NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - NFL ATL: Who has the NFL's best offense?

Episode Date: August 6, 2014

A room full of heroes -- Dan Hanzus, Gregg Rosenthal, Chris Wesseling and Marc Sessler -- react to the latest NFL news including the Browns QB battle, the rise of Teddy Bridgewater and more. The guys also debate the best offensive team this season and answer your mailbag questions.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. The Around the League podcast keeps defensive coordinators up at night. Welcome back to another edition of the Around the League podcast. My name is Dan Hansis and I'm joined by a room filled with heroes, Chris Wessling, Mark Sessler, and Greg Rosenthal. What up, boys? Hey, Dan. We're in very odd surroundings. We're in the new studio.

This feels like, and look at TD, behind the glass, actually behind the glass. Dancing. Dancing. I can't even see TD right now. That's sad. This seems like a set that they reclaimed from Demolition Man. And they're like, oh, we're going to toss this out. And then the NFL stepped in and Rod was like, wait a second, we got to redo the studio for the podcast, guys.

Let's move that in here. So it has a post-apocalyptic type feel. It's cool. Very sci-fi, which means if there was a movie made about this podcast, TD, would watch it. Well, they're not quite done with it, and they're going to continue to build it, and they've got cameras in here, and sooner than... A huge television, too.

Sooner than later, people will get to watch the Around the League podcast, but not for a couple weeks. We are now spaced out like a spread offensive line. Yeah. And it's about, you know, there's a couple yards in between each one of us. It's not nearly as intimate. We're going to have to overcome this. We're sitting.

We were standing for the past month or so. So, yeah, very exciting. And, of course, I hope you can hear it. The microphones are all better. This is just a better setup for... professional podcasting. And that's what we are. When you remember that we are the best of 2013 iTunes,

and we won a damn Stitcher. And people need to remember that. A Stitcher Award. A Stitcher Award. Stitcher is an app. Where is that Stitcher Award, TD? I don't know, guys. No idea.

There's a physical one. Usually when you win an award, you would have one. Yeah, we're looking into it. Okay. Anyway, so we have a very nice show today. We're very excited to be back in Studio 66, and we're going to get back into the studio. In a special way, we're going to invite the fans and the listeners into the studio in a way because we're bringing back the mailbag over the last couple of days.

I said some tweets out from the Around the League account asking for questions. The listeners, as they always do, came through with dozens and dozens of questions, so we're going to pick some of them and answer them. We're also going to get into a little bit of a debate. an instant debate, if you will, to take a line from NFL.com, the instant debate series they have up. The current one is the, what is the most explosive offense in 2014? Is that? The most, who will have the most prolific offense in the league?

Prolific offense in the league. So we're going to go around the horseshoe here, or the U. Seating arrangement is going to take a while to get used to, and talk about who we think we'll have the most prolific offense in 2014. Before any of that, though, we're going to check back in with TD behind the glass. You look like a man who's almost like you found your way home. You're like Tom Hanks after they rescued him off the island and you're finding peace. But it's an uneasy piece. I'm excited.

You know, you guys are talking about the studio. It looks good. It's not a finished product yet. So let the people know. It's going to be a lot of... It is not a finished product yet. Not a finished product. It's not done.

What would you call this death setup? A horseshoe, a V? I think it's a space-age horseshoe for like a horse that just made half out of computer parts Boomerang There we go, boomerang Let's do some news Really? Really? Really?

Yes. Oh! I love that. That, of course, from Hard Knocks, the season premiere on NFL.com slash ATL, you could read My Hard Knocks Recap from episode one and then Greg Rosenthal will be taken over next week

and writing episode by episode we're going to do everyone to review you should watch it's the best football documentary of all time very, very nice work there TD. Love me some hard knocks again my NFL career started with NFL films and those great guys they put that show together on HBO but what's up with that rookie Smith man

that linebacker rookie who's just like he just going at him he's like the villain he's just going at him like he doesn't care yeah like he's the honey badger he's the new honey badger basically he doesn't care there are a lot of interesting characters I know I think I'm the only one in the room right now that's seen the episode

Hard Knocks my favorite show on TV but I had a rare opportunity to have social interaction last night I did that and so I'll be watching it tonight and I hate taking over the recaps it's one of my favorite things we have all year but Dan will not be with us we believe next week because of the arrival

of his first child so that's going to be exciting Elvis I don't know we cannot say what the name is yet I've been told sworn to secrecy, but boy, Hansis is all I can tell you. And it will take me out of the picture for a little while, but I plan to return. I'm going to tell me, you don't have to tell me if I'm right or wrong, but you can kind of just look at me and let me know. All right, for the kid's name, Sanchez.

If this was 2009, it could have actually been a play. How about Sean Green? Sanchez Hansis, that kind of has a rings to it. He'd be the second person that named his son after a failed quarterback. Yes. or Sessler named his son Colt after Colt McCoy. That, you are a factory offended. You are talking about my child, TD.

