NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - Final Super Bowl thoughts & top free agents

Episode Date: February 5, 2015

A room filled with heroes -- Dan Hanzus, Gregg Rosenthal, Chris Wesseling and Marc Sessler  -- discuss the latest news including Bill Belichick on the Peter Carroll criticism, Josh Gordon’s suspension and RGIII's uncertain future in Washington. Plus, the guys debate what made this Super Bowl the best ever and debate over the top 25 free agents.Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comNFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL. Visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. The Around the NFL podcast. Initiate Phase 3. Welcome back to another edition of the Round, the NFL podcast. My name is Dan Hansis, and I am joined by. by a room surprisingly filled with heroes.

Mark Sessler, Chris Wessling, and Greg Rosenthal. What's up, boys? Hey, Dan. Why is it surprising? Well, first of all, Mr. Man, Mr. Paternity leave, I thought that you would be spending time with Young Walker. Instead, you said, I got to get back in here and talk more pets. Well, people say they love their job.

I mean it. I want to be here. I mean, plus Ellis, my daughter, she's taking her nap right now. It's a good time. And I miss you guys. I want to talk about it. Oh, that's sweet. I've gotten some distressing text from your wife.

being like, where's Greg? Stop. Have you maybe had too much time? I'm a little worried that she knows the cell phone number. I'm refreshed. Well, Michael Bennett knows it. I'm refreshed after a couple days off and four days sober now, so I'm feeling really good about myself.

How are you guys doing? Wes and Mark, you both look healthy as well. I slept 12 hours last night. Wow. Which was more than I slept all of Super Bowl week combined. Wes actually is, he's been cranking right through. So you're just hours. away from your three-day weekend coming up.

Oh, what is going to happen with you? Big plans. A lot of cornhole? Well, you know. Do they involve the Santa Monica police? And Mark, you are wearing, let's talk about Mark. He's wearing Stripey McStreeperson, which I thought had been sent to the circular file, but apparently not.

And then underneath it a free NFL.com t-shirt. I just don't care anymore. I see you've done as much laundry as I have. And this is a throwaway show. shirt, but when you go unbuttoned with t-shirt underneath, it can be, it's more like just a rag that you'd wash your car with. Mark is single-handedly trying to bring back the mid-90s open button-down shirt with a t-shirt underneath type.

Well, that's when I stopped paying attention to any style. It's a little co-bany. It's a little co-bany. But that's cool. Oh, sorry. I'm a little too much like a music legend in my dressing in the off-season. All right. So you would think we'd have nothing to talk about, but that's not even close. And, in fact, you know, screw you for thinking that.

Because we got a lot to talk about, all right? This is our first post-Super Bowl show. Greg sitting again, maybe it's easy to get to work when you could fly around on a throne of ease. Yeah, I'm not going to deny it. Notice also, I would not have pegged Greg as an aviator's sunglasses guy. He sits on his throne of ease. That is weird throne of ease music, T-Dame.

Yeah, what is that? I like that. Take a second shot of that one. I was singing more like the harbors like something more a little jaunty. It's throne, Game of Thrones music, Game of Thrones season five is back soon. It's, you know, okay, you know, working on it. I can no longer deny the throne of ease, but part of what's making it so easy is the NFL network just replaying the game over and over in the nonstop Patriots programming. It's been on nonstop.

It's been great for us because Dan, a notorious hill black. last his television at like volume 120 like he's the only one in the room off the entire week because he cannot stomach a second of it. Well, you did say when we were planning this, a little bit shot of the volume of my television, that was unnecessary. That's accurate. I will say that when we were planning the show this morning that Greg, one of his takeaways were going to talk about a little more about the game, the Big Patriots win, is that

the game is still all over the place and you can't get away. I got away from it just fine. Yeah, you turned it off. I'm serious. It was at the front of my wife watches the Today Show, all sorts of shows, the parade. It's getting a longer life, I think, because of all the elements of the game. Then a normal game. Is that crazy?

Is that a crazy assessment? I feel like it stuck with me more than any of the Super Bowl's that we've been to live. It might have been the game itself, which sitting next to you was crazy. Right. It's a lot just football, talking about that play call, Pete Carroll's comments, Belichick's comments. I'm saying all these comments and kind of rehashing everything that went out in the game. It feels like it's got a longer life than some great other games like Ravens 49 or stuff.

Right, but it's also a massive personal triumph for you. So you're just sort of glowing and you can see the glow on you. I think it has nothing to do with New Fatherhood. It has only to do with the New England Patriot. Yeah, you're like a maternity leave because you're pregnant, you're glow because you're so happy. I feel like this is the year where, I guess, to back up Greg's argument, people are writing about things that are germane to the discussion, whereas in previous years other websites are just trying to crank out like people.

FFT level content that, you know, the quotes don't really mean anything, but we have to talk about the Super Bowl anyway. There's nonstop analysis over, you know, the percentages of whether it was smart to run. I mean, just stuff like that. What's the way it ended? Forever. All right. So we will be digging back into Super Bowl 49 in a segment we're going to call one last thing.

I have many more than one thing. Which will give us the stage to add some things. Maybe we didn't get to on Sunday night show because it was kind of a fever dream. after getting a few days to think about the game. And Greg has said that has several things he wants to get out there. So we're going to get to all that. It's going to be a four-hour podcast today. We're also going to hit up Wes's big old top 25, actually, right?

Top 25 free agent list that he put up on the site earlier this week. So we're going to go through Wes's list of the top 25 guys ready to hit the market if teams don't lock them up first. of those guys will never hit the open market, but it's still fun right now to take a look at who may. So we'll go through that list. And if we get a chance, we might not be able to, but this will be something we get into as the weeks past. We are right now giving our off-season forecast of all 32 teams. We have a couple of them up already, a few up ready, including both the Super Bowl teams. So we might get to that.

If not, our next show, we will handle it. But to start, we got to check in behind the glass today. How you doing, buddy? It's going on, guys. And, yeah, I mean, the last podcast, sorry to everyone who had an issue with the audio quality, but we were at the stadium to, like, 2 a.m. I had to finish up the pod in the back of a taxi cab. Yeah.

You can pipe down. We have to labor of love. We love doing that. Thank you for listening. Everyone else. Everyone else that works for NFL media, and I'm not saying that we were working harder, maybe I am, was that like the post-Nepel Super Bowl party at that time? We didn't have to tape the podcast Sunday night.

And then, Greg, just stay out of it. And then on top of it, he'll go nameless, but somebody tweeted like, you guys should be ashamed of yourselves for not getting it up sooner. What? We were still at the damn stadium at 2 a.m. Walking around, like asking security guards how to get out of there. Who wasn't? I like that.

