NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - NFL ATL: Rookie camp whispers, top rookie WR

Episode Date: May 19, 2014

A room full of heroes -- Dan Hanzus, Gregg Rosenthal and Marc Sessler -- breaks down all the observations and rumors from a weekend of rookie camp.  Tune in to find out which newbies impressed, which players are making headlines around the league, and who would be cast to play the heroes in a Hollywood movie version of the podcast.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.

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Listen to the NFL Fantasy Football podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Toyota, the official automotive partner of the NFL. Visit Toyota.com slash NFL now to learn more. The Around the League podcast has no prior head coaching experience. Welcome back to another edition of the Around the League podcast. My name is Dan Hansen, and I am joined by a room filled with some heroes. Mark Sessler and Greg Rosenthal. What up, boys?

The disappointment level in your voice about just some heroes and the lack of Wessling was even more apparent today than Monday. Friday, rather. When do we get Chris Wessling back in the studio? I was thinking that just before I started speaking there is I thought he'd be back by now. And I know we talked about Wes went on his romantic getaway up the coast. He's not back. And what does that mean? Was he scheduled to be...

No, he was never scheduled. He had today off. I have been in contact with him. He is going to be making his way back down the coast today. He's probably on his way right now, and he can regale us with tales of the northern climate. His woman friend, Aaron, was on the podcast over the phone for a few seconds on Friday. So we'll see if that love connection holds up.

I'm excited. I've seen a lot of positive Facebook post, so it seems like it's going, well. Well, at least you knew her name this time. Aaron. Aaron with an E and an R and an I and an N. Hey, Gold Center. How you doing, buddy?

Doing great. Thanks, Dan. I want to thank you before I came into the studio today. You stopped me and showed me a clip of Kieran Pollard, making a stunning catch at the boundary line for Solitaire 56. Was that all correct? That was brilliant. Well done.

You know, I had the Galaxy Timbers, Extra Time Shootout last week. Now we've got some cricket. You're really expanding. Yeah, hashtag broadened horizons, right? You know, gold standard is like one of those guys. Until you said cricket right then, I didn't know what you were talking about, and neither did the listeners, I would think. Timbers, well, I do know Timbers is an overrated entity. Right, am I wrong?

No, you're right. I mean, of course. Wait, what? I follow other sports. You know, I'm plugged in. You certainly don't. I thought you were talking about the industry, the timber industry. Oh, the timber industry is in trouble.

Yeah, but also the team, you're right. All right, good. So thank you. And, Greg, I did notice that today you have gone business shirt tucked into jeans with sneakers, which is an unusual look for you. So you're mixing it up today. I always notice my employees how they're dressed. I didn't know I was one of your employees now.

Excuse me, my colleagues. What? Yeah. I mean, my wife was not a fan of, in general, the whole business shirt with the jeans look. It doesn't matter about the shoes, which is very popular on here. I try to avoid it. You know, I'm just... I like it.

You like it. I really do. I think it's a good look. What do you think, Mark? That's fetching. I could see why the wife would be... You're saying she is a fan or she is. No, she doesn't like it.

She thinks either you go business or not. I could see her point of view as well. And just to clarify, Greg is actually my boss. Not my employer. Yeah, you can't come in here and redo the org chart. All right. So, okay, so we got a good show today. Wes, I think we'll be back our next show.

Who knows? You know, but we don't know. So we're going to soldier on another show. another show without him. We will talk about some good rookie chatter. We love talking about the rookies and how they're going to impact. Mark, you wrote a really, really

good piece on rookie wide receivers. Greg, you wrote a piece on rookie running back, so we're going to get into both of those. We're also going to get into something that we're calling rookie camp whispers based on all the camps this weekend.

And Mark Sessler, you were manning the ship and you wrote some, you know, Nice nugs. A lot of juicy nugs, and we're going to go over some of them. Whispers. I'm just trying to out. I liked it. I liked it.

But before we do any of that, the gold standard behind the glass, what do you think, man? Should we do some news? Let's do some news. All right, so Andre Johnson, we know, is unhappy with the Houston Texans, the direction of the franchise. He came out last week and said he wasn't sure if Houston was the place for him. Bill O'Brien, the new Texans coach, spoke out this weekend, and he had this to say, I'll let Andre speak for himself, and he added the conversations that Andre and I have had

have been very positive about what we're doing here as a team. Obviously, offensively, what we're doing here, we've had good communications, but as far as what Andre said, I'll let him speak for himself. Gentlemen, what do you make of this situation? Do you think Andre Johnson is not long for the Texans? Well, there is a report out Monday from ESPN's Adam Schaefter that suggested people around the league don't expect Johnson to be traded and everything we've heard so far indicates the Texans don't really want to trade Andre Johnson. So even though he's not happy, what's he going to do about it? Is he going to hold out the whole offseason?

I mean, skipping voluntary work. That's one thing. Could he really force a trade? Ultimately, it's up to the team what they do. And why would they want to trade him? I think that's the better part of it right there because if you're the Texans, you've got DeAndre Hopkins, a good young player, but if you dump Andre... Might be good. Well, you dump Andre Johnson out of the mix, you're suddenly that team that's really thin at that position.