Awkwardness. I love it. You know what? Unprofessional. The Minnesota Vikings' quarterback competition is real and it's spectacular. Teddy Bridgewater to get first team reps on Friday in the Vikings' preseason opener against the Oakland Raiders. Vikings coach Mike Zimmer made the announcer official with the quote,

Teddy will get some reps with the first team. Yes, we have Matt Castle, we have Teddy Bridgewater. We've talked about it over the last couple of weeks. Who's going to come out on top? The room seems to think Teddy Bridgewater will, and it looks like he's going to have every opportunity to do it. Gentlemen. The way this has been going, I guess it's not a big surprise,

but the Vikings did not plan to have Teddy Bridgewater taking starter snaps in the first preseason game. So because he's played so well in practice, they want to give him as good a chance as possible to win the job. I mean, again, they took him in the first round. They moved up to take him in the first round. Norv Turner, the question was, would it be a match with Norv Turner? Turner is the guy that I think lobbied behind the scenes to get him to Minnesota after working with him before the draft. He seems like a good fit.

He's raving over Bridgewater. And I never, again, in the month of April or May, want to write a post or believe any message that tells me a quarterback's going to sit in the entire rookie year. It's nonsense. We fall forward every year. This guy's going to be played. He's going to play by week one. If he struggles in the preseason, he won't start. By week one, you're saying it's over.

He's got to go out there and really struggle. Right? Do you agree? Yeah, absolutely. I don't think any of these quarterback competitions have anything to do with the veterans. It's all on how the rookies play in the preseason games. Well, if Bridgewater struggles, he won't be the starter week. He's got to play well.

So he has six quarters of time that he'll actually be in the game before they make decision, maybe even less, maybe four quarters or so in the first two weeks and they have to make a decision. Well, with Matt Castle, there's a chance that he's a bigger disaster than whatever struggles we're pitting on the rookie, too. Well, one thing I feel like we know about Matt Castle is he's at the very least a capable backup and he's unlikely to be a disaster. That's why they brought him back because they believed he could at least hold things down.

I don't think they're in a disaster mode if Teddy Bridgewater isn't ready. Well, we got these preseason games coming up this week. Bridgewater, to me and Mansell and maybe less. Les of Gino. Those are the main guys to watch this week because Bridgewater played two quarters. Mansell play half the game and those snaps are going to go a long way towards determining what we see in week one. They will. John Middilcoff, former scout tweeted last week that really preseason games are 85 to 90% of the evaluation on quarterbacks

and practices are about 10% of the evaluation. Chicago Bears tight end Martellis Bennett. We saw him a lot during the summer on NFL AM. when we were in the office, he appeared, I think he was like a regular on that show. Everything seemed to be good. He's a jovial type. But there are some issues in an embarrass camp. His lackadaisical attitude has reportedly rubbed some officials within the organization the wrong way.

And then on Monday, he threw Kyle Fuller down to the ground, their first round pick, a move that angered the team enough that GM Phil Emery announced that Bennett had been fined and suspended an undetermined amount of time for conduct detrimental to the team. Not good there for Martellus Bennett, who's in a weird spot with a team now. I think Wesleyan, on Twitter yesterday, put this very well. Not the type of conduct we would see from a team of ATL. No, not at all. We don't sanction that. It's too bad because that offense is pretty fun to watch, or it should be. Wait, we're eliminating the Bears as a option because...

It's just a bullet point. It's not something we would smile on necessarily. I don't really care that he's a little lazy and... practice and throws a guy over for a team of ATL. It's pretty minor. No, I was kidding about that. The debilitating factor is they have Jay Cutler as their quarterback. Oh, there we go.

You hit me with a dagger. That's not so easily fixed. Well, it's apparently not just this one incident throwing Fuller. It's the fact that they try to run an up-tempo practice and they're always waiting for Martellis Bennett to get to the snap. Imagine how annoying that would be. They're saying like 23 guys are running. to get ready for the next nap and then they're waiting an extra three or four seconds

and I'm just imagining Bennett, you know, strutting up there thinking what, you know, funny jokes he's going to say on NFL AM the following morning. That would get frustrated. It's like Shaquille O'Neal, the Phoenix Sun Jeeers. They also, there also was a report, not verified that there was a previous altercation with Brandon Marshall during camp. So it was a couple of altercations. And it's weird because he should be a leader on that team in terms of the money.

he's getting paid and they need him with Marquez Wilson now out he got surgery this week you know they need Bennett to step up let's check in Cleveland where Johnny Mansell worked with the number ones the first team this week Mike Petton announced that Brian Hoyer would be starting the opening preseason game which is not a surprise but Mansell could see some snaps with the first team on Saturday as for Mansell's behavior some good promising signs I guess out of camp where one Browns player told Mike Freeman a bleacher report that, quote, none of us have seen the crazy Mansell. All we've seen is the professional Mansell.

And then another line, he's the fastest learner I've ever been around. So, Mark, I'll send it to you of the resident Brownsman. That sounds pretty promising. Yeah, I think in that same piece, there were other players that suggested that Mansell is maybe not the right guy to start them off. And, you know, and Wes pointed it out in what he wrote, too, that you don't have a quarterback competition if everyone 100% of the locker room thinks, no, no, this is the dude.

I think there's that faction that looks at, look at Hoyer is a hardworking veteran who's been around the league and he's really been around the league, just hasn't played much. And then you got Mansell, who maybe the younger players are gravitating to. You know, it's, again, the games will decide. I hate to beat a dead horse here, but it should be pointed out that these players, to a man all said he's been the most studious Brown's rookie. He's been totally 100% football since camp opened. So we don't need newspapers posting a photo of him in a tavern acting like he's not all about football.

