NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - Most Underrated Player For Every AFC Team

Episode Date: May 19, 2026

Gregg Rosenthal and Patrick Claybon give you the most underrated player for every AFC team. First, the guys get you caught up on the news including Jacoby Brissett's status with the Cardinals and Minnesota hosting the 2028 NFL Draft. Then, find out why Gregg and Patrick think players like Nick Herbig, C.J. Stroud, Trey Hendrickson, Jordan Phillips and more are the most underrated players on their respective teams.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 will not be making jokes about Jacoby Brissette's holdout. I'm Greg Rosenthal. It's voluntary. You know what's not voluntary? What's that, Greg? Attendance in the Chris Wesleying podcast studio on this Tuesday.

Patrick committed to it. I made him come. And I'm making him talk about one underrated player on every AFC team. I'm hoping nobody noticed it. No, I can't help. I am glad to be here with you, great, to celebrate this moment together. Yeah.

And when I first got the assignment, I'm like, one, I get to do the podcast again, which is always great for me. Two, I get to celebrate some guys who the official raiders have a little bit low. Right. It's a tricky exercise. You've got to figure out how highly is the person rated

before you react to, whether they make the list. But before that, we'll do a little bit of news. Not a ton, but I mentioned Jacobi Brissette, so we might as well just start there. He's not at the start of OTAs, despite being told, and this is a new development in the story just on Tuesday, according to ESPN, that he is the presumptive starter, that the plan is to start Jacoby Brissette, but he's not there working out. And one thing I've just noticed online, I'm still too online, a lot of people. A lot of people, people like, oh, who do you think you are? Bridge quarterbacks now like getting too big for their bridges and skipping like voluntary work. Calm down. I'm going to just drop some ads there.

Because who are the people saying this? Little jokes. Like how many times, how many times have they sat behind somebody that they? I famously, to you and to the people behind the last, forgot my computer today. So I can't look up exactly where I thought, but I've just seen it. Calm down people. Look, Aaron Rogers or Malik Willis are the two lowest paid week one starting quarterbacks on a veteran contract. They're making around $22, $23 million. Jacoby is set for about five. I think it's perfectly reasonable for him to negotiate something considerably more than five. If I had to guess, it's going to be like 12.

I think that's about where it'll end. But why even entertain the exercise? Just pay Jacoby. Right. Well, they are. They're figuring it out, but it's the card. There's no figuring it. it out. Like all across

the world there's all this, well, we have to have these conversations, you know, at the appropriate time. You would like to pay the person as little as possible. Yeah. And right now is not the time that's conducive to do that. Right? Also, Mike Lafleur spoke on it and he said, look, Jacobi's been in a million offices.

He's been in this office. He's not going to fall behind. It's not a big deal. They're in shorts. It's very early. But they are on the field. The bigger news to me was that they have told them that he is the presumptive starter. It's not going to be Gardner Minchu if we're to believe that report and it's not going to be. Praise God.

Yeah. I don't know. Or your deity of choice to everybody listening. They're talking a lot about I third round pick, Carson Beck. I mean, if I had to guess, Carson Beck will start a game this year. Right before we started taping, got the news that Rishi Rice is currently in jail after violating his probation for a marijuana test that came up positive. Initially reported by KS.HB.

And by Matt Foster. But a couple other places have it. It's a public report. So it's a rule. I believe it's in Texas that you get 30 days for violating your probation, according to the document that we saw. That would have him getting out in mid-June. around the end of the OTA season.

Unfortunately, for Rice, it does just continue a, you know, series of off-field stories where we're talking about, you know, what Rice is doing and how that impacts them in terms of law. And in this case, it's going to impact them in terms of missing

the off-season program before training camp. Yeah, the, obviously the priority is going to be the hit and run and how you approach that situation in terms of putting people in harm's way, You know, this particular test, which is mandatory as a part of Texas probation for a substance that, you know, in a lot of places, it's perfectly legal. And a lot of professionals indicate that it hasn't necessarily harmed people to the extent that the substances that Rishi Rice was on during the accident, allegedly, you know, is up to the person listening. And the NFL had already said that Rice wasn't going to get suspended going into this season.

any further based on everything that's happened. In theory, they could revisit that. You know, the NFL's taken an easier stance on marijuana testing, but whether they view this as a recurring thing with Rice, and then more importantly, in terms of his career, it's just a big deal that he needs to prove himself to be a reliable, professional for the Chiefs. It's a big season for him. He's entering his fourth year.

And he's going to have a huge role on the, team. It's one of the things that really stands out when you go through all the depth charts that they are one of the thinnest teams in the league at wide receiver. You got Tyquan Thornton at three, and I don't even know at four. Rice is the clear one. And so it's an important season for him just as a professional and as it relates to the chiefs just playing well on offense. So I don't want to start it. Let's go to an injury that we learned about. The Panthers lost to Shahn Turk Wharton. He's going by Turk these days as a nickname. He has underwent neck surgery.

If you remember, he was relatively highly ranked on my top 101 free agents last year, coming off a nice Super Bowl run with the Chiefs where I thought he played his best in the playoffs. He had an okay season with the Panthers. Not great, but not terrible. I think he's making around $14, $15 million a year. The reporting from Joe Persson, the athletic, indicates he won't miss the entire season, which implies... A significant portion of the season is going to be.

Yeah. And when you hear neck surgery, you're obviously very worried about them. What does that make you think about this, this Panthers defense and where they're at? Well, the majority of it, especially free agency additions, you think about on the defensive side. And so this can kind of, it takes away from it a little bit in totality. Obviously, the bigger pieces being in the edge of a middle linebacker.