I like that. Maybe we'll let you know privately, Wes, because I know you got to hankering to block him. He's considered him blocked. I mean it. I like it, that people are so in love with our podcast. They're upset. They're not getting enough faster. I look at the positive.

All right. TD. Yep. Let's listen to news, buddy. Hey, I love you guys. Let's go, man. Let's go. And that was from the NFL films recap inside the NFL of the Super Bowl, and it really is great stuff.

Edelman, though, is the one pat I can get on board with. Cool guy. Forget Gron. Forget Tom Brady. One? So you're going against Connor Orr, who pretty much chose the Seahawks to win by in a wrong one points just because he didn't like Julian Edelman personal Julian Edelman a Tinder superstar this week

Mark you want to leave it at that I am not on Tinder all right we'll start with Bill Belichick who of course and this was interesting because Pete Carroll makes what many people say is the worst play called Super Bowl history leading to the game ending interception this obviously has a great consequence for Bill Belichick who goes from losing potentially three straight Super Bowls of Tom Brady to winning the Super Bowl. And don't forget that Pete Carroll was the coach of New England before Belichick got there.

So Carol did a good service by getting out of the way for Bill. So maybe that explains why Bill Belichick is getting behind Pete Carroll and defending Pete Carroll for the play call that was made that led to the I&T. Here's a quote from Belichick, who was on WEEEI in Boston and Wednesday. I think there's been a lot of criticism that I don't think anywhere close. to being deserved or founded. That football team is very good and they're very well coached. Pete does a great job.

Malcolm and Brandon on that particular play just made a great play. Not exactly Frank Caliando over here, Caliando. He went on to say that the criticism is totally out of line made by people who are not qualified to make it. Chris Wesleyan, I'll start with you. Does Bill Belichick have a point? Sure. I mean, I don't have any kind of hot takes on this. I see Belichick's side.

I don't think he's talking about fans. I think he's talking about people in the media who are questioned this without a deep knowledge of everything that went into that situation. And basically, I think Belichick is saying Pete Carroll is one of the best coaches in football history, so leave him alone. Yeah, whenever you go to one of these, like,

owners meetings, whatever, you realize the walls break down and the guys are friends, they just want to talk. They're in a fraternity together. It's a very tight-knit thing. It's like when we go to the Super Bowl and you talk to someone else, some other writer, and you're like, oh my God, will Antrell Roll ever shut up?

It's like you have that shared pain. Belichick knows what it's like to get everything questioned. Well, Belichick also went out of his way to talk up Carol as one of the best coaches of the last 25 years. He is. And he is. And that he's learned a lot from him from afar. And he knows how tough it was to deal with that Seahawks team. So he's trying to help him out there.

He also understands the logic behind what Carol did, even though it doesn't make a lot of sense that they went away from their strength. Bill Belichick in that same interview stressed we had our goal line people and we're going to have eight big guys in to block them and I he said look I don't know if we're going to stop Lynch but I'd like to see our chances in that spy he's like that's that's as good a situation as I could have put my team in for Lynch running and you have to think back and I'm sure maybe this was a part of it Lynch did get stopped in short yardage two other times in that game forget about what he did over the course of season or the play right before. He was dunked in from eight yards. He almost did, but that was different people on the field at that point in a different goal line setup. Two different drives stopped because Lynch got stopped on third and one and third and two.

The first drive of the game and another drive where they were near the goal line. Well, they also wisely brought in the defensive back for Akeem Ayers who ended up making the game changing interception. That was a good post you wrote there, Wes. Yeah, Jason Hartilius, one of our producers brought that to my attention, and we got Gold Standard actually was working in the video department tonight. We got to him to cut the video and we made a post out of it. And I don't think anyone else had that information.

Wow, what a great how the sausage gets made breakdown by Chris Wessling there. The umbrella of NFL media, powerful indeed. And maybe part of it is Belichick, I don't know, putting focus more on the player and the play than the coach making a bad decision. And it was a bad decision. It didn't work. But when you watch the coach's film of that play, Butler is breaking on the ball well before Russell Wilson throws it. So it is an incredible anticipation play,

and he didn't go run and knock down the play like a lot of cornerbacks would. He didn't bobble it and hit the ground. There wasn't any big-time replay. He went for it and he made the play. It was one of the greatest all-time plays in Super Bowl history. The more angles you watch of that play, the more TD is wrong on the Damashek podcast when he said it was a mistake by the Seahawks,

not a great play by the Patriots. That is a great play by Malcolm Butler. I have completely changed. Again, I watched the NFL films inside the NFL, and that shows how great of a play Butler makes. That's the Patriots snaring. He went for broke. He went for broke, and he got it.

That's what I mean. When we think of a Kurt Gibson's home run or whatever, this will make Dan happy, a little baseball. I mean, people don't talk about it because Dennis Eckersley hung a slider or whatever. You talk about the great play Gibson made. It was the great play that Malcolm Butler, of all people, made. Yeah, that was an accurate replay of that World Series. It was like 12 people in the crowd.

Wait, there was 12 people at the crowd at Dominique. No, in this soundbite. There's like this little lazy backyard baseball play, and it's like one of the loudest stadium scenarios. That. Okay. It's like a low-level Little League affair. Maybe 85 people there.

All right. Moving on, Mark, we'll move on to the Cleveland Browns, where Josh Gordon will not be in their plans for at least the 2015 season and maybe forever. The NFL announced Tuesday that the troubled wide receiver has been suspended without pay for at least one year for violating the NFL policy and program for substances of abuse. And, you know, the Browns then, Mark came out and fired off a statement

that showed that they are pissed. I think they stood behind this guy. They waited patiently from the get back, and then he got busted again. and now who knows where he is. Let me ask you, Mark. Are you going to see Josh Gordon on the Browns again? No, I think, I don't know. I could see him coming back to the league.

Well, it's like we talked about on NFL now, West and I yesterday, that it's maybe a Justin Blackman is the closest model for this and how the team wants to deal with it. There was no reason to cut him. It's not absorbing any salary. But there is a reason. The reason is you're sick of this. Sure.

I think they're going to move on. I think they're going to be done with him because I feel like this last. chance was his next chance. Why cut him and watch him lead the league in receiving with the Steelers? That I agree. I think you don't have to cut him. You haven't been through all this to finally. You've pumped millions of dollars in this guy.

I think there's no expectations. You go out and you draft and you find wide receivers the best you can. But you don't just cut him free. What statement can the Browns make about anything right now? He's in the netherworld, but don't have him get signed by the Chiefs and go for 1,300 yards two seasons from now. the same point a year ago, which I was on board with, and you're making the same point now, which is something you can still get behind.