That's interesting in this article, which I would recommend reading, played against everything you think about Mansell, because it pointed that out that he's had the right attitude. He's been studious, has been smart. And what he hasn't been is exciting. A lot of people are, a lot of the teammates are kind of waiting for that John. any football to come out. Those wow plays. There was a quote in here just skill level that he hasn't done anything to wow me. That was what a teammate said. And so those are the sort of plays. Maybe they only come out in games, but right now he's looked more like an ordinary quarterback. Charlie

Catherly said it too. When you watch Mansell in practice, he's not going to blow you over. No, totally agree with that. He's a game guy. That's when he will wow. You're not, I mean, you can't replicate game situations in a practice. It is August 6, 2014. This is going to, I'm to have a question for the room and T.D. West, you can sit this out. The question is, Will Chris Wessling eat his softball pants? August 6th. We'll start with Mark Sessler. He will not eat them. Greg Rosenthal. He's got to be eating them. T. Day. He will not eat him. Definitely. Not eat him.

Dan Hansis. I think you're eating them. The room is divided. Is it 2-2? Is that what just did? I cast the deciding vote, and I'm not eating them. Health-conscious mood. I mean, listen, it is wide open right now. But that's why I think he won't.

It is wide open. If they were going to decide today, he'd be in a whole lot of trouble because I think the coaches still would do the safe thing, but that's after a couple games, they're going to have no. You already hear Mike Patton saying, oh, he's starting to look good, he's catching up. He won't be. What else did we hear, though, Greg? We heard someone say or report that maybe he's not been looking that good this summer.

Well, the article... Do you mind if we wait until football is played? Yeah, I think that's fair. Well, it's coming. Don't worry, but we can talk about what's being reported on, right? But I just don't think it means much. That's what we do in this podcast. They, the teammates said, basically, they're waiting for the Johnny football to come out and practice.

They're waiting for some plays that you say, oh, wow, that's interest. They haven't seen why this guy is so hyped yet. And we'll get a chance on Saturday. on NFL Network. How's that for a plug? Oh, give me a break. It's football. It's live.

It's Johnny Manzo's first game. We've been honking about Johnny Mansell just talking about nothing for four months. You can't get excited for a game. The shadowy league figure just snuck into the room and patted Greg on the head. Gave him a lollipop and walked out. Okay. Don't watch the live football that's on our network. That'd be a terrible idea.

Also being constructed downstairs along with this studio. Greg's new shiny corner office that overlooks California landscapes. I like that. All right, moving on. Speaking of Greg, let's talk about his boy, Ryan Tannahill, who is entering a really, I wouldn't call it a make or break year.

That seems strong. But a very important year where we try to figure out what is Ryan Tannahill. There was a report that we did an ATL, a Miami Herald report in which it was reported that Tannhill is continuing to struggle with his deep ball accuracy. this with Mike Wallace, who's missing a lot of practice, again, with some hamstring issues,

so that's not helping matters. I wrote a post this morning where it broke down that he is among the NFL's worst, percentage-wise, deep-ball throwers last season. So that's a major part of his game. That's got to get better. I'm going to ask Greg Rosenthal, are you worried about the Ryan Tannahill experience as we enter year three? He's enigmatic right now. He's a bit of a mystery.

and there was a great article that you pointed to about his deep ball passing. Grantland did a deep dive looking at the fact that he's really good, a top five quarterback, according to QBR numbers, since he entered the league when he's outside the pocket, and he's a bottom five quarterback when he's inside the pocket. And that's tough to win that way. And he struggles when he gets pressured and you get pressured a lot in Miami. I'm a little worried, but I believe in his talent.

I still think he'll have a good year. So he plays quarterback like a converted wide receiver. A little bit. He plays like a lot of athletic quarterbacks over the years that couldn't sustain success, that they do their stuff outside the pocket. That deep ball thing, I don't know if we should read too much into that. We know he has the arm. We know they have a deep threat.

It's hard in football to kind of tear apart how much is that on him, how much is it on the offense, which is different this year. So it's kind of hard to tell. I mean, it's preseason in Wallace as a hamstring injury. I don't know that I'd be too worried about the deep ball. And, yeah, some of it's on the offense that Mike Sherman rolled out last year and a line that was decimated, went through chaos. You know, when you're a young quarterback on the run all day long,

it's going to be hard to be productive in the pocket. I don't care who you are. You haven't even brought out, I can't believe we made it this long without Mark mentioning Bill Laser. This is your chance. I think it is. But it's an offense that might take some of the heat off of him having to do, you know, as predictable as scheme.

They're going to take Mike Wallace and move him all over the place. They said they've looked, they've had some growing pains on the practice field as a team. Mark, true or false? Your third child will be named Laser. Laser assess. Lazor. You've already crossed the threshold that I'm having a third child. That in itself is a giant debate that does not trend towards yes at the moment.

