NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - First-Time Super Bowl Champion Draft

Episode Date: July 14, 2026

Gregg Rosenthal and Jourdan Rodrigue draft the teams most likely to win their first Super Bowl. NFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Welcome to NFL Daily, where we're back at the base of the mountain. I'm Greg Rosenthal here in the Chris Wesleyan podcast studio. Great to say that name. Great to say the name of my friend Jordan Roderig, fresh off a starring role. Doing a great job hosting the show a week ago. Are you ready for season three of NFL Daily?

I'm fired up for season three of NFL Daily. it really never makes me appreciate your job more than when I have to sit in that chair for multiple shows. That was a terrifying and exhilarating experience, and I like where I'm sitting right now. Yes, it's very egocentric of me to call this season three just because it happens to be when I'm back from vacation. But yeah, we started...

I think that's fair. Your name's on the show. In mid-July, a couple years ago, so we thank everyone. And yes, I mentioned the base camp later on in this episode. inspired by my recent trip atop Mount Fuji, we're going to rank the teams who have never won a title most likely to reach the summit. You see what I did they?

It never worked for those people, but maybe it could work for us. 48 hours ago, I was still on Mount Fuji. And this is sad. I listened to your shows after I got back down and you guys were like, oh, you know, he can't unplug from football. I was pretty unplugged until the weekend, but I have to admit, I was on the top of Fuji, the sun's coming up.

We're way above the clouds. It's just beautiful. It was pretty exhilarating. And one of the thoughts I had just sitting there, it's total quiet. There's a lot of people up there. It was, it's really weird. I have a podcast in two days.

What are we going to talk about? Of course. 48 hours from then. Of course, that thought just crystallizes into your brain. The time zone being 14 hours gave me a little extra time, but it was like, huh. And so what we're going to do? We're going to talk about the teams that will be reaching the summit for the first time. It's amazing.

Sometimes now I've gotten to know you, I've come pretty good friends over the last couple of years, Greg. And I've noticed your off seasons and your trips, I feel like pretty inspired by them, honestly. If you'll excuse like a little earnest moment here. It's, you just go do stuff. Like you just summited Mount Fuji, for example. Like you just go and your family, you guys just go and you do stuff and you experience things and you get inspiration from things. I mean, really, this inspired the segment we're doing today. Hey, I mean, you'll take inspiration wherever it comes from.

I am very sore. They don't tell you that the coming down the mountain, sneaky, maybe harder. You didn't just roll. Sneaky may be harder than going up it. But I'm sure we'll be sprinkling in little bits of Fuji. and the trip over the next few weeks. But we will do some news before doing our rankings of the day. We're about nine days away from the first full teams reporting to training camp.

So this is the last truly quiet week of the NFL offseason. We think, you never know. Something could pop up. But the first week or the last week, rather, where teams will not be showing up. Some rookies are showing up a little earlier in that. But those are the Hall of Fame teams. And then the rest of the teams are all working out. and will be daily by then.

They show up by July 28th. But let's get to the news, starting with your Rams, Aaron Donald over the weekend, working out at the Rams facility. This was Friday. TMZ with the scoop. That's how you know it's true. They've got pretty good accuracy lately.

It's just amazing. They're breaking football news. In full pads, any thoughts about whether this means he's back or not? My first thought was picturing the, I think apartment building where they were filming into the Rams practice facility. That was a much discussed topic when they first opened that new facility about what if people just got up into some of these apartments that were all around the facility and started

filming. I think that this is a real possibility. I've thought that Aaron Donald could come back for quite some time. The reason I think that is less so some of the reporting and some of the excitement around this particular off season, but more so the Rams tried to. trade for Miles Garrett in 2022. And part of that rationale was to bring Aaron Donald, like this player who he'd always really admired from afar and really like basically stave off any retirement thoughts from Aaron Donald who started thinking about life after football after winning

that first Super Bowl. So I think this is really exciting. But I also knowing Aaron Donald a little bit, knowing his his his habits, he does work out at the facility a lot. Now, this was a little different because he had pads with him, which was pretty cool, I think. But he does work out there pretty frequently throughout the course of the off season. And even in season, people will see him around the facility. So I'm like, I think that this could actually happen. I don't think it actually is going to be a real thought or a real conversation until we're way into the off season, excuse me, way into the regular season, even like post-trade deadline,

November, starting to get his legs under him for real. This is like sort of an Eric Weddle vibe. to me. Less so I want to spend an entire training camp after being retired with a team. It's just not, I just don't see him being in training camp or anything like that. I figured training camp, yeah, like the earliest possible Aaron Donald return would be after training camp, but before the season. But hearing that he could potentially show up for like the playoff push.

Yeah. The end of the regular season does make more sense. If I, you know, I'm not a betting man. We're not allowed to do that here at the NFL. If I was, I would say I expect to see Aaron Donald in Rams colors this year on the field. And Adam Schaefter, for what it's worth said on Pat McAfee on Monday, that Aaron Donald just wanted to see how it felt with pads on. And he just left it at that.

