NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - NFL Around the League: September 4th, 2013

Episode Date: September 5, 2013

A room full of heroes, Gregg Rosenthal, Dan Hanzus, Marc Sessler and Chris Wesseling preview the Thursday night regular season opener between the Baltimore Ravens and the Denver Broncos. The crew also breaks down the latest headlines from around the league before giving you their Super Bowl predictions. Join the conversation on Twitter: @NFL_ATL or #NFLATL .Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comNFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Hey, everybody. Daniel Jeremiah here. And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move the 6th, we take you inside the game from breaking down college prospects and NFL rookies to evaluating team building philosophies, coaching trends, and how front offices construct winning rosters. We study the tape, talk to decision makers, and give you a perspective you won't find anywhere else.

It's everything you need to understand the why behind what happens on Sunday. Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Sticks podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Marcus Grant. And I'm Michael Florio, and together we host the NFL Fantasy Football Podcast. Ready to dominate your fantasy league this season? Then you need the NFL Fantasy Football Podcast, your ultimate source for player news, draft tips, and winning strategies. Whether you're a rookie manager or a fantasy vet. We've got the insight to help you crush your opponents.

Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL. Visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. The Around the League podcast. Mrs. Randy Moss. Welcome back to another edition of the Around the League podcast. My name is Dan Hansis, and I am John. joined by a room full of heroes, Chris Wessling, Mark Sessler, and Greg Rosenthal.

What's up, boys? Happy to be in here on my so-called off day. A lot of heroes here. You know, none of us ate lunch because the news has been flowing fast today. It's been brisk. It's here on his off day working. It's regular season. Still my favorite thing, and welcome back, Mark, after your absence.

Thank you. I had noticed while it was gone on Twitter that you had lent to speculation that I had been released in some sort of final roster cut. Thank you, Dan. We had to get down to three, right? Yeah, I did not begin that speculation, but I didn't shoot it down either. But my favorite thing probably in the world right now

is Chris Wessling off days. Wes in the office today in his khaki shorts. I just want to go over a list before we start today between the differences between Wes's off day and Sessler's off day. And let me know, Wes, if I miss anything for your off days. Okay. It involves beer and just check.

Check. Check. All right. shuffleboard not really I just say that okay pool yes check

Zarina's check film study check okay Cess I'm gonna go out of a limb and say there's only one thing

out of that whole group that connects and it's not Zarina and it's not beer shuffleboard or pool is it just film study it is that I have I'm a family man

I have two children and I am on a wicked strict budget right now West has children potentially but doesn't know about that he's not actually overseen they're being raised. There are no many mailmen running around this country.

I've never seen Dan write out things ahead of time in preparation. He had that list. That was well done. He was really ready for this. He surprised us. All right. We have a good show today. K. Rich behind the glass.

Welcome, K. Rich. How are you today? All as well, guys. Excited for week one right around the corner. K. Rich brings the youth to the show. I'm not sure you're, you didn't sound that excited about it. Yeah, you really didn't. I didn't sound that excited.

I tried this time to sound excited. I guess, do I sound monotone? Now you're getting into it. This is the, K. Rich is very feisty. She'll let you know what she thinks. But I just want that to come out on the podcast. Let's just face it. She's just trying to leverage this into the Eisen podcast.

And we understand that. This is a temporary arrangement. That's where you'll see the exuberant. Yeah, she'll be jumping off the walls. All right, so we have a big show. We're going to talk about the Thursday night opener, which finally football is upon us, Ravens and Broncos. We do a little news with Kay Rich.

We're going to finally make our Super Bowl picks and basically talk about our final four. But yeah, we should definitely start with real football coming back tomorrow night in Denver. The Super Bowl champions, the defending champions, Ravens, against the Broncos. Who wants to start out? Well, we should start with the big news.