Bill Barnwell in that Grantland piece had a good line that he feels like after 32 starts or whatever it's been for Tannahill, that we know less about him than almost any quarterback that started their first. two years. And I agree with that, that he could go in any direction, and it wouldn't surprise me. And no one's talking about Deanna Hill or the Dolphins right now. They feel as off the radar to me, I tweeted about this, than any Dolphins team since Cam Cameron in 0809, because you had Parcells, then you had the end of Sparano, which was, you know, dramatic. Jeff Ireland always got, you know, Fire Ireland, then you have hard knocks, you have the bullying last year, Mike Wallace, all the free agent money. Now no one, who cares about the dolphins right now? No one, no one's

talking about it. Only had they traded for Sam Bradford at one point, could they be less relevant to him. Very true. And it does show you, Tanahill shows you that when you invest in a quarterback at the top of the first round, how damaging it could be potentially if you don't get it right? Because you have to invest years in that guy trying to figure out if he's the answer or not. The Rams are doing the same thing with Sam Bradford. The Titans are wrapping up their Jake Locker experiment. I mean, you have to get these things right or it just dooms you to a When Mayock always called Tannahill a red shirt quarterback coming out of college. Now, I didn't think that that was necessarily played out to be true, but we still know nothing

more about it at this point. I love watching him. He could have a Jay Cutler-like career where guys like me are still believing in him seven or eight years from now where he does some good things, not others. I don't want this to go too long, but just around the room quickly. I've been thinking a lot about this this week. Which AFC East team do you think, if it wasn't going to be the Patriots, which one could win the division? Or which one could challenge them the most? Out of those three teams, they're pretty even. I will excuse myself from this as a fan of an AFC's team, but I can tell you where

my heart lies, and it's where Cumbie plays. I will leave it to Wes and Mark Sessler. You are going to be surprised by this, Dan, but I think it is clearly the Jets. Wow, I am surprised. They have the best defense in the league outside of the Patriots. Gino Smith has looked pretty good. If he doesn't work out, they can always turn to Vic. They have some interesting guys on offense this year.

And I just don't trust E.J. Manuel one bit. The dolphins are just blah. I'm with you. I want to go Buffalo because I think Buffalo's defense is extremely talented in many different layers, too. They lost Kiko. E.J. kills it for me. The Jets are the best coach team outside of New England and the division. I'm going New York.

Good job, guys. I can't decide. That's why I asked. I really see them. You could make a strong case for all three of them. I'm going to wait a couple weeks until we do our predictions. I can't make a strong case for the bills. I'm sorry, Patrick Shawley.

I don't have to answer it. The bills lost too much on defense, including a great coordinator. And their quarterback is the biggest question mark in the division. They're talented. By the way, half our podcast did not answer that question. Antonio Holmes is back on the NFL radar. NFL Media Insider Ian Rappaport reported that the free agent wide receiver who's been out of work since the Jets released them in March,

worked out for the Chicago Bears on Tuesday. The Browns also have said had some interest in Holmes, according to two sources, with knowledge of the situation. It doesn't look like he'll be signing with the Bears, however, that Chicago signed Greg Hurd on Wednesday, which tells you that the Chicago Bears when presented with the option of signing Santonio Holmes, or Greg Hurd, they chose.

Greg Hurd. They chose a guy. who does not even have a roto world football blurb over St. Antonio Home. Can you blame them? Can you tell me something about Greg Hurd? He's from a small college, and he's a nice guy. Wait, we have an expert in-house on all matters of low-level NFL prospects. Mark Sessler, your thoughts on Greg Hurd.

Well, I know less about Hurd than some of the other small guys as well, but he's got a little wiggle in the after-the-catch category. I think that's what they like about him. He's elusive. His injury history is clean, hasn't suffered more than a minor injury years ago in a nefarious college incident. I wish you weren't a liar.

Are his hands also interesting? I'm not going to put him up there with the gentleman we spoke about last time. Wiggins. Oh. I wish you weren't a liar. I just had a thumb through my rollo file here. I've got a lot of information. I love low-level scouting reports with Mark Sessler.

We might need the theme song for that. We do. We need a low-level scattering ports theme. What happened to San Antonio Holmes? Is he not healthy? Well, he was shot last year. He came back off that crazy foot injury, which was way more serious than anybody realized in terms of the recovery, the Liz Frank. And then he wasn't the same guy.

It wasn't moving well. It didn't seem particularly motivated. He caught about a third of the passes in his direction, which is horrible. Yeah. And he remains the only player, to my knowledge, ever kicked out of his own offensive huddle. Exactly. I mean, that's what it comes down to.

Former Super Bowl MVP, of course, but he's a 30-year-old malcontent. You know, 30 is not that old. Well, when you have only one working foot, then, you know, you have some mileage on you. Then you're Kaiser Sose trying to play wide receiver. You're a potential, you're a guy that's not who he used to be, and he's a potential locker room issue.

I get it. What did you think, Mark, when you heard the Browns have some interest in Mr. Holmes? It surprised me because it must have meant some sort of endorsement by Petten, who, coming away from reading the Jets book, we all read, Collision, I did not think that Petton would smile on the idea of bringing San Antonio Holmes around again. If Patton was interested in San Antonio Holmes, he would already be signed by the Browns. Well, unless they felt that they weren't as desperate for it until now.

But, yeah. And finally, Scott Mitchell, the former Detroit Lions quarterback, will be on the newest season of NBC. he's reality show, the biggest loser. The big lefty is a very big lefty now. The Portley Portsider. He now clocks in at 366 pounds, and he's one of the contestants on the show. Also on the show is another former NFL player, Damien Woody, an offensive lineman. But Scott Mitchell is the standout here, and I will be checking in on this program because Scotty Mitchell.