But it hurts. It hurts in a spot where they've needed depth. And hopefully, you know, we know, no idea. idea on the similarities with regards to the neck injury, but we saw nominee out of beat game this basically entire season. You know, long way back. There were extensive questions about whether or not he would be back, hopefully. Considering the timing, this is centering, you know, Wharton's, not just his football activity, but post football activity. My immediate thought, which was incorrect was, oh, this maybe helps to explain the Lee Hunter

pick. He was the defensive tackle that they took a little different styles, but same position, Wharton, a little bit more of an upfield kind of pass rusher. Okay, maybe they knew about it. That was not the case. He reported to the team something that happened with his neck and soreness just a week and a half ago. So they say that was happenstance. That was a position they wanted to get deeper at regardless. And so they do have that second round pick, Lee Hunter in the mix. They have Bobby Brown, who's a veteran who's probably coming off the bench. You have Derek Brown. It is one of the stronger positions on their team. So just hope for Wharton that he can get better.

Finally in the news, Minnesota, we're going back to Minnesota as a league. The Super Bowl underrated people really talk trash about that Super Bowl because it was so cold that weekend especially. It was like negative degrees Fahrenheit. The wind chills like minus 20 on Super Bowl day. It snowed and kind of shut down a bunch of activities that Friday, Saturday. But I had a good time going to the team. TGI Fridays and hanging out of all of America.

And great fans there in a nice city. And now it's going to be a nice city at a nicer time of year. Though late April is a little unpredictable. And how great the people of Minneapolis and St. Paul get a chance to show their community at not like a time where everybody's like, oh, yeah, I can't, I can't go there. They can say, hey, look, this is how we're living in part of the time of the year. Although as they are probably thinking right now, Now, I'd like to go check the temperatures, but I don't have a computer, of what late April was like this year.

Because, I mean, they're not above a late April like snow or mid-30s. Or it could be very nice. But either way, they have some of the best fans, one of the most underrated cities in the league. So let's give Minnesota and Minneapolis a special. And I think we could use a little cold if it does get cold because like the long wind and excessively cringe draft introductions by, you know, players and fans and former players and other folks. Maybe we could dial those back a little bit. If it's colder, people would be less likely to awkwardly stand there spouting nonsense for 45 minutes. I will be there.

Well, not there, but I will be covering that draft here for NFL Daily in 2020. All right, we're to the segment. We're going to do one underrated player for every AFC team. Jordan and I did this exercise a week ago. Jordan, some well-deserved time off this week. And it's going to be back and taking big swing. next week. Looking forward to that. But we got Patrick here doing

one underrated player for every AFC team. We'll let Patrick do the honors to start off. You have the Bills. I will go with Ed Oliver from the Buffalo Bills at the Tour Meniscus last year. Also had a bicep tear caused people to maybe forget about the type of impact he can have on the football field. I will always love and celebrate

Ed Oliver because he was one of those guys where it was the, well, I don't know how much he really loves the game. In the draft because Major Applewhite tried to take a jacket off of him on the sideline. And he being a fully grown man at that point did not want that conversation. And so love the game really translates to how much appeasement do you have for the authority figures. In 2024, pass yards per play go up a half a yard when he's off the field, pass yards per attempt, go up four tenths of a yard.

And this is an 82 on PFF last year, 84 on Madden, NFL, 26. And so these agencies, again, tasked with rating. I think they underrated him. Oh. And they underselling his ability. 82 is really good though for PFF. But, but eight. And again, this was a post-Aron Donald draft.

Like Aaron Donald's wrecking the league. Uh, he comes into the league. And it's, well, we have an undersized based on the schematics of what you want in an interior defensive lineman who deals in explosiveness and quickness. And so it's like, oh, he's, he's, uh, he's, he's not strong. Matt hasn't been a 64 strength, Greg. 64 is almost failing and I think that is underrating

Ed Oliver's strength at the point of attack and he is underrated. I mean, if you compared him to an average human, 150. 120. Like, it's crazy. You imagine if Ed Oliver was here and we told him he's got a D in strength?

No. You really could see his value last year when he got hurt. Unfortunately, they were just not the same defense. No. And he was playing some of his, best ball. He kind of occupies to me a similar spot to Greg Rousseau on the bills in league wide where he is one of the best players that like I think understandably doesn't make the Pro Bowl,

but it's just like just below that level. Pro Bowl, you know, I'm talking about the initial people that make it. It's only a handful of players at your position. Very, very good player Ed Oliver. And I think, like a lot of players at that position, has steadily gotten better each and every season. They need a healthy season out of him. And our Bill's fan, who is recovering well. You wouldn't have known that the Sabres lost a brutal overtime game last night by Eric's disposition.

What was your note on Ed Oliver here? He writes horses around Buffalo. Around the town. Yeah, like regularly throughout the season, people will post like, oh, there's Ed Oliver going by on horseback. Like functionally or just for fun? Or he goes and picks up groceries. He is a horse guy.

Love that. His preferred method of transportation around town most of the season is like regularly you'll see him. There goes Ed Oliver on a horse. One of the benefits of living in Buffalo. Got to be strong, I think, to ride a horse. I mean, that scores. That's crazy.

That's fair. I'm going to go Armand Membu with the Jets. And so with this underrated tag, we're going to have different levels of fame for these players. I think Membu, was pretty commonly recognized as one of, if not the best rookie tackles in the league. Where I am putting him as underrated is that, first of all, he could have been in a world where we voted for offensive linemen

and felt confident enough in our evaluation and had the time to look through all the tape. In a world where that happened, I think it's a totally fair argument that he was the best rookie offensively in the NFL. In fact, I should have put my money where he was mouth this, but I'm part of the problem. I didn't necessarily feel confident enough in it. Am I drilling down?