But I would think at a certain point, the team is going to say, yeah, maybe he becomes the next Chris Carter, but as things stand, he just stands as a black mark that, you know, for this franchise that's just trying to get away from the dark cloud, and he's one of the big dark clouds that continues to hang on the team. I just think it's bad business to put, what is, what is he, 23, guy has potentially 10 more playing years in his body. He's not even, he doesn't even log miles over the last two, seasons to say hey we're going to change everyone's perception about us by cutting them and then a

smarter team like the patriots frankly that could care less about his they'll pick him up and he'll thrive i don't want to see that happen as someone that follows that josh gordon is not the only black mark in this organization it's not limited to the players either it goes a lot higher than that so let's not like there's an investigation into the text that were sent down to the sideline that's not let's not act like getting rid of josh gordon solves everything for this frame well they don't have to make a decision for a year we're talking about something that That's what I'm saying. Don't have to do something emotional right now, that's all.

They won't. He's going to be suspended. We won't hear about him. We're going to be talking about the next winner of the Super Bowl before they have to do anything with Josh Gordon. Well, this offseason is a train wreck for this franchise. You've got Mansell going into rehab. You've got Gordon suspended for at least a year.

So your leading receiver from two years ago who led the NFL, your first round draft pick, supposed to be your quarterback of the future. And then the offensive coordinator who made Brian Hoyer, Hoyer into a legitimate NFL starter left. So you've got a disastrous. And your GM is under investigation, and your owner is littered with question marks. I mean, it's whatever hope was generated a year ago in the offseason is the opposite. And let's hope that Johnny Mansell thing is legit.

And he went to rehab for the right decisions. And it wasn't a business decision. It wasn't a decision to save face with teammates. And he's actually getting help and he has a real problem that they're trying to fix. And maybe, just maybe, if you want to try to look at the bright side, he comes back and he gets his head on straight and you can maybe salvage something of his career because I think the one thing with Manzell is

everyone's very quick to say it's over for Manzell and let's move on and let's draft Marcus Mariotta he's still your 22nd overall pick in last May's draft so if he shows a renewed commitment maybe you can get behind him and build something and he shows you something I know he didn't do much last year to get you excited but I don't know but a smart team that's fine but a smart team

with all these players we're talking about can't rely on anything. Right, and they've got to go get everything. They won't. They won't be. But it's the same argument with Josh Gordon. You're saying you don't want to let him go and then let someone else make something of him.

I would never let Mansell go. I think the difference is Johnny Mansell, you have major questions about his personal life and maturity and about his football. Whereas Josh Gordon, it's really just about maturity. It's not about his football. All right, Dan Quinn was announced very quickly after his team lost in the Super Bowl, Dan Quinn,

became the head coach of the Atlanta Falcons in his introductory press conference. He said the goal of the team is to play fast and physical. Greg, is that what every coach said? Right. Well, that's my thing. He's really going against league trends because slow and passive has been the hot new thing around the NFL. People have been doing that. But Quinn's going to turn that on his head.

He's going to go fast and physical. Mike Smith, God rest of soul, his heart. knock's proclamation that they were going to be the toughest team in football didn't really take this season. So now they have a new coach that says fast and physical, but this, a lot of people seem to be happy with this hire. And I know Chris and I believe, yeah, Chris, you spent a good amount of time and talked to him during Super Bowl week. This is a good hire? I think it is. I would say for the second year in a row, the person on the Seahawks beat in the Super Bowl for around the NFL has really fallen for Dan Quinn. He was my favorite figure at the

Super Bowl, he's charismatic, he sits down, he looks you in the eye, explains everything, we'll tell you what he's going to do, and you can tell the players absolutely adore him. I felt that way about him last year, and I think that he's, he, he did talk about teaching in that thing too, and one thing, and this is a little tiny thing, but from us, Wes and I sitting with him, he teaches even writers in 10 minutes, something that you wouldn't know about the team, and I like that about him, and there's something about that that's genuine, and he also showed the ability to bring a good staff with him. He brought Kyle Shanahan. I think that's a huge hire for this offense. It suggests they're not going to tail up. This is what this team's still

about. And I love the idea of Matt Ryan paired with Kyle Shanahan. Right. He, unlike Gus Bradley, who leaves Seattle and joins a team in total disarray with no quarterback and no offense, Dan Quinn's not going to come in and fix your offense, but he's got Matt Ryan, he's got Kyle Shanahan. All he has to do is improve what's been the worst, one of the worst defense in the league for two years to a mid-level jaguars-like defense like Gus Bradley's done over there, and they're probably right in the midst of our playoffs. Are we concerned about the Dan Quinn Thomas Demetrov hair disparity situation and how that could create problems?

Well, they gave Quinn full control over the 53-man roster, so maybe Blank likes his men to be with less hair. So you're saying that was almost to compensate for the hair differential. I had no idea what I'm saying. No, it comes up a lot with Wes and Dan especially. Dan is, you know, probably has the best hair of the group. Probably. Yeah, definitely has the best hair of the group.

Got Patrick. He has the least amount of hair of the group. Well, I have zero. And there's been a lot of tension. It's been a lot of tension. Has there? I thought in this room, no, never. There's never been tension.

Classic case of the boss flying in, paternity leave to stir the pot. I thought you have a kid to raise. You just brought up the whole hair tension. Well, not within our group. I was trying to back you up. Every six months or so, Dan tries to get me to grow my hair out. just for his entertainment?

No, wait a second. You followed that cue. I think that 1994 ER Anthony Edwards is a great look for you, and you do try it every few months, and then you give up on it. Well, I'm still not over the fact that I first went bald. I shaved out of pure laziness, and I couldn't leave my island, and there were no barbershop on the island, so I just let it. And, you know, I met your brother, which was it?

Nick Wesley. Middle brother. Very nice guy. And two things about Nick. First thing about Nick. Immediately, you know that they're brothers because they started arguing about something that, like, I couldn't even believe the argument was happening. It was like how much of a fan Nick was of the Bengals, and Nick said he wasn't,

and Wes said you still were. There was a lot of, there was some heat there. Nick, Nick within a couple minutes of meeting me, said, hey, I listen to your podcast, finally, on Tuesday. And I was like, oh, really? It's like, it sucked. No, he's listened to many, I thought. No, that's the first one he ever.

Oh, really? I was like, all right, cool. And then we talked about, we started talking about hair, and Nick has hair, but it's not all the way there at this point. And he pointed his head and said, this is what Wes's hair would look like if he grew it out, which I found interesting. I preferred to point to my head and tell him that's what his head's going to look like in four years.