And I don't think that suddenly Bill O'Brien wants to go into the season with questions at quarterback and you just let your star-wide receiver out the door. Yeah, I don't know. You're trying to sell Ryan Fitzpatrick as your starting quarterback throwing to D'Andre Hopkins and Kishon Martin or DeVier Posey. They're already thinn it at wide receiver. And I don't think this is a case of a guy towards the end of his career

and you're just trying to squeeze out another year or two. He had 3,000 yards combined over the last two years. We were debating downstairs, Dan, what we thought his value would be if he was open for trade. I thought it'd be a second round pick at least because this is a pretty good player still. I think we all kind of agree. He's turning 33 this summer that based on what he's done in recent seasons, this is a guy that has one monster year left in a maybe two, something around there.

So what's that worth to a team that's looking to get over the hump? I mean, the second round pick makes a lot of sense. And this is a guy that in theory he's troubled because he wants to go to a contender. So suddenly you needed to be a contender with a lot of cap money and ability to give up a pick and a place that Andre Johnson's going to want to go to. I don't see what that is. Ryan Mallet. boy here we go well there's okay and a fourth round pick for andre johnson i don't know how it all

fits in with the salary cap but just bring him on over this is what uh you know what it's it's funny that everyone is immediately like pinging him to the patriots just because the patriots need another star from another team but uh albert breer reported last week 11.96 million in dead money against the texans cap if they were uh to get rid of johnson and then of course you course, any team that took him on would have to take on Johnson's contract, which is fairly immense. So any possible deal, it would seem to be a long shot. I don't think. Yeah, I think that's being safe.

I don't think there's much of a chance to happen because of what you just said, that dead money, the Albert reported, I mean, that's a killer. So not only are you getting rid of such a talented player, you're taking all this money and you're getting it for a pick that's not until next year's draft, and the draft's already over. You can't get a pick for this year's draft. It would be a shock to me if he was traded. And not to say that we don't understand where Andre Johnson is coming from because he sees the writing on the wall here that he's got a couple of years left and all of a sudden he's set up with a team that's coming off 2 and 14 catching mortally wounded ducks from potentially Case Keenham in play.

This is where Wes would jump in and say this isn't such a bad situation at all, but it is. By the way, Wes, I'll let him, we'll have plenty of time this off season, but Wes is still holding out hope that Case Keenum is their weak one starter. That is a thing. Yeah, but Wes jumped off the Case Keenum train long before now. He actually constructed the entire railway track of the Case Keenum train in addition to the train itself and then pushed it off the rails after about five weeks. Wes, if you're listening to this, we miss you so much that we're now including you in the conversation, even though you're not here.

We're pretending you're here. I like them. That's all I can say. All right, moving on another wide receiver. Brandon Marshall, this was kind of a weird move. The Pro Bowl Chicago Bears wide receiver. signed a three-year, $30 million extension. That's not so weird.

That makes sense. But he did it during a live taping of The View on ABC, which was strange. But this locks him in. NFL media insider Ian Rappaport reported that the deal, which takes him through the 2017 season, includes $23 million in guarantees per source informed of the pact. Yeah, I mean, it's the first time that I can remember that Whoopi Goldberg beat Rappaport to an NFL. NFL news story. You can't hold what we did. By full minutes.

I'm furious with our news desk that they were not watching the view at the time because I got to be honest, we were chasing this story. No one saw, no one had it right off the bat. Oh yeah. Hey, there's Marshall signing his contract next to Jenny McCarthy. Yeah, speaking of Jenny McCarthy. Joy Behar. Is she still around?

I believe so. I don't think she's on this year's version of the show, actually. I have not really ever seen the view, but of course we saw. clips of it this morning because of what happened on the show. It was a bit sobering to see Jenny McCarthy at this stage of the game looking a little different than she did. For men of a certain

age, Jenny McCarthy was an absolute comet of the mid-90s, you know, a playboy playmate star of singled out, which might have sent me through puberty that show. And now you see her and there's a whole different situation going on. Yeah, Greg

flipped it around and said that actually it's a victory for Jenny McCarthy, that it's a very solid, consistent landing spot. For sure. The word that came to mind for me was wasteland because suddenly you're a woman who's on the view. It's a regular job. I just, I don't know.

You're disconnected on this. I'm a national so. I don't know how you can walk around and hold your head high and say, I'm on the view. Well, we wouldn't, we wouldn't do that. Brandon Marshall did. Not only did he want to join the ladies there, he wanted to break some news. I mean, it's rare enough for a player to break their own contract extension news anywhere on Twitter or whatever. He said, where can I go?

The view, they'll take care of you. Mark, what's wrong with strong opinions from a woman and females on a daytime television show? What's this about? That's not at all my issue with the show. I don't feel, I haven't watched it enough to say that that's not happening on there. I feel that the show, you know, I'm not going to go down this right. You're trying to get into it. I don't like to view.

I don't have to, I'm fine with it. Put this way. For Jenny McCarthy, who went from, she thought she was the next Lucy, and then she kind of faded into the ether and made babies with Jim Carrey and then said weird things about vaccines. Now she's on the top-rated daytime television show.

