NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - No Preseason Games and Jets Deep Dive
Episode Date: July 22, 2020A bunker filled with heroes - Dan Hanzus, Marc Sessler and Gregg Rosenthal bring you all of the latest news in the NFL including Dan taking a phone call during a large zoom meeting, preseason games be...ing reduced to zero (10:46) and Mike Zimmer getting a deal done with the Vikings. (23:24) Manish Mehta stops by to do a deep dive on the New York Jets. (34:10).Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comNFL Daily YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/nflpodcastsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Welcome to another edition of the Around the NFL podcast.
Dan Anzis, and I'm coming to you from a country filled with heroes in bunkers.
Mark Sessler, Greg Rosenthal, Ricky Hollywood.
What is up, boys and girls?
Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.
Remember that old one?
You know, the coronavirus is taken so much from us.
It's annoying.
It's insidious.
And it got us again yesterday.
We did the media talent son, NFL media.
a talent summit on Tuesday, but because no one can now get together at a posh hotel on the
west side of Los Angeles right on the, on the ocean, it was a virtual summit.
And think of all the things that we lost because of that, all the fun.
Michael Irvin getting to just watch him sitting there and see how long it takes before he taps
out.
Didn't see him on that gym, by the way.
Didn't see the very highest of the high.
on that scene. Let's see the highest, but that used to be one of the hooks of, that was one of the
great hooks of the talent summit, quote unquote, is that even the highest of the high had
to attend. So you saw them squirming in the chair like the rest of us. And the biggest tragedy,
Mark Sessler, is we didn't have Steve Smith and all the other guys screaming at Al Riveron about
the new rules. We lost all of that. And the coronavirus strikes again. Well, there is a part two to
the summit, which I guess might include some of that. But I don't think that it was without its charms
because there was a moment during it, there was a, you know, there was a very intense
conversation going on. And if you've been on one of these zooms with 60 people where you can
see them, and, you know, I'm shuffling through from page one to three and couched on page two
during this, I don't want to say what the subject matter was, but it was important. It would be a time
for you to look plugged in and to be paying attention to the company messaging.
And I catch Dan.
And Dan is in the setting that he is right now up in his father-in-law's, I guess you'd
call that an attic area, a redone house.
No, we established that this is Bill O'Brien's attic.
Oh, Bill O'Brien's.
He's up in Bill O'Brien's attic.
But completely not engaged in the conversation.
Dan, in fact, is on a phone call and swiveling around the room in his chair and laughing.
and getting up and walking around the room.
And I text, Dan, I said, Dan, I don't know what, I don't know what you're doing.
Oh, I have those texts.
Let me read those texts because I had forgotten that I was on camera.
Well, because, you know, the Zoom stuff is a little bit of knowing.
It lasted a while because once Mark made a joke about it, you know, I didn't see the text for five, ten minutes.
But then I did.
And there you were.
You were still going wild.
It went on forever.
It went on way longer than it should have.
It says, Mark wrote to me.
I'd go off video, bro, intense combo, your front and center on another phone call,
go dark with a unicorn, bro.
It is only after I saw a bro that I even noticed your text, and I very promptly went
off video.
Well, you saw it, but I'd sent those at least 12 minutes before you read them.
And I was dying there because I was like, we have the highest to the high of our company.
If any of them were to see Dan, while everyone else is just very magnetized and giving great
opinions and discussing.
You got Dan flipping around.
I don't know who you were talking to, Dan.
I don't know what I was talking to.
And it would have to be someone very important for me to jump off temporarily, my focus.
It was the Gatesville Bessinger.
It was the long-awaited one-on-one interview with Heather Ashley, their features columnist.
And I had to take the call.
And you know what?
Extra, extra, extra, read all about it.
Me and that playboy are in trouble again.
Extra, extra, extra.
Extra.
If the bosses do, you know, hit me up with a phone call or an email and they want to discuss why I wasn't plugged in that moment, I was promoting the brand across the country.
Well, you've got intense cover, no doubt. No, that's, you do.
That was bad, though. When I saw the text, it was a holy shit moment.
Yeah.
You know, when Mark only breaks out the bro if things are really serious.
I was legit. It's one of those times where you're concerned for your friend because it was like it looks.
so incongruous to every other person in our company.
I was like, is Dan just going for it here?
I saw it and I laughed.
I was not concerned.
I thought if anyone happened to be scrolling through it and saw it, they would find
the humor in it, I believe.
Well, the other problem, and Mark alluded to it, the conversation was a sensitive topic.
And I guess you could take my behavior on my video screen and see it as something that
was disrespectful.
I mean no disrespect, that's all.
Well, we know that.
Not great, though.
You just got to turn the video off like 70% of the meeting was smart enough to most of the time.
I know. I thought it was like a, I know Mark, you were on video most of the time too.
I just thought it was the right thing to do.
Yeah, Greg, I saw you on there too.
Erica had a cardboard cut out of herself for a portion of it.
That was an incredible move by Erica.
I told the Erica, I told Erica, the only thing that would have made it better is if you had it as like a gift that blinked occasionally.
You really had people.
Well, we were going to, our plan was to all at some point put up, it was a headshot of Erica,
all put up headshots of Erica and that would have caused total chaos.
It would have been great.
I was listening.
I just, you know, didn't want to be watched.
It was a long eight-hour day and my headshot is smiling and very attentive and I have my headphones in.
I just, you know.
All right.
Well done, Erica.
Good job, Erica.
Today's show.
Shut up.
were the one on the phone swinging around like swinging your head around like head banging like
swinging his what around?
I don't know.
Oh, I told you that was not my finest moment.
But I, you know, a lot of America playing shuffleboard with yourself.
You're running from one end of the table to the other.
A lot of America is doing these Zoom meetings every day for work for hours and hours.
And they have it down at this point.
There were multiple times where I forgot I was in camera.
I'm just glad it didn't go worse, to be quite honest with you.
Ah, all right.
Spun the wheel of teams on Monday, landed on my New York Jets.
So we're going to have Manish Mehta of the New York Daily News joining us in conversation.
And I love that as soon as I say that, Jets fans are either excited to hear it or are angry.
Because that is the reaction that META gets in Jets Nation.
He's a polarizing figure.
why we thought it would be fun to have Mnishon for that reason.
And we're going to talk to them about that as well as what's going on with the Jets in 2020.
But before we do that, let's hit the news.
What's up, everyone?
Autumn here.
We're doing another Q&A today.
And I'm taking the questions from comments from my different YouTube videos.
So let's jump right into this.
What weights do you use in extreme?
That one is from Mark Sessler.
This is a crafty mommy.
Mark Sessler.
Thoughts on juicing in the morning.
This one is from, I hope I pronounce this name right,
a hero?
What type of shoes do you wear from Mark Sessler?
Bye.
Wow, someone put a fair amount of work into that
because that is completely fictitious.
That was autumn.
I found it right on YouTube.
It was kind of weird, actually.
Speaking of people that were caught, you know,
not aware that they were going to be seen.