Champ Bailey is out for this game. It's not a shock. But it's one thing to be missing Von Miller. And it's another thing to be missing Champ Bailey, your Hall of Fame cornerback. Those are your two best defensive players and I think that story has been overlooked a little bit the last three weeks

while he hasn't been practicing. Well, not to mention that Elvis Dumerville coming off of one of the biggest off-season gasps of our lifetime, a complete mistake of facts-related issue, suddenly is Dumerville now chasing Peyton Manning. And I think that Baltimore's defense

may be better than they were last season. That actually isn't news at this point. I think most would agree. Yeah, I think Baltimore's defense is better. And if we look at this game setting up where the Ravens are going to have to pass because the Champ Bailey's out, the Broncos pass rushers are gone, that's the matchup that they're going to have to exploit right there. And it's intriguing because the Ravens passing game was so kind of up and down in the preseason

with Flacco not always on the same page as receivers. So to me, that's going to be the most interesting aspect of this game. How big, by the way, is Dominique Rogers Carmardi to this team? I mean, if he, and I wrote this in the post we just did on Bailey being out, if Bailey is still Bailey when he gets back, and he's now entering his 15th year, which is pretty crazy. But let's say if he gets back to full health and then still has it, and DRC kind of gets back whatever he lost in Philadelphia,

this could be a really good secondary on the outsides. but also there's a chance that it's not a very good secondary at all, right? Well, we took a look at their secondary in our Making the Leap series, and I actually think that Chris Harris has more to offer the defense than DRC, although a lot of people feel like DRC is going to make this bounce back. Elway talked them up, but for me, what we saw in Philadelphia the last two seasons, he's going to be a factor if he isn't the player he was. You could argue that DRC is among the most physically gifted cornerbacks in the NFL,

so there's always going to be a coach. staff that believes they can turn him around, and maybe they can't. One thing about the Ravens' offense real quick, they passed the ball. Flacco just kept dumping it off to Ray Rice when they actually had starters on the field over and over, and that makes sense with Pitta ripped out of there. That team only has two running backs right now. They could not afford any sort of an injury. I mean, I guess I don't know.

But they're two very good running backs. They aren't saying if they lose one, though, it's like, what do you do? Who do you line up back there? That's two more than I trust out of the Broncos. We might see Noshan Moreno as a starter, by the way. There's a report out there that maybe John Fox has kind of been lined in the weeds here by putting Moreno third on the depth chart. He might get the most snaps on Thursday night.

And that's a big question. There's a lot of questions about this Broncos team for them to be such heavy favorites in this game. I'm kind of surprised they are. By the way, also, Tori Smith is probably more upset than anybody that Champ Bailey is not playing. If you saw what happened in the divisional playoffs in January. Speaking of the divisional playoffs I touched on this on Twitter In the backfield

They didn't trust Ronnie Hillman Enough to play over No Sean Marino Then He's now fumbled three times In the preseason Why would they trust him To play over No Sean Marino now? It's a good point

And I just love the fact That we're talking about a game That's tomorrow I mean I just We all We all Tried to get into this profession Because we love football

And we love the game And we love our jobs In the off season too but I mean this is so much more fun that's all I'm just that's my public service announcement I like one random subplot and I agree Greg one random subplot also is that

I think I saw a tweet yesterday that it's supposed to be or as of yesterday literally 100 degrees warmer than it was the last time these two teams played in Denver like literally 100 degrees warmer it's going to be 107 degrees listen this is a tweet that I read maybe didn't read properly and it was in the corner

of the screen it's probably erroneous information And the game, you know, by tradition, should have been held in Baltimore. Right. Right. But thanks to, what place are the Orioles in right now? They're in middle of the pack third place. Okay, so a middle of the pack baseball team that no one cares about is the reason that we now have Joe Flacko's image paste it all over Denver Stadium. Peter Angelos, the owner of the Orioles, is a well-known, reputed goon, and he decided not to give up the parking lot so they didn't have to play an afternoon game.

So nice civic job there by Angeloos. Do we think this is a high-scoring game? I do. I think too much has been made of the Broncos' defense falling apart this year, but for this game, without Champ Bailey, without Von Miller, I think that's problematic. But as a season goes along, you figure they've lost only, what, Dumerville, and they've gained first-round defensive tackle, Sean Phillips, Rogers Cromarty, and they've got a new starting strong safety. What's it? Duke Ion Nacho. Is that how you put? Yeah, something like that. Who looks pretty good. To me, this defense could even be better by the end of the year.