But this offseason, especially knowing I was picking him for this role, watched him a little more, talk to some people. And I just think his athleticism is crazy. Like he gave up a lot of sacks, which I think is the basic thing we're going to look at, unfortunately. And so maybe that would have prevented him from winning that rookie of the year. But if you look at the overall QB hits he gave up, and the overall pressures he gave up very, very low,

He did get beat cleanly, like, a handful of times where he gave up sacks. But he also was playing... He was also playing ahead of quarterbacks that were taking sacks on, like, everything. Also had some penalties. So in terms of stats, like, wasn't incredible. But if you just watch him, his athleticism, he's everything that you want in a tackle. And here's a stat for you. When they ran the ball to the right side, the Jets averaged 4.6 yards per attempt over right tackle.

where he's playing. When they ran to the left side, same running back. These are actually Brees Hall specific numbers. I even drilled it down. He's about the data. Let's get to the best player. 3.2 yards per carry to the left, 4.6 to the right. And he is one of those guys.

You don't need to be a big tapehead to watch him and be like, man, that is impressive how he moved. Not saying he's like a future Penaesu, but in terms of like right tackles that have entered the league, maybe as exciting as high a ceiling since Penae Soule. Yeah, the Jets could use those 1.4 yards every single time, Breece Hall, it carries the ball. And to have a guy, yeah, you take him in the top 10, but he starts 17 games and he plays 100% of the offensive snaps. And you're going to be okay with a few mistakes because when you have a guy that's explosive,

he's making plays that aren't on the board to make for guys who can't reach and get to those spots. So I'm with you. And it's a tough position for a rookie. I think if you actually went through who played and stayed healthy and played well, he's probably a top to 12, you know, right tackle already, top 10 to 12 as a rookie, maybe the hardest position as a rookie. That projects to making those Pro Bowls that I was talking about maybe as early as this year. All right, you got the Patriots, and I'm proud of myself for not having mentioned that the Jets,

you know, took bamboo a few picks after Will Campbell until now. Yeah. Well, you can't be proud of yourself. Were you proud? Because you were about to say it, but you didn't? That was the joke. Oh, okay. Sort of.

I'm making fun of myself. No, it's great. And I'm glad that I get tasked with talking about the New England Patriots on a podcast with Greg Rosenthal because this player is underrated, not just by the folks, in my opinion, on PFF and Madden. But also by the New England Patriots themselves because. Oh, yeah. Kisham Booty had a 71 grade last season, according to PFF. On Madden, he has an 80. I say underrated because the people, again, who are tasked with rating players are short of where they need.

need to be. Only one receiver had more yards on deep balls to the sideline than booty. That was George Pickens. And how many more yards did he have? One. He had one more yard on deep shots down the sideline. Another rating agency. Again, the Patriots bring in Romeo Dobbs to replace digs. That's fine.

And I can definitely see A.J. Brown coming in as a substitute for protection issues, which were the actual problem for the New England Patriots down the stretch, especially in the Super Bowl. And I am not saying that he is A.J. Brown. But the protection is a vastly bigger issue than Booty, who is massive. Kishan Booty is massive. I think this is a perfect pick. If he goes to the Eagles, I think he could have an incredible season.

Some of those stats you just said about the deep passes, I think it indicates how rare he is because there's only so many ball winners really in the NFL. Yeah. And he's a ball winner. including against Derek Stingley a couple of times. For the other one, right? Like, I don't, I wouldn't understand it. If it happens, then it's even more underrated.

They maybe don't win that game against the Texans unless he can beat Derek Stingley of all people off the line and make an incredible one-handed catch. I remember when we recap that game, there was only three long passes that Derek Stingley gave up all season long or something like that. And it's like Booty for two of them. Oh no.

Booty was the first, I think it's his entire career in terms of a big place. Multiple R. Kishon Booty. And two of them looked almost exactly the same. Yeah. I've got the Dolphins. And here I went with someone that's truly under the radar. And that is Jordan Phillips,

a fifth round pick, day three, defensive tackle, one of the youngest players in the entire NFL last year. as we tape here in mid-May. Still just 21 years old. He started 16 games. He was one of three defensive tackles that the Dolphins took last year.

It was Kenneth Grant in the first round. Is it Zeke Biggers, I believe? This is where I need my computer. On day three as well. And he was the one that they trusted to be out there on the field. He's already, you know, almost a 500 snap guy and I went and watched him.

He's a big guy who, when he came into the league, the reputation is, okay, he's going to play nose tackle, and he is known as like a great run defender. But what happened was when he went up against some of these smaller centers, and these are guys who get paid a lot of money. Garrett Bradbury was one. Tanner Bordellini, who had a great season for the Colts. He got past them with, like, quickness.

And so if you watch his film for a rookie 21-year-old defensive tackle, there is a strength and quickness for his size, which is massive that not many people have. Like, I'm definitely taking him long term over Kenneth Grant, who improved later in the season was their first round pick. But they told us what they thought of him by putting him out there, essentially week one and keeping him as a starter, not a guy, it's gotten a lot of pop,

but someone I think they feel pretty good about moving forward, Jordan Phillips. Whenever you can have somebody contribute very early in a rebuild, he's also a 71 rating on Madden which and again a lot of these things a lot of it's based on the awareness stat which is heavy and you're going to move that over as a guy progresses and gets better at the game

but in and of itself that's underrated to me the potential for growth but even you know what a rookie defensive day three tackle getting 71 on Madden's like a nice little accomplishment you want to know another accomplishment that he has

What's that? He was one of two different men named Jordan Phillips to be drafted by the dolphins in the last 10 years. Pretty weird. I kind of forgot that the other Jordan Phillips who then went to the bills bounced around, was drafted initially by the Miami Dolphins. Both defensive tackle. Yeah, same position. What are the odds? This next one is spicy.

Is it? For this exercise, I thought it was spicy. It's the Ravens. So now I feel even more. I'm like, this is shades of font. No, no, now. No, not at all. No, it is.