Mark, you told us today that you were doing your beach body workout in your backyard
in a pair of boxer shorts, and the lawnmower man came out back.
Icaramba.
It was the worst because, you know, the kids are home 24-7.
They're never not home.
So they were in the living room where I would normally do it.
And I can either, like, cause total chaos by trying to get them out of there.
So I said, I'm just going to do this in the backyard.
Why boxers?
Like, why not a pair of athletic shorts, gym shorts?
I honestly, because I don't have, I was looking around for the kind of shorts that you could exercise in and could not find any.
So I was like, no one can see my yard.
So I just went out into, and they weren't out boxers.
I would say they were closer to like briefs.
And I was not, I was not facing like the entrance to our yard.
My summer just got hotter.
Yes, it did.
And like, anyway, so I'm doing this like sort of boxing class and, you know, kicking the legs around and doing punches.
And then I turn around and then I see our very nice lawnmower man is like, you know,
seven feet into the yard sort of just trying not to look at me, but extremely awkward.
I just walked into the house.
You can call them a landscaper too.
He's the landscaper.
Lawnmower man.
I don't know.
It's not like a bad horror movie in 1991?
That's a rental property.
I don't think there's a whole lot of landscaping going on here, but he is mowing the lawn.
But I'm not going to be doing that again.
I had no more yard workouts in your brief.
I mean, just put on shorts.
Just put on.
Well, that's a pair of shorts.
That's a fair solution.
I probably should have thought of that out of the gate.
Briefs keep it like bunched in the front, right?
So you're not swinging around like Dan on a phone call?
So to speak.
Okay.
Just, yeah, just adding it all up.
Any other questions about that area?
No, I'll let you know if I come up with any of them.
Okay.
All right. Good. No preseason games in 2020. The NFL Players Association on Tuesday told its players there will be zero preseason action this summer. Mike Garifold and Tom Pellarcero and Rapsheet all reported this. Union leadership shared this info with its players during a conference call.
One day after the league had proposed a one game preseason slate to the union. They followed that up later on Monday with an adjusted offer that included zero preseason games.
this had been a note of contention and now that is wiped away so that is one of the few things
that we've seen in the way of progress since Monday Greg yeah and I think it's significant
because it really shows A the league is trying to listen to some of what the players are saying
I think the social media blitz that the star players did on Sunday was effective in that way
and bringing the message to the public.
And I think it's really striking, like, how quickly this has been changing.
I mean, even though it feels like it's been slow, like they announced that, hey, we're
actually reducing the preseason, and the NFL hasn't officially even announced this yet.
They've just told the NFL, but we're reducing it to two, and here's the ticket plan,
and we're going to do one in each thing.
That was just a couple weeks ago.
And it's like, hey, we're still starting training camp on time.
That was just a couple weeks ago.
And now here we are, okay, the preseason's gone.
that training camp you can say it's starting on time but it's not really starting on time they're
just testing for a handful of days and then guys are working out for a week or two that's not really
training camp that what people think of as training camp in terms of players hitting other players
might not be until about mid to late august in a best case scenario so i actually think this has
been moving fairly quickly and uh i think it's significant that the owners you know whatever hard
line that they were hoping to have just a couple weeks ago is moving pretty fast. And it's moving
in the direction, hopefully, of health and safety, which has definitely been a priority for the players.
I think, Greg, you said something notable in the last show where you mentioned that the season
overall might separate some coaches and make some stars out of certain coaches. I mean,
this is going to, you're going to need to be on the ball as a coaching staff to get the best out of
your players. There's a lot of little wrinkles and folds here. I thought of even, like, it's not just
veterans. I mean, think of like when Ocho Sinko joined the Patriots and couldn't handle their
playbook. You're going to find out right away in August that a third of your team didn't
study the playbook the way that you thought. And you're going to have rookie running backs that
you're going to find out in week one, whether they can block a pass rusher coming in off
the edge. Totally different. It's totally different season and sport. It just is. It's going to be
different. The NFL and the NFLPA made another move that's going to have a big impact on the summer.
They agreed to reduce the size of training camp rosters from 90 players to 80 rap sheet reported this.
And this is very bad news for undrafted free agents, guys that are just looking to make a mark.
It takes so many jobs during the training camp process out of play.
So that's just another unfortunate byproduct, like we're saying, of this season is going to be different.
And it's going to be a smaller group because they're trying to control this however they can.
And just one other note connected to COVID-19.
The NFLPA reports that 59 players from the union have been tested as known positive for COVID-19.
That is approximately 2% of the union's membership.
I don't really know how to make heads or tails, whether that's a lot or a little, but that's the number.
Well, I think to make it clear, you know, players have not been tested.
you know, in mass yet. So this is 59 players who had been tested, you know, on their own volition
throughout the offseason. Since then March. Right. Yeah. And know they were positive. Andrew Whitworth
is one of them, the Rams tackle and had a pretty, you know, interesting story or, you know,
sad story. His entire family had. His father-in-law was was really banged up. But he spoke about
the lethargy and the impact that it had on him.
You know, a guy who's over 300 pounds,
that it wasn't just a couple day situation.
And we'll see when players report,
and then they're doing these mass testing.
There was, I think, another 36 NFL personnel,
whether it's coaches or guys inside a building
who also tested positive.
So to me, that's a relatively small number, I guess.
And we're going to see what these numbers are like
when all the players start showing up.
I get a little more worried about, obviously, the staff because you've got a lot of coaches that are, you know, not in great health or of the right age to be in the right target to have Corona be let, you know, it could impact them a ton.
I don't know if you guys saw this tweet from Eric Ebron, which I found mysterious.
He said that, you know, he basically said I'm mentally preparing myself not to see my family for six months.
This is going to be the hardest season ever if we have a whole season.
And there was a little bit of speculation that there might be something bubbling up
where the idea of a bubble is like for certain teams might be in play.
I don't know what the tweet meant.
I don't know if it meant simply that he's making a decision to not engage with family members
if he goes through with the season himself.
But it gave me pause.
The NFLPA on Wednesday revealed that eight teams have had their COVID-19,
Pandemic protocols approved, infectious disease, emergency response, IDER, plans submitted by the Ravens, Bills, Panthers, Broncos, Lions, Texans, Chiefs, and Dauphins, all approved by the Union.
There are 24 more teams, of course, that have submitted plans.
There are still under review as of midday Wednesday, as we're taping right now.
So that is another hurdle to get everybody into camp and get this thing rolling.
But I have to say over the last 48 hours since we last did the podcast, overall, you kind of feel good about the direction where things are heading.
It went from last week this idea that, all right, what's going on, the scramble, the players acting, getting together and putting out that tweet and making it known that they feel a little bit of confusion.
It does feel like we're seeing some progress now towards the goal of the end of July.