You know, at age 45, whatever, that's a good spot for a former Playboy girl. So I have to be impressed. Yes. Do you know that it's top-rated, or you're just saying that? The view, it's a juggernaut. You know Gold Standard. It's huge.

I was actually the first person on it at NFL media because I had it on my internal monitor. I was watching the show, you know. The show does well on the Nielsen's. I'm just going to go out on a, you know, relatively to other programs. All right, let's move on. Unless we want to keep top mark. Do you have anything else you want to say?

We could actually say something about Brandon Marshall if we wanted. Oh, yeah. That would be good. Although, I don't know. It makes all the sense of the world. The guy's a great receiver. You put him with Jeffrey and that's arguably the best tandem in football, right? Well, it's interesting that he's moved around in his career so much.

He's never signed two contracts with the same team. The Broncos got rid of him. This contract that he was on still was from the Dolphins. They got rid of him. And now that he's older and we had him in studio and he was delightful, it seems like he's matured and Mark Tresman. It's like, okay, now he's finally setting in. He gets that contract to stick around with one team for a while.

And it couldn't be a better spot with Mark Tres. Well, and some people talk about, oh, you know, you cross 30 and suddenly you're in trouble. Back-to-back seasons with 100 catches, 1,000 yards, 10 touchdowns, the only player right now in the league that's done that two years in a row. He's in an offense that's perfect for him with, I think, his soulmate quarterback and Jay Cuddler. The only concern with him is he's had so many surgeries over the year, and he's not a receiver that builds his game around speed anyways,

kind of like in Anquan Bolden, he's turning into a better version of that, but you still wonder as he gets older all those surgeries. He's had six, seven, eight surgeries in his career. That's true. view him at the same time as one of those money in the bank guys, and if you're a fantasy football player, you could, if you take Brandon Marshall in the third round of a draft

or whatever, you could basically pencil them in for that type of production that you've come to expect. And now with Jeffrey becoming a star, you know, it's just, that's one of the best wide receiver duos in the league. I'd say it's the best. Yeah. How about that pivot off of McCarthy straight into

Marshall, hardcore football? What other podcasts are giving you that? Good luck with that. Challenger's to the throne. All right, moving forward. Teddy Bridgewater, the number 32 overall pick in the 2014 NFL draft. We'll take first team reps at OTAs. Here is a line from Vikings coach Mike Zimmer,

not the Mike Zimmer that's signed with the Vikings today. I just want to make that. Thank you. Yeah. That's a linebacker, Mike Zimmer. This is the coach, Mike Zimmer. Teddy's been great. He's had a good command.

of the offense. I like his leadership. I like his determination. He's throwing the ball well. He's got good quick feet. He is a god. I made that up. I think he is a good athlete.

So he's progressing at a good pace. Mark, as you alluded to, and we're going to get into it later with these rookie minicamps, everyone thinks that everyone is awesome at this stage. But the Vikings, perhaps they need Teddy Bridgewater to pan out for them to have any chance. Well, I mean, some teams are getting massacred

on the media front for, you know, hedging about, the quarterbacks they drafted and where they'll wind up in September. The Vikings can't say that about them. Everything coming out of Minnesota tells us they want Bridgewater to be their guy from week one on and who can blame them. Well, teams handle these first round quarterbacks in a couple different ways. They either say he's got to earn every rep in practice,

and for now he is the number three quarterback, and any movement he makes is going to be up. Or you can just be upfront and honest about it the whole time instead of playing this game and say, we're going to give him some first team reps. Castle will get some first team reps. Christian Ponder will probably get some first team reps. Who's that? But why even pretend that he's not in the mix?

He's in the mix right away. It's good to see. He's got a shot now for week one. Has any quarterback fell from Grace in a faster manner than Christian Pomer? He's almost like an NFL afterthought. Last year he was like their guy and he had the great week 17 and they had the high hopes. Now he's like not even an option anymore. I think of though Ponder's been on.

lightning rod for criticism from the very beginning with the way he plays. Well, Dan asked the question, has any quarterback fallen from Grace faster? There is a correct answer to this. I'm wondering, Mark, if you're, you could guess the same wavelength that I... I know where you're going to. I could think of five quarterbacks in Cleveland, you know, in the last 10 years. Yeah, there was a quarterback that a certain Mr. Hansis was predicting 4,000 yards for going into last season, Mr. Brandon Whedon.

Listen, that was a personal fall for. I thought you were going with Mark Sanchez, actually. Well, how about Tim Tebow? Yeah. Yeah, but he was terrible. Come on, society. We all knew that. All right, this is news from Friday, but we didn't get a chance to touch on it.

Then Indianapolis Colts outside linebacker, Robert Mathis, was suspended four games for violating the league's performance enhancing drug policy. Mathis released a statement through NFL media insider Ian Rappaport in which Mathis said the fail test came from, and this is the worst one, fellas, taking fertility drugs. Tough break for the cults. This is a big time player. His explanation was so in depth and just everything that you know about Mathis and the fact that he and his wife are now pregnant

and they've had twins before. I usually don't give the benefit of the doubt. It doesn't really matter if we're giving the benefit of the doubt or not, but this is one that it seemed to be believable. Is that fair to say? I would agree with you. I mean, we, and when we were just sort of learning piece by piece on Friday as the news was coming out and the details, it lined up that Mathis was, had a very detailed account about why he believed this was an incorrect ruling.