Nick is kind of the Potser. Nick is the Potser. of the group. I've met all the brothers. He's, I don't know, what we could compare him to. Well, when I hung out with the brothers... He would whisper in my ear when I was with all the Wesleyan brothers, and he was like, go over and tell Wesleyan and brother sit, brother B, this, and just stand back and watch and get like, Jordan, LeBron,

and then bang, 48 minutes later, they're done arguing. No, no, no, no. Phil was the one who instigated that. Nick is the one who likes to argue. He's the argument. Who would win in a brawl between the Wesleying brothers and the Walbergs? I'm taking the Walbergs. I'm going Westling. How many Walgars are?

Walgues are soft, man. There's like six of them, I think. Wallbergs are soft. Mark looked pretty big there on the Super Bowl. We've got a wild card. Yeah. Who are you? No.

We do have a wild card. Actually, I think I don't know you go with that. Say no more. All right, moving on. The Redskins. The Redskins. The Washington Redskins wrote a letter to their fans entitled or was entered with a greeting. Dear Premium Club member, I'm sorry, I can't talk.

And then it goes into a general intro, and then it goes a little like this. Head coach Jay Gruden, new general manager, Scott McLaughlin, and defensive coordinator Joe Barry will lead a nucleus of Ryan Carrigan, Deshaun Jackson, plus pro bowlers Trent Williams and Alfred Morris. The Redskins are poised to rebound next season. Someone's missing from that graph of stars. on the team and his name is Robert Griffin the 3rd. This all

seems, type of story, it's a nothing story, but at the same time, it's like, come on, you don't even put the guy in the paragraph anymore? The person who wrote that letter, obviously watched Redskins film last year. Keeping a rail. Well, it's a team that can't get out of its own way because you have to know, wait a minute,

when we do this and we put these in the mail and send them out, and it gets the Washington Post catches way to this immediate news story. Oh, again, you know, we're not showing support of your quarterback. What team wouldn't put the quarterback? He's not the quarterback. But he's not the quarterback.

So I do think these sort of letters don't get sent out without approval from either Jay Gruden or Bruce Allen or whoever it is. And the reality is there's a 50-50 chance at best that Robert Griffin, the third is a week one starter there. So why I put him? They're not going to put, you know. I just might avoid like I'd write the letter in a different way. Exactly. You write four players and leave him out. You realize as a PR guy, this is going to blow up in our face.

I get it. Just to me, it just recognizes the obvious that he is totally up in the air, Robert Griffin III, in terms of his status. They don't really count on him for anything. By the way, the way that they wrote this thing, drove me nuts writing the post, because they capitalized general manager and head coach. It's like a grammatical, associated AP style guide nightmare unfolding with this authoring. Real quick, around the room, RG3, week one starter in Washington. Mark, yes or no? No.

Wes. No. I go yes, just because. I don't have a better option. I'm going to yes. I'm going to go yes, too. But it speaks to exactly why he's not in the power. You're taking the field.

That's my move normal. I'm going to say they're going to do everything in their power to make him the week one starter, and then he's going to do everything in his power to play like he has been for the last few years. And they can't overcome that. What a difference in off seasons between wrestling rhetoric on RG's Greek? I didn't even know what sport he was playing last year. It wasn't football.

All right. That's what's happening. By the way, this was the highest, one late last thing. This is the highest rated Super Bowl ever. And I bring that up because usually whenever you learn that nugget, it's the show beats the MASH finale. And then Wes tweeted today that he watched like four episodes of MASH this morning, which I thought was really funny.

I hated that show growing up. You watched MASH this morning. I hated that show growing up because it was always taking the place. After like a cartoon. Yeah, there could be some great cartoon on at their school, like, you know, Scooby-Doo or Tom and Jerry. Whenever MASH came on in my house, that depressing song, that was my mom was like, it's over, TV's done. Because it's nighttime, it was the end of the TV television watching. WPIX in New York would use it as filler, so after a Yankee game, if they had to get to the next show,

they would put on MASH for a couple hours, and that's when he knew to switch a channel. I hated that song, exactly. Suicide is painless. It just was kind of brings on many changes. I just saw that, and now I felt like MASH was attacking me. Like, no matter what channel you switched to, that stupid song is on with some reason. Wes is the only friend I have that would watch men. Totally curious move, but I admired it.

And I gave it another shot this morning, and I thought it was excellent. People love it. The writing is fantastic. The acting's good. It's a great show. So Wes sleeps 12 hours, wakes up at like 7 a.m. And he says, you know what I want to do this morning? Watch four masses back to back.

Well, that's normally when I would just turn on game rewind and knock out a couple of games. And I felt some freedom. I'll just get a match a shot. They got the coaches film of this game up. I'm taking a break. And if we're doing TV reviews, everyone, if you're an NFL fan, and you like comedy, watch the K&P, Super Bowl special. That was really funny. Legitimately good.

TD, did you see that? I haven't seen that show yet, though. Okay. It's pretty good. Cool. But MASH is good, though. All right. Let's move on.

Let's go back to the game. Super Bowl 49. One last thing, but in Greg's case, many last things. So let's talk about, because we got in, we did a nice 43-minute show, nice and tight after the, you. after the game from the press box at University of Phoenix Stadium. So let's now maybe touch on things that we didn't touch on Sunday or that have come up since then. And Greg, since you have a lot to get to, you get us going.

One last thing. Well, I'll start with the Dante Hightower play on the second to last Seahawks offensive play of the game. Marshaun Lynch runs for four yards, gets it down to the one. This is where Coach's film does help. Because if you watch that game from the overhead angle, and you stop it at any point, right after they give the ball the Lynch for about the next couple seconds, I swear if they run that play eight times and they have it blocked like it is, or 10 times,

he's going to get in eight times. Everyone's blocked. He's got a big time lane. Hightower is getting not held, but blocked by Okung, and he's the only one with even a chance. Hightower dives to the left of Okun, kind of shakes the tackle, gets Lynch in the knee, and gets him right down. So if Lynch breaks that tackle or Hightower doesn't disengage and kind of make a last-chance diving effort, if you watch how that thing was set up, it looks like he's going to walk in. And this is Lynch, a guy who breaks tackles routinely, and Lynch just kind of, I mean,

Hightower just kind of knifed down and hit him right in the right spot in the knee. It's an amazing play that got lost, and it's understandable, but it got lost. And, you know, I'm going to be thinking about that every time I see Dante Hightower make a play for the rest of his career. He's the guy that did that. That's fair. Thank you, Dante. And if they gave Lynch the ball again, he was going to score a touchdown. Probably, probably.