Yeah, Dr. Sills, you know, the NFL is really, you know, leader.
on this issue, spoke to us, you know, as part of this summit yesterday, I feel the same
way, Dan, that I'm, you know, I'm feeling more confident that, okay, the procedures are in
place to get this on-ramping starting. I do think that the uncertainties of what's actually
going to happen once all of this is going, you know, still weighs on me. But I do think the
fact, you know, the steps that they're taking, and more importantly, that the players and the
union. I think are, I mean, the players in the league are agreeing on many issues and the financials
are still part of it, but it seems like that part of it's not going to hold it up. I just don't know
because nobody does what it's all going to live, you know, look like. Because as you mentioned with
the Eric Ebron thing, okay, well, like, of course, like, I don't know if he was talking about maybe,
I don't know if he has kids in a wife or he was talking about like his parents and different
members of family, because that's going to be best practice for everyone. That's, that's us too. I haven't
seen my family. I'm not, you know, I haven't gotten, you know, we haven't gotten on a plane and stuff
like that. And that's the case for a lot of people. And they're going to be trying to encourage
all of these players to keep their circle about as tight as possible. But it's one thing doing that
in a, in a Disneyland bubble where you're literally not allowed to leave like the NBA. And it's
another thing when it's 53 active players, all with totally different lives and motivations and
things in trying to keep that under control. And that part of it is just,
we're just going to have to find out.
You know, we know there are various assistant coaches out there
that live vibrant night lives and social lives of their own.
So it's not just the players.
I mean, it's the kind of thing you could follow orders perfectly up through, you know,
late October, but then like many people are feeling in general,
like, what do you do when you're just like, I've had enough of this?
And I have to go see people and do things.
I mean, it's going to require, to your point, Greg,
that it's just such a different season, like a mental strength,
that you're not really asking anyone in the past to duplicate.
It's completely new.
But I do think that I agree with you, Dan, that there is an ounce of hope this week
that I didn't feel a couple weeks ago that they, that there, I can see the season starting
on time.
I think that's been the goal.
And I don't know what would get in the way of that other than a gigantic, you know,
beehive exploding, a corona beehive exploding.
I think it's players, you know, getting coronavirus in large quantities in these places.
where a lot of people are.
And I think that's what could do it.
And there really aren't answers yet about what NFL teams are going to do.
What's the number of players that would have to have it where they just shut the whole thing down?
Or in terms of certain players on a position group where they shut it down.
And those answers are moving targets.
Even the league would admit that it's not that clear right now.
And there was a coach also that said, what happens if like five defensive coaches get it?
how do you because you know you're all doing a ton of work and how on game day how would you coordinate that so there it is um it is it is it is nothing but uh drenched in suspense start with wearing a mask whether you're testing positive or negative and uh you imagine or you hope that's what's going to be happening inside these buildings when the coaches are working together the NFL confirmed that masks will be mandatory if fans are allowed in the stadium Brian McCarthy the VP of communications for the league
used Twitter to make that official.
Of course, the Jets and Giants announced on Monday
there will be no fans at their home games
at MetLife Stadium until further notice.
Mark Davis said the Raiders, owner of the Raiders,
said he's leaning towards not having fans at 10 games
in the new stadium in Vegas.
The Rams announced Tuesday
that there will be limited or no capacity at SoFi Stadium.
The Eagles,
the Philadelphia City officials said last week
that no fans would be allowed in the stands during Eagle Games in 2020,
but the next day the mayor's office kept the door open that that could happen.
But so as you could see, it's a team-by-team, a state-by-state situation with fans being allowed.
They have to wear masks and everyone should be wearing a mask, coaches, fans, players.
Come on now.
But it's frustrating too because, and I understand they're trying to announce things now because they sort of have to.
but like the Falcons today, for instance, announced they're going to allow, I think, 20,000 people.
And I know that could change.
But Georgia is a mess.
Georgia is a mess right now.
And it just, it seems a little crazy if we're not in a different situation in September.
And obviously everyone hopes that we are that, okay, public schools are closed.
Like, we're not safe enough to do public schools, which makes sense.
But we're cool with 20,000 people being indoors to watch a football game.
Yeah, it doesn't line up.
It doesn't, it just doesn't, it doesn't line up.
So either, so one of those two has to change.
Like either maybe the virus is in a better shape and in schools start opening up or, or the Falcons and teams like that are going to have to change.
So you're really telling me that we think we're in a great enough place that have 20,000 people inside of, inside a building.
I, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to turn this into the politics.
It's not politics, so it's science, though.
It's like, when did science become politics?
It's crazy.
Yeah, that's, well, I'm an agreement with you on that.
My point being that this whole situation has for a long time, to me anyway, cried out for
leadership on the federal level and the fact that that has not been the case and it's been
left in the hands state by state basis.
And some states are handling it well and some states are not handling it well.
And that's why it's another kind of, it's another obstacle and hurdle for professional
sports teams because the leagues are trying to do their best to make this as safe as possible,
but it's not the same playing field across the landscape of the league.
It's been left to private businesses.
You've seen Walmart and so many grocery stores being ahead of the government in those
southern states.
They're making the decisions that you have to wear masks, whereas the governments are not.
And that's ultimately, I guess, what the NFL is kind of coming down to is that it's up
to the private businesses.
I mean, if you really want to strive for accuracy, you know, Madden,
is rolling out.
I don't think that you put, you know,
you got the close-ups on the head coach,
and you got Adam Gase strolling around on the sideline.
I mean,
he should be in a mask on Madden 21
just to really paint the picture of what,
to really get the simulation correct.
Am I wrong?
Eric and I have done some Madden broadcast on Twitch.
Oh, yeah.
We have some sway here.
Yeah, we know them.
I like the idea.
I like the idea of those Adam Gase eyes
darting all over the plate.
You know, the rest of the rest of the rest of,
his face covered up um you know we haven't done in a while wild dan i oh if you have another point
i was going to say we have no no we have some breaking news yeah let's know it too all right
breaking news out of minnesota the uh the minnesota vikings have reached an agreement on a multi-year
contract extension with coach mike zimmer according to tom pellicara who by the way is kind
of having to break out offseason himself tom pellisera been breaking a lot of news he's tight with zimmer
He breaks this story, and one of the longest tenured coaches now in the league is Mike Zimmer,
even going into this season, which is crazy to think about, but he's going to be there a little while long.
He's a good coach.
He's a good coach, Mike Zimmer.
They did a nice job there, and they've had some stinkers along the way in Minnesota since Danny Green, who was fine.
But Zimmer's the real deal.
It's an interesting time for it, too, with like a lot of transition there on his defense to
you know, kind of give him some faith.
And I think it's rewarded, too.
I agree he's a good coach.
He's 63 years old.
He's been there six seasons.
Compiled a winning percentage of 59.
If you can coach 600 ball, 96, 96 games, 57, 38, and 1.
They have not yet, unless I am, have they made it to the NFC title game yet?
Yeah.
Against the Eagles when they got blasted.
When they lose in the playoffs,
They tend to lose hard.
They lose, yeah.
But they also had a great win on the road.
Sure.