Does this mean we can use all the Jared Lorenzen nicknames for Scott Mitchell now? Fifty Lefty. Quarter got back. Scott Mitchell is a lot. Pillsbury throwboy. Also on the program, the top 10 lefties in NFL history somehow on NFL Network. Really? And while we're here.

Not a lot of good lefties, I guess. While we're here, we have some Breaking Lions news. We'll be quick about it. I know we've got to move along. They have waived Jonathan Baldwin while we're sitting in the studios. He did not pass a physical. The Jonathan Baldwin era in Detroit is over. Makes sense when we were seeing the Twitter reports from the Niners Beat guys,

one which was that he was what? Oh, if it was insanely lazy moving, like a, what was it? Like a man who hadn't had much sleep. Sleep deprived individual. Jonathan Baldwin's line's career already more memorable than his 49ers or chief's career. Wesleying, today you signed Baldwin or Santonio Holmes, sight unseen. Holmes. All right, let's move forward, gentlemen.

We'll save the mailbag for last. Just so I can party with him. We will now go around the room and figure this out. The NFL has many prolific offenses or teams that have the potential to be prolific. But only one team can have the title of the most prolific offense in the NFL. Instant debate on NFL.com you could read. You get the opinions of Wes and myself, Gil Brand, Charlie Casserly, Adam Schein, and Damashek, yes. So there are a lot of options there.

Mark and Greg sat that one out. You didn't take part in this instant debate. Let's hear from where it was happening. Yeah, no one told me about it. They only went to the heavy-headed. Come on, what's that? What's up with that? So, yeah, why don't we check in? We'll talk to the boss first.

Greg, who will have the most prolific offense in 2014? I never try to get cute with these questions. How is it, I don't know, how is it not Denver? It just seems like an obvious answer that I'm not going to think too hard about. Well, their most prolific offense in NFL history last year, and I like on paper what they did in the offseason better than what they had. Do you like Emmanuel Sanders better than Eric Decker? You have been disrespecting Eric Decker for years,

and I think it's absurd. I just don't want to overthink it. There's other great options that would be fun, but if I had to put some money down, that's not allowed here at the NFL, how is Broncos not the heavy favorite? I'm taking the favorite. The shadowy league figure just came back in the room

and took the lollipop back from Burma. Short-lived. Well, their quarterback is, is going on age 40. Oh, come on. He is. Is it 38? Yeah, going on age 40.

That's going on 40. Well, how many quarterback do you know who have not gotten worse as they got older? Peyton Manning is the only one. There you go. So it's bound to happen eventually. We say that all the time. Well, you say, but you argue the same thing with Tom Brady the other way. Tom Brady's younger and has not lost anything on his fastball.

Peyton Manning hands. You were the one last year that thought after one week or in the preseason or something, this is going to be the greatest offensive in NFL history. You were right, and now they have great continuity coming back. They have Ryan Clayty and all pro-left tackle. Did I just default to the 2012 best offense, or did I look at what a new team had done with what they had? I like the-h-C-scientists go out of each other. I like the continuity.

Help me get Clayty back. They clearly are going to run the ball more this year. Julius Thomas, another year older, Demarius Thomas, in the system. Why not? Monty Ball? Yeah, that's not too exciting. But they want to run the ball more. I don't see Moreno.

I saw Wes. I read what you wrote about. You mentioned, I don't know where I read it, but you said that losing Noshan Moreno would be an issue, but Monte Ball is probably enough. Probably on our website. I think it will show up in the passing game a little bit. I said it on the podcast that Marino bailed Manning out quite a bit

when he was the fifth option where no one else was open, and I don't know that he has that kind of trust in Monte Ball in the passing. The best argument against the Broncos is the schedule, just that four games against the NFC West is going to hold them down a little bit. Mark, the most prolific offense. All right. I picked the New Orleans Saints to win the Super Bowl a couple shows ago, but I don't think they're going to have the most. Well, I just wanted to point that out because I have a feeling they'll be mentioned at some point in the show. But Eagles, I think they're going to continue on what they did last year. I think we've just started to see. You know what says, oh, they've got tape on them now. Well, Kelly has another year of tape on the defense as he's facing. He's got another year of experience on how to prepare for week to week. Foles is better this season. Potentially they've added. Jordan Matthews as a weapon is interesting. I'm going Philly based on just common sense the way Greg did.

I don't think that was common sense, though. Well, it is for me. Nick Foles should be better is the part where I wonder, why should he be better. What's their wide receiver situation, too? Isn't that a little scary to think about when you're talking about the best offense in the league? Jordan and Matthews is getting a lot of love. I know he's getting a lot of love, but, you know, that happens a lot with rookies. What if McLean doesn't bounce back?

You got a guy coming off in ACL. Riley Cooper is not that exciting. Foles is really the only issue for me. I worry that he could regress that his numbers last year were inflated. Greg would not take my sandwich proposition. I get Jordan Matthews. He gets the entire rest of the Eagles roster on receiving yards this year. I don't like that.

I don't think I'd take that either. Yeah, I don't want to be stuck rooting for Riley Cooper. I'm just going to leave it at that. And Maclin's coming up. off the tournace, yeah. No, part of my proposition was to stick Greg with rooting for Riley Cooper. Interesting. I don't want that.