But yeah. But it's something you couldn't have appreciated live. They actually co-credited the tackle with Hightower and Ayers, but Ayers just kind of fell on him after it was all over. It was an unbelievable play. Your thoughts, gentlemen? Go ahead, Wes. I think Greg nailed it.

Yeah. Thanks, Guy. Well done, Greg. Mark, your turn. You know, I remember when the Seahawks, young Seahawks team lost in the Falcons to the point. playoffs a couple years ago, and the anecdote that came out was that even in the tunnel in the stadium walking off the field, Russell Wilson was already coming up to people being

like, we're going to get back, we're going to get back, you know, and I thought, you know, I don't know if I buy this. I get it. I get it. You're all manic and you're a great student of the game and everything. But I'll say, you know, that defeat was young in his career after what happened in this game when you find out that he was, he sat down with Carol and they talked for ages after this thing, and he was texting him at four in the morning. and he came out, I thought, on Twitter and also just in his statements in general, I loved Wilson's, not every C-Hawk handled this game well. And we got that firsthand with Michael Bennett dealing with Dan.

We got it with the fight at the end of this thing. But Russell Wilson, who has to set the tone for the off-season, and maybe you think it's cheesy, I don't know. I thought that he's a great leader, and there aren't a lot of, we've seen with guys like Mansell and other quarterbacks that are young that don't know how to be a leader. If I'm a Seahawks fan, I think they're going to get back to this game, if not next season.

down the road, just like the Patriots came back from the Super Bowl defeats because of what they have in Russell Wilson in their coach and a couple of core players that I think genuinely this is a talented team, the best team in the NFC still. And I think Wilson is going to win multiple Super Bowls. Wow. Just to back up Max's point there, a lot of times the hat. Who the heck? Mark's point there, I know. I like that. The Patriots of the team often compare it to the Spurs, right? But this is one scenario in which the Seahawks are almost an exact same situation

in the Spurs were in the 2013 NBA Finals. I know, Dan, you don't like cross sports. No, I do like that. He's the one that does like it. Okay. You got to pay, but this is Mark. Oh, Dan, he's the host. I'm not Brian Billick.

Gotcha. Who's DJ here? No DJ? No, what am I doing here? Either way, point is, the Seahawks have a star just like Dunkin who's level-headed who can see through this hardship and then hopefully come out better next season.

So in this, Duncan, Wilson, Jeter, Brady. I like it. I like where we're going with all this. Odell Beck and Michael Jordan. Thanks, DJ. And they're a really young team. They were one of the youngest Super Bowl champions ever.

Somehow the Patriots average age is the youngest Super Bowl champion of all time, which is crazy. They got a ton of young football. It's just crazy to me. I'm totally on board with that. Oh, go ahead. No, no. I'm just saying I'm on board with it too because so many of their great players are signed long term. Things will change when Russell Wilson becomes the highest paid quarterback in the league.

Oh, sure. So there will be more challenges. but Russell Wilson is fun He's cheesy but in a good way Here's a tweet that he sent out On the 4th Is that today? No

That was earlier in the week Good job That was yesterday Wednesday I quote I'd rather be hated for who I am Than loved for who I am not And then dash

Kurt Cobain And then Russell Wilson feels like He needs to hammer his home Nirvana lead singer Well right That's not the tweet Let's get out of there the Nirvana lead singer line.

We don't need it. That's not the tweet I was referring to. So he's a dork, but he's a leader and a great young player. I think he'll be back too. Because when I think of inspiring quotes for leadership, Kurt Cobain's the guy I'm going to go to. All right. Well, we did not go down.

I love Nirvana. I'm just saying it's a little weird. A little too soon, though. Come on. Moving on. Wes. My first ever concert was Nirvana. Really?

That's good. Your good rock tour. Mine was the Little River Band. In 1812. they're a group why's there a group by the way not a band

I know there's a difference they're an outfit well we're here Mark what was your first concert blues traveler don't remember any of it I in 1986

I was a 6 year old boy I saw the monkeys in Weird Al Yankovic I'm not counting ones Jones beer Yeah how about as a I mean Oh then it's cake

And counting crows At the Beacon Theater Manhattan All right Wes Give me a little bit of a birth here. Okay.

Just take a minute. Okay, my one more has been, not only is this the greatest Super Bowl, it's ridiculous to say any other Super Bowl is. Whoa, let me explain why. Let's hear it. I agree. Hubba, hubba.

Let me explain why. Going into this game, 50-50, Henry Hodgson talked about this on the Damashek podcast, on the NFL.com pool. He's never seen it this close before. 50-50. The two best coaches in the league, two great teams.

You have one dynasty for the last 13 years. You have another one that has a chance to be the next great dynasty with four or five Super Bowls in a row. This is what's at stake. You go into the game, Patriots take control. It's like the Packers in the NFC title game. They're taking control, but they're blowing opportunities. At one point, Brady's got 14 completions, and Russell Wilson has zero. I mean, it's just total control.

Seattle battles back in. Then the Patriots get the Grunk touchdown. It looks like they're going to have major control going into halftime. Russell Wilson, brilliant. brilliant 29 second drive with Pete Carroll dropping his lower extremities on the field twice going into halftime totally different game Seahawks take control you think the Patriots are out of it three out of the five of us on the podcast Sunday night thought the game was over Tom Brady epic fourth quarter two touchdown drives 13 of 15 final drive eight for eight two huge plays Julian Edelman gets knocked out almost by cam chancellor just one great play on top of the other final drive

Butler makes a play. Brandon Browner makes a play in the end zone. Malcolm Butler makes another play, but Kirst makes the David Tyree, Antonio Freeman catch. Two plays later, Malcolm Butler makes the Ray Allen three. Analogy. Two, I mean, just in a span

of 30 seconds, you've got two epic history-changing plays. And Malcolm Butler, that was one of the greatest defensive plays in the history of football. Good job by Tom Brady, offering up his truck, too, to Malcolm Butler, because he deserves it. The more you watch that play, the more amazing it is.

The IRS has taken $18,000 out of it. And you can argue a few different things, but there's really no argument that that was the most impactful play in Super Bowl history. Never has a Super Bowl had one play that was any bigger than that. And for everything that you said in terms of the flow of the game and the greatness of the players and then the historical meaning, it really is the greatest. How could something have been better than that?