Before the Niners wiped them out in January, that was an awesome win for the organization
to go to and take out the Saints, which are, you know, we were talking about before that
game that the Saints might have been the best three seat of all time.
And the Vikings kind of brought that conversation to a grinding halt.
So 63 years old, Mike Zimmer keeps the gig.
He was the D.C.
In Dallas for many years in the aughts, I went to Cincinnati.
and for another five or six years.
So this guy did 14 years as a D.C. from 2000 to 2013 and now has made the most of his opportunity in Minnesota.
The only time that I ever in my life spoke to Bill Parcells in person, well, was over a phone call on a George Zimmer feature.
And he was in a parking lot.
He was very annoyed that I called.
It was through Mike Zimmer, right.
Right, right, Mike Zimmer.
But Parcell's very peaked that I had called him up.
on the phone at this point in his shopping outing.
And he's like, all right, kid, you got one, you got five seconds.
I'm like, I'm 43, so I'm not necessarily a child, but I feel like one right now.
And I asked a Zimmer question and he fired off a very complimentary answer.
I mean, he's a Bill Parcell's protege.
And I love that the likings are doing this.
I've always been a Zimmer fan.
A lot of history here with Zimmer and Kubiak's his coordinator.
I mean, this is Kubiak taken over the offense totally after last year sharing it.
It's the fancy. It's an interesting crew with a lot of success and a lot of impressive lineage.
You know, it's kind of like the old guy.
You know, it's like the old guys.
We're going to take over this young league, Zimmer, Kubiak.
That brings back memories, Mark.
When I was a literal kid in the journalism industry, they sent me to cover a Mets Rockies matinee at Old Shea Stadium.
And Clint Hurdle was the manager of the Rockies.
And Clint Hurdle was a guy, a real man's man type, former player and had a lifer in the game.
And it was September of a season where both teams were playing out the string.
The Mets almost had no hitter that game, that game.
The pitcher, I can't remember who it was.
Steve Traxel maybe took a perfect game into the eighth inning.
And the Rockies basically didn't show up.
After the game, I go down to the locker room, the clubhouse.
And Preston Wilson, who was a former Mets prospect who became a big star for the,
the Rockies didn't play that day and I'm 23 years old and it makes all the sense in the
world once you understand baseball more that a veteran player in the middle of September after
150 games a day game after a night game Preston got the day off on a getaway day or whatever
it would have been but I felt I had to get a question off for the manager and I asked Clint
Hurdle you know Preston Wilson back in New York you know any reason why he wasn't in the
lineup today and he nearly killed him he said
Oh, is it okay if I give one of my guys the day off?
Is that okay with you?
Is that fine?
And I'm like, homina, homina, and I slinked away.
I mean, yeah.
You got the best quote and the most interesting moment of that press conference, I bet.
I bet people were writing about that response.
It wasn't even in the, like a press conference.
It's just kind of a gathering in the clubhouse, as I recall.
And speaking of which, my other big time clash with,
someone in professional sports.
Michael Bennett,
who is not like a question that I asked him after the Seahawks Blue Super Bowl 49 against the Patriots,
the Malcolm Butler game.
And I asked Bennett, you know, just the vibe right after that play went down on the sideline.
And he made a derogatory comment about my manhood and then said something about my wife.
My wife!
The fugitive.
and I remember being completely stopped my tracks that day as well.
So Michael Bennett, who, yes, I have been reading everywhere that he is, you know,
the agent of change we all need and what an incredible guy he was.
But I was never the biggest Michael Bennett fan after that.
He retired, announced his retirement on Tuesday after, yes, a very successful career for several teams.
Michael Bennett, great player, not such a great moment for Bennett or myself after Super Bowl 49.
we create we all contain multitudes and uh yeah it Bennett that apparently was a bad moment
and actually it's funny because I can think of some other moments after a loss you know where he
he's a he was a competitive guy where he did not handle um things well with reporters so that that
that happened to other times in his career and the interesting thing is that reporters love him in
general too so that's what I mean about the multitude there's like a lot of them had very
great relationships with them, great conversations with them about football and beyond.
And it really is an interesting career because I think the Seahawks dynasty,
as great as they drafted, or not dynasty, but their defense to me was like kind of a defensive
dynasty that those four years they had that dominant we haven't seen.
I think it really happened, like the most important day was the two days they signed
Bennett and Cliff Avril to like the cheapest best value contracts in,
in the last decade of free agency, two of them, back to back.
And Bennett ended up kind of going from a guy who was up and down in Tampa,
but pretty good, but was coming off a bad year,
which is why he was so cheap.
They got those two guys, and that really made them special.
And those two, they didn't get enough credit for it.
And Bennett's crazy because, like,
he was the best player on their defense for parts of it,
which is like he was the best player on one of the best defenses for parts of it.
I'm not saying he had the best career, but like during stretches and certainly during some of those playoff runs, he was their best player.
That's Super Bowl 49 loss.
He had a great game.
We had a tremendous game that day that nobody remembers anything about that game but Malcolm Butler now.
But yeah, that was another big performance by him.
I think they had those two players for under 9 million combined, which is incredible.
And then they re-signed them again because it's like, and then you're coming off the cheap deal.
So you don't even get full value the next time it works like that where they got.
Got him cheap again. Sorry.
It was the kind of guy that I think anyone would want his career.
I mean, he probably underrated through long stretches of it, too.
You know, blowing up guards, easy to find him on the field because he's always moving
around an old school type player.
You know, he had nine sacks in that final year with the Bucks before he went to Seattle.
I mean, he stood out everywhere he went.
And, you know, I'm sorry, Deanna, you had the run in with him.
You did.
Maybe if you had asked him a similar question or a question at all after.
after they decimated Peyton Manning and the Broncos,
you would have fared better in your whole viewpoint of the man.
Do you remember?
I couldn't remember the exact question.
I mean, it wasn't like a Pulitzer Prize award winning question.
I think it was just kind of asking him the, you know,
what was the vibe on the sideline, like right after the play?
And maybe that's a tough question to ask the guy shortly after the game,
an hour after the game also.
But, I mean, listen, he was totally out of line with his response.
Of course.
But at the same time, I really don't like wish ill will of him.
And it is true that he's been a guy that has been a fun guy to cover in the league
and also it can be a difference maker off the field now that he's a non-player.
It's just, you know, it's also maybe a lesson in like the pitfalls of parachuting into coverage of teams.
If you're of Seahawks beatwriter, you probably know how to approach a Michael Bennett
after a tough situation.
If you know him more, I didn't know him from Adam.
And so I went and just found the guy that had a smaller scrum around him
and tried to get a nice quote.
It did not turn out to be a nice quote.
What if like Clint Hurdle like jumped out from behind Michael Bennett
and was like, yeah, another bad question.
That would have been really weird.
It's interesting to think back to 2016-17.
Michael Bennett kept sitting during the National Anthem throughout.
It was interesting how Kaepernick, and I know Kaepernick was first
and so he kind of bore the weight of everything.
But it was interesting how the kneeling,
which was, in theory, supposed to be, like, showing more respect
ended up being, like, part of the story.