That was his report. Yeah. I mean, like you, I think this will happen. Truly, I do. But I don't think it would happen until, like I mentioned, the Eric Weddle Path. He joined the team in what was it, early December or late, excuse me, late December, worked his way from practice squad into starting in the Super Bowl,

but they gave him time to do it. He took the time to actually see if it was going to be the right thing for him. And it worked out in a very storybook way. And I think Aaron Donald knows exactly what his plan would be in that case. Why play potentially 20 games when you can play six to nine

or whatever it would be, depending on their playoff run? Also in the news, Daniel Jones, reported to be cleared to do everything, I believe this was from Stephen Holder of ESPN and just kind of puts a stamp on a story this offseason. We've been following that he's been a little ahead of what we would have expected. And yeah, the opening of training camp, he will be allowed up. I bet they still won't have him in pads too often.

But he basically is ready to go. And it just confirms something I've been thinking, which is I'd at this point be surprised if he wasn't the weak one starter. Yes. And as we remember from some of these Achilles tear recoveries over the last couple of seasons, return to action doesn't necessarily mean return to full performance. So I would still exercise a lot of, I think, cautious optimism in terms of what he would actually be capable of doing or the level of play. But it's kind of a miracle, some of these surgeries now in a way that they're getting players back on the field faster than ever. Absolutely insane.

And so I just, I'm curious about how all of this is going to. go. I also was on Riley Leonard film study watch last year. You gave me that really glorious. Got a lot of mileage out of this. You gave me that really glorious assignment and I was happy to do it for the show. I do whatever it takes for the show, right? And so I didn't think it was that bad. So if you need a patch, if you need a patch filling guy for a little bit, fine. That's fine. Anthony Richardson's still on the roster. We'll see if that's the case. Week one, the Seahawks were sold while I was gone. Actually, over the weekend. The venture capitalist binad Kosla.

First time I've heard the name out loud, so apologies if I got it wrong. $9.6 billion is the sale price. In some research materials I conducted for this very moment, I found out that Kossla prefers the term venture assistant. Doesn't like the term venture capitalist. I mean, if you're able to buy a $9.6 billion team, I feel like, you know, just embrace the capital. That screams capitalism.

Yeah. It's like, you might not be able to avoid the title there, man. Probably the most interesting things about this, because obviously don't know much about this man. That his wife, Niru, Kossla, will be the controlling owner. In general, it's the family that's running it, according to Kosovo. But his wife is going to be the one representing the team at, you know, a league meetings and whatnot.

So that's who will get to be familiar with, assuming they get approved. And that he was a minority. San Francisco 49ers owner as recently, you know, just bought into the team like a year ago, like 3% of the team and will have to sell that stake in the 49ers before he is officially confirmed. But yeah, this is the biggest price ever for an NFL team. It is crazy to think that the Waltons of Walmart, and this is the kind of money that you now need to have to get into the NFL, which I don't feel great about, bought the Broncos. four years ago now for under $5 million. Billion. Billion dollars.

$5 million. That would be inflation. For under $5 billion, and now we're almost to $10. Yeah. And I remember, I mean, I covered the Panthers sale. I covered the process and the tax, the different tax possibilities in the two different states and like all of these different things that factored into that sale. And you're not even looking at half of what that costs.

This is something like $4 billion, $4.5 billion at the time. And now it's only, it's been less than a decade since that sale went through. This is already also $3 billion more than the commander's sale. $2.25 billion, $2.275 billion for David Tepper in 2018, which just goes to show. It's crazy inflation. Well, Ann, it's not great because you now have to be able to put together these consortiums of, it's like the rest of society. It's almost tamed to think back to the types of people

who could try to buy NFL teams before. And in theory it would be like someone who really hit it big and was from that town or had some connection or just always wanted to run a team. And they didn't even look at it necessarily as a way to just like print, print money. Whereas now it's just the billionaires are running every aspect of society.

And you have to be ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, ultra, rich to even consider getting into buying an NFL team. And the reason to do it is you'll always be able to sell for a profit. Except the Green Bay Packers. There you go. Hold on, guys. Speaking of which, former Green Bay Packers quarterback, Aaron Rogers,

we'll end the news here. I just thought this was cute. You know, had an Instagram post over the weekend. He got together with a bunch of his... teammates with the Steelers, including DK Metcalf, Michael Pittman, Roman Wilson was there. Scoronic, I think, was there,

a whole bunch of people with the hashtag, like, last rodeo, and they're all in, like, cowboy gear. But the reason I wanted to mention it was the first picture he posted was very fuzzy, and then people made fun of him. And then a few hours later, he just posted a clearer version of that same picture,

but left up the original fuzzy one because it had the other ones in the carousel, It's just a very old guy move there. Yeah, boomer. Boomer move. I can just see this happening in like December, January, whatever. He's on the Pat McGithy show, and they ask him about one last rodeo. And, you know, so that really means you're done after this, right? And then Aaron Rogers, very coily sort of smirking at the camera and saying,

well, that could have just meant that I was talking about the last week off before training camp, you know, in the summer. last rodeo of the summer. Did you like my impression? That was pretty good. That was unfortunate, I would say, not pretty good. Well, you will never unhear it now. I like that he's branding his final season.

It just makes the whole thing official. His former teammate, by the way, Isaiah McDuffie signed a one-year extension with the Green Bay Packers. How about that at linebacker? Let's take a break. Why not? It's the cleanest time to do it. We're going to come back. we're going to have a fun segment for you.