Trey Hendrickson had a 56 run defense grade last year, according to PFF, where clearly the Will Begone Bengals suffered as a run defense from the presence of Trey Hendricks and based on that rating. 56 will get you held back a grade.

People will make determinations about your viability as a human participating in society with 56. The Bengals gave up a yard and a half more per carry with Trey Hendrickson off the field. Hey! Last year they loaded the box more without Trey Hendrickson on the field. And behind the line of scrimmage, they got hit behind the line of scrimmage more, 5% more when Trey Hendrickson was on the field. And the explosive run percentage was cut in half.

Those numbers were an issue in 2024. But what my take presupposes Greg is when the football player is being asked to do different things, There's different outcomes. And also, there may be deleterious effects when you are in a long-term multi-year conversation about not providing somebody with compensation, and they rush the passer, and they prioritize sacking the quarterback over other things because that's how you get paid when somebody is fairly compensated. I think Trey Hendrickson is, let's be honest, he's not, he's not Max Crosby against the run. Okay. But he's a serviceable football player that I think like this idea. idea that like, oh, yeah, he's getting murdered in the run game every single time you don't, like,

that it's just not happening. Like, it's like, oh, if you could just post up Steph Curry every time, okay, it's not working. That's what I'm saying. It's a great point. The majority of people paid to do this that said that Trey Hendrickson is a sieve in the running game, is a negative in the running game. They just kept parroting that over and over during this whole offseason. They don't know what they're talking about.

They're just saying something that everyone else said. I'm not going to go out there. I'm going that far. Okay. I'm saying they're just saying. You are going farther than me. I'm going media criticism. They're just saying things other people said.

Now, I'm not going to say that I have a hot take about his run defense in general. I would have to, I would want to go back and study that whether they're targeting him. I wanted to confirm my priors and bring tape to give to Eric. There's not a lot of great stuff on there. Yeah, but your stats.

Stats are more important. You backed it up with real stats. The spicy part of it is that Trey Hendrickson is an extremely well-known player. And I think people think highly of them. So I think to go as far as saying he's underrated, the most underrated player on the team in theory,

I guess we just, an underrated player. You're saying he's another level better than people even realize. Like 56 being the issue here. And to go back to, like if we want to talk about Armand Mimbu, right? Here.

Has a 50, 55, he has a 61 in change of direction. Okay. Armand Mimbu, the massive human being that moves around, they're giving him a 61 in change of direction. Like the relative here is that Trey Hendrickson is like a quarterback out there in the run game, and I'm just not feeling that. He's just like lying down every time they run the run. I don't know what to do.

And so I went back. The worst run defense the Bengals played last year in terms of success was against the Denver Broncos. RJ Harvey had a good game as well as J.K. Dobbins. He went for 121. And I just expect to see Trey Hendrickson just diving out of bounds on these run plays. It just was happening. I'm not seeing it. I think he is an underrated run defender.

And I do believe systems can impact how people view you. So he is going from a team. that's been terrible stopping the run in general, one of the worst, the Bengals, to a team that prizes stopping the run, especially from their edges. So we might see him get coached up a little differently, have different responsibilities,

and see that run-stop score, skyrocket and Claibon look like a genius. I love it. We're going two of the most famous players on this list, back-to-back in terms of underrated. So when I say that Chase Brown is underrated, I am recognizing the fact that the average fan does know Chase Brown, and they do think he's probably pretty good.

My point is that he's even better than you realize. From week 11 on, when they kind of figured out their running game, Dalton Riser is healthy, they figure out who to play. He was fifth among all running backs in yards from scrimmage. You can guess the players ahead of him. It's Gibbs and it's McCaffrey and Robinson. And Bejohn, and I think Cook was. was the other one. Cook, I think, is a good comp for him

and the type of contract that I think Chase Brown would be worthy of getting, because I think he's a very smart player. Went back, watched some of his tape from last year, and he sees things before they happen. I decided to watch a game where the Bengals didn't score a single point. I was like, this is a game where Chase Brown, he's not going to do well.

And that was against the Ravens. Multiple times in that game, he made great plays. On one, Aloie Gilman, perfect defensive play call. He sees him approaching. He's going to be unblocked into the hole. He knows Gilman's coming. Brown hits him with a spin move. He's got one of the better spin moves in the league. He likes to use it. He likes to use it as a receiver. He used it if you're watching on YouTube on the very play that's going on right now against Jordan Brooks. Magic. There's multiple times in that game, by the way, that he made Jordan Brooks look like the stiffest linebacker you'll ever see. I don't want to, I don't want to be smirch anyone,

but an elder linebacker that needs to basically end his career. And Jordan Brooks is a good player. Now I'm wondering who you were talking about. Chase Brown. It's on the list, actually. Chase Brown makes slower linebackers look that way. He is outstanding in terms of his receiving production. I don't need to tell you this, Patrick,

because as fantasy football goes, and I know he had a slow start last year, he's a productive player, top 12, I believe, in fantasy at running back the last two years. I do think he comfortably fits in that 5 to 10 range. He'd be exactly the type of running back if I was making a team that I would want to be my running back. Assuming you're not going to get like Bajon Robinson,

a Hall of Famer, he can do everything really well and I think is better at the things like running through contact, power, picking up the tough yards than people realize. Yeah, people sleep on his, I think most people are well aware that Chase Brown, everything he can do in the receiving game as a guy who can separate quickness in and out of his breaks, making plays on the ball as well, especially

for a smaller guy, but people undersell his capacity to be explosive with the ball in his hands in the rung. And is he Jamir, is he Bajan? No. But there's other aspects of the game where he contributes, but because I think of this size,

the box is placed on him. They have this idea of like a satellite back. Okay, he's going out there and getting yards, he's being productive. What more do you want? And I think he makes the Bengals able to do what the Bengals can do. And how many running backs in the NFL in the last two seasons have had more total touches than Chase Brown? It's a pretty short list. At this point, having 240-ish carries and then you're getting 50 catches in the receiving game, that is your workhorse back in

26. There's not many of those left. I actually can consider Chase Brown one of those. And And yeah, he's not your first pick to just run it in the middle. And yet, like, his mistackles force is really high in that same Ravens game. He ran through a Kyle Hamilton tackle. He's one of the best tacklers in the league two times. I mean, just ran straight through him. And there are sometimes where he's got a smaller guy from the secondary trying to line him up, and he'll run right through him.