I don't get the hand-wringing there. But for early season, I think they will have a lot of high-scoring games because they're going to score. Today, by the way, Demarius Thomas became the latest guy to come out and say that Manning's arm strength is spectacular compared to last season. How much am I supposed to be buying into that? And will that make him even better than he will? People forget how good he was last year, which drives me crazy. He never had spectacular arm strength.

Right. Or much improved from last year. And he's another year. It's more comfortable. And that offense is, from what we've heard, going to go fast-paced from start to finish. And the Ravens are often basically a no-huddle offense. So we're going to see two teams that are going to push the ball down field. It was not a good game by Peyton Manning in the playoffs.

I thought that was going to be one of the dominant storylines of the offseason. It kind of got forgotten that they didn't push the ball down the field at all. I don't know if it was the weather, but he didn't play well. It's crazy that West Welker's return or first game for the Broncos is kind of slipping under. the radar too. There's a lot to chew on in this game. So who's going to win? Should we go around the horn and make our prediction for this game? Sure, why not? All right, I'll start. I think

the Broncos win. I have the Broncos well, I don't want to give too many teasers for our Super Bowl talk later, but there's a bit of a teaser right there. But I think the Broncos are going to be very good again this season. They're a bit under the radar for a team that shouldn't be under the radar with Manning and all the talent they have and I think in a high-scoring game

would say 35-31. I think it'll be close and I like the Broncos to win a close one. maybe Chris Wesleyan's boy, Julius Thomas, announced as the starting tight ends. Orange Julius. Plays a factor here because I think James Aheadabot is starting at safety for the Ravens. I don't think that's something you should be too excited about if you're a Ravens fan. So how about those tight ends for the Broncos doing well?

I think the one thing that the Ravens came out of that playoff game very upset with, even though they won, was their special teams. because Denver used two scorching kick returns to basically stay where they were in that game. You take that away. It would never have gone to overtime. I'm going Baltimore. I think it's going to be a very tight game,

but I think it's going to lead to questions a week from now that are ill-placed. What's wrong with the Broncos? I like the upset picks. You know, last year we do the picks on the website. We're going to do it again this year. We have a category named hero picks. That's when you get the game right.

and the rest of the group gets it completely wrong. Mark and I tied for the hero pixley last year, but Mark dominated us. I'm just, you know, I hate all the group things. By the way, Greg, excuse me, Mark also earned the nickname the Sizzler because he was among the top five, top three even, expert prognosticators in the entire nation among sports writers.

That comes off of literally eight straight years of losing to my mom in a pickam pool, so I don't continue with that to continue. I don't see that continuing this season. You're like the Baltimore Ravens of the Picks world. Surprise champs. No one's given him any respect this year. Cessler, like, I don't trust it. Cessler, I was going to say, yeah,

it seemed like you're going to give Cessler a raise. You're so happy that he took the Ravens. He is an MVP. Wes, who do you have? I feel like we've been talking about this all offseason. The Ravens' defense has actually improved. And I think they're even better than we thought from what I saw in the preseason. Darrell Smith looks like a pro bowler.

but having said that out of all the great offenses in the NFL I really like what the Cowboys are doing the Falcons the Saints I think the Broncos with Wes Welker and Julius Thomas joining that offense have the best chance to go like 2007 Patriots on the NFL this season

and I don't think the Ravens can stop them I'm picking the Broncos I like that so you're talking potentially high octaic epic I'm talking a potentially historic offense Darrell Smith just mentioned on a podcast for literally the first time in his life. Welcome, Darrell.

All right, anybody else want to put a bow on this topic, or should we move on? I like the Thursday night preview. We'll do that every Wednesday. Oh, yeah, very exciting. Kay Rich, you're still there, or are you hanging out with Eisen? I was talking to Eisen, but I'm back now. All right, great. All right, so let's do a little news.

By the way, Kay Rich's news jingle, it's coming together. It hasn't been produced or even, we haven't reached out to anybody, but she will have a jingle eventually. Oh, it's coming. It's coming. But for now, it's just, this is all you get. So, K. Rich, let's do some news. All right, let's do it. Now, this is a team that never, ever, ever fails to make headlines, the notorious New York Jets.