12 teams in NFL history have never won the Super Bowl, Jordan. Mm-hmm. It seems like too many. Doesn't that seem like a lot of teams to have never won the Super Bowl? There's a league of 32 teams, and there's still 12 that have never won the Super Bowl? This is supposed to be the League of Parity? Yeah, I mean, when you look at how many appearances many of them have, it makes a little bit more sense. Four teams have not made any appearance.

Yes. And yes, that includes some new teams like the Jaguars and the Texas. But they're not that new. Like, we're 25 years old or whatever by now. Try harder, guys. We don't have as many first-time winners as you would think. More on that in a second. But we are going to draft with some serious stakes here, Jordan,

the teams most likely to win their first ever Super Bowl back in it. Hey, I'm Ruby Carr, the host of the podcast, Encore. Check out our brand new episodes featuring music from the show. But everyone is reheating as we speak. Heated rivalry. Join me as I go behind the songs that brought Shane and Elya together. I'll tell you the stories of Fice, My Moon, My Man, Wolf Parades, I'll Believe in Anything, and tattoos all the things she said, and how they all became a part of this global phenomenon.

Stream encore on IHeart Radio, crave, or wherever you get your podcasts. Back on NFL Daily. Back from Japan. Back off Mount Fuji. shout out to one of my best friends, Dave Bennett, best man at my wedding, who I climbed Fuji with, and who also is very sore, I think, a few days later, as I am I. When I was atop the mountain, Jordan, I thought,

all right, what's the first segment I can come up with to use this as content? And as I mentioned, 20 of 32 teams have won the Super Bowl. But there's not as many first-time winners as you would think. We have not had a first-time winner of the Super Bowl since 2017. That was the Eagles. That was the first time they won. The Seahawks were the last one before that in 2014.

Both those teams have doubled up now. Each have two. There's only been two first-time winners since 2010. So it doesn't happen too often, but there are 12 teams eligible to be drafted in this draft of the teams, the franchise is most likely to win their first Super Bowl. And if this happens, Jordan, the team that we drafted for us will earn us a prize. I don't know. Have we finished deciding what the prize is going to be? Well, at minimum, we do know that it is public celebration on NFL daily and also dinner.

Okay. Now, I suggested that as we continue to go, if, you know, as the years go by, we just simply raise the stake. So at one point, one of us is going to owe the other a kidney. Okay. But, you know, the stakes will just increase as as time goes if our teams don't win. Okay. So here are the terms.

We're drafting these 12 teams. We'll each end up with six. It could take years. We are going to have to keep NFL daily going at the very least until one of these teams wins the Super Bowl. So if it takes, it's been nine years since the last first time winning. If it takes another nine years, you're locked in. This is bonding. I'm so here.

This is binding and bonding. But I'm excited. It'll give an extra little wrinkle to, you know, if we get to a conference championship weekend this year and one of our teams is still left, the drama will be up there. We held a random selection of who got the first pick before it happened. It was legit, right? I did not want you saying it was not legit. We had a random number generator. You guys will never believe who gets the first pick.

Our producer quab witnessed it. So there was no chicanery, but I did get it. the first. I wasn't going to just be good and give it to you because in this case, there was one team I wanted more than the rest. Can you guess which team that I really wanted the first pick for? I think you're going bills here. I am not. Ooh. I am going with the Houston Texans because ultimately I hate you so much right now. I want to annoy you. That's number two. Number one is I want to be on the side of my son and something that I can root for. I don't want even just a small bit of me mildly annoyed when the Houston Texans win the

Super Bowl this year. And then I evaluated this in a few different ways. But the most important things are ownership, coach, GM quarterback. Ownership has been pretty stable. I'm not going to put them in the top, but it's been stable. Let this group execute their vision. But we've done the GM rankings. We've talked about the coaching.

that's as good a coach GM combo as there is in the league. I believe in CJ Stroud. Like I'd rather have like a top five quarterback, sure. But you add all those together. And even if my son's rooting interest was not involved, they would easily be my top two. But I actually think they would be my first pick because this is not a one year pick. If it was most likely to win this year, maybe the bills are a little ahead.

Maybe, maybe not. But if you're giving me five years, I like this Texans squad. That would have been my number. number one overall pick. I had a feel. That's why I wanted the one pick. So first of all, how dare you? Yeah.

Second of all, I agree with everything you're saying. When I was looking at the sort of tiers that I would rank these teams in, I was thinking about teams that had in this top tier of draft choices above average to elite quarterbacks with at least five prime seasons ahead of them. And C.J. Stroud is obviously above average and could be in his career, elite. and we've seen flashes of elite play from him. I really appreciate that we were having, I think, a little bit more nuanced conversations about C.J. Stroud

through the year and into the offseason because I think that a lot of people just totally wipe out the fact that he had no run game. They blame everything on either the offensive line or on C.J. himself when establishing that run game and sort of reestablishing what sets him up for success is going to be really important for him this year. and we've seen true superstar potential from him. So I think that's a really high upside pick. And I also was looking at ownership.