So really impressive player that wouldn't surprise me if he takes another step and he's kind of recognized in that James Cook, I think, is a nice. comp for him of the level that I see him at. Yeah, and I just do think the accumulation of pain and punishment on his, like, we didn't necessarily appreciate peak Austin Echler at these times. So I'm glad that you're shouting out Chase Brown is underrated. Well, in the first five weeks of the season, there was this crazy stat that him and Ash and Genty had,

that their average spot where they got hit was in the backfield. It was negative. That's how bad the Bengals' offensive line was run blocking early. last season, and so it was a slow start for him, but once they got it going, he got it going as well. All right, you got the Browns up next. So Harold Fanon got a grade on PFF of 69.1. It was in the offense.

Here's my point for Harold Fanon. The offense had a 34.6% success rate. They were dead last in the league. They had 26 touchdowns, rushing and receiving, total. In 2025, Harold Fanon had seven of them. He was the team's leading receiver, demanded a ton of targets. Everyone in the stadium on the planet knew he was

getting the ball. His catch percentage was low. Yeah, the offense was bad. The quarterbacks were bad and the coach got fired. I think everybody generally accepts that he's good. But his target percentage was similar to Trey McBride. His reception EPA was comparable to Tucker Kraft.

His rating on targets was higher than Theo Johnson, Travis, Kelsey, and Tyler Warren. The Brown's offense was miserable and all those things were still true. He's underrated. Love that. Love recognizing a unique player. When you see Harold Fanon on the field. I remember very

distinctly, you know, watching him overseas. There's no one quite like him. He moves a little different. Big player makes crazy catches. Drop some catches too. It happens. Yeah, it happens. I'm saying he's just... But he's a bucket, as the

kids would say. It's out there. Produces. And also another position that traditionally, pretty difficult for tight ends. I know they've gotten more productive over the last few years. He's someone, I have a feeling, is rooting for Shadur. to win that job because I think him and Shadur specifically

had a nice connection and Shadir trusted him, as he should, as really his best receiver. I'm going with a guy who probably would have been on this list last year for the Steelers, and he's still on the list because he's still underrated. Nick Herberg has finally graduated

in my own brain from confusing him with Nate Herbich. It just was something I just couldn't get past. It happens. Nate Herberg was on the Steelers. It's like a gar. It just was very confusing.

At this point, Nick's career is so outstanding. I'm not going to confuse him anymore. Sorry to Nate. He led the NFL. There's only space in your brain for one Herbig on the Steelers? Yeah, that's it.

Okay. I don't know what Nate's doing right now. I think he's still on the Steelers. I think he's bounced around. So it's true for real. Who knows? Only one Herbick is allowed at any time. So in 2024,

past Rush or win rate, people have different opinions about the stat in general. but in 2024, Nick Herbig's pass rush win rate was so far ahead of the entire rest of the league. I think it was like 9... He was 34%

and the next closest was 25. The next closest, by the way, was like Will Anderson and Jonathan Grenard. And not far behind that, Nick Benito, Michael Parsons. So you can say it's a flawed stat, but last year, after Nick Herbig went back to back... Back to back.

The people right behind. him are Nick Bonito, Michael Parsons, Will Anderson, Abdul Carter, watch out for that second year leap, and Miles Garrett. So, I don't know how flawed that stat is if it's pumping out those players as the best pass rushers in the league. And yet, I still think that makes him a little underrated. To be able to do that back-to-back season, now he didn't win it by nine percentage points last season.

What they did was up his usage, mostly because of injury, early in the season. And then they put him back on the bench. At the end of the season, he only had one game in the last, I believe, seven or eight games, Patrick, with over 30 snaps. So he's not underrated by Joe Fan. He's underrated by the Steelers. And that's why he deserves to still be on that list where, like, Highsmith and T.J. Water, just getting so many more snaps down the stretch than Nick Herrick. Especially when late in the season, when you weren't necessarily getting maximum T.J. Watt, like, it was like 25% of T.J. Watt

last year. A bit of a crime. Like, to play 60% of the defensive snaps in 2025. He went up 10% from 50 in 2024. But to have win rates similar to those guys, they got to know. We need more Nick Herbigh. And we need, like,

better Nick Herbig propaganda. Like, we need Nick to be promoted. I mean, he's got the traditional numbers, too. Eight sacks, 13 quarterback hits, 47 total pressure. So those numbers were good and he only got that extra 10% because Highsmith and Watt missed some time early.

And even late in the season, it was crazy. I mean, when they essentially benched him and I guess he's not as good at stopping the run as those other two, but I don't think he's a total sieve. When they essentially bench him, he was leading the league then too. Imagine that. Essentially benching the guy who's leading the league in past rush to win and rate. We're going to

take a quick break. And when we come back, Patrick Claibon is going to blow your mind. wait the most underrated player on the Houston Tech yeah this is taken this may IHart radio celebrates Asian Heritage Month discover powerful stories vibrant cultures and unforgettable music from inspiring podcasts to playlist that span east south southeast and West Asian artists we're honoring the voices shaping our world listen now on the free IHR radio app and at iHeartRadio.ca.

Back on NFL Daily. Patrick Claibon drawing a lot of disrespect from the matting ratings specifically. And he noted the ultimate disrespect that the two Jordan Phillipses, the Phillipsci in Buffalo and Miami, only have one profile picture. They just were lazy and copied and pasted it.