Rex Ryan will not commit to Gino Smith beyond week one. Wes? Who cares? Who really cares? There's no, there's no fresh news here. Both quarterbacks stink, the Jets are terrible, the rest of the country doesn't care just the national media. All right. I will say that it actually is news because Rex, what he could have done today was say,

Gino is my quarterback. He will be the quarterback this season. Instead, he's playing it by ear, which is probably the smart move when you're coaching for your job and you need at least seven wins to stay alive. You're not going to drown with a rookie for the sake of the progress of an organization that you won't even be with next year. What a poorly handled situation though I know I'm not supposed to say that blah blah blah but Rex had a chance to say

look we've got a first year quarterback we believe in this guy we're going to stick with him instead he continues to muddle the message and I just think it's the Jets want their coach to speak about the team in a certain way and Rex keeps going off that message over and over I feel like we're just throwing this Jets news in

now to troll Wesleyan just to get him angry it's working it's working You cannot slide the word Jets past our editor's desk or Tebow. It's going to be suggested that we write about it. If anything in the Jets comes up. Oh, yeah, we've got to keep doing this. Hey, Crystal, what else is on the news? All right, next up, this is not about Tim Tebow, by the way.

This is a story that hits close to home to me with Seattle Seahawks, QB, Russell Wilson, as my backup in fantasy. We weren't expecting to see his whiteout, Percy Harvin, anytime soon, until he tweets out keep an eye on week seven. Hmm. That's interesting. Well, and we, Dan and I reacted immediately to this by, we were supposed to have a post up very quickly, but we dropped everything to make a transaction in our fantasy team to pick them up, right?

We picked them up. Well, yeah, this really is, in all seriousness, a potentially big development. I don't know. A hip injury is scary, but the only thing really, if anybody's not going to pick the Seahawks doing the Super Bowl to me, is that if Harvin is a complete non-entity of the season, If he's back midway through the season, which let's say he doesn't come back close to 100%,

but by December he's Percy Harvin, this is a huge news development if he's feeling good right now. Well, a few things on this. I never trust the player's injury prognosis, so they're always overly optimistic. You know, that's one. The second is Percy Harvin is probably driving the Seahawks crazy. He was the one who announced this hip surgery before they even okayed that. Now he's saying he's back in week seven. I'm sure they don't want that out there if for some reason.

and it is true. It shows at least they're optimistic that maybe it's not late December, maybe it's November. And I don't be ashamed about the fantasy thing. I did the exact same thing. Unfortunately, someone already had drafted him. I mean, Pete Carroll officially today said,

look, we're not even going to develop some sort of timetable form until later this month, but he's progressing well. What do we know? It's a hip surgery. I don't think Harvin even knows when he'll be back. I wouldn't pay any attention to the week seven part.

To me, the takeaway here is, they're optimistic. And, you know, when guys come back, they're not the same right away. So, like you said, maybe by mid-December, he's back to the old Percy Harvin. But I wouldn't expect Seahawks fans to get excited and say, hey, week seven, we've got Harvin back as our new weapon. At least it's not, hey, there's been a setback and, you know, temper expectations. I'm really excited to see this Seahawks offense this Sunday against the Carolina Panthers defense, which looks so good in the preseason.

And I just wonder if teams are going to do. something with Russell Wilson's second year to muddle him up. I know I'm getting ahead of ourselves with a preview. We're going to preview all the games, and that'll be definitely one of the games we preview on Friday. But what a, what a matchup. I just debate every week about what games I'm going to assign to myself. It's like the toughest decision. I think I got to go, Seahawks. Looks like I'll be on Jack's Chiefs. We're going to have to put Greg in a straitjacket by Sunday. I've never seen you this excited. I might have a hero pick on that one. I also haven't eaten today, so I think that's a factor. Oh, that fact is that. Football is back. We all

to be excited. That's true. We have to be. Moving on. Lions, first round pick, rookie defensive end, Ziggy Onsaw is still not practicing and has been out for 10 days counting. And he's officially out with a concussion. Officially?

