NFL Daily with Gregg Rosenthal - Senior Superlatives

Episode Date: July 17, 2015

A room filled with some heroes -- Gregg Rosenthal and Marc Sessler – are joined by NFL Now's Colleen Wolfe to discuss the latest NFL news including the new contracts for Dez Bryant and Demaryius Thomas(6:19). Then, they give senior superlatives to NFL players and coaches (31:18) before wrapping the show with another edition of ‘Orr you kidding me?!’ (45:29).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 NFL podcast made you swipe right on Tinder. Welcome to another edition of the Around the NFL podcast. I'm Greg Rosenthal sitting in for Dan Hanzas, and I'm surrounded by some heroes, Mark Sessler, and Colleen Wolf. What's up? How are happening? Greg, a massive user of Tinder under the radar, but you're on there,

a bit. I think we all are, right? I mean, we're all married. It's all under the radar, but it's like you just want to see what's going on. My wife's not a fan of it. You know, you're the youngest one of us, Colleen. I mean, I know you're married and everything, but you would be the most likely to use Tinder. Let's be honest. He lives on the other side of the country right now. Well, all right. So I don't use Tinder, but my roommate does. She's going to kill me for this. And she sends me the best profile pictures in the world. So it's a great experience for me because I don't have to actually be on it to, you know, have all these great things. I have been given a chance to take over

David Ely, one of our editors at the holiday party allowed me to take over his Tinder for about two hours and it went very well actually very well he was on the precipice of a date I asked him a couple days later what happened no progress the thing fell off a cliff

the minute well this is a common thing we're going to get we have a big show today by the way I know TD behind the glass he uses Tinder all the time we're going to get some letters from the future which is pretty exciting not many shows are able to really break the space time continuum. None that I've seen.

And jump into the future. We're going to do that. We're also going to hand out some senior superlatives, an idea from Colleen Wolf, you know, like just in your yearbook, you know, best dress, best hair, some things related to the NFL. We're going to do that. But I don't want to drop this, this Tinder thing quite yet. Because Mark, when you take over, sometimes you take over cell phones, you know, a friends of yours,

and you start texting back and forth with ladies. Well, no, hold on. That's not characters, right? I've taken over a Twitter account. I'm not texting back and forth with ladies. You've done some texting back and forth, and you write some crazy things. Not as me, though, as the owner of the phone.

Exactly. But the women seem to go for it, for the most part, even though you write crazy poems, essentially. Well, the one time back in the day when MySpace was like a dating mechanism, long before I was married, a friend and I set up a fake account for what was like a cute girl in Brooklyn.

A guy friend and I, like, we just were like trying to test what are, did you know her? No, no, no, it was a fake person. Okay, oh, got it. We created a fake person out of nothing. And, you know, the influx of nonsense that she received was awe-inspiring.

Like the crappy, come-ons, the guys are sending and everything. It just made us feel a little bit better because, and it made me feel worse for women everywhere. Well, this is enlightening. It made you feel a little worse just that you had set up this really strange,

creepy thing. That's, that potentially was, a little out of bounds, but it was an experiment. On that note, I think it's time to go behind the class. Say hello to TD. Are you doing, buddy? What is going on, guys?

Just real quick, a bunch of shows that have used time travel before. Boy, my God. Family guy. C.W.'s Flash. Family time. No, but those did it as like sort of a bit. We legitimately were given

letters from the future. Gotcha. We have the answers. Yeah, it's a game changer. By the way, for everyone, listening, who misses Dan Hansis, as you should, and Chris Wessling, as you should. They're going to be back from vacation next week. We'll all be back together, I believe, for our Thursday show. Wes will be here early in the week.

So that's just sort of a status update. But you can read Dan's fan pain rankings, which is a great series going up on the site. Little plug there. And now let's do a little news. Before we do some news. No, you're always coming up with a couple things. I just want to do the news. We've been...

See, me and Dan have a difference is, but at least he gives me a little bit. time. Real quick. He just complains about it after. Oh, good. I've been waiting for this, TD. My toilet has been fixed. I still need to fix the floor, but no more self-cleaning bubble bath toilet. So that's awesome. And real quick, I brought up Tinder in the open simply because

Russell Wilson, man, he needs to slow down. I have a relationship question for you Colleen. Oh, great. He's out here on Instagram posting photos with the following captions. One of them is him in Sierra. He goes, the one. That's all that's in there. The other photo goes, love ballad.