Tyree catch was pretty crazy too, though. That's true. The quality of play, the whole game was better in this game. about a lot. I agree with you, and I think it helps that we were in person to feel how electric it was. And from another lens, like we all had guests, and my wife, Simone, and her friend Tracy, they were up near the front of the stadium, and driving people crazy, they told me, because there were so many big plays for either side that they didn't just clamp down on one team, and they couldn't name 18 of the guys you just mentioned, but it was so exciting. They were

cheering for every big play, and people around them like, wait, wait, who are, what side are you on here? But it was that kind of a game where you couldn't even figure out who, were you were rooting for if you were neutral because it was swinging in both ways. Even this thing where TD doesn't like Tom Brady, but he has admitted that montage when Brady's coming out of the tunnel, oh, forget it. Goose bumps. He looked like a warrior. I didn't even, the Cleveland Browns melted entirely from my consciousness. It's like this is football like this. Tom Brady in that moment, I think we all were a bit transfixed, but I mean, that is like a god coming down the tunnel. I really got to show. You knew the moment until he owned it.

That made me feel like a fan, like a kid. I don't know if people even saw that on TV. With him coming out, getting all fired up. The place went nuts. And Mark, Mark, I loved. It really did get Mark on the side of the Patriots cheering like crazy the whole game. Mark's actually thinking about just jumping ship right now. Well, no, I'm just in a very dark place.

Come aboard. I will also say it was also badass. When the Seahawks were coming out of the tunnel and speaking in Nirvana, they were playing smells like Teen Spirit. and Wilson's walking. He's walking like a rock star, like down the tunnel, leading his guys. I thought that was like a super cool moment in general, both sides that maybe you don't get that experience unless you're there.

Well, they show Belichick and the place goes crazy with booze. I was like Darth Vader. It was an electric atmosphere the whole game. Let's keep moving because we do have. So you have some more things? I have things. And you have more things. That's what I'm saying.

Yeah. So I wanted to hear you. I'm guiding the show properly. Okay. Good. I'm doing my best for you. your boss. I'll lay some blame on the Seahawks and Wilson and

Pete Carroll that for whatever... Wait, did you just skip over me and go to your next one? This whole point was I was trying to let you set up and you just passed on it. I was going to set myself up before you got it in your second. Oh, I didn't know. So I thought that was, this was like a basketball play where I just kept asking. Go ahead. Do yours and then I'll do mine. Now I feel bad. Your tape.

All right. Okay. Come on. Make it quick, Dan. Greg's got back. Cut that all out. Thanks. Greg is just so excited. Anyway, Gronk. Let's talk about Gronk Summer of Gronk has already begun, you know, after playing a great game and then having a big touchdown catch. He's now done the tour by Sunrise. He was already back in L.A. or in L.A. doing various things, including the Kimmel Show.

And he had the greatest grunt quote ever before he did a reading from his erotica novel. And it was so great, I had to ask TD to cut it. I mean, I haven't read a book since ninth grade when they made me, like, you know, you don't raise your hand, but they call on you. I'm mocking to remember or whatever. Mockingbird to remember? Right. He went to the University of Arizona, folks, by the way. This is going to be a great next six months or so with Rob Grankowski,

who, you know, God bless him. He stayed healthy, had a nice Super Bowl and now has a ring and now is going to celebrate. So I'm just happy that we got the Grunk, the happy, explosive, stupid gronk just to enjoy. That's what I took away. Great job chugging. on the parade route. I sent the video to these guys that they,

I mean, just the movement, the accuracy on his, it just brought me, it's almost like he's done it before. Yeah, he's got, he's got experience,

you would think. Greg, your turn. I'll bring up some criticism of the CIOC that hasn't been talked about for whatever reason too much, and that's that they burned

two timeouts on that final drive for no reason. So you want to kill Pete Carroll for that call. I honestly think the way they burned those two timeouts was more inexcusable. they used one timeout after an incomplete pass with 150 left at midfield.

Can you ever imagine Tom Brady or Bill Belichick or a lot of teams that are well coached burning a timeout off of an incomplete pass in that scenario? And then the other one was after the curse crazy catch. They took so long figuring out what had just happened and getting up to the line of scrimmage that they had to take a timeout then, but it was at the end of the whole clock moving. So that's two timeouts that no one's. really killed them for, and that showed a lot of inexperienced. Well, one thing, though.

You just couldn't line up for two straight plays on the biggest moment of your lives. They couldn't line up in time on two different plays. Totally fair. And, like, I mean, one way they would have escaped any criticism at all, is had they run Lynch on that second play, I mean, oh, how brilliant that they didn't leave any time for the I mean, so many things translated to our view of this game at this point. Right, but I don't think there's any justification of taking a time out when the clock has stopped. Well, by the way, flip side, and I know you're...

At the 50-yard line, no matter what. There's no one like, oh, okay. I hear you. I know Bill's your boy, and he had a kind of a thing no one can argue, Bill, but he explained why he didn't take a timeout because he liked the look that he... But honestly, 99 out of 100 times, you take that time out to give your offense a chance. I understand that's not the case here, but I mean, really. Well, no, he admitted.

He admitted, when you look back, he's like, you could make the argument, I should have taken a timeout. He admitted that. Well, he sort of did. Then he said, but... He said, maybe I should have. but the way I was looking at it and that would have been killed if they had lost this game

and that's why it's great to be the winner because you don't get killed it didn't work out against you and that's why Pete Carroll will never shake this and nobody will ever think of Belichick did we talk about the poop celebration by Doug Baldwin I think you just did

I don't care for it you know NBC didn't even air it they cut away from it Doug Baldwin and then after the game was one of those weird juxtapositions because I think he did he have any other

catches besides that? No. And the only way he got open is because Revis got picked by the referee and, you know, he was there and he was, you know, somberly talking after the game at a riser and it was just like, wait, it was just kind of, it was just weird that this guy in front of the biggest TV audience ever in the biggest moment of his career, I think we talked about this, decided to do a fake poop. That's what he wanted his legacy to be. It's kind of a duty on the field. And it was an Adam Carolla bit, wasn't it? It's kind of amazing for his. Right. I listened to Carolla. for a long time and he used to

he actually came on our air NFL network a few times and did this with Rich Eisen just saying wouldn't that be the greatest celebration ever that you pretend to take a dump and use the football as you know I don't get it why is it funny I don't know it's just stupid

we're all the internet immediately I saw places that said it was brilliant and we're pissed at NBC for not showing it I don't know I feel that feels like more like an NFC division divisional playoffs celebration I like that right What about it is funny?

I just don't get it. Like, Corolla is a comedian, so maybe he sees something about it. The way he brought it up. I don't understand why. Well, poop is inherently funny. I think that's where it all kind of stems from, and it does take the sport less seriously when you do that. Maybe that was where it was at, but that happened.

Is there anything else? I'm not going to, like, Joe Bucklewell here. Yeah, I got you. I got a question for you guys when you all done. TD. Okay. You know a good question. All right, this is about the parade.