Yeah, that's going to be, that's a big blow for them. And the fact that they're announcing he's out on a Wednesday is not a good sign for future weeks. And he suffered the concussion like 10 days ago. He hasn't practiced that long. It's a shame, I think, for fans because you guys, But Adrian Peterson against the Lions, what would be one of the nastiest front fours in football, especially with... They still are.

I don't know. It's a little bit different for me if you take Ziggy out of there. But Peterson also, when he doesn't have his full back in, has not been sometimes the same player, although he's a superhuman, so who am I to say? What else is in the news, K. Rich? All right, guys. Next up, I'm sorry I keep making references to my fantasy team, but I just had my draft last night. Because everyone's fascinated by other people's fantasy teams.

Yeah, and it was great. So huge matchup in week one. We have Green Bay at San Francisco. Now, Niners head coach Jim Harbaugh dislikes Clay Matthew's tough talk about his team. What do you guys have to say about that? Shut up. You know what? I like Harbaugh a lot.

But this guy, who does he think he is, honestly? And by the way, I know you've had a lot of- Keith Hernandez. Yeah, he thinks he's Keith Hernandez. What does he won? This guy thinks he's a deity. He's not a deity. He's won the same amount of Super Bowl titles as Rex Ryan.

So, shut up. People can talk about your blessed team and all your beautiful players. Deal with it. Win a ring! Do you want to tell the audience what Harbaugh's point was? Well, what's the context here? He's won a lot of games, first of all. He's won a lot of games, but what does he won?

I feel like he believes that he is above everything, and his team is above everyone else. but they're really not, you know, this is not a, this is, we're not dealing with some type of dynasty in San Francisco. Well, so he specifically said what, that he feels that the Packers are talking about singling out the quarterback for punishment, right? I'll explain it. So Clay Matthews did a radio interview earlier this week where he talked about the best way to stop a read option quarterback is to hit the quarterback. And this is something John Madden said earlier this offseason, Chris wrote about it, really not too, controversial. Jim Harbaugh came out on Wednesday and said he thinks that tough talk, and that was

his words, you know, could be interpreted as targeting a specific player, and he's gone to the NFL for clarification about the rules of hitting the quarterback that are in the read option. What a weasel. That's a weasly mood, Jim. That's screech what he thinks about it. Shirley has changed since I was in school. This is the oldest trick in the book. Go to the reps and the league. just so they'll be aware of the situation when Clay Matthews lights up Kaepernick.

Quarterbacks are going to get hit in the read option. They're going to have to deal with it. And it's the defense's job to knock the snod out of him. It's a non-issue. It's just hardball being a weasel. Don't we like a little gamesmanship? I mean, we talk about the coaches that are so boring in their press gun.

I like that Jim Harbaugh is unpredictable, and he doesn't mind zinging the other teams. He does it to Pete Carroll. Remember Kevin Gilbride last. last year. Teams come at the 49ers just a little bit, like Matthews had pretty benign comments. Kevin Gilbride had some benign comments last year. And then Jim Harbock comes back, guns blazing. Here was his quote last year about Gilbride after Gilbride said something about Justin Smith. Kevin Gilbride's outrageous, irrational statement regarding Justin Smith's play is at first an absurd analogy.

Second, it is an incendiary comment targeted at truly one of the exemplary players in the league. It's obvious the Giants coaching staff's sole purpose is to use their high visibility to both criticize and influence officiating. Now, would you rather have that or would you rather have Eric Mangini's press conferences? I'd rather have Harbaugh. He's entertaining, but...

Wes cannot stay off killing Cleveland Brown's officials and players. Mangini was a blight on the coaching. How about Mike Malarkey? If you had to cover his press conferences, it's like, what am I getting out of this? Yeah. They were not entertaining. Jim Harbaugh makes the league more entertaining,

But pride comes before the fall. Just get ready. Ooh, a little hubris talk. Interesting. Get ready. I like that one too. Hey, anything else in the news, Crystal? Yeah, one last thing up.