Greg refuses to root for Eric Decker and Riley Cooper. I'm taking notes right now. A big Julian Edelman fan making a leap last year. How about that? And as far as this side of the table goes, Wes, I'll let you take it. We both believe that the New Orleans Saints, New Orleans Saints will put up monster numbers. Well, let me comment at this from a couple of levels. If we talk common sense and who, you know, would be the obvious candidate,

the Saints have led the league in total offense four of seven years that Breeze and Sean Payton have been together. They play in a dome, which is a reason why Drew Breeze has half of the 5,000-yard seasons in NFL history. But what else is going on here is the pendulum is kind of swinging back. Offense has got really good in the passing game, and then teams like the Seahawks started taking away what they do, all NFL teams are starting to get really big at cornerback and we saw what happened in the Super Bowl and I think it's interesting what the Broncos and the Saints are doing this year they're going to run more and I think defenses outside of cornerback are smaller and quicker at every single position

so offenses know they can run and that's how you stop a team like the Seahawks and really in New Orleans they had gotten too predictable the running back skills didn't overlap you have Darren Spruill's on the field. Defense is know exactly what's coming. You have Mark Ingram on the field. Defense is know what's coming. You can't allow a defense to key on your play calling like that. And I think this year,

Brandon Cooks is playing the Sproul's rule. So there's going to be a lot more different personnel packages you can go to. And the backfield isn't going to be nearly as easy to read. And I think Cooks is one of those guys like Percy Harvin comes in and takes a league by storm. They have so many weapons on offense. And I know no one else in the media will talk about. this Jimmy Graham pre-planter fascia last year, a much different player than he was post-planter fascia.

It should be back healthy this year. How are we defining prolific, by the way? Yards or points? I asked that question. Total offense. To the man that organized this, and he did not give me a straight answer. Wes?

I thought points. That's how I put it. We can do points. It's points or it's yards. Why are we deciding this now? Well, yards are, I mean, I thought that's worth talking about them. It's all about scoring points. I guess either way, it's the same.

These all are the team with the most points will also have the most yards. I wrote that I believe that the Saints are average 30 points again. You know, that's absurd. We come up with the ground rules after we've given our answers. I was just curious. Wait, do you change your answer now that we've ripped yardage away from you? I'll give it another look and come back.

I'm not sure. So the Eagles are going to have a bunch of empty calorie yards and not sure? None of us agree that total yards is the best way to measure a best off. offense. We all know that, but that is how, in theory, that's done. All right, then it is by yards. That's fine. It's harder to do if you're running all the time like the Saints. I can't believe this upset you so much. We're going to know the answer but I'll tell you what. No, I'm going to be honest. I'm going to be honest. I'm going to lay it out. The Saints are my Super Bowl team, but I knew that Wes had prepared this massive unfurling of facts,

so I didn't want to say the Saints and take his steam away. So I went with Philly, which is not a bad choice. choice, but I think the same to go to the readership. Well, the readership. So you're regretting your Eagles choice. Hey, I never did this debate. Oh, you never did it. I never did the debate.

I lied to many listeners, and I apologize. But it was simply to not... He was playing stocked into Ma'am alone. Had we gone in a different order, I would have said, correct. By the way, we will be having our fantasy extravaganza at some point before the start of the regular season. I just want to throw one out there since you mentioned Brandon Cooks, the guy this room believes will hit the ground running as a rookie. I will ask the experts, Greg Rosenthal, Chris Wesley. Mark is here as well.

Brandon Cooks, where does he go? Where do you take him in a draft? I haven't thought about fantasy yet. It's time to think about it. We've got the extravaganza coming up. I wouldn't end up with him because I almost never take rookie wide receivers. It never pays off. They always get overdrafted.

I feel the same way. I'm just curious if he is an exception because he's so high up. I was asked this question on Twitter yesterday. In fantasy, who would you take, Jordan Matthews or Brandon Cooks? I think Cooks has a better impact as far as the Saints becoming an offense like the Broncos last year where you can't stop them. But from a fantasy perspective, I would take Jordan Matthews over Brandon Cook. I wouldn't take Cooks probably until the 9th or 10th round, that sort of value.

So you wouldn't get them. And then I'm looking, as we're talking, we got some Wi-Fi up in here now. How! Brandon Cooks is being average taken in the eighth round early. I would go round seven with Cooks because he's going to surprise. You can use him as a flex guy. Depends on the league, too. PPR you might take, I mean, Bucky Brooks promised 70 receptions, right? If he does, if he goes 70, 1,000, 5, I mean, he's worth that and more.

Right. And Mark and I, of course, have our inter-office fantasy team, Kate Mara. Well, I totally am questioning why, outside of the fact that I initially brought you, in as a co-owner because you were invited into the league. Why you continue to keep me on. I don't remember this. That's how it started because it was just who was sitting around a desk and we were just intern

guys at that point. But why keep me on as a partner if I am so... I didn't say that you're not worthy as a fantasy guy but we have some high-level geniuses of the craft. Not experts though. We did not use the word expert. There's no such thing as a fantasy football

expert. That's ridiculous. Also one last thing on the best offenses. We should give Patrick's team some love. Who's that? The Lions. Oh, Kevin Patrick. That makes sense. I thought last year, like the first few games of the season, we talked about this.