We had Julian Ederman with the Sherman Post. We had Liguerre Blunt with a shirt. And my question is, I'm off of Trash Dawkins, playing sports. What was the shirt again? It was Beast Mode, except it wasn't Beast. It was a B word, though. A female dog word. Yes, exactly.

And my question is, it's sort of funny how a lot of people call out the Seahawks. And some guys don't know. Enough with the Homer stuff. This is that Homer isn't. They call out the Seahawks for being brash and whatnot and not, you know, being not having sportsmanship, but kind of quiet on the front with the, with the Pats there. Don't you think that what you do in a parade should be held to a different standard than what you do on the actual football field? No, that's a good point.

But do you think the Seahawks would be afforded that even if they did that in a raid? That's fine, but these guys reap what they sell. I agree with you. And they're just grabbing stuff from people in the crowd. It's not like Garrett Blunt was up at 7 a.m. You know, putting that t-shirt together or, you know, past in a poster. You know, Edelman wasn't at home with his kids using a bunch of paste. Well, we know Edelman wasn't up in the crowd hands them the thing and they holds it up.

So it's like, you know, whatever. It's the question. It's not a homeowner. It's just like, hey, it's kind of weird how people want to jump in a high horse.

It also helps that they don't have to face each other twice a year like some of these. I'm with Wes on this. I think in that setting, someone hands you a shirt and you hold it up

and all of a sudden it's on social media. It's not like Doug Baldwin or Richard Sherman holding a, like a faux press conference to show how funny they are. Dropping 2.4 on the camera.

Like these guys, they were easy to root against by the end of that game. I stand by that. I'm sorry, TD. I'm just saying. I'm just pointing it up. It's okay.

You know, you have every right to do that. All right, that's it. I thought we were still going around. Well, I mean, Greg's got more points. You got more? You got another one? Well, he's savoring.

I am. It is your moment. We actually got through most of them. Give us some thrown-abee's music. That all cut the chicken scratch. We got some Charlie Day scratch. We got to the Lynn Short Yardage. We got to the everything else.

Greg Bedard had a good check out his piece. And I don't know even know if it's up yet, but he was tweeting about it. He thought that was one of the best games he's ever seen Brady play, which I thought it was interesting, because he had two interceptions, and he's been very critical of Brady, but he thought the way that Brady won the game kind of from the neck up and knew exactly where to go,

and there was not many open receivers each and every down, and this is typical of Brady, it's not like it's unique, but just the patience that he showed throughout the game that so few quarterbacks in NFL history could have ever done that, and the difference kind of between Brady, who didn't make a ton of big athletic plays or deep down the field, and Wilson, who had a great game and made a bunch of plays, is kind of stark. And for him to win it like that was impressive.

Did it? Badard actually, right, that it was one of the best games he's ever seen by Brady even before the fourth quarter. Right. That's what he was saying, which it's interesting. And I did watch, I haven't watched the whole game over again on. You will. I will on coaches. I tried to get through it before this podcast.

But just almost everything that he's learned throughout his whole career ends up being on display in this game because there weren't a lot of open. receivers and good point you know exactly where to go. And how about some credit to Josh McDaniels who came up with really one of the few game plans we've seen that took advantage of Seattle's strengths even as a secondary in their speed? And I ate them up and when they got down, you know, bad teams move away from the game plan. They stuck right with it. You said that right during the end. They're not going away from what was working early on. I don't think they would have won this had they veered away from that early success. Didn't the Patriots, Brady had more

pass attempts than I think the Seahawks had total plays. Well, I mean, Russell Wilson only had two pass attempts deep into the second quarter. All his real estate came from then on. They control, yeah, they control them. By the way, what was that thing we did on Friday? Confident call was the Patriots will have long, slow drives and limit the Seahawks playing. This was your week, Greg. It's just no way around it.

All right, I'm done. By the way, we should bring Greg back down to Earth about a little sandwich wager from NFL honors. That's right. I owe Dan. In which, wait, I get to explain this because you're having such a nice run. Give me something. I have nothing.

Wait, can I have some throne of ease music for this? We wagered a sandwich about how many MVP votes J.J. Watt would get. We came down at eight. We said, I said he'll get at least eight. And Greg said, I'll maybe get two or three. And guess what? He got 13, baby. High octane sandwich for Danny Boy.

Wasn't I in on that? I think it was a personal group. I think it was just Dan and I. I thought it was great first to feel. You wanted to jump on later, but I said no. The wind started blowing the wrong way on that one. That feels to me like right buys lunch for everyone. I was wildly confident on that one too and wasn't really that close.

So anyway, we will settle that up. So at least it got something out of the moment. If only we had done a sandwich on Bobby Wagner winning an MVP vote, that would have been a sester. All right, moving on, before we get out of here, Wes, the great scientist, they call him, put together his list of the top 25 free agents of the 2015 class, a list that you could check out at NFL.com slash, I don't know, around the NFL, unless there's a vanity earl.

Slash news also works. By the way, every science teacher I've ever had in my life would be laughing at the description you've painted here with me as a scientist. All right, so we've got to be out of here in 10 minutes. So let's get through this list. We're going to, I'll just, I'm going to do the top 10. I'm just going to roll it out there. And then Greg or Mark, you can jump in what you think about it.

10, DeMarco Murray, 9, Devin McCordy, 8, Randall Cobb, 7, Mike Upati, 6, Julius Thomas, 5, JPP, 4, Demarius Thomas, 3, Des Bryant, 2, Justin Houston, and number 1, free agent, according to Chris Wessling and Domicons, Sue. Thoughts? Can't argue with the top three at all. It's interesting. Dez behind Justin Houston was interesting to me. Justin Houston, I mean, did you put out this yesterday, Wesley,

that he didn't have a penalty all season? In the last two years, Jerry Hughes has 20 penalties. Justin Houston has zero. I think pass rushers always make a hill of money. And I don't think Des Bryant's going anywhere, so that I don't know. He had maybe the best non-JJ. Watt season for any defensive player in the last four years. I'm trying to come up with one because he would have won defensive player of the year, a lot of years. I mean, he was good against the run.

And he averaged more than a sack game the year before, too. I mean, this guy's right up there as the best pass wrestlers in the league. I think it's funny that, you know, a guy like DeMarco Murray, whether he stays or goes at number 10, with the market for running backs that we've seen in general, I wonder if he's finally the guy as a running back that will make a significant amount of dough because these guys are just getting nothing he was the hardest guy for me to rank

because the first three months of game film is just incredible he looks fantastic he's making defenders miss the last month and a half he's not quite the same back and he has 500 touches teams aren't going to want to pay for that and they already don't want to pay for running backs he's a hard guy to grade

and he seems to think he's only going to go and make a lot of money. He's not sounding like a guy that's... Well, I don't really blame him, seeing as NFL media insider Ian Rappaport has reported the Cowboy's standing offer was four years, $16 million, which I firmly believe is a slap in the face to him. He carried their offense.