Panthers' whiteout, Steve Smith, get ready for this one. Said that Brown's head coach, Rob Shenzinski, got too cute with Panthers' offense in 2012. Mark? Well, I think Smith is, number one, the guy talks too much. But secondly, I know you love him. He's going to come find you. I think he is correct. Because before the Panthers figured out how to kind of get their run game going,

we wrote a post about this last year. They basically run endless stuff out of shotgun and read zone option plays and basically had very little effect. It was trying to channel it through Cam Newton. And they got back to basics. And that's what Smith was talking about. You know, Chud got too cute. And it happened number one on that week three game against the Giants, which was a disaster

for Caroline on multiple levels. but it's a guy saying basically oh Mike Shula's going to come in and save us I'll wait for about three weeks to hear what Smith has to say about Mike Shula if he's still alive he might be taped to a chair getting pushed well probably the most offensive thing Smith said

was that Chudinsky was just auditioning for other head coaching jobs that he was putting basically his own personal career interests ahead of the team that's incendiate and by the way just for fun just for Mark especially I'll give you one more Brown's headline. Brown's kicker Billy

Cundiff replacing a legend like Phil Dawson quote is a good thing. Then we'll come back to watch you. Okay Kay Rich, that's it for the news, right? That's all. All right. So, our last top, thank you, Kay Rich. That was great. 12 out of 10 as always. Our last topic

we're going to do our Super Bowl picks. It's time. All season we're going to be doing, I guess we'll do some variation of our weekly picks and our debut of the weekly picks will be on Thursday on the site that you around the league blog but right now we're going to do super bowl picks uh west do you want to start out who do you have your final four and who wins it all sure i'll start you know i was um watching a lot of texans film

last night and the more i watch him the more i like them shab is still a question mark but j j watt is the best player on the field almost every time he takes the field and he's just in the backfield on every play it's incredible you throw in cushing deandre hopkins uh jonathan Joseph is healthy. I watched him shut down AJ Green for the entire first half of that playoff game. You've got Ben Tate is healthy. It wasn't last year. So you've got two new

weapons on offense that you didn't have for the most of last year. And you've got two healthy two out of your three best defenders are healthy this year. The Texans are going to roll through the NFC or the AFC South, I think. So they play the Broncos. Broncos go to the Super Bowl. Like I said, I feel like the Broncos' offense can go 2007

Patriots and their defense by the time John Miller gets back will be good enough. I think people forget that the Broncos had the best defense in the NFL for the final three months of last season after they got off to a slow start. So I've got Broncos, and in the NFC, I've got Packers over Seahawks just because I trust Aaron Rogers more. I feel like the Packers upgraded at running back and on defense. I just, you know, even if the Seahawks have a better roster, I trust the Packers to come through in the playoffs. and I've got Broncos over Packers in the Super Bowl. A little 1997 rematch right there.

I like that. Cessler, what do you got? I mentioned right off the top that I thought that Denver would lose this game against the Ravens and people would start to freak out, but I think they'll quickly realize, as Wes has mentioned, that Denver's offense is good enough to carry whatever issues they have on defense. I also think that we overrate players being out for the start of seasons in the sense that by the time

Von Miller is back, you know, there's plenty of room for Denver to make up whatever was lost. Is that recency bias? Does that count? It might be. It's a strange form of it, maybe. I have them getting to the AFC title game against New England, and I've mentioned

already that Tom Brady is my MVP pick, and I believe that New England will beat Denver in one great last Tom Brady versus Peyton Manning duel and go to the Super Bowl against the winner of the Seahawks and the Bears I think the Bears are going to win a playoff game

over potentially a higher-seated team get into the NFC title game but fall to Seattle and then I'm going to have New England topping Seattle in the Super Bowl one last Belichick Brady crown Very interesting Isler did you listen to our podcast

the other day? Monday I guess it was No I was busy please What do you think about our theory that you love the Bears and Mark Tressman so much because Mark Tressman is the coach that reminds you the most of Mark Sessler. And spelled with a C. Spelled with a C, spelled the noble way.

I'm not sure I know enough about him to say that he reminds me of me, but a little nugget from his past, when Cleveland last won a division title pre-Belichick, it was an 89 with Bud Carson, and our offensive coordinator was Mark Trussman. And he got a lot out of that. offense, and I never forgot them since.