And you, having dealt deeply into the younger George Phillips, have determined that that is a picture of the young Jordan Phillips. Pretty sure, yeah, it's the younger one. So you come into the league first? It's your name. And the Madden folks, who are great, by the way, they got a lot of ratings to do.

Somebody's got to do the ratings. Yeah. I get it. We're doing underrated. I'm not, you know, taking to task the people who are doing this. I'm just saying, as opposed to saying somebody's just underrated

based on ether. You went with the numbers. Provided some numbers. And we do love the Madden family. Yes. Family. Shook is a part of that family. My son, a massive Madden players.

and fan, and you're going to talk about his favorite team to play with here. Yeah, and honestly, one of his favorite players. That is Coleridge Bernard, C.J. Stroud, the 4th, who has cratered to a 77 overall on Madden. A lot of people may be familiar with the game against the New England Patriots in the playoffs where it was horrible. I would like to suggest to the people who watched that game, who saw some football, who appreciate our game, that C.J. Stroud was not as bad over the course of the season and had a miserable playoff game.

He was successful against man coverage. He had 116.2 pass a rating, the fifth highest in the league. He averaged 7.1 yards per attempt. In the red zone against man, he had the third highest mark. He completed 67% of his passes. He had 11 touchdowns, not a single interception. He had a bad game. He had spots in the season that were miserable, and we've gotten to the point where C.J.

Straub, who was like the future of the NFL. I don't think we leaned too heavily on that. But I think the fallback after some bad play has been way too much. Totally agree. His numbers for the season actually are better than I would have even expected, having watched every one of his games, his EPA per play, his QBR, his success rate. Like, they all paint a picture of about a top 12 quarterback.

They just, if you consider the offensive line struggles, and the lack of a running game and the offensive coordinator, like you got to give some extra points for that. The catch is, last year was the most concerning year for me as a CJ Stroud fan because I do think what happened in the playoffs

was typical of what happened a few times in the season. Usually you'd get out of it. When he would get into a funk, it's like he, it's like he had a hard time getting out of it. Like you could almost, you could see it on his face a little bit, but you could see it in his play where, you know, they say with Sam Darnold,

oh, he leaves the bad plays behind him, and on to the next play. I didn't get, I felt like Stroud got streaky in a bad way last year, but people are ignoring all the good streaks too. Yeah, and I think that is instructive in that that was a thing that was said about Sam Darnold.

Yeah. Who one time lamented the things he was seeing on the field. And it became like the thing about Sam Darnold. But we've seen that a Sam Darnold quarterback and literally win the Super Bowl with the team around him is correct. And if CJ plays to the extent that CJ Stroud has in the past with

this team and this defense, the Texans will be fine. I think we've gone too far. I say we. Agree. I'm included in that. In going back and trying to figure out which Texan is underrated and I'm scrolling through looking at PFF, I'm looking at Madden and I'm seeing where C.J. Stroud was

and you go back and look and think about it. He's underrated. I still have him as a top 15 quarterback in the NFL. I had taken over Sam Darno, who just won the Super Bowl. I'm going Josh Downs as my next pick, the slot receiver for the Indianapolis Colts. Look, his raw numbers are good.

He's got almost 2,000 yards in three seasons, which is very good for a third round pick. He got over 100 targets in 2024. It was his best kind of counting stat seasons. But to me, he's better on tape than he is as a player. no one converted last season more third downs. And this is where he missed a lot of games too, where he received the ball short of the sticks

and then converted a first down than Josh freaking first down. He was the third highest volume in terms of targets in the entire league. On third downs, the two guys ahead of them were improbably on the same team. Pooka and Devante Adams, which just shows you like this literally a two-months. in offense.

Pretty effective duo. That's crazy. So everyone knows it's going to Josh Downs. You can't cover him high volume and the after catchability is just fantastic, which I think the first stat points out. In the right situation, I think he

could have a crazy great counting stats season, but he doesn't even need to for me to just recognize him as one of the best slot receivers in the NFL. And I think it explains some of the moves and why they're able to do that and the perception about the MPJ trade and the way

the Colts are moving is Josh Downs allows you to do that and maybe we, you know, I gotta stop with this week. Maybe folks who generally perceive Josh Downs feel as though the slot capacity, you see Pierce and Pittman and the size

in the way that they can produce and Tyler Warren doing all these different things. It's like, oh, these guys are where it's based. But when you're getting almost a third of third down targets going your way when you run around, it's the most important play in the game, that's who they're going to. Is Josh Downs.

I became a bigger fan of him when Drake May was coming out. And I went back to watch those two seasons. And I think it is instructive that we always talk about quarterbacks making receivers better. Like Josh Downs made Drake May a lot better and vice versa when they were together. Drake May was not the same player without Josh Downs. I don't think Dana Jones would have been the same player last year without Josh Downs. I think he helps out his quarterbacks a great deal on Money Downs. All right, you got the Jaguars.

So looking at the Jacksonville, Jaguars, a team that lost some talent as well. I don't feel they are as good as they were last year. Maybe I'm underrating them. But this is the antithesis of the Trey Hendricksson take where Trayvon Walker played pretty good in rushing the password.

Again, it's tough to say that a player that was the number one overall pick in the NFL draft is underrated, but there's this idea that he's only good against the run where it's like, guys, we got to pick something. Either it's important or it's not important. But when he was on the field, the Jags had a pressure of 35% of opposing quarterback dropbacks when he was off the field. It went down to 27.5%. The Jax were far and away the number one run defense where nobody had over 100 yards rushing against this team. The entire season,

they were great. And he was a big part of that. And I think he's a touch underrated. I agree. I think he really got caught because he's the number one overall pick. But now he's graduated to the point that he was a good number one overall pick. He kind of reminds me of Genevian Clowny in the sense, playstyle, athleticism, how he developed into his career just below an all pro level, you know, but not quite there. The problem is multiple things can be true.