I was looking at does your head coach give you an edge, or a premier coach on your team give you an edge in some way, and or does the quarterback do enough to lift the floor of the coach? In that case, I think you can know who I'm talking about. He's officially above average, C.J. Stroud, by the way, because he came in 15th on the NFL Daily 32, quarterback rank. That came out over July 4th week when we were both off. You just buried it. You just dropped it, you know, that 4th of July holiday news dump because you knew people would yell

at you. No, no. I didn't put the rankings up until today. Actually, you know, that was going to sit up there for five or six days. I was trying to think of a good spot for it. But yes, there are a lot of people angry about T.J. Stride, they thought he was too high, actually. Wild to me. There's a lot of Jaden Daniels, like he's too low there at 13. Washington Radio wants to talk to me. They only want to talk when they're mad about one of your rankings. But yes, I had a feeling both of us had the Texans number one. And so that's why I made sure it was legit.

You are up with the number two overall pick. I'm going Buffalo Bills here. Obviously, the Josh Allen factor falls right into my category of above average to elite, in his case, elite quarterbacks. And I believe with at least five prime seasons ahead of him, I think that we have yet to see truly if there is a real, advantage in an edge that Joe Brady gives to this offense, gives to this team as a head coach. I do think he gave them a real shot at Edge as an offensive coordinator. I don't know that I worry

as much about the front office understanding that if they have the coach and the quarterback set into place, then either the front office has got to evolve and pivot in certain ways or ownership will make a change and reinstall different people in that regard. So I think this is a team. that organizationally I feel confident in. Famously, they have agonizing reasons as to why they have never actually summited Mount Fuji here. But I think that in terms of teams that are built to do this to finally get over the hump, it's not just that I think they are.

It's also that I think they have to. Okay. They have no other choice. I'm interested when you're thinking about the different factors, and yeah, they would have been second for me too. It's mostly about Josh Allen. Yeah. And just they've done it.

Like, they have been in the divisional round six straight years. I don't know if, are you into analytics? A lot of analytics talk with like the NBA these days, Jalen Brown, what. Are you asking me if I'm, if I'm into analytics? So here's some. You've known me for how long. Yes, Greg, I'm into analytics. It's for the listener, you know.

Here's some analytics. Six straight division rounds, right? How many teams are in the division round? Sixth grade two. No, total. In the NFL. How many teams make it to the divisional round? Oh, two.

Yeah. Two, it's a divisional round. I'm saying in the entire NFL, eight teams, 18. Oh, I thought you were saying how many. Yeah. All good. So 18. We have to rephrase your questions.

Dave made it six straight, right? Yes. I would say, analytics would say, you do that two more times. That's eight times. You're due, you know? Yeah. You're just up. If you make eight straight, you're bound to win one of those on average.

Do how many times? over the next two weeks, do you think you're going to roast me for misunderstanding your question? Not, not many because I have, I have so many more vulnerable positions. But I am curious, and we'll keep going, but I am curious when you were thinking about coach DM ownership quarterback. To me, this is a different exercise than, you know, just ranking the teams this year. I'm curious how you slot those. Because I, to be quarterback at the top. Is by a decent amount the most important?

I think for this exercise, I actually think ownership might be second, just barely ahead of coach. And then GM front office, sorry to all the, you know, you gentlemen out there. That would be lower. Coach would be a little closer to ownership and then GM would be less. For me, it was a sliding scale, right? If there's a proven track record of success or there's a proven real collaboration with the quarterback, regardless of whether the quarterback is elite,

I think that the quarterback and coach tandem is a sliding scale when it's not a totally elite quarterback. And similarly, I think that ownership and executive team are also a sliding scale just depending on how good the quarterback is. So ultimately, the quarterback is absolutely of the utmost importance for me, but we'll go later on in this draft, a team that I have sort of in the middle of all of this. I don't buy into their head coach at all,

but I do buy into the quarterback big time. And I think that lifts the floor of the rest of the organization. So that was the ultimate factor for me. Speaking of, the chargers are my picket number three. Nice. Ownership. Eh. I think you just got to look at the history.

Eh, at best. Like, yeah, they're essentially playing another team's stadium. I don't know that. But they got the quarterback. They got the coach. The GM is solid by, you know, know, evidence so far. And obviously Mike McDaniel, you know, maybe gives Herbert a little bit of a boost to try

to, like, win this thing for me this year or next year, maybe while he's there and before it gets another job. Like, they could win now. But even if Jim Harbaugh burns out at some point, which he has done in the past, you have Herbert and two young tackles. That feels like a nice foundation for me to take them off the board. Yeah. And it's also one of the things that I was thinking about when we are thinking about

quarterbacks and the scale of above average to elite is how many more prime seasons do I think they have? Because again, they could win it this year. Some of these teams could be, you know, all or nothing this year. Over a long period of time, I want to know that they could repeat this type of excellence as well. And Justin Herbert, to me, that's at minimum five prime seasons ahead of him, in my opinion. And to your point, the rest of the offensive build, minus a couple of players here and there, they really are poised to continue to maximize Justin Herbert's window.