No one ever cared that Michael Bennett did it throughout.
Like, he kept us sitting on the bench,
but for whatever reason, like, sitting on the bench didn't get the same, like,
level of heat that Kaepernick did.
Hmm.
All right.
So there you go.
Happy trails to Michael Bennett.
maybe down the line we're going to patch things up he and I probably not well probably
working at NFL network in about three months so you're going to have them on the show i'm sure
he will we'll work it all out um that's what's happening in the news
If the bell go deep, Anderson's out there.
This is going to go the distance, 92 yards.
Donald to Anderson.
Donald.
Touchdown.
Labion Bell.
They're going to come the other way, and this is Jamal.
With a one and a hit six.
Off the plane.
It's out of touchdown.
Jules.
Prater, got loose, and the Jets re-take the lead.
Up next on the wheel of teams is the New York Jets the Jemann.
Last season 7 and 9, head coach Adam Gase entering his second year.
And the man who will help guide us through Gangrene.
And it's always a tricky road through Gangrene.
As a man who's been covering the team and around the team for years now from the New York Daily News, Manish Meadow.
What's up, Manish?
Welcome to the round of the NFL podcast.
Thanks for having me on, guys.
I appreciate it.
You know, Manish, I think I've shared the story with you, but I want to share it with the audience now, the first time that we ever met.
It was years ago, I think it was at Radio Row.
And I was a fan of your work covering the Jets.
And I wanted to introduce myself to you.
And I saw you kind of across.
the room and then I went up to you and then you started
following at the
time the general manager of the Jets
Mike Tannenbaum and
you corner Tannenbaum
and then just teed off on him for giving
a he
he had given a scoop to another
beat reporter that you
deserved you thought you deserved because you
had traveled down to the Super Bowl
and this beat reporter had not traveled
and you were on fire about it and that
was the first time I ever saw Manish Mehta
and you were very nice when we spoke
But Mike Tanabon looked like a guy that had seen too much in war by the end of the conversation.
I think that was actually after Tanabon was fired, and he had not spoken since he was fired.
And then he spoke to somebody else after that.
And, yeah, I think teeing off on him is probably an accurate description of how that went.
You were very considerate that here's the guy, you know, out of low right now.
It just lost his dream.
Yeah, well, you know, Mike and I have a really good relationship.
So, you know, it's water under the bridge.
But I was, yeah, I was a little bit upset at that moment.
So it's pretty funny.
The Jets beat's wild.
I do remember, like, going to scouting combines.
And this is like in the aughts, like the mid to late aughts.
And the Jets beat was a little different.
Like there was some sharp elbows on the Jets beat.
There was a lot of infighting.
There was a lot of people within the beat that, like, weren't.
talking to each other and had
major beef. And what I
found out was Mniche was at the center of all.
Greg, I can honestly tell you,
like that was probably like 10 years ago.
Not much has changed.
Okay.
Perfectly honest.
Some of the surrounding cast members have changed.
But yeah,
it's a very cutthroat competitive environment.
It's probably the best way to describe it.
And you're still standing all these years later,
Manish.
Let's talk about the Jets a little bit.
Um, you know, this is, well, let's start here.
Let's start at the head coach spot because, um, one thing that I do like about you on
the beat, Manish, is that you are not afraid, uh, to polarize Jets fans, uh, deliver opinions
that are polarizing.
And when Adam Gates was hired as the head coach, you wrote a column that was glowing that said,
relaxed Jets fans, this is the guy you've been waiting for.
He's not going to take any trash from anyone.
He's going to guide this team back to.
prominence. I got the vibe by the end of the season, based on some of your writing and some of your
tweets, that you kind of got off of the Gase bandwagon. Where do you stand on Gace? And do you think
Gase deserved a second year after the way things started in 2019? Well, I think that Adam Gase,
first and foremost, has a lot of good ideas. And obviously, I didn't know him particularly well
when the Jets hired him. But, you know, speaking to people who had worked for him, played for him,
you will get players and coaches and front office people that have been around him
to tell you that he's not a dummy.
So he has a lot of good ideas swimming around in his head.
What I think I discounted or didn't give enough importance to was his ability to lead
and galvanize people, inspire people, and you really need that as a head coach.
I don't think that he showed that very much at all last year,
not the most inspiring character.
He's not really a leader of men.
He didn't show that this past year.
So I marginalized that aspect of the job, I think, after the Jets hired him,
and I realized talking to people in the organization
in the locker room throughout the course of the year,
just how important that actually was
and how he wasn't necessarily good at that part of the job.
And then obviously, the results speak for themselves.
He was hired to bring the best out of Sam Donald
and to lift this offense.
By every objective measure, the offense was at best the same as it was the prior season
or, you know, in all practical terms, probably worse than it was the year before by virtually
every statistical measure.
Now, look, I've been extremely critical of Adam Gates.
Everybody who follows the Jets is fully aware of that.
I think if you just look at this objectively, he has been in the NFL for 17 seasons,
six different organizations, 17 seasons.
He's only been a part of a team with a winning record in four of those 17 seasons.
And in three of those four seasons that he has been part of a winning team,
Peyton Manning has been his quarterback.
So only one time in his career, one time in 14 years, has he been a part of a winner.
Now he hasn't been a head coach, of course, in that 17-year period.
He's only been an assistant coach, a coordinator, head coach at different times.
But he's not associated with winning.
He's not associated with a winning culture.
And I think with that big of a sample size,
that should tell you a little bit about who Adam Gates might be as a head coach.
Yeah, I'll get to my Jets question in a second.
One of the first times that I met you, Manish, was at the Combine,
and, you know, Rex Ryan was holding court back then.
And we are, everyone in our podcast had just read Collision Low Crossers,
and we were slightly enamored with it.
And I had one question of Rex Ryan, which was a hideous,
dumb question that wouldn't have even led led to a news story. I asked him if he read the book
and he looked at me, looked through me basically, like he had no idea what I was talking about.
And the news conference broke up and you're like, dude, he definitely did not read that
fucking book. So I was like, I just needed to ask me, you know everything. So I, you know,
and that's a million Jets coaches ago. And I, you've been through it through so many things.
Sometimes I wonder why you don't just, let's move to Kansas City and cover the chiefs at this point.
but I thought he would
I know
when I look at Gase though
and Joe Douglas
I think the one thing the Jets
should not lose
no matter what happens this season
from what I see is Joe Douglas
I think you've got a great talent
evaluator there
and a rising GM
do you do Adam Gase
and Joe Douglas
do they like each other
can they get along
yeah I think
do they like each other
they've known
each other for a few years. They're not as close as what I think was portrayed when Joe Douglas
was hired. They'd worked together for one season in Chicago. The jury's still out on Joe
Douglas. You know, you have to be fair to him. I don't want to say he's, you know, the next
superstar general manager. I also don't want to say he's a flop because for all intents
and purposes, he's really been on the job for only one year. He's been in charge of only one
draft. He's made some changes this offseason, but we're not going to know that those are the right
changes. We just know that, you know, he shuffled the deck. We don't really know if the pieces
he brought in are going to be more effective than the pieces that they already had on board.