I actually think it was kind of an inspired and good pick by Trent Balke in a way that he went number one overall, and he actually is going to be better than plenty of number one overall picks. And it was still the wrong pick because there was a better player that seemed more obvious available at the same position,

Aidan Hutchinson, that they passed on. But that's not Trayvon Walker's fault. No, it's not Trayvon Walker. Like if you put him number two or three, he would have had this career and you'd be like, yeah, that's an incredible two or three pick. Like Trayvon Walker.

I'm going Cedric Gray. Not C.J. I wrote, he's so underrated, I wrote him down as C.J. and my aforementioned son was looking at my list and I was like, it's not C.J. Gray, bro.

It's Cedric Gray. So a nice correction there. Shout out to Walker. It's not in there. Pretty impressive. Second in the league and stops. I'm talking about Cedric Gray and my son.

And my son. For the Titans. People probably don't even know that. Offball linebacker. Not a lot of carryover from last year's Titans defense to this one. And I think they have a keeper

in Cedric Dre. Look, He was second in the league in stops. Tackles and stops can be a little misleading, but he was also extremely high in stop rate. So that's per snap that he was on the field. Ultimately, it's like success rate as a defender. Did you prevent the opposing offense from having a successful play?

Depends on if it's first or second down. Also very high in terms of tackles for loss. And just the guy that's a seaball, get ball, pursuit linebacker to do that. as a second year day three guys is really impressive. Or was he taken in the third round? Like he was in the middle of that draft. But as a second year guy, I think he's going to get better.

He's not all cleaned up in terms of his, you know, past defense, but that's true of basically all linebackers in the league. He could become a star with Robert Sala. So I'm also kind of calling my shot here that he's only going to get better with a really good coach in Robert Sala.

And that's what a typical underrated player is. is. They finally get the opportunity. A guy who went 106 overall. It was a fourth round pick for said gray. And sky's the limit. Get Bob Salah in there. Start, start,

you know, you may get diced up at linebacker, but these guys are all put in conflict all the time, especially in that division. And so, got to be next to Anthony Hill. I mean, that is an athletic,

you know, they could get diced up a little bit. Hill's kind of the more the, in theory a guy that's going to really play well in coverage. But we'll see. That's going to be a fun duo to watch. And Salas, linebackers are always fun to watch.

All right, you are up with the Broncos wrapping up here with the AFC West. Yeah. And the Denver Broncos, famously, had an opportunity to go to the Super Bowl. They beat the Buffalo Bills with an opportunity to go to that

AFC championship game. They didn't have their quarterback. DeKwan McMillan, who is a 76. Hey, now. according to our friends at Madden. And again, this is a difficult task to rate these players. 34 snaps in the divisional round against the Bills. He was targeted three times, negative four yards,

and he got the interception in overtime. Even after the interception, we can't get my man into the 80s. It seemed glaring to me. I feel Jekon McMillan is underrated. I was going back to that Bill's Broncos game for another exercise we're going to do on quarterbacks. And I was on Nate Tice's show this. we talking quarterbacks.

People should check that out. And I remember, like Josh Allen had a few turnover-worthy plays in that game. But this wasn't one of them, the interception that Jayquan McMillan had, because that was just a great defensive play by McMillan to rip that ball away.

All he didn't see. Right. At all. I love an undersized slot guy. I love a guy who was kind of told by his coaches, hey, we're probably not going to play you as much this year because of the draft pick that we made Jada Barron, first-round pick.

and he comes out and he just earns his spot and he keeps that first round pick mostly on the bench. They told us what they thought of Jake Juan McMillan. They were like, we can't take him off the field. It's kind of why I was a curious pick because he's been so good throughout, but you know, can't ever have too many defense backs.

Yeah, upwards of 70 targets over the course of the season, zero touchdowns. Come on. So they told us what they thought of McMillan by his playing time. And that's my main take with Noah Williams from the Chiefs. I'm not going to pretend

that he stood out to me watching him each and every snap, but in some high-leverage spots against good teams, including, I can't remember that Bill's game. They trusted him in a very similar way as an outside cornerback to the way that they trusted Jalen Watson as a rookie cornerback all through that Super Bowl run. And then they told us what they thought of Noah Williams by the way they acted this offseason.

Yeah, you move up in the draft for Mansour Delane. Noah Williams is still locked into that starting job right opposite him. I think they entered this off season thinking, okay, Noel Williams is one of our starters. How do we get that second starter next to him? That's a mid round pick. And I trust him. You think I'm stretching here? No, I like the idea of like, you know, with the Broncos, we're like,

we got to find somebody to go on the other side of certain. It's like, we got to find somebody to go on the other side of Noel Williams. But it's true. It's true. I mean, yeah, maybe not thinking it that way, but like, I think they look there, like, okay, we saw enough. He's our guy. He's going to be our guy throughout this rookie contract. I just have

kind of no doubt that if Steve Spagnolo believes that he's the guy for the next four or five years, then he will be the guy. They've proven that they're going to be right about these things. You got the Raiders next. And this was a very difficult part of the exercise

to me. I lean towards discussing Ashton Genty and all of the tackles behind the line of scrimmage, but I decided to go with Trey Tar. Okay. Greg, who is a 78 overall, according to our friends on Madden. Trey Tucker has consistently been explosive.

In week three, he had, you know, eight catches for 145 yards and three touchdowns. That was a significant portion of the Las Vegas Raiders receiving totals for the season in week three. When, like, there was, you know, they beat the Patriots. There was this idea that they may be some sort of viable football team. they weren't. And I had to pick someone. Purely, I had to pick someone. I went with Trey Tucker because the team was miserable.