I agreed with him. Here's the thing, though. They had a problem at that position before this suspension. They, who are their pass rushers other than Robert Mathis? He is so valuable to that team because they're trying to trot out Eric Walden and their, first round pick from a year ago, Bjorn Werner, who hasn't done anything yet, and they're not sure if he's really passionate. So it's a big loss for them, is my big takeaway. Especially, and they play Denver, week one, and it was Mathis primarily that put Peyton Manning on the ground. Last

time they played, I think that he completely disrupted Manning's play. The Colts don't have anything special at any layer of their defense when you take him away. 19 and a half sacks last season. I don't like that defense. It's supposed to be a defensive. type of team with Pagano and if you just look up and down it's not it's not a defense to get excited about especially if Mathis is out finally we went this far into the news and I was starting to get nervous nothing about the Browns but Mark pulled it off Greg Little the former Browns wide receiver cut by the team last week how did I what I had to not pull this lever I didn't actually happen as we were starting the show claimed on waivers by the Oakland Raiders

Greg Little, former Brown, now a current Raider. Good job, Mark. I would classify that as a Raiders story. Well, is Greg Little going to be on that roster week one? Well, talk about a team without a whole lot special at the position. They've got James Jones. Denarius Moore. We're still waiting for DeNarious Moore to become that guy, though, right?

Rod Streeter. He's got a pretty good chance to make the team, I would say, as a fourth or fifth wide receiver. After that, it gets grisly. Well, they tried Josh Cribbs last season, so I'm sure a year from now they'll... Another former brown. Just keep going down that road. Al Davis is, you know,

not been with us now for a couple years, but they still sign these guys that feel like they would fit in on Al Davis teams. They used to major in receivers that are physically talented but could not catch the ball, which seems like a factor. And Greg Little would...

It fits that mold, right? All right, gentlemen. I mean, do we have more to say on Greg Little? Let's be honest. I'm stunned. He made it into the docket on the news front. We got all angles covered. Greg Little, Jenny McCarthy, Robert Mathis, everything on the docket.

Moving forward. We mentioned Mark, rookie camp, whispers. You wrote up a bunch of little nuggets based on your glancing around the league. So we figure we'll throw it to Mark now. And Mark can maybe, you know, mention a couple of things that he read and wrote about and we will then make comments based off what Mark says, and that's how podcasts work.

Whispers. The reason I actually put this together was because on a Sunday morning, all these beat writers suddenly have on-field observations to make and they're talking to coaches. Everything is exceedingly and painfully positive. Not a single negative word, about any rookie draft that everyone's an all-star.

Well, all the rookies practiced over the weekend for the most part. Almost every team, about three quarters of the league, had their rookie minicam. So they were out there for the first time.

I think for fans, it's something to get excited about. It is exciting because suddenly you're getting some return on the guy that you went out and picked last week in the draft. The thing I saw Saturday night

that jumped out for me because the Arizona Cardinals, interesting offense under Bruce Ariens, they drafted this guy, John Brown, who you look at what Ariens did in Indianapolis when he had T.Y. Hilton. John Brown is, they're calling him an explosive sudden player who has the same 4-3-4 speed as T.Y. Hilton and almost exactly the same build.

And they're going to dip him into that offense that already has some very interesting receiving talent. I like him. He's on my radar all of a sudden. He's on gold standards radar too. Totally. Big John Brown. On your radar too. Yeah, been all over it. We're doing a series on the site projecting starting lineups for week one around the league.

And for the Cardinals, I had Ted Ginn in there as their third receiver. It's logical. But now this John Brown guy, if you think about what they're doing, Ginn almost works better as a return guy and a number four. If this John Brown gives him anything with Fitzgerald and Michael Foote. And Dan came flying into the office today to point out that I had spelled the school he went to incorrectly. Pittsburgh State telling me that I'd left the H off. No H. And he came from Pittsburgh State in Kansas. No H. You know what? I really gave you a lot of credit for getting

that right. And I'm sorry for ever judging you or questioning your abilities. If we had a power rankings of the least amount of typos, Sessler might be number one, I think. I'm not sure that's true at all. He's pretty clean. I've talked to the desk. And they consistently He only said that Mark and I put forth the cleanest copy. This is true if we're going to talk about it. It's just throwing himself in there, too. And then somewhere Wes and Greg, you know, I've heard Greg's making a lot of improvements as time has gone on. What about Patra?

He didn't even mention him. Patra's solid. He's just steady. That's what I hear. That's what I hear. I need to talk to your stories. Clean copy does not equal compelling copy. Whispers.