What I can tell you about Joe Douglas is that, you know, he has made one prior, you know,
prior to this pre-agency. He had made one significant personnel move, and that was bringing in Ryan
Khalil right before training camp began, you know, former Pro Bowl Center who had retired. He brought him
in, and that was a terrible decision in hindsight. That was a flop of a
decision. So let's be fair. It's not like he has turned everything to gold, but you know,
you want to be fair in that you want to give him an opportunity to show everybody that the guys
he drafted this offseason and some of the free agents that he brought in this off season can
actually help toward the greater goal of turning this franchise around. I don't know what Joe Douglas is.
I know he came from a couple good organizations in Philadelphia and in Baltimore. That doesn't
necessarily mean anything other than he was surrounded by some good people whether he can succeed
in the big chair is TB did well and whether he gets a chance i mean one of the reasons we were you know
i was critical um of how that all went down like a lot of people was just you know wanting and the
jets have been through this so many times of having the coach in the GM aligns and i and i think
that that's an open question and we're going to we're going to wrap up our conversation with
Jets ownership and what's in the news today with Woody Johnson, which I think is going to hang
over a lot, including Joe Douglas and Adam Gase, because if there's turmoil in the coaching
staff or in the front office or, you know, up to ownership, then that everyone's job suddenly
become a little more precarious. And I think when I think of Gase, to go back to what we
started, I think if Gase makes Sam Darnold better in 2020 or they work together, or they work
together really well and Sam Darno plays well, then Gase is fine.
Then that's why Gase is there.
And if not, then the lack of the leadership that you talked about comes more into play.
Then all the off-field stuff that I'm talking about in terms of turmoil comes into play.
Because, hey, you don't have to be, you know, have a lot of rah-rah speeches.
If you're actually giving your players like schematic advantages, we just haven't seen that,
certainly in the year that Darnold had with Gase.
I guess I'd ask you watching them closely.
Like, how much of that do you put on Darnold?
How much on Gase?
And like, what are your hopes for that relationship looking better, you know, on the field this year?
Well, Greg, look, I'm a big believer in Sam Darnold.
I don't think Sam Donald's going to magically transform it to Aaron Rogers in 2020 or 2021.
But he has the raw skill, the physical talent, and he has the mental makeup to be a difference-making player in this league.
League, whether that means it will, you know, Matt Fetz itself in 2020 or next year or the year
after that. I don't know. He's extremely young player. He's younger than Joe Burrow. So this is a very
young player who doesn't have. Don't you think he has to this year for Gase's sake, at least,
just to bring it back to Gase a little bit? No, no, absolutely. I think if there's anybody on
the quote-unquote hot seat when you're talking about the quarterback or the head coach, it's
absolutely the head coach, because as you said, he was hired specifically to bring the best out of
Donald relatively quickly.
And even though Donald made some incremental improvement last year, it wasn't that
significant jump that I think a lot of Jet fans had hoped, especially when you look
at recent history, whether it was Carson Wentz, Jared Goff, even Mitchell Trubisky,
when they got that new head coach in, that first year together, there was a significant
progress.
And you didn't see that with Donald.
I don't use the mononucleosis as an excuse because the first game that Donald came.
came back after missing three games with Mono.
He was the AFC offensive player of the week and a win against the Cowboys.
And the last five weeks might have been worse than the first five weeks too, which I think
gets lost a little.
Yeah, I just think that with Donald, you need to bring out consistency.
He is an inconsistent player.
He makes some incredibly great decisions and plays that a much older player can make.
And then at the same time, he'll make a boneheaded mistake.
It is incumbent upon not only him, of course, but the head coach, his tutor, his teacher, to bring out that consistency.
And that's why it's such a pivotal year for Adam Gates, because, you know, I know we're going to talk about the ownership a little bit later.
But Woody Johnson did not hire Adam Gates.
He did not hire Joe Douglas either.
Now he signed off on both of those guys, but this was predominantly a Christopher Johnson production.
He's the one who hired Adam Gase.
And for all intents and purposes, Adam Gase is the one who hired Joe Douglas, Christopher Johnson signed off on it.
But Woody Johnson has no ties to either guy.
That being said, there is a financial component when it comes to Joe Douglas that can't be discounted.
He signed a six-year contract.
I do not believe that ownership is going to be willing to eat three, four years of his contract.
So I think if there's anybody who's on relatively firm footing for 2021, it's Joe Douglas, not Adam Gase.
because in theory, you get rid of Adam Gase
if they're unsuccessful this season
and then you allow Joe Douglas
to hire his own head coach
and then at that point,
Joe Douglas and the new head coach
are tied to the hip
and then maybe two or three years down the road
if things don't work out, you move on.
But I don't think that Joe Douglas
is any kind of real jeopardy
of losing his job this year.
I cannot say the same for Adam Gase.
I mean, counterpoint, Mnich,
you could always bring the glacier
back into the building
and reignite what,
It was a magical period for the organization.
Yeah, I don't think that John Isick is going to be the general manager for the Jets.
I don't actually think that John Nizik will get a second opportunity to be a general manager anywhere.
Just checking.
All right.
Manish, you know I'm a Jets fan.
So I'm going to paint the optimistic viewpoint for the upcoming season.
Darnold does get better.
The offensive line improves.
Perryman's the real deal.
Mims gives you something.
Herndon, back in the pit.
picture at the tight end position. The offense is league average at worst. Let's put it league
average. The defense, which people kind of slept on a little bit last year, with a lot of
injuries. Greg Williams coached that team up. That was a great defense against the run.
And with C.J. Mosley back, I think it's only going to get better. You see some issues in the
secondary. But I just, I trust Greg Williams to get this defense, continue keeping them in the right
direction. If Darnel does make that leap, the offense does become respectable and the defense
could be hovering in that top 10 range, why can't they be in the hunt for a playoff spot this
year? Well, Dan, if they have the same schedule as they did a year ago in which they played
the worst. A tough schedule. This year, they're playing the AFC West and the NFC West.
It's a daunting schedule, not only for them, obviously also for Buffalo and also for the Patriots as
well. I think that schedule makes it very difficult for them to, you know, unless everything goes
right for them to be a viable playoff contender, if they were playing a week schedule, at least
on paper, I think there's a possibility. All of that being said, if the offense is respectable
and the defense, you know, maintains what they did a year ago, maybe gets a little bit better
and they finish, you know, 9 and 7, maybe 8 and 8, somewhere in that neighborhood, then I guess
that's a check mark. Yeah, I guess that's a check mark. That being.
said, if that does happen, if they do finish 8 and 8 or 9 and 7, they would miss the
playoffs for 10 consecutive years. There's only two teams, Cleveland and Tampa, that has missed
the postseason longer than the Jets. So how much longer do you wait? I know this is not all
on Adam Gays or Joe Douglas, but at the same time, at some point, if your ownership, you do
have to hold some of these key decision makers account. Well, they keep doing that and they keep
getting fired. And that's, I mean, they have the second worst record in the NFL in the last five
years. I mean, they are one of the worst teams. And I do think that there is a case to be made of them
winning eight or nine games, but there's also a case to be made. They're one of the two or three
worst rosters, you know, just talent in terms of depth-wise in the league. And so I think it will take
Darnold. And I think Darnold has a chance to do it, just stepping up and carrying them.