And I really like it. I think that with this, I would have normally factored in ownership quite a bit to drop them a little bit more. Had it not been for the clear power dynamic that we saw Jim Harbaugh take on immediately as he got into that building. So he's running the fran, franchise, right? So I feel a little bit more confident over, over a long period of time that they can

break through. They've had two great quarterbacks back to back, and they've been in the playoffs a ton in this century. Now, where the ownership comes in, have they maximized that? They've only gotten to one conference title game in that whole time, a lot of wild card losses and whatnot. The one major regret, by the way, I have for that quarterback's draft is I took Herbert over Stafford. And I wouldn't have done that if I could go again. I just did it in the moment. You found the horse head I left in your bed. I was wrong. I should have.

Stafford fell all the way to seven, which was stupid. I, it was just for this season only, but I can say when I'm wrong. I think that was the wrong choice. I was not judging, but I was noticing. Yeah.

You always are when it comes to Stafford. All right, you're up with number four. Okay, I have the lions here. I think that it's not only that the lions have an incredibly high ceiling and will continue to do so in the Dan Campbell and Brad Holmes era. It's also that I trust this new

era of their ownership. I also think that they're pretty solid to very good, pretty much across the board. I think solid to very good coaching. Dan Campbell had a tough year last year as we saw, but I think he hires well. I think he identifies talent really well. The front office, every once in while, they'll make these decisions in the draft that you're like, what the heck? And then two years later, it makes more sense as to why they made those decisions. So I think that solid to very good, including an ownership across the board and including at quarterback, above average, with a really, really good running game can play some, and a dome, can play some elite football in these key moments.

That's Jared Goff. I think he's got at least five prime years left. All of these buckets were checked for me in terms of putting them at number four overall here. And I actually even had him as number three right above the chart. Yeah, I might, you know, I had to pick between two of my favorites because either way, going to be just wanting to fully enjoy it. I will be happy to lose this one if the lions can get there. It was the Goff versus Herbert factor for me, but in every other way, the lions are kind of,

it's crazy to be in this world where the lions are a great example right now of a successful, stable team build. Your buddy, JJ Jansen said, like, he didn't have him that high in his interest ranking, just because, like, oh, we know who the lions are. They're good. And, like, they're boring at this point. They're boring. Like, if you could have told Lions fans that five or six years ago, I still find them absolutely fascinating.

That's a strong choice. I think it was a strong, I think it was a clear top four. Then it got a little trickier for me. And I'm going to go with my gut here, which is go with what we know now. Don't worry about the fact that Joe Burrow might be an ex-Bengel eventually. I'm just going to take them because they do have Joe Burrow. and I just feel like they are going to do everything in their power to control his rights and to keep him playing for them forever. And the quarterback was the most important person for me.

And ultimately, they were one series away. You know, they were right there. But the ownership and the coaching and the GM are negatives ultimately for me. I could see it this year, though. If, like, if I was picking one of the teams, you know, to win it this year, I think they have just as good a chance. really all these teams that we've listed so far. They're in that ballpark where these five teams would be like, okay, I could see it this year. So I will take it because of Joe.

I have them a spot below in terms of my personal rankings that I did, but I still have them in tier one because I have the caveat in here. No, I don't trust the front office. I don't trust ownership. I don't trust coaching. The quarterback lifts the entire floor of everything and not only lifts the floor, but puts them in a competitive position. And so for me, I agree with you.

And I do think he's got several good seasons, great seasons left, even though he's had some injury issues, which people always seem to, we just sort of gloss over. Yeah, that's a fair one. He's got some injury issues. But I do think that he is, when he's healthy and when he's playing, you know, the brand of football that we know him to play, he is such a organizational catalyst that I still had him in my top six, basically. Now I had the Bengals at six, but still I had them because of his abilities and because he is an elite quarterback. And the ownership, it's been well documented, you know, some of the difficulties in the Mike Brown era. And now you look at the overall record. I mean, they did make three different Super Bowls with three different quarterbacks.

We're going way back to like the early 80s and in the mid 80s. But they have, you know, then also made the conference title game. In addition to that Super Bowl with Joe Burrow, so that's recent history that they can overcome some of this stuff. But as you know, I've been wanting a coaching change. They're barely, I mean, they're actually negative point differential since Zach Taylor, you know, showed up. And they're barely positive even over the last five years, which includes, like, those good seasons. So I would like a coaching change. But I think they'll find a way to keep Joe Burrow long term.

All right. So you had someone higher than the Bengals in your ranking. Yes. I'm not going to guess who it is because then maybe it'll spoil who I take. Who is it? I had the Jaguars. So I would like to pick the Jaguars at six. I had them at number five ahead of the Bengals on my personal rankings,

but here they're going off the board at six. To me, this is about a quarterback who is always above average, but can play elite football, especially when paired with the correct play caller and schematic guy in Liam Cohen, who absolutely gives this team an advantage. I think that Liam Cohen hires really well, which was one thing that I thought was really, really important because we know that offensive play callers are going to lose their coaches a lot.

I think he hires really well, Anthony Campanelli. And Grant Udinski, I think that as an ownership group, they've made some mistakes, certainly, but also they're willing to put up a ton of money and invest a ton of money into making this organization competitive. And I do think over time, I will be proven right about the quality of the front office and what they're building over there. It's not something that you can just prove in one or two seasons. But I think overall, this organization has already broken through

into the next layer of competitiveness. And I think now it's all about building consistency and really gearing up to understand what you are and what you are not to make it through that next glass break of contention, which is Super Bowl contention. And so I think very much could see them winning one in the next couple of years. Ownership I feel good about overall.