I think Greg agreed with me on this. When you watch defenses trying to guard Calvin Johnson and Reggie Bush at the same time, they were having trouble. And then Bush kind of got injured. They had a lot of problems at receiver, but they, you know, you can't triple Calvin Johnson when you've got Eric Ebron and Golden Tate. And then three running backs out of the backfield that can all catch 50 passes. They didn't put Theo Riddick in the slot lately. That's true. And they also didn't have a coach, though,

that coached a Baltimore Ravens offense to the worst performance in team history. Worse than any Kyle Bowler offense. Worse than any... Anything like that. The offense is Joe Lombardy's from the Saints. Never. First-time coordinator.

Dan wants us to move on. We got to move on. How did you not throw out the Packers, at least? Packers should be in there too much. Jordy. Cobb. Lacey. The best quarterback in the league.

Rogers. No, that's true. All right. Now you're going to go. Poor damn. There are readers that sent in questions, and that's what I want to get to. It's about bringing them into the show. We had some great questions.

The ATL mailbag has been opened up. So let's start with Marcel Fondock, Marcel Fondock, who asks, what is the team that might go from first to worst in a division this year, most likely? I have three candidates. All right. You got to pick one, though, was. Okay. The Panthers were the first team I thought of. The 49ers because Greg has been kind of on this point.

Oh, no, they were second. It was first to worst was the question. First to worst. Bad listening comprehension. I'm going to say the Cincinnati Bengals. I don't see where you go beyond Cincinnati and Carolina. I'll go Carolina. Yeah, it's hard to see Indianapolis falling,

even though I don't really think they're that great. I would go with Carolina Because that division I think Tampa Bay all those teams It wouldn't surprise you if they were over 500 And it wouldn't surprise me if Carolina was under 500 Well it could be a game separated I mean you know

Yeah Carolina could fall off pretty hardcore How about the Philadelphia Eagles Chip Kelly hits one too many genius buttons The whole thing goes up in flames That would be honestly my third pick after Carolina You're counting on Dallas being a surprisingly good football team The Giants, actually, I kind of see a team that could actually do something.

I hate that division. Because everyone's just going to pick the same teams to win the divisions again this year, except for, okay, everyone will slot out Cincinnati. They'll put in Pittsburgh. You know, a couple of people. There's not going to be many surprises. I want to pick a surprise in the NFC East. And the Cowboys Giants and Redskins, they can't, I don't know.

Well, you hate the Redskins, so you can't make that cool. Yeah, that's my bias. The Redskins probably are the friskiest. I don't know. There's another question. and this one also about the NFC East, if Nick Foles and Tony Romo got injured, and Brandon Whedon and Mark Sanchez are playing for a playoff spot.

Who wins? Sanchez. That's from James Tidwell. Sanchez coached by Chip Kelly? Yeah, I'll take that. He's already looked very good in camp. Sanchez has had some really good moments as an NFL quarterback. Brandon Whedon, not so good.

I'd like it to be Brandon Whedon just to look at Mark's reaction as this was happening. Brandon Whedon leading the Cowboys would really be revolting to you, I feel like. By the way, the last Browns quarterback to get jettisoned by the team and lead the Cowboys to the playoffs, Bernie Cozhar. In spot duty. Like his one start with the Cowboys? He helped them in the NFC championship. I would be really torn there because, of course, I had a lot invested in Brandon Wheaton last year as a first team all pro selection.

And Mark Sanchez will always have a spot in my heart for what he did. or what the teams did that he was on in the beginning of his Jets career. But I think Sanchez probably is the better bet. He's a better quarterback. Moving forward. He's got to beat out Matt Barclay. Supposed Lee was looking buff at Eagles Camp. That's a clown.

If Brian Hoyer starts game one, will Chris Wessling's meal of softball pants be captured on video this from At Grebes? Sure. Yeah. We planned on that last year if the Raiders won. Six games that we would put it on video and have it a catered affair and make a gala out of it. FY, that's why we built out the studio so we can have it on video. Like, Wes, if this does break against you, and it is Hoyer in week one,

you're going to eat some soft foot pants, right? Yeah, I mean, I haven't allowed my mind to go there yet because it's not going to happen. But, yeah, if it were to happen, what kind of question is that? You can't back off. I thought there was, at some point, there were some whispers that Wes wasn't going to go with it. We had a party at my house over the weekend, and the softball pants made an appearance were captured on photo and may be seen online. I mean, they exist and they will be eaten. All right, good.

Moving forward. I couldn't figure this question out, but I just wanted to run it by you from at Darth Luna. What would the ATL-themed board game be like? I don't know. Does anybody else? Does that make sense to anybody else? They still make board games? This goes back to Greg's

What would you do in 1840 thing? This is what people had to do for entertainment in 1840 Play board games That might even been pre-board game I think would have a shoots and ladders Centric feel to it A lot of you think you're getting somewhere Then you're not

Then you are, then you aren't Lots of ups and downs There'd be a little section of the game Where you pretend you're Mark Sessler And you pick which NFL players Are going to get injured that year That would be fun You're like picking them off

And then like also like even if you win, it ultimately means nothing. Wait, that makes it much more like Candyland, where there were a lot of different zones where you could experience. It could be like Monopoly or something like that. You know, you landed on jail. You have to go, you hit a Sessler, you got injured.

You have to go back to do not collect $200. I'd have a lot of hands of sound effects. Doesn't matter. All right, this one from at John McFarvland. If they made a boyhood-style movie about one of the ATL writers, which writer would make for the best movie? Sessler.