Sierra's caption for him goes Oh, this is the sweetest man I've ever known It's all a little cheesy And I don't really like any of it to be honest Here as the body language expert Did you pick up anything in those pictures Because I looked a little Looked a little stiff to me

It looked like a little bit Some sort of relationship that's just set up by publicists And Russell's coming a little bit too strong for me You know, he needs to slow it down He needs to not be cut up He has a girl already He's got a lot of pent up frustration or whatever you want to call

We're praying for him Has a girl already All right, let's do some news. All right. I need your award. Real quick of a mind before I head out of here. For Heaven Six. The show was up for a Stitcher podcast for an award up against, you know, the starters, Steve Austin's show.

I think we're going to come away with it, though. I thought you were referencing that we're giving out the superlatives later in the show. Yeah. Which would have made sense. Lots of awards. It's all intertwined. Time travel. So TD basically was here for five minutes, dominated the mic for those five minutes and then is leaving.

This is what you call a hard day at the office for TD. Back to the apartment to deal with domestic issues. So the big news, of course, on Wednesday was the deadline for signing your franchise players to a long-term contract. And a little bit of a surprise, I would say. We ended up having a very busy day. Des Bryant, Justin Houston, Demarius Thomas, and Stephen Gaskowski. Don't forget about him. All signed contracts for the day.

And everyone's wondering, like, how are these contracts going to go? Which one was the best value? Which one will blow up in the team's face? So many questions. And we're lucky enough to have the answers. We have acquired some letters, like I said, from the future. And they're really going to give us the answer. So why don't we start with Colleen Wolfe, who has really been able to acquire a letter related to Des Bryant?

The future came in, gave this one to me. so it's a letter to Jerry Jones from The Future. Hey, Jerry, it's the future again. So much is happening here. Infinite time and space, it's exhausting. Anyway, about the Desd deal, you did the right thing. Des deserved the money, and he played four more pretty good years

before falling off a cliff, not literally but close. There was an incident in Cabo. We won't get into it. Listen, too many pieces were out of place at this point. Tony Romo had to deal with multiple back issues in 2015 and beyond. And his herniated discs were nearly as painful as the rotating rushers they brought in to replace DeMarco Murray, which, by the way, wow, what an end to the career he had in Philly.

I mean, that was insane to Marco Murray. All right, ultimately, your desperate prize to win a championship for the first time and over two decades were answered by a buddy of mine, silence. He's a nice guy, but silence, he sucks to go drinking with. The offense never replicated its 2014 efficiency, and the Eagles continued to win the division and beat you ever. Thanksgiving. Sorry about your losses. By the way, super weird. You look the same now as you do in the future. See you soon. The future. That's grim. That was a scorcher. Well, the DES contract, that alone really didn't seem like a negative, but it is interesting.

I mean, you must have been, now that we're talking to you, Colleen, you must have been kind of excited. Great news for your Philadelphia Eagles. This is great. It looks like everything works out for the Eagles. I mean, yeah, Des got paid, but, you know, the Cowboys at this point, it's not looking great for them. For the Eagles, though, I mean, future is bright. You know, there was a call between Des and Jerry Jones that's on their website where Jones is in New York talking on conference call with Des Bryant at headquarters.

Is this when he was with Rock Nation? Yeah, he says he's sitting next to a table of Brazilian Cowboys fans that are beside themselves that Des signed his contract and said we're going to win five straight Super Bowls, but clearly the future is telling us that is not even close. That phone call really was the moment where I just, if you don't mind seeing the Cowboys fall apart this year, which I don't really care either way, but just the level of confidence right now in that building just like I think this is our team this is the time we're doing whenever it's that team that it's like everything's setting up it has to be this year this is the time like

that never works out minus the NFL's offensive player of the year right that was that was the cowboys thought they were going to have I believe it was the second TEO year where they were coming up they were the one seed but they had lost in the play and everyone just thought they'd walk to the title I think you have to sign Des Bryant to this contract and everything it's not like it's a it's a bad contract, but the level of, like, hype and hubris in Dallas right now is pretty high. Well, I mean, if they didn't sign Des, what would their offense look like? I mean, it would be, if he held out, it would be, I mean, that's awful. You can't, I mean, yeah, you have a great offensive line, but that only gets you so far.