The coach is a definite plus. The QB is medium. You know, he's in the middle, but you're, you know, because every quarterback gets paid towards the top, you know, that's, that's tricky. But Seahawks just won with C.M. Donald, obviously. Above average.

That's what I'm saying. All you need is above average. Maybe, but like everyone, you can't call everyone above. He is above average, I would say. Yeah, I'm not calling everyone above average. I'm calling him above average. Fair. Yeah.

And CJ, but like. Well, I think CJ's, is above average with an elite upside. That's my point is C.J. Stroud, to me, has more long-term elite qualities where I think he is going to, as his career progresses, be an elite in the elite conversation in this league. I think we know who Trevor Lawrence is and who he isn't. And I appreciate that when he's paired with the right play caller and playing with confidence like we saw last year when they were absolutely destroying these teams, I really think that that is a really good marriage and similar arguments made for the other teams we have ranked higher than the Jaguars, including Detroit and Jared Gough, and including like, you know, Josh Allen and not, maybe not being put into such risky positions and having a play caller who will maximize his abilities.

I don't feel like I know who Trevor Lawrence is yet still, just because it's so streaky and he played so well. I think that's who he is. Right. That's how I've always assumed him to be. And to me, that made him a pretty average player overall. He played so well down the stretch last year. And because it was Liam Cohen, if that's just the new Trevor Lawrence indefinitely, then I would have him even higher than wherever he ended up on our quarterback's board, for instance.

I think he went 12th or 13th. Like he has a chance to be a top 10 guy. But I had him six. So I had him in a very similar spot. They, of course, came out of the gates swinging, made the conference championship game in their second season and then also in their fourth season, but they have never been to a Super Bowl. One of the teams, and of course with Blake Bordels, they made it back to a conference championship championship.

Never been to a Super Bowl. One of the four teams that have never done that. All right, I'm up. We're now in the back half of this draft. This is where it gets a little tricky for me. I'll go to Vikings who are generally in the mix. I think the Wolf ownership, you could accuse them. of being a little, maybe almost two hands off

that they're out of the building, but overall, like, they got that stadium built. I give them a little credit for that, Pat on the back. The coach is a yes, and so the offense is a yes, and I care more about offense than defense. Like, they're not a poorly run organization. Is this current build, like, that close to winning the Super Bowl?

If you got top 10 quarterback play, yeah, I don't think you're, like, that far off in a draft or two, but it's ultimately, like, a vote. for Kevin O'Connell here and just the general, as teams, cursed teams go, like the Vikings are not the Browns and the Jets. You know what I mean? Yeah, I, yeah. They are the frisky team, to use your words, that'll break your heart in the end.

Yeah. But at least they're in the mix. So I'm going to have some fun here with the Vikings. I like this pick. They were the top of my, all the rest, right? Because I do trust long term, the organization. I just don't trust the quarterback position right now. and I don't trust the decision making around the quarterback position right now.

Once they get the guy that they're going to go with long term, and then he's actually on the field, then I have all the trust in the world and what that's going to look like. It's just the process of it because I can't trust that yet. They're seven for me on my board too. They're the top of the middle tier for me because I really like the organization. Overall, I think they have a really sound, logical, smart decision making throughout. I think that, to your point, the coach is an advantage.

And I think he hires well. Brian Flores is one of the best hires made by any head coach over the last, you know, some odd seasons. And I think that retaining talent like that is also important. That shows that this organization is competing and wants to win. They, you know, of course, made all those Super Bowls and broke their fans' heart way back in the 70s. So they're very close to not being on those lists. It's been a long time since they have been back there. Of course, the famous missed field goal with that season with Dante Culpepper that sends them out, Gary Anderson, was it?

And then getting to the conference championship game in 2017 and getting the doors blown off them with Case Keenham. So they have yet to reach the summit. They would be high on my rankings of teams that would have the most fun reaction to winning a season. Super Bowl. I know. Like the fans, see everything. All right, who's up next for you? So with pick number eight, I'm going to go with the Carolina Panthers here. And my tiers, they're the second in my middle tier of this entire exercise, right?

And my middle tier for me is either or, either no quarterback in terms of the Vikings or big questions at quarterback, which I think is fair that we still are wanting to see. see Bryce Young sustain the success that he ended the season last year with. And then also, I like the direction of the organization. That had to be a quality here, that maybe they've had harder times or whatever, but I can see forward progress. I can see them building blocks and putting things together in a way that I agree with, that I buy into.

I think that David Tepper, after a lot of bumps along the way and mistakes along the way in terms of decision making and pivots and things like that, really has found the answer here with this trifecta or triumvirate between, you know, Dan Morgan and Brandt Tillis and Dave Canales and the way that specifically they all work together, the way that they've built out, they've taken one of the, one of the franchises that was still so behind almost every, if not every other franchise in the NFL for so many years into this modern era of football and so far behind and finally have rebuilt it into something that's not just makes sense in terms of their infrastructure analytics and scouting and the way that they have their processes, but also is competitive with some of

the better teams out there. And so I think that when that happens, you can really, really trust the direction of the organization. Now, you need, they've had some of the most fun seasons I think we've ever seen in terms of a run to the Super Bowl. That 2015, you know, undefeated the Cam Newton season. was like one of the most fun things I think any of us have ever watched. Favorite in that game in the Super Bowl. And heartbreak at the end, right? And so I think that now, though, this is an organization that's not just sort of a magic moment away. It's an organization that the floor is lifted throughout.