Speaking of ownership, so Woody Johnson bought the team in 2000, 2016, Donald Trump was
elected president, 2017. Woody Johnson takes over as the ambassador to the UK in Trump's
administration. Christopher Johnson, his brother, becomes acting owner. And then the report comes out
today. CNN reports that Jets owner Woody Johnson was investigated by the State Department
for alleged racist and sexist remarks. There was also a report in the New York Times,
connected to Donald Trump asking Woody Johnson to try to push to get the British over.
played on a Trump golf course and Woody went along with it and that led to some waves.
So obviously some bad press and some disturbing allegations around Jets' ownership.
What are you hearing on this?
Well, look, anytime you've got alleged racist and sexist remarks, you know, that's not something
that should be taken lightly.
It's significant.
You know, my understanding is that the Jets actually did an internal investigation back
in 2017 when there was some issues.
with Woody Johnson's social media posts that dealt with sexual conduct.
The team actually scrubbed some of those posts after doing their internal investigation with their IT department.
It's not a good look.
That's, you know, that's the preliminary part of it.
We'll find out obviously more, I think, in the coming days and weeks.
The Jets, as of right now, having commented on the situation, the NFL's kind of just said, you know,
we're going to refer to what the State Department has said.
So they didn't say much, you know, either.
It's disturbing.
It's also eye-opening, I think, when you're your best player, and in this case,
Jamal Adams, comes out against the owner and says, you know, right is right, wrong is wrong,
this is unacceptable.
I'm pretty sure.
In fact, I know that he's not alone in his thinking.
He's the only one, however, to this point, was come out publicly and, you know, voiced his displeasure
at this report.
I know that there are other players, other people in that organization.
who aren't particularly pleased with Woody Johnson,
you know, not a good look.
I don't know what's ultimately going to become of this,
but I do know that there were concerns in the organization
as far back as three years ago
in which they had to actually scrub some of his social media post
because they were probably not something that, you know,
the organization wanted out there.
Well, this is something the players can have their voice heard.
And I think that's where I'm watching this story,
and it shouldn't be on them.
you know, to be making change on their own.
That that shouldn't be their responsibility.
But I think if their voices, if they do speak loudly and unified, like that that's going
to have a real impact as it should.
And with everything that's gone on this summer, it'll be, it's hard to know where this
goes, but it'll be interesting to see how the NFL has a league response to that,
because ultimately it's their owner, you know, it's their team.
Right.
I completely agree.
What I will say is that prior to all of this surface.
I was under the impression that Woody Johnson was coming back to the United States
regardless of what the election results were going to be,
whether Donald Trump got reelected or not.
If he weren't reelected, obviously the new president would appoint his own ambassador.
But my understanding was that even if Donald Trump were reelected,
that Woody would come back.
It wasn't set in stone necessarily,
but that was the vibe that I had gotten all along over the last several months.
The question now becomes, you know, when he ultimately does come back, what does the NFL do?
Is there any kind of punishment?
Is it slap on the wrist?
Is it, you know, is it severe?
But I think it is particularly eye-opening when players speak out because, you know, I don't know if these allegations are true or not.
But all I can say is that after reading the story,
both the racist and the sexist element of this story was particularly disturbing.
And I don't mean to make any kind of political statement because I don't think this is about politics.
But some of the stuff that was alleged in that story is pretty disturbing, at least from where I stand.
I mean, does nothing to help the Let's Keep Jamal Adams in a Jets uniform for life campaign that some are attempting to run?
Yeah, that whole negotiation has been a fiasco for a number of different reasons.
It's really unfortunate.
It's strange, to be perfectly honest with you.
This is an organization that doesn't get dynamic players very often.
They don't have superstar players very often.
In fact, I think it's fair to say that the last homegrown superstar player that the Jets had prior to Jamal Adams was Dorel Revis.
And that was nearly a decade ago.
And the idea that the Jets have bungled this situation in the fashion that they have.
And believe me, when I tell you that they have, I know that.
you know, there's a lot of strong opinions on both sides, people, you know, siding with
the organization, people siding with the player. But based on the information that I have
over what has transpired in the past six or seven months, it's, it's incredible that the Jets
would allow certain things to have gone on in, you know, in these quote-unquote negotiations,
which really weren't negotiations at all.
The fun ride never ends. I've said it many times before to my, no, Greg's like, I love it.
No, I'm just saying, this is usually your time of year.
This is your time of year for the optimism,
but it's getting cut a little short right now.
No, I still think this could be a fun season for the Jets.
I do think, though, it does remind me that I'm just happy that I'm a Yankees fan
because I couldn't deal with this.
If I was the Jets Mets, Knicks Islanders fan, I needed to break that up.
Shout out to Matt Casey, our buddy.
You just named his four favorite teams.
There you go.
Mnish, you've said.
at all. Hey, July 22nd, 2021,
Jamal Adams,
a member of the Jets?
I think,
God, that's such a good question.
I would say no.
Okay.
Well, we'll bring you back and we'll talk about how you were wrong.
Maybe I will be.
Hey, I love covering Jamal.
You know, I would love to cover Jamal for the next decade.
He's one of the most genuine people I've covered in my career
and this notion that, you know,
he's a selfish guy who wants money.
I can tell you, if you talk to players in that organization
and coaches in that organization,
they wish there could be 52 Jamal Adams.
It would make for a loud locker room,
but he is all about football.
He cares about his teammates.
Nobody in that organization works harder
and nobody cares more about winning.
I mean, he's tackling the Patriots mascot, please.
Of course, he's important to the organization.
Yeah, well, it's pretty pathetic
that it's gotten to this point with him.
Manish Meta.
Follow him on Twitter and read all of his NFL coverage and Jets coverage on the Daily News.
Thank you very much, bud.
Thanks, guys.
I appreciate you.
What a day to have him on.
I mean, he had some good insight on all the Jets issues, but the ownership, but certainly the Jamal stuff, heavy hitter.
Dan, you know, you mentioned a, by the way, that doesn't mean, I just, that doesn't mean he's right, by the way.
About what?
I don't, we can't, we can't sit and talk with Mniche for three hours.
I continue to believe the Jets have been in the right in letting this play out a little bit and letting it breathe.
And I believe you are in the same camp as well.
I understand, Greg, I understand that where he's coming from, Manish, though, that the Jets aren't a team that come into game-changing superstars.
So don't mess this up.
Do not let him get out of the building over a petty disagreement that turns into something bigger.
I still have, I still have hope that come this time next year he's under terms.