Wes, you're a football head. So a lot of people that will look at Sue's numbers might not understand why he's ahead of everyone on this list. But tell me what makes Indomacan Suh. so valuable to the middle of defense? Well, I don't think casual football fans can look at defensive tackles numbers ever

and gain – you can't glean anything out of looking at numbers for defensive tackles. He pushes the pocket. He's the best three-technique tackle in the league. I know Greg likes Gerald McCoy, but Sue has been healthier and is better against the run. He dominates – there'll be five or six games a year where he just picks up the opposing center and guard and just pushes him out of the way. Dominates games. As a fellow wannabe scientist, we are going to collaborate on a larger...

You're in the lab, Greg. Don't sell yourself. Top 101 free agents later. And I can predict some people's ranks are changing. Here's my list of people which will have lower rankings when the final list comes out, because I'm going to drop them. Mikey Ayapati at 7. Maybe he even is the 7th one.

If it was on who's going to get paid the most, but he's coming off a bad year, I thought. I think we had Alex Mac higher than Mike. you potty and mikey potty has been a more dominant player i don't know mike eyepot jared adrick 13 that i was really where did that come from he seems like an average he was starting player below pro bowl level last year and guys who can play three four defensive end and four three tackle get paid a sometimes starter in the league uh brand he hasn't been a starter his whole career he's kind of like a wrote you know so was that every down player last year you already moved jason worlds because i really complained about how low he was initially

Brandon Graham's 17 That one I'm more just curious What's the reason? I actually hit him higher And then moved him down a little bit Because I thought maybe I'm just too high on him That is high on Brandon Graham On a per snap basis

He's always been one of the most efficient Pass rushers in the league He's been a poor fit for their defense He's better in a 4-3 I think Greg attacking me I'm not attacking I like Brandon Graham I'll go to the barricade

I want to check in on that one That one blew my mind So I might move him up on my neck Further laboratory work is necessary. I notice that you have Jordan Cameron rounding out the list of 25. Don't you have to kind of know where you are to make this list? Well, that's why

he's this low, I think. On game film alone, that was unprofessional. On game film alone, I would have Jordan Cameron in like top 12. I loved what I saw out of him, especially 2013, but you can't, how can you predict what teams will do with three concussions? Isn't it really only 2013? Because if you're

going to get, if you're going to pay for him and you're going to get what you got this year or any of the other seasons, you're getting a guy that plays about six games a season. and you can't rely on them. I mean, it's not just concussions. We overrated to Michael Finley last year in the end. You know, that was a more serious situation than Cameron, as far as we know. But that would be a big risk.

The two most interesting names on this entire list are pretty low to me. Greg Hardy, number 19. Right now he's on the reserved, what do you call it list? Commissioner's exempt list. Commissioner's exempt list. But he will be a free agent eventually when he's allowed to play again. Just on pure talent, he's in the top five. Fitch kitty pass rush.

No, question. But that's not what NFL teams gave free agents on. No, I get it. But just pure talent, he's number five. No question. He's maybe not the greatest citizen, but someone's going to take a gamble on him, no doubt, and they might get a great, great player. Somebody's going to take a gamble on him after they explain to their fan base why they're doing it.

But I don't think they're going to have to pay a lot of money to take a gamble. Maybe not. So that's an interesting guy to watch. And then Nick Fairly, 22. When he is right, and that's, I guess, not all the time. Yeah, not all that often. I mean, he's pretty awesome. I mean, he's a much better player than Jared Adrick or Brandon Graham has been.

When C.J. Spiller's right. He's also another one. Yeah. A question for both the scientists and Mark. If Dorel Revis, because we know. As Mark gives you a dirty look. Just as like we know, what, Mark, you a scientist in the lab? I actually did not. I thought we always watched them from below.

I didn't give you a dirty look. They make me very uncomfortable the two of them. If Dorel Revis ended up on this list, and I know the Patriots have rights until the end of March, where would he be if you dropped him into this? I actually had him on this list and had to take him away after I had our editors go through it with a fine tooth comb. I had him fifth. Interesting.

Interesting. Dan making the point this morning that Revis will be a New York jet next season. Now that I think about it, I'm looking at this list, Sue, Houston, Dez, they're all definitely ahead of Revis. Yeah, I'd put him fourth or fifth, Demarius Thomas, and him. You know who I like on this list was? I think it's a fair spot at 18 for Tori Smith. but I feel like if you put Tori Smith in the right office,

I don't know, maybe Indianapolis or something, he could go next level in his game. I love me some Tori Smith. I could definitely be convinced to rank Tori Smith over Jeremy Maclin because I feel like Macklin is a product of his system. Smith's only problem is he's not going to catch many passes. Greg and I talked about it. He's a bit of a Mike Wallace one-trick pony kind of guy.

You send him on go routes and let him get a pass. Mike Wallace is one of the highest paid receivers in the league, so Tori Smith might get paid huge. Mike Wallace runs a four, what? 3-3 or something? I mean, he's faster than Tori Smith. He's also a malcontent. I was going to say he's the highest-paid receiver, but he never should have been. What about Byron Maxwell?

When he goes to a team where they're putting him on the front of the tickets and stuff, he's our number one corner. I mean, do you trust him as a number one corner in a bad defense potentially? I trust him as a number two corner in Dan Quinn's defense. Right. If he goes to Quinn or Gus Bradley or someone that knows how to use him, there's no reason to think he can't be really effective. All right, anything else, gentlemen, before we get out of here. From this list, Chris, great working.

I'm sure we're going to have a lot more free agents. Well, you guys get together and start banging heads to figure out the top 100. It's going to get ugly. Post-combined. We'll have a lot of sweet free agents. Sweet music gets made. Yes, Earl Thomas, just something that came across while we were up here, going to be out six to eight months with that shoulder injuries, having surgery.

So that is a length, a length of the rehab for a guy. you right to almost the start of the season. Well, it could take you in October if it's to eight months. But he'll hear a quick math there on the months by Sessler. Underrated mathematician. Might not be a scientist, but... Right. Mathematician.

All right, so that's it for Thursday's edition of the Round of the NFL podcast. I think we're going to do two shows next week, too, and then eventually we're going to ramp back up to three around Combine time. This is Dan Hansis, signing off for Quiet Storm, the Mailman, the boss. day behind the glass until Tuesday. Hey, everybody, Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks.

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