And I'm just curious more about the quarterback. Yeah, you got to squint hard to see them win a title right now. I mean, that's going to be true for all the teams. Yes, this is over time. Yeah, that is remaining. I didn't write many notes on them because I just figured you were drafting. Yeah, well.

It's just like Jordan in it. They actually would have been next up for me too. The coach GM quarterback, even ownership, if Tepper has learned, it's all like, okay, I'll give you some, okay, middle of the pack,

front office has potential or something, but to win a title, you need a lot of things to come together. It's a good shout out that they've had two of the most entertaining Super Bowl losers, unfortunately, in NFL history. Because that Jake DeLone team

and that Super Bowl specifically where they lost to the Patriots, like they were so close to not being on this list. Falcons have something in common with them getting close to a Tom Brady team in the Super Bowl. But they're starting from scratch essentially now. I'm just taking them next a little bit on the

ownership and just they've always been a little more in the middle. And I know it doesn't really matter for this current build, but you have, I think, good ownership and, you know, the stadium and everything. And there's not anything that is there right now. I don't know if it's going to have much to do with their next Super Bowl or not. But on a long enough timeline, I feel like they're the horse I'm picking next. Yeah. You know, as an aside, one of my favorite things about watching all the World Cup coverage over the last several weeks is the marveling over the stadiums. And when like the BBC

comes in and they'll do like a full on breakdown of the state. And I watched the one the BBC did on the Atlanta. They're calling it, you know, the Atlanta Stadium right now because of sponsorship rules with FIFA. And I just love, you know, of course, all the hits were played. The concessions. Yes. The roof. The band around the entire top.

I mean, I just, I loved it because these are all things that we're like, yeah, of course. I mean, we, but it's like a modern architectural. I mean, it is a modern architecture of Marvel. We're just used to it. We're going back. We're going back for the Super Bowl. And what if the Falcons? win the Super Bowl in their home stadium and then win me, a dinner,

and you just having to give me praise on NFL Daily. Yeah, and do it soon so I don't owe Greg a kidney, please. Yeah, well, that would be, what, in a couple of years we're going back to Atlanta for the Super Bowl. Yeah. Let's do it. All right. Hopefully you're healthy. You have number nine.

Hopefully I'm healthy. Okay, you just picked nine. You picked the Falcons. Okay. I'm going to go with the. Tennessee Titans here. And this, they were the top of my lower tier or my lowest tier. That's three teams that are in that tier.

And my lowest tier has these sort of qualities that make it into what it is and how I parsed out these teams, either a very young quarterback or no quarterback at all. So obviously, Cam Ward, who I think has a lot of potential, we just don't know yet. He's so young. He's so early into his career. and or the team organization has a history of chaos and dysfunction. They have a history of significant turnover, whether it's the front office,

the coaching staff, or both the Titans check those boxes for me, ownership issues, all those things, you know, needing to trust competency, those types of issues that come up with them over and over again. It's just that I really like Kim Ward.

And so, and I like the fact that of, you can see him win in the Super Bowl. I love that. Over a long period of time. Yeah. that's the thing. None of these teams in these picks at the bottom here,

we can see them doing it like next year. But over a period of time, I think that Kim Ward is going to be great. And I also think that this is a team that when I compare it, especially to the other two that we have left to pick from, those teams being the Browns and the Cardinals. Yes. I like, they've got their quarterback position figured out.

They've got it settled. The other two do not. For some reason, I have the Jets written down this whole time. Sorry to Joe Willie Namath, you know. I guess I had 13 teams written down. I just like, you know, carmically and cosmically, they have not won a sewer. It feels right that they should be on here.

Yes. Good point. They weren't even last on my list. Yeah, I agree with everything. He said, GM, you know, we'll see. The coach is okay, QB. I'm not there yet on Cam Ward, and we'll talk about him plenty leading into the season.

This isn't about that. But I don't think you have to be there yet on him. No, I guess. I just, I'm talking more long-term. Right. I'm not even there long-term. I know I'm going to enjoy watching him play football throughout his career. But if he has a James-like career or even like a Cutler-ish type career, that like that wouldn't surprise me.

Like the range of outcomes for me, I don't, I'm not all the way there yet, let's say, after, like, we have been with some rookies after the first year. And yet, you know, he had a very difficult circumstance. And if AFC South teams, one. want to complain about the coverage that they get in general. I mean, this is the third AFC South team to come up on this list. This is a little bit why. There's no history with this division. I mean, the Texans have never been to the Super Bowl.

The Jaguars have never been to the Super Bowl. And the Titans who have been around the longest and moved to, you know, they've only, they've only made it and haven't won one. So that's partly why. There's no history with this division. That's fair. Step up your game. Let's go to the Browns next.

You have an ownership that's willing to spend and maybe not in a good way. You know, I think Jimmy Haslam at this point has to wear the Deshaun Watson contract, but he's willing to spend whether it's his NBA team now, the Bucks or the Browns. They have the Rams first round pic next year. I mean, there's not a lot of building blocks that I would think would be there if they win a Super Bowl in the next six or seven years.