Here's one interesting thing that I want to just say about this whole rookie camp thing. and I think a lot of people get sucked into these initial things and we're getting excited about John Brown now, leaving the Cardinals in 2014. Two words, Tyler Wilson, Raiders quarterback. I believe it was the rookie camp last year where there was a lot of buzz about him being there a week one starter and being the future in Oakland,

a fourth round pick, and he wasn't even on the team by about six or seven weeks. That's fair. That's fair. In the season. Doug Morone had a good quote which speaks to what you're talking about, talking about Sammy Watkins, who dominated, as you'd expect over the weekend. He said he's a first-round pick.

If I came out here and he dropped five balls and he fell down five or ten times would be pissed. Sammy Watkins dominated a bunch of undrafted guys and fifth-round picks. He's Sammy Watkins. Mark, spin us through Berea and the Johnny Mansell circus. Well, I like this. Someone came away with one comment about Mansell calling him Tiny. That's a great characteristic to have. That's all this one beatwriter came away with just a tiny figure, a tiny individual.

Like six inches tall? I don't know. I mean, well, comparing him basically to the rookie running back, Terence West, who did break a little news mentioning that he was or his agent was on the phone with the Ravens who wanted to draft West five spots later, which reminds me of another ill-fated scenario, which we reported on how the Ravens wanted Brady Quinn as well. I hope this one works out a little better for this team.

Did we, are the Brown's reporters allowed to talk about Mianzell? Are they, is that? They're fully, they, from what I saw from the footage, they were fully allowed in the building and on the sideline. Do we have any proof through this weekend, Mark, that Tom Savage is a real person? I've seen none. Although there was a post written about Tom Savage,

I believe by Kevin Patcher, I think, a day earlier on Saturday. So is that proof? It leads us closer to proof. And how about my boy, Jets rookie tight end, Jay Samarro, told reporters he, quote, wants to be a tight end that catches 100 balls a year, a bang, which is great. Although I do remember Kellynne Winslow Jr. saying something very similar last summer. Yeah. That didn't work out.

They always like saying 100 passes. I've noticed that rookies or free agent pickups, I'm going to catch 100. Not many people are catching 100 passes. Jace. Why don't we set these goals a little more reasonable? We'll start at 60. 50 would be great. 50 would be nice, too, and we'll see where we go from there.

But Rex Ryan, according to the Mark Sessler Post here, Whisper. Set offensive coordinator Marty Morninwig, quote, thinks we've got a new toy and we're trying to feature him. I'm very excited about the Jace era, and I don't want him to bite into hashtag Cumbies production or playing time, but I think there's enough room for both of them, because I don't know if Amaro could block it all,

but it sounds like he can catch. Not to burst your bubble dam, but I actually just made that bullet up. Oh. That speaks to an integrity issue for you. So that multiple quotes, Marty Morningweg quotes too, you made those up as well.

I'm not sure. All right, give me one more mark, and then we're going to move on. The most absurd quote of the weekend coming from New Redskins coach Jay Gruden, who took a look at a fifth round wide-out Ryan Grant and said that he plays all. already like a 10-year veteran.

Come on. Give me a break. How tiresome. It is a little bit tiresome. It's like these kids, they don't know anything. I don't care what you look like. Come on. Let's be fair.

Maybe this speaks to Gruden's struggles to evaluate talent in Cincinnati. He thinks Sandy Dalton looks like a Super Bowl champion. Greg firing shots from the corner of the room. There was a second of empty air, so I just felt it had to be filled with something. That's good. All right, so gentlemen, I really enjoyed both of you guys, wrote great pieces on rookie players, rookie skill players on offense. Mark on wide receivers, you asked, you know, you kind of laid it out who will gain the most yards in 2014.

Greg, in a different around-the-league post, which you could find on NFL.com backslash ATL. You get all our posts in a neat scroll function. Wrote about which rookie running backs will get the ball the most. So I guess that's a touches. prediction from Greg. So why don't we get into this? Because I'm very curious who's going to make an instant impact. We'll start with the running backs.

Greg, you are the boss. Tell us who is the leader in the clubhouse for most touches as a rookie? Well, my Bishop Sanky love has been repetitive on this program. Highly. If you look at all the rookie running backs, there's no one else that's really set up to get over 250 touches. I have Sanky at 275, and I think that's conservative. He could be over 300, but I'm kind of hearkening back to my old days at Roto World. Fantasy projections.

That's basically what this is. And to me, Sanky, he was the leader by far more than 100 touches over any other rookie that I wrote down. I think he's going to get the ball a ton and be a factor. I'm curious how many running backs in the last 10 years have gotten over 300 touches in a rookie season. Greg has the answer right here. Go, go. 17. No, I have no idea.

What did Gio Bernard had last year? Zach Stacey did last year. So there's one. I think you, did he? Gold standard behind the glass. Can you do some research and find out Gio Bernard's touch total? It would be under 300.

Yeah. Who else, Mark, in the... Excuse me. Who else, Greg, do you see getting, let's say, more than 130 touches? Well, the number two on the list was Mark's boy. We just talked about Terence West. And I think if you're in fantasy leagues,

I'm sure this isn't a news flash. He's going to be someone that's a sleeper. He won't even be a sleeper. He's going to be a very popular guy because you look at their situation, they want to run the ball, have a young quarterback. You have Ben Tate who may or may not be a true lead back, may or may not stay healthy. And this guy, West, he looks like a Kyle Shanahan type of back.