The quote from Dez, from Jerry to Dez, well, he started the phone call with, I just want to hug your neck right now. Listen, they like each other. something I've never, I know, but I've never said that to another person. I want to hurt your neck. Well, not, why not the whole thing? He also said that. That sounds like you're strangling somebody.

And that's maybe, you know, indicative of what he put Jones through. I don't know. I mean, yeah, he got a great deal. Ultimately, all the off-field stuff that people were worried about. I don't think it had a huge effect. He's going to get $33 million fully guaranteed, really almost regardless. And as long as he's still on the team next year, he'll wind up probably getting $45 million guaranteed. Now, if he, if something happened over the next year,

a lot of these guarantees were puffed up a little bit. They could get rid of them if something terrible off the field or on the field happened. But here was the other quote. You did a good job associating yourself with Jay-Z. He's wonderful. I spent hours with him last night. That was Jerry. I didn't understand the whole like sidebar Jay-Z story in Rock Nation.

It almost seemed like part of the deal. Like you've got to come out and say how great it was to negotiate with us. And without you, this wouldn't have gotten done. Because there's been obviously that, you know, they rattled some cages. Some people weren't happy about that whole group forming themselves and taking over players. But here's the thing. Jay-Z's not negotiating that contract. Oh, CIA did it.

Tom Condon, who's, you know, one of the most famous, probably powerful agents, he's the one to negotiate it. I guess Rock Nation was somehow saying they have a lot of support services and other things that they're going to do to make sure Des Bryant stays on the straight and narrow and they have, you know, commercials and all this stuff for him. Hold on. We're skipping over something important here. Yes. We just, nobody acknowledged the fact that Greg just did a slight Jera attempt. A pretty bad. Yeah, it was pretty, it was not bad, but I can't believe nobody called him out on it.

It's almost like, I can't, I can't, I can't not go on and say something about his Jera. I want to just move on and forget about it. Our producers are very frisky today. I'm just saying, I'm just saying. The one thing I can't imagine is what is that like hanging out a couple hours, Jerry and Jay-Z? And is this basically a situation where Jay-Z is his role in the matter is that he has to hang out with Jerry Jones for a couple hours just to kind of make this deal happen?

It's like, hey, I get to hang out with Jay-Z. That's worth a couple million dollars. Who is it more of a chore for Jerry or Jay? Oh, Jay-Z? Are you kidding me? I think Jerry Jones loves it, right? I'm sure. Oh, I think he loves it. Well, I mean, we aren't allowed to say certain things about the 32 owners,

so let's just continue on. All right, well, I'd love to hear more about, what's happened with all these deals in the future so that it's kind of silly for us to even analyze it when we have all the answers and Mark I believe you've acquired a letter well this and this you know first Colleen wrote us and said like I've got a letter from the future

and we didn't have anything but then suddenly I got an email and it came over email so there must still be email from Chris Wesleyan and myself interesting and the date on it is attached to September 43rd 241. Wow! So things are different. Crazy news. The whole calendar.

Calendar's changed. It's changed. Entirely. Here's how it goes. It just says, apparently I wrote this. I said, I'm sitting here with my dear old friend, Chris Wesleying. We're at our favorite tavern, the updated Whaler 4. Watching snow tumbled down over the Pacific Ocean.

Climate alterations have turned Los Angeles into a cold weather environment, making it much like the city you once called Green Bay, which itself was swallowed up in an event we'll call the first visitation. our society in the NFL you knew has changed beyond imagination but more on that later Wes and I were just talking about the old days of the league and he referenced one of the worst contracts ever handed out the massive five-year $70 million deal given to Demarius Thomas of the old Denver Broncos franchise nobody knew in 2015 that Thomas would hold out the next offseason steamed over the cash Julio Jones received but John Elway and the Broncos wouldn't

budge this time. And Thomas never played again, drifting away from the game and falling hard for a Denver area poetist named L.E.N. Shadow Fox. By week eight of the 2016 season, the two had run away together to a weak grass farming commune in Boulder that also doubled as a writer's retreat for quasi-revolutionaries. Still, L.A. 1 in the end, boldly waving farewell to Peyton Manning, promoting Brock Osweiler, and signing an unknown young whiteout named Webster Slaughter the third. Together, the Denver Broncos would finally win another Super Bowl in 2018. And that came two years before the visitors arrived. And everything changed from then.