He's the rare NFL player that makes everyone else look slow. If you're checking us out on YouTube, you're seeing some after the catchability. You're seeing some tough throw catchability, some plays at, like, look, he's not going to break a ton of tackles at his size, but his speed just jumps off the screen. There's not that many receivers that actually have different speed. There's only, like, I'd say, like, 15 of them. in the NFL. I think Trey Tucker is in that group.

Just a pure, pure like kind of make the defense panic speed. Hit 18 miles an hour on 309 routes this season. It was the third most in the NFL playing for a team where you don't have a lot of opportunities to hit 18 miles an hour. Like frankly, you had Gino doing weird stuff back there and the protection, not necessarily being NFL caliber protection,

not terms of players, but just implementation all the way through. Similar to the Fanon thing where people produce despite the situation around them being miserable, Trey Tucker did. I kind of like that fit too because I was thinking like, Trey Tucker is one of those guys. If he was a role player on a great team, he'd be very famous. And I have no doubt he would be a really effective role player for a team like the 49ers or the Rams or something like that. The Rams have been looking for Trey Tucker for years. Right.

And then everyone would be like, Trey Tucker's awesome. I'm going Chargers next. and I was bullied into taking a player that the average fan would recognize more that we have B-roll for, that you can see the vision. But I'm not going to be bullied on my own show. That was so needless.

Tier Tart is the man. Tier-Tart is so good at defensive tackle that they had to give him big contract. Okay, I was bullied. I'm sneaking to it. My two guys were Tier-Tart who capably replaced Puna Ford. a little different, more of a pressure guy.

Eric wrote, please on this. He goes, please go with the running back. I was going to play the Omerian Hampton B-roll over you talking about T.R. Tart anyways. Oh. Whatever. People get to see it because I cut it. It is cool.

Let's see some old Marion Hampton B-roll because it is awesome. I think he is underrated. Especially with the Mike Mack influence. He's going to be much better than he was his rookie year. Not usually my style of player either. I really like the short area quickness, like the guys who can make you miss in a in a phone booth, as they would say. And Hampton isn't that guy,

but what he has, almost as much as, like, anyone for this skill set since Derek Henry, is a combination of, oh, my God, he is going to run your ass over if you're in the secondary. There were some plays, like Paul Senebaudibon, Javon, Holland, in that Giants game, where, like, he is just going to make you look like a small person and run you over,

combining that with the bad angle, just breakaway speed. He obviously doesn't have the size that Derek Henry has, but I think he can have like a Derek Henry style of play that gets him to some Pro Bowls with some major yards. Because it's actually a pretty rare quality to have the run over you and big playability that he has. Yeah, because there's that moment of conflict

where you're trying to figure out how to get this person down. Obviously, Derek Henry, he's stiff-armed a million people and that's like the fifth time that a tackler is trying to figure out how to tackle Derek Henry and for Amarian Hampton it's similar in that

like the way we see Jamar Chase break all these tackles where he's explosive but he's also larger and so the arm contact isn't doing what it normally does to people because force equals mass times acceleration and so like Hampton's out the gate that's why I'm so excited

to see him in an offense that has spacing and like planning to it where I'm excited about what the chart is. Have you been tracking average draft position or anything like that? How people are in Hampton? Where's Hampton at these days? ADP was.

And again, like a post-draft ADP tends to be a little bit different. 16. He's overall 16. He's RB10 right now. I think that goes up as we get closer. Praise maybe, hopefully we get to have fantasy preseason shows.

fantasy show exists in some capacity. But I think we're going to talk him up and leapfrog guys like Sequin, you know, where you don't necessarily know what the Eagles offense is going to look like. McCathory, J.T., Jemir, Bejohn, that's going to be lock solid. But Amari and Hampton gets to this place where you're in that, you're thinking about the RB dead zone kind of starting where it's like, am I getting the value here? Maybe I'll go a wide receiver. I think you can still get good RB value.

with Omar. He just has to prove that he can stay on the field and stay healthy because like those broken tackles I talked about for instance against the Giants. It was it was kind of a joke like Paul Sinadoevo Javan Heil and Tyler Newman like they literally can't tackle him. He's just too big for them. He just runs right over him. But sometimes he just puts his head down and literally runs right over them and so he's going to take a pounding. If you told me if there was a world where you're you're drafting everyone for fantasy and you're telling me everyone gets 15 games minimum, I think he's a top five or six pick like that that I am I'm I'm loving him on the turn in fantasy drafts I just he could be a 2,000 yard type of guy it doesn't take long for these these running backs uh in 2,000 yards

from scrimmage and dynasty folks are obsessed with getting in early and they're going to want oh it's going to be jeremiah love and all these situations of iron hampton's been a league when you like you're not losing the value you need to win now I think winning is important in fantasy football yeah you want to prioritize the dynasty down the road You'd also like to win now because it is a season that you were playing as well. And I think Jeremiah I love like being close to there as a little fraudulent. Ooh. A little fraudulent.

Just because of the situation. I agree. Long term, I get it though. I mean, he's pretty special. No, he's a special player. The franchise and I recognize we're talking about the Chargers. I feel a whole lot better about the 2026 Los Angeles Chargers than I do about the Arizona. I think that's a fair take.

A lot of fair takes. loved the underrated players that you pick Patrick. You'll be back next week. Hey, I love the opportunity to do this show with you, Greg, and I hope nobody ever takes it away. I could not agree with you more, and I feel good about it. I feel good. Claibon to the moon, Claymates, the Claibon Vivant.

It's not the name of the show, baby. All the Claibon fans are excited. Both of me. They should be excited about our nation. next show too. I mean, the shook ones out there can't get enough a shook. It's a two shook week. We're back on Wednesday. No such thing is halfway shook. This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed human.