You're excited about him. Well, I mean, he ran behind the same. They have to find running backs with zone blocking scheme experience. And when he was drafted, he's from Tauson. and there are a couple of their assistants are too, and I guess some of the Brown staff stood up in... Pipeline and Towson. I don't know.

They sang the Towson fight song, so I think, you know, there's a lot of in-house sense that this guy's going to play a role. I agree with you, Greg. He is being compared to Alfred Morris in some circles. Gotta like that. I like this concept of, like, circles of men and women

standing around comparing Terrence West to Morris, please. Best running back in... Towson history. I'll throw it out to you. I know the answer. I just want to see if you guys do. Are you serious? Yeah. I'm going to go Terrence West, just because he's the only one I know. I'm going to go Walter Fratz. All right. That's incorrect. The answer is David Meggett. Dave Meggett. I'm going to give the nod to West. I'm sticking with my answer. All right. Give us one more and then we're going to swing over to wide receivers.

Well, I think Andre Williams is a guy who I have number three on the list who could be an even deeper sleeper in fantasy. League, because you look at his situation right now, and who does he have to beat out? They signed Rashad Jennings, who's bounced around the league, does not get me excited at all. They have Peyton Hillis, forget him, might as well be off the team at this point. David Wilson, we don't know if he's ever going to play again. Meanwhile, Williams, he's from Boston College, just like Tom Coughlin likes it, and he's the type of running back Coughlin dreams of. These pounding guys on the first couple downs breaks a lot of tackles.

He seems like a guy who could emerge from the fourth round to surprise a lot of people. I like that. The only thing there with New York is they don't often, with their rookie running backs, use them that much. Brandon Jacobs was a factor as a rookie, maybe not 150 carry type of factor. But this is a team that always talks about wanting to return to the running game and they haven't been able to do it. and he seems like a guy that his skills will translate and he could be on the field a lot.

And one name I found interesting just because Greg, you are such a huge fan of the inconvenient truth, Frank Gore. Carlos Hyde, you have him flirting with 100 touches as a rookie. Yeah, you know, that's 70 runs, maybe 20 catches or, yeah, that's a backup type of level. Kendall Hunter will be a factor there. There's a lot of backups in this draft.

I mean, Trey Mason should be a clear backup. Jeremy Hill and Cincinnati will see what, He does Jerich McKinnon in Minnesota. He'll probably be Adrian Peterson's backup, Khadim Carey in Chicago. A lot of true backups, not a lot of guys that should be challenging to start. And then fresh from the Goldman Elias Sports Bureau,

Benard, Gio Bernard, had 226 touches last year. And then just a bunch of info from a gold standard. Force that combined 44 mistackles, hashtag elusive, hashtag slippery, hashtag like budda. This is all stuff that Zach just sent to me on his. sent messenger. There you go. Gold standard. Stepping up big. Total package. Total package is a producer.

Zach Stacy, by the way, 276 touches, so fell just short of 300 last year. All right, Mark, which rookie receiver will gain the most yards in 2014? I looked at this the way, Greg, did it? I think part of it is fit and what else you're competing against the system, blah, blah, blah. Brandon Cooks for the New Orleans Saints to me just stands out as a guy. A, you've got a franchise quarterback there. You've got a coach that knows how to use players that are young and get them

their talents out. Cooks is a guy that I think is going to see a lot of touches based off of where Darren Sprouls would have in space set up to win. I think they've basically told them before they drafted him. If we take you, you're going to see, I think he said an instant contributor was the

quote or something like that over the weekend. So I think Cooks is my number one pick close behind him. Is it? Oh, go ahead. Mike Evans, Tampa Bay. That's a bold choice, Cook's number one. That's very bold. And I'm going to say you have Evans at number two with the Buccaneers.

It makes sense there. But Sammy Watkins, a lot of people say he's the best wide receiver prospect since Megatron. You're putting them at number three here. You think it's not going to happen immediately, and I think I know where you're going with this. Well, the minute you publish something like this, you got people hitting you up saying, why are you saying Sammy Watkins isn't the best wide receiver? Why are you saying that Sammy Watkins isn't the best wide receiver? people from Buffalo so much, Mark.

And women. The question was, who will have the most women? What is the, really going to know with that? From earlier. The view, it's a callback. I think the view is insulting to thinking women. The view is insulting to thinking women. That's what I would say.

To recap, Mark, it's called the callback in the industry. Okay, go ahead. Wow, we put him on the defensive here. No, he's frazzled. I don't like the spin on the view because the view is an insult to women who think critically about the earth. That's fair. All right.