If you squint hard, yeah, could Carson Swessinger in a seventh or eighth year still be there and Fanon is there and some of these draft picks like are part of the team that turn around. Yeah, maybe. I just like them essentially a little bit better than the Cardinals. They're devil's advocate because I have them ranked here as well at 11. I know that their argument, whether or not it's creditable or not, regardless of what we think, their argument will be after this season that they are a quarterback away. Their argument will be that they've drafted well enough over the last two seasons and acquired enough capital to move around and possibly get that quarterback or whatever they're

going to do. They will argue that that roster is primed and ready to drop in either a rookie quarterback that they draft or somebody that they bundle picks and trade for. They will make that argument that their roster is. that player away at that point. I think that you could see that. You could make an argument for that. It's just that you could also make an argument for this is the Browns.

We've seen them be a quarterback away or in their minds a quarterback away multiple times. We've seen them either discard the wrong quarterback or acquire the wrong quarterback in disastrous fashion with those results, you know, in the case of Deshaun Watson. And so I don't have an easy time believing their argument. I understand why they would make it, and I like their last two draft classes. But I don't trust it because I haven't seen proof. So that's where my thing is like I got them near the bottom, regardless of how I think they are making, in my opinion, forward progress. I don't trust that they'll sustain it.

So that's where I'm kind of at with them. Yeah, I mean, it's an ownership group that had a three-year window at one point where they totaled four wins combined. Hot damn. So look at the last two years. Like they're great. Tingles. Eight wins in the last. Two years combined.

And yeah, that's all old stuff. But this is the exercise we're doing here. They got a shot with this group to become relevant. To win a Super Bowl, it's a long way to go. They've never been to the conference championship as the new brown. Technically, we're using all the old browns. You know, they got the stats and whatnot. And so then you get the heartbreak of the conference championship game losses.

But the new Browns have not been to the divisional round. Is that right? Yeah, they have not. They have not been to the divisional round. Yes. All right, you got your Cardinals are last. Yeah. On a list of teams that have yet to reach the summit, they, according to us, are the furthest away from the summit.

Yes. So I'll just go back to my qualifications for this tier at which they are at the bottom. They're in the early phases of a longer term rebuild. They either have a very young quarterback or no quarterback. In this case, no quarterback, not only no quarterback, but no visible or apparent plan for acquiring that player, with their draft pick, their top five

pick this year, and or history of chaos and dysfunction, history of significant turnover, whether at the coaching level or the front office level or both,

check, check, check, check. There's the Cardinals. Yeah. It bums me out because I remember, I remember, and I was heartbroken, and Kurt Warner

was going to get it done and seal the, just fantastic, storybook football moment that, you know, enamored so many of us. And it just, and, and I, I learned that I'm only set up for, um, for heartbreak. That was such a miracle team. I've said it before that I've never been more disappointed at a Super Bowl that a team lost. I covered that team for NBCSports.com that week than, then that specific Cardinals team. I mean, it was a miracle that they were there. they were blown out like multiple times to end their regular season.

They sneak in at 9 and 7 and then they played electric football for three rounds and three and a half quarters and gave up a drive to a really great Steelers team. So that that'll always break my heart. I'm almost more surprised that the Carson Palmer Bruce Ariens Cardinals did not win a Super Bowl. Those were legit teams. Of course they made it to the conference championship game one time. But right now they're about as far away as you can be. But hopefully we're proven wrong. It would be crazy if you win this thing with your hometown Cardinals as the last pick.

Although they taught me, again, at a formative age, that the thing that would be cool is probably not going to happen. Probably. Okay, we should go over our picks, right? We should. Yeah. The order of the draft as written by Jordan. Thank you for housekeeping here. I had the Texans first, then Jordan takes the bills.

I have the Chargers with the third overall pick. Jordan then has the Lions. I have the Bengals. Jordan has the Jags. That was sixth. I have the Vikings. You have the Panthers. I took the Falcons.

You took the Titans. My last pick number 11 was the Browns and you had the Cardinals. So if any of those teams win a Super Bowl, I mean, we don't even have to keep still be doing a show. If for some reason we're not, like if podcasting ends for everyone, because that's the only way that this could happen. Like, we will still be working in football and you will still owe that dinner and public praise for me. Even if it's not the Vikings, even if it's not until the Vikings, or no, the Vikings win in like 2047 if it took that long for some reason.

I'm going to build your confidence up so much only to crush your spirit. And then I'm going to make you get a matching tattoo with me. Okay. A matching tattoo. I would do that. Especially when my Texans pull it off this year and you can't even fully enjoy it. because you know that I won that pick, fair and square. All right, that's it.

I'm back. We're back. We are still doing three shows a week for now. We're not bringing the daily fully back to NFL Daily quite yet. But teams are heading back to training camp next week, and so are we in terms of really fully bringing back to the show. We will be back with a little bit of a mailbag. If you're listening to this, and it's before Tuesday afternoon.

Send us your questions on social. media and we'll try to answer them with Jordan rodrigue and patrick claybon we will see you then this is an iHeart podcast guaranteed human