It all goes back to the brown. I'm not sure that I see, like, a personality blueprint. All roads lead back to Berea. Oh, okay, Dan. Not Florin Park, Barreya. Okay, my pick. You know what? I agree with you, by the way, Sessler. I believe that we get one last Brady Manning Bowl, and it would be the fourth one in January, and at least that's what I hope happens. And I feel like we kind of got robbed of it this past January.

I think it happens this year. I think this time the Broncos get over the hump I think they beat the Patriots who I think will be good but won't be better than what Manning has put together this show that's a great team and they will also I also have Seattle going into the NFC title game but I have them beating the Redskins

I almost did it I almost put the Redskins in the Super Bowl Greg kind of said something snarky when I first mentioned it and he talked me out of it That's not true though I didn't know you were thinking about the Redskins Yes that's what happened and I almost did it And then I, you know, I hedge my bets a little bit. And I rethought things. And I said, let me play it a little safer.

So I'm going to have the Seahawks getting past the Broncos. And excuse me, Seahawks getting past the Redskins. And then I do see the Seahawks beating the Broncos Super Bowl champs. I look towards the organizations and the quarterbacks and the winning this team over the last decade by, I think it was 11 games is the New England Patriots. They still have the same quarterback. So you're not looking at them because you're a fan? Well, that's part of it. I really debated whether to go with the Patriots or the Steelers as my AFC team.

I've been thinking about it for two months, really, that those were going to be my finalist. I finally went with the Patriots. The Steelers, not coincidentally, the third best team over the last decade. I still think they have one of the best head coaches, one of the five best quarterbacks in the league. So those are my two final teams. Got the Patriots going to the Super Bowl because I think they're deep. defense is going to be better than it has been in five or six years, really like the linebackers. I think they have a lot of depth on the defensive line.

And then in the NFC, again, one of the best teams over the last decade, Green Bay Packers, the best quarterback in the league. I try not to outsmart myself. So I'm going Packers over Seattle. And I think Green Bay's defense is going to be a weapon. As good as it's been in the last couple years can be a top 10 defense. And so I have them winning the Super Bowl and beating Tom Brady and giving him a third Super Bowl loss. What happens to New England if they lose another Super Bowl?

I think all Patriots fans would agree that they would rather never make a Super Bowl again than go through that. I guess that's obvious enough, but it would just be... Well, that must be a nice problem. Right. Right. I mean, I think in their heart of hearts, a lot of Patriots fans, when they lost to the Ravens last year, thought, well, if they're going to lose, it's better now than in another Super Bowl.

All right. Those are our picks. I think they all seem to be, I wouldn't call them chalk, but they seem to be going with what the experts are saying for the most part. But, you know, get off our backs. Packers is kind of, not a ton of people. Most people are going, Seahawks, 49. None of us went 49ers. Packers, just a tremendous stretch. All right, by the way, a little housekeeping. We have some really good content on the Around the League blog. I don't know if anybody's noticed. Greg, you just put out the QB and Decks. That's right. Wes, you have your running backs. Running back power ranks should be up within and, well, by the time you get this podcast, it will be, they will be out.

Cessler, you have your 10 things that you're looking forward to. I also rank long snappers. Oh, that's good. You can do that. And I have the final hard knocks recap, the finale, so check all those things out. Anything else we want to talk about before we go today? I just wanted to say that I enjoyed, I really enjoyed your hard knocks recaps all year. Some of the finest work we put out on around.

on the late. That's the only reason I brought it up. I was fishing for a compliment, and I got it. There's a victory. Okay, so on Friday, we'll be back. We're going to review Thursday night. We'll talk. Big, big week one preview. We're excited about that. And that's it. So,

thank you to the mailman, the sizzler, the boss, K. Rich, behind the glass. And, of course, Lyle the Inter, until Friday. I would venture to guess that I took a nap at least a dozen times in the fireworks. Hey, everybody. Daniel Jeremiah here.

And I'm Bucky Brooks. On Move the Six, we take you inside the game from breaking down college prospects and NFL rookies to evaluating team building philosophies, coaching trends, and how front offices construct winning rosters. We study the tape, talk to decision makers, and give you a perspective you won't find anywhere else. It's everything you need to understand the why behind what happens on Sunday. Don't miss it. Listen to the Move the Sticks podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

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