That's a pretty logical take. Sammy Watkins, number three on your list, Mark. I think Watkins might be the most talented receiver here. I mean, that's not that it's that. Who's your quarterback in that system? Do we even know that E.J. Manuel's going to be the starter five weeks in? And is that a team that isn't going to have three or four different quarterbacks play like it did last year? Here's one thing I think, and if you're correct with your assumption here or prediction,

that Kelvin Benjamin will be the sixth most productive rookie wide receiver. I think that's very bad news for the Carolina Panthers who need an instant impact from him. One thing to mention that of the 28 wide receivers picked last year, they averaged as a group 246 yards. Bad class, though, for skill players. It's just not a position, though, that you often see rookies come out and dominate early. you know, Keenan Allen was the only guy

that crossed a thousand yards last season. I think we need a bigger, you know, sample size. In general, wide receiver. But it takes, right? I mean, it's longer for a wide receiver. Yeah. I mean, I think it's hard to make an impact right away. When we get down to the Kelvin Benjamin and Beckham at 6 and 7,

we're looking at maybe four or 500 yards. See, if I did this list, I'd have Beckham much higher. I think he has a chance, a chance, to be a pretty big impact player. Whereas Jordan Matthews and Cody Latimer, to me they have a bigger uphill climb to instant relevance. Who knows how Beckham will translate, but I think the Giants would love it if he was their number two receiver right away. With Jordan Matthews, Kelly's already said he's going to be a starter in the slot,

and I look at that Riley Cooper's numbers from last season tell me that an average receiving talent can be pumped up statistically, and that's why I put him for. You got a sleeper on this list, Mark, and maybe we'll do this as the last one. Paul Richardson, the Seattle Seahawks, you have him as a guy that makes the top 10 here. If I could go back and make a change on this list, I might put Devante Adams for Green Bay in at number 10 or even higher because, you know, Green Bay, that's a team that gets a lot of receiver production. But so do the Seahawks and Richardson's a super fast, deep threat kind of guy.

And I kind of think that he could have two or three big games yardage-wise at the end of the year and be at the nine or ten spot yardage-wise. I think he's got a chance. I was just doing that NFC West Dept chart starting lineups, and I thought, okay, so they drafted Richardson to replace Doug Baldwin eventually. He's that sort of receiver. Then you have Sidney Rice, who they were fine if he left. So I don't know if he's going to be much of a factor at all.

Then you have Percy Harbin, who's never healthy. Richardson could wind up being on the field and be a pretty big factor. All right. Good job, fellas. Except for the Cook's part. Cook's number one. That would be an upset. We should go back to this one, because if you get that one right, that will truly have been a Sessler.

That's a Sessler right there. We'll see. Sessler. And whispers. That background music, that's where Wes has been, I think, for the last two or three days. He's been up in the Big Sur Wilderness. You know, I don't, I'm not ashamed to say that I had some. wonders or some negative thoughts about how this weekend would play out.

But now that I had no idea this was going into the next week, this could really be, this could be the start of something big for Chris Wesley. I'm talking wedding, Tybee Island. We're all there. We're doing the podcast there at the reception. You've done a complete 180 off of your last predictions about this. When a weekend trip extends to Monday, it changes the game.

Okay. Yeah. All right. Before we go, I just wanted to touch on one last bit of news. It could have put it in the news, but I wanted to give it its own separate area. The Seahawks running back Marshawn Lynch is set to star in his own biographical film about life growing up in Oakland titled Family First. And the always verbose Lynch told the San Jose Mercury News, just trying something new. All right.

Well, he's trying something to a movie. So I asked my wife, Emily, the beautiful. And expecting Emily Hansis, who works in casting for a major network, I'll say that, in Los Angeles. If there was an Around the League podcast movie, a biography about life growing up in Culver City, who would play each of the roles because we wouldn't play ourselves. You know, we're not complete egotist like Seth McFarlane. You know, we're going to get somebody to play us. We're not going to play them ourselves.

little Seth MacFarlane family guy burn deal with it while you sleep on your billion dollars all right so I'll just go through the list real quick and this is unimpeachable because it comes from a professional and also my wife so you know be respectful Chris Wesleying who's not here

anybody want to take a guess and gold standard you can as well has to be someone that's somewhat misanthropic if that's a word. Jason Statham. It's funny. That's a good one.

Emily chose Woody Harrelson. I like that. Yeah, that's a great one. Yeah, that's perfect. See, that's why she gets the big bucks and you couldn't come up with anyone. I initially thought in my mind maybe Billy Bob Thornton. But then Harrison came and I thought that Harrison, especially after seeing true detective, you can handle them.

A little old. Well, they're both a little old to say the least. Yeah, that's true. See, I would have gone, were you alive, Philip Seymour Hoffman? Oh, interesting. I don't know. I don't think they have the... Well, he can do anything.

He could do anything. Yeah, I guess that's true. He could play you. Greg Rosenthal. How about Greg? What do you think? Well, Greg and planted a thought into my mind on this front at another time, which basically Kevin Arnold Wonder Years, I can't go anywhere else after he drew that.

Fred Savage. Yeah, Fred Savage is to me an ideal pick. That's the worst pick he could possibly have. Why? Well, he got Winnie Cooper and all that. wouldn't mind being him as a character, but I don't know about Fred Satt. He hasn't been in a lot of things. Part of it is a question of likeness, not where he is at his career.

There is a likeness in theory between you, and that's not an insult, by the way. I get that from Twitter a lot. In a perfect world, Seth Cohen of the O.C., you've gotten that before, right? I've gotten that a lot. He's very handsome guy. I'll take that. Seth Cohen, I like. I don't really have one.

