting a gold bust or anything like that well I appreciate your honesty because it is tough and then from a you know like you said you've you cover them you're a fan of them

and sometimes you can see that and I understand he's had a great career for what he was you know really brought in to do and really where he started to where he's finished. And no doubt, Hall of Famer for the Patriots. I think he's got a long way to get himself into Canton, obviously looking at some of the Rams wide receivers that we've seen fall short in years past and looking at just the stats alone. And they've got almost 10,000 more yards than he does

and all that type of stuff. When it looks at the big picture, I think you're right. I think kind of this um you know grabbing it from what is most recent and he's been dominant if you ask anyone in this generation and about julian edelman they're like yeah all i know is he's awesome and he's win super bowls and he's very important in those wins so i get where the argument comes from uh but i just don't see it yet still got some things to do but uh great conversation today we went back and forth, you know, hopefully throughout the season,

maybe after the draft, we can catch back together and take a look at where our teams are at and talk about kind of what is next in 2019 season moving forward. But I appreciate it, Mark and guys, make sure to go check us out. You can find us at Mark is at Mark Schofield. You can find me at lockdown Rams, lockdown Patridown Patriots, and LA underscore Rambling Bear.

Subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, and Google Podcasts. Leave reviews. We aren't done yet. We've got a lot to cover. So Mark, I appreciate your time and I look forward to talking to you soon. As do I, man. This has been fantastic the past three weeks. Three great shows and looking forward to chatting again.