But, you know, it's, with the Jets, it's never, it seems like it's never simple.
It just never is.
Well, I mean, the Woody Johnson thing does not help.
That is a fresh wrench in the works potentially.
So TBD.
Yeah, his voice, so many, you know, having the relationships.
So it does, it does, it does carry weight with me that, like, he knows.
Oh, of course, I know it does, you know, I know it carries a lot of weight with you.
He knows the negotiations.
What do I know?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, that was the Pulitzer Prize winning question that you mentioned.
I think they don't have, they don't get the benefit of doubt because they're loser,
because they lose so much and because they don't get the benefit of that.
That's it.
I think that's why a lot of people who study the game are doubting Sam Darnold on some level
because they connect him to the Jets the team where it usually doesn't work out for the quarterback.
I just think every situation, ultimately, though, should be judged separately.
And I just hope eventually they figure out how to get this organization running well.
It's very difficult.
And it is when things like what popped up today now with Christopher Johnson, it just never seems, excuse me, Woody Johnson,
it just never seems to end.
There always seems to be something new around the corner.
So Jets fans hang in there.
Let's hope that Darnold is the real.
deal because if he can play, that will help a lot.
But as far as what's gone off the field, he really is.
I mean, I think it's, and I, I understand you can, why he's so interesting to me is like he's
a Rorschart test where you, you can look at it from either perspective and see, oh, this
guy is clearly showing signs that he's not going to be the guy.
But then if you want to study other way, other angles on Donald, you can see, all right,
there's something there in the second half of the season.
Even when you look at the numbers, Greg, you mentioned his.
his last five games were concerning.
But there were other numbers you looked at the last eight games of the season.
Their offense was kind of middle of the pack,
and he had a top 10 figures in some of his passing statistics.
We'll get into it on Friday's AT NFL broadcast.
We got a whole segment about Darnell.
But he is interesting to me because he's the type of quarterback I usually fall for
and I like more than I should despite some evidence.
So I did go back.
I'm writing about all these.
young quarterbacks at some point. I went back and watched and, and we'll talk about it Friday,
but I think the thing with him is he's been making similar mistakes since he started. And they're
kind of, you know, a lot of it is just, you know, they're not ready for blitzes coming. And that's
coaching too. Like, it's a lot of rookie stuff where like everything is going so fast and they don't
know how to handle it. The problem is the coaching isn't, isn't leaving either. So it's like that
that like that needs to be that needs to be buttoned up because he hasn't he hasn't showed enough
of like what's going to make up for that you know he hasn't had been as creative like he hasn't
had as much creativity making plays kind of on his own that you that you would expect basically
that's i mean that i hear you and i i find him to be a mixture of of an enigma but also as you say
fascinating but he played behind a shattered offensive line right and i mean
Mono is not, I know it became this, like, ridiculous sort of gag and everyone made fun of it in the graphic that was on Monday Night Football, but look, I mean, Mono depletes the body, it takes muscle mass away, it leaves you exhausted for weeks, and then he's suddenly thrown back into an offense where Levi-on Bell is not living up to the billing on any level, and you're getting destroyed behind a bottom five offensive line. I'd love to see Darnold in a more functional setting before we cast.
the die on the guy. Of course. That's why I think he has top five upside and like a pretty
big disappointment downside, which is like that's, that's a huge, huge gap. I totally agree.
I agree with you on that. And Jets fans believe in Darnold. I don't think any doubt has crept in
with him. Gase is a whole other story. And Mnich, I'm happy he came on the show. But Mnich
thrives on that dissension and the doubt and the doom and gloom around the Jets.
It sells papers and, and you, I mean, I just, I guess my point of view is there is, there are some rays of sunshine if you want to try to be the optimistic Jets fan, which isn't easy to do amidst all the clouds and the thunder clouds rolling in.
I will see how it all turns out.
Every year I feel this way that this could be the year they get it back on track.
But, you know, 2000 to 2010 under the Woody Johnson regime, they were one of the more competitive teams in the AFC.
But the last 10 years has been a nightmare.
all the way around
I always think about the timing
it's such a sliding doors moment
when Leon Hess, their former owner passed
because if that didn't happen
Belichick would have been the Jets coach
and I don't know what Belichick would have done
with Leon Hess
and I guess I don't know that for sure
who knows if the Parcells thing
Parcells would have had been
yeah Parcell is a big part of the Belichick's big thing
was I'm not you know he was
he was close with Leon Hess
and he's quoted
it is, I'm not going to work for that guy, you know, and for whatever reason,
whatever the on-row ramping with the ownership change rubbed Belichick the wrong way,
and then it's just like that was, it was just a forks in the road moment,
whereas he was he was tight, like the Parcell's love test,
Belichick loved test, and it was just a different, it was a different thing.
He learned that in Cleveland with Art Modell.
He came out of there with a mantra that he would never coach as a head coach under an owner
that he didn't, you know, completely trust and believe in.
So that is a hideous.
He was the Jets coach for what, about eight hours or eight minutes?
Something like that.
He resigned as HC of the NYGJ.
And it should be known that during that time of transition from the late Leon Hess,
when the Jets were looking for new ownership, it came down to two people.
Woody Johnson of the Johnson and Johnson family and James Dolan,
cable vision, who bought the Knicks and is arguably the most hated owner in the history of New York sports.
maybe not even arguably so you know just another chapter all right good stuff i still believe i say
nine and seven and i think donald's got a pro bowl coming soon pro bowl doesn't matter whatever
you know what i mean it's gonna be good we will seven's optimistic nine and seven might win the
a fc east uh might win it outright i don't know if anyone's getting in
yeah i don't i don't put too much into it because the schedule was soft but they went
It's six and two in the second half of last year.
All right.
Everyone's going to get mad.
He's like, oh, you gave the Jets too much time.
Calm down.
Just 40 minutes.
Just having fun.
All right.
We'll be back on Friday on the network with our Around the NFL broadcast.
So please check that out.
And I know not everyone has NFL network, but there are workarounds out there.
Go check out the around the NFL subreddit.
If you want to watch the show, what we do try to do with the broadcast is we don't make
it a facsimile.
of what the podcast is.
We like to keep it fresh
and not just do retreads of segments
that we do on the Monday and Wednesday show.
So it's a new show, original stuff.
So check it out if you haven't already.
And we'd appreciate it.
And then we're back next week.
At some point, we're going to be going back
to three times a week on the audio show.
So the boys, we have to, and Ricky,
we have to put our heads together and figure out
when we're switching over.
I guess some of that's going to connect with
what happens with training camps in the NFL,
whether they're starting.
Oh, there's so much to figure out.
What an off season this was.
I feel refreshed and ready to go.
All right.
That's it.
This is Dan Hansa signing off for Quiet Storm.
The mailman.
Ooh, not the mailman.
We wish the mailman was here.
And he will be here again.
The old boss.
Ricky Hollywood.
Till Friday.
Hey everybody, Daniel Jeremiah here.
And I'm Bucky Brooks.
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