I would say early, early Michael J. Fox. Okay. Basically, we're just looking. for short actors. Oh, no, there's a lot of short actors. No, but Michael J. Fox, that's nice. A talent evaluator, casting associate, said Ben Stiller. It's interesting.

Interesting. Well, the casting person is also thinking box office. Right. Especially, like, reality bites Ben Stiller, I would say. Because she asked, like, is what about ages? I said, you could be a little bit. That was met with crickets, though. Let's be honest.

That was, we're still pondering that. That's fair. I like it. Listen. Listen, I guess you can't hit all home runs. Mark Sessler, around the league writer and also podcast, stalwart. Mark Sessler, any thoughts? First one that came to my mind was James Franco, and I don't know why, but that's what came to mind for me.

I could see that. I could see that. I was going to go Emil Hirsch. That's a very good one. Do you know who that is? Yes, he played into the wild. Yeah, I think that's why. I just imagine Mark going into the

Wow, that's basically the connection. I'm going Estabez. Amir Omeo Estabez. Mighty Deaths star. I don't know if that's good or not, but I enjoy it. Who's like 55 right now, I think. All right, this one was... I like that Emily chose such an unlikable star for me, too.

That shows where her bind's at. I got it. What do you mean, Ben Still is unlikelyable? It's a little unlikable, I think, to the average person. Is this going to end with me losing my job? Casey Affleck was her first thought And that she thought about it a little more And she said

She wanted to go with Jacquesine Phoenix And her explanation Joaquin Stupid name And asked why And this is her quote on Instant Messenger A lot of layers there I liked that Emily

When it came to my role Had to came up with an answer Then it had to stop Reboot the machine Think deeper about it And come back with something else I don't know what it says about Sessler But, you know

The other options Throwing out one or two It's like Sessler we can think of five or six good ones Maybe He's a shape shifter Yeah Zach Goldman The gold standard behind the glass

Emily does not really know you enough So I didn't really She didn't want to venture a guess with you It's totally all right But I did come up with one The Kid from Almost Famous Oh I like that I like that

What's his name? That is his name Legally change his name. To the kid. I'm going to go with Emil Hirsch again. Is that the kid from Almost Famous, though? No. Is that the same person?

No. It's not the same person. That's good. That's a good one, though. I've gotten Breckenmeyer quite a bit. Oh. Not sure that that's ever a good thing, but God, no. Road trip star, Breckenmeyer.

That is unfair. And also not accurate. Also, helicopter pilot and rat race. Tons of big roles for that guy. And like 17 failed sitcoms, Breck and Meyer. Kind of love it. Kevin Patrick are coming at you, our Chicago correspondent, ATL writer. Emily has not really gotten to know Kevin at all either, so she didn't want to venture a guess.

Lucky for you. Yeah. Unlucky for Emily. Patra is a great character. But we will take a shot at it, right? Why don't we? And I would like, I'll throw this one out there because I was thinking about it downstairs. Somebody a little salt to the earth, kind of masculine.

Mark Wahlberg. I like that. I can't top that. That fits. That's good. I can't think of anything except for Jake Johnson in the movie Drinking Buddies. So that's really just a character. The new girl star, Jake Johnson.

That's my choice. But I could totally see that because they kind of have some personality traits that they share as well. Salt of the Earth, but also salty. Salty. There's something sitting out there in my mind. and I feel like we've kind of missed the boat on this one. I'm coming for your job, Emily, with that one. Oh, yeah.

And then finally, my wife said I was John Hamm. All right, so, moving forward, come on. What? John Hamm. Well, we'll allow it because it is your wife. What's wrong with that? Is that really it, or is that your joke? Listen, she said that, and I think she just didn't want to go down that row with me, and I understood it.

Okay. You know, the best casting decisions she ever made in her life, casting you as a husband. We all tilt a lot older. Is this us, like, in seven or eight years on the podcast? I said you could be kind of keep it flexible at the age. I would have maybe for you, and this is going to go straight to your head. Sure. Baldwin.

Well, he's my spirit animal. I kind of think, hey, I'm thinking box office, too. Well, it can't go more to his head than John Hamm. She basically chose, like, whose university accepted as, like, from a guy friend. Let's be clear that I knew exactly what the score was when she wrote that. That did not go to my head. That was like, okay, we can keep moving. Another Hollywood film with no female roles.

Yeah. Is there like a website, right? I'm the vanguard on that front. It can tell us who we. Oh, we should look into that. We should do that and then we'll post the results. Anyway, that was the casting of the ATL move. Well done by Emily.

Yeah, thank you, Emily. And we are getting out of here now. We will be back on Wednesday with another show. Wes will probably be back. He might be wearing a wedding band. We don't know what's going on with West. We'll find out and we'll talk more about the NFL and all the news that's going on

and anything else that comes to mind. Until then, this is Dan Hansa signing off for the sizzler, the boss, and the gold standard behind the glass. Until Wednesday. We threw it back at you. Oh, right, in your face. Yeah, a disgrace in your face.

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 Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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