I was my first instinct as well. I would think anyone, to be honest. Wesleyan would be, you're talking about a guy that grew up with six brothers and was a male man? That's true. Well, but it's boyhood. So we're only thinking like age 5 to 20 or something. We're 18.

Yeah. Unbelievable movie, by the way, for anyone. How about this? The movie was two hours and 50 minutes long. Let's subject the viewers to four of these. All four of us are portrait. How about TV, like Nigeria's in the mix? I like that. That's true.

A period where he's at school and all the women and young girls are calling him young Kobe. That seems to be a nice hook for a movie to make some money. Varian into fiction. Moving on. This is from Darien at Pool Mood. What do we have to do to get the toaster back from Greg? That's easy. It's a good question.

I know what we have to do. Well, one of our bosses, John Marvel, has been threatening to come on the show for a while to set the record straight. But as far as I've heard, I don't have to put that toaster up for the first six months. And so I'm not in any hurry. I've been going around the world, enjoying my victory tour. I show the to-eating your way out of pants like James Buster Douglas did. I show the to West every once in a while. And everyone's talking.

I'm getting a lot of tweets about when is the West rematch. you know, when Buster Douglas beat Mike Tyson, he didn't immediately sign up for a rematch. Why can't I get some of the tomato cans that Wesleyan always was going against 606.6 for a little while. I didn't line those people up. Gold Standard did, and some of them did quite well. It took a year for you to have to get a matchup against another employee. Marvel is going to bring this to a close real fast.

Marvel will make an appearance like Steinbrenner on Seinfeld? Put it this way. This six-month thing that you think you're working with, you'll be lucky if you get three. Because Marvel is asking for it. I'm just enjoying it. You're boss. All I've got to say is I got the toaster.

And with the toaster comes power. If you guys cross me, oh, maybe I only get one question right against, you know, Johnny Franklin and Toledo. Bye-bye, Toaster. Bye-bye game. You do have power. Well, then Johnny Franklin will have to be a recurring guest,

and he'll have to defend it against us. All right. One more. We'll close with this. This one is actually not quite a read-a-question, but it was something Damashik rolled in with into the newsroom, but right before we went up to the podcast studio today, what is the best Michael Jackson song?

And the reason this came up is because... TD's already excited. The reason this came up is because Dave asked Willie McGinnis this question in the green room at NFL Network Studios. And without missing a beat, Willie goes, remember the time. What? A middling early 90s R&B number off the dangerous.

I think it must have had personal meaning in McGinnis' development in life. You can't knock him for that. Yeah. Remember the time Willie McGinnis had four and a half sacks in a playoff game? That was awesome. I didn't get what you did there. The answer, obviously, is Billy Jean.

In my opinion. That would be in my top three. The greatest song of the 80s. Forget about just the most Michael Jackson song. Oh, come on. What's your, Wesley? I said smooth criminal down in the office when we talked about this, but I have since thought on the way up here off his first album, early 1970s got to be there.

Great song. Yeah, but the best song? Yeah, I think I would take, like, if I had to listen to one Michael Jackson song, that would probably. He wants to chime in, clearly. Come on. Guys, it's got to be legit. That's, I mean, that's like his, that's a signature track.

If you have a Michael Jackson theme or whatever it's going on, Billy Jane's the first song playing, but I mean, it's MJ. He has a catalog of like 20 that you could put up there. If we were having this debate in 1988, everyone would say Thriller. The song Thriller? It hasn't held up as well. Anybody that says Thriller, and I saw somebody on Twitter say that, you grow up, Peter Pan.

You know, that's like a kid song. He just told Gold Standard to grow up. Thriller has the best video, right? It's not the best song. I went with wannabe starting something. That's a good one. Extremely solid. And bottom line, in my household, I was the same age as West.

Michael Jackson took over life. That album took over life. My brother had a Michael Jackson doll. This is right around 83, 84, right when pop culture starts to take over America, Pac-Man, Cabbage Patch Kids. I mean, everything is a big pop culture thing right around this time. And it was the fusion of right when, like, Jordan went to Nike. That's when you had Michael Jackson go to, was it Pepsi?

I don't even remember, but he caught his hair on fire. I mean, everything he did was huge. He started something, want to be starting something. Ow! And now you have Johnny Mansell, who's the MJ of the modern day NFL. Full circle. Any other thoughts on MJ? Did Greg say his?

Smooth Criminal was the first one that came to mind, but they had that awful, there was an awful remake of it. Oh, by Alien. Alien Ant Farm. Oh, yes. That sort of ruined it for me. That was pretty bad. It wasn't interesting.

I was just going to say Billy Jean, too. Okay. So that's it for this edition of the Round the League podcast. Thank you for everyone that sent in questions. Anybody who did send in questions and didn't get on the show, you know, don't take a personal. Life is filled with disappointments. Maybe next time. We will be back.

What is today? Wednesday? We'll be back on Friday with the third and final show of the week. We'll be reacting off obviously some preseason games that will be played on Thursday. night. Some Gino action Thursday night. Some Gino action. We're going to have a pro football focus in the house.

We're going to have a gentleman from the website Pro Football Focus, who's going to talk about some of that. Advanced metrics. Advanced metrics, that seems to be all the rage in society these days. So until then, this is Dan Hansa, signing off for the mailman, the sizzler, the boss, T. T.D. On the glass.

Until Friday. This is an I-heart podcast.