Back to the beers with Wes, yours, Mark. Wow. It kind of, you know, it threw me because it's a little bit about football. This is Mark talking now in the present. Because there's a lot going on. I feel like listeners out there, their mind has been blown. And I just want to say that the letter from the future is over, we're in the present. It bothered me because forget the Demarius Thomas business,

and we can get down to that. It's just like, what on earth has happened to our planet? I mean, visitors. Who are the visitors? I'm probably not going to have kids at this point, because if there's visitors coming, I don't like visitors at all. Well, and it's happening two years from it. I don't like you at my house.

So, yeah, you know, I don't know. There's a lot to unpack there. Still getting. Colleen was taking notes during it. I'm just wondering, what are these notes? Like, quasi-revolutionaries. Like, what are your notes that you? Well, I wrote down for some reason I liked the fact that Wes was talking about the old days of the league because that's way back when.

I mean, it's, you know, and I'm glad to know that I'm still friends with Chris. Yeah, that's cool. But it sounds like a bad world to live in other than that. Maybe. I don't know. I guess just thinking about the football part of it all, ultimately. The more important part. Well, no, I'm thinking about Thomas.

He ran away with the poetess, right? So ultimately, was it a good or a bad contract? Because they did win the Super Bowl in 2018. Not with him. But, you know, whatever happens to win the Super Bowl. I think, I think it's one thing that it made me think about was that you do have the Julio Jones contract coming. You've got the A.J. Green.

And is he going to pull, one of these guys pull a Michael Bennett where you get your deal. And then 365 days later, you're antsy and you want a new deal. Or you run off with a poet. But that's always a possibility. It's always good that you have a slaughterhouse the third or whatever waiting in things. Webster slaughter the third. Slaughter the third, right.

I feel like, you know, Demarius Thomas didn't get really like a lot of attention between him and Desbrain. He got the better contract ultimately, at least a little more guaranteed money. It was pretty much the same. It's weird to me that the agency that represents Demarius Thomas is getting bought by, CAA, the agency that represents Des Bryant, like last week that came out in the news. And then these two contracts come out within

an hour of each other. And oh, by the way, they're the exact same contract. Like, they were the ones like, they were the ones, you know, saying that there was collusion. And then they basically just did the same same contract together. I don't know. Yeah. It's very murky.

You look at this team and if they didn't sign him, I think that they would still be able to be okay if he held out. Whereas with the Cowboys, they would be in so much more trouble because you do have Peyton Manning and Emmanuel Sanders. You could make something happen there, but you have C.J. Anderson and Gary Kubiak who could make the run game sort of balance things out, but that's not the case in Dallas. I agree with you because I think Des, you removed Des from the Cowboys, and that's potentially a 4 and 12 type team because everything changes them. I don't, I think Denver's got one more shot

with Peyton Manning. That's fair, but they are in as much as the Cowboys are in win or else mode right now. I mean, the Broncos are really in win. They have to be. Yeah. And Demarius Thomas, people say, well, did Manning make him? I mean, he was pretty productive with Tim Tebow. That's the ultimate sign of respect. And this contract guarantees that the Josh McDaniels era will live on in Denver for a little while. You know, Josh McDaniels was misunderstood in Denver a little bit. How about that 2010 draft class he had in Denver? Eric Decker, Demarius Thomas, who am I forgetting here? Parish Cox was in that mix.

I know I'm forgetting some pretty good names on the offensive line. Zane Beatles. Tim Tebow, that one didn't work out too well. And they started what, six in O or something or six and one? They had a great start. In the first year, yes. So the third big contract of the day was for Justin Houston. And I'm lucky I was able to get this letter.

It just was at my desk this morning, strangely, when I showed up. It's from the year 2020, and it was addressed to Andy Reid. Dear Andy Reid, I'm writing you from the year 2020 to send you congratulations for the Justin Houston contract.

It will turn out to be the best value of the three-big contracts signed on July 15, 2015. But no one will remember it or give you any credit because you still work for the Kansas City Chiefs. Remember how NFL Network didn't even mention Houston's contract

until 20 minutes into total access on the day they signed it, despite the fact he's the second highest paid defensive player in history, that actually was the last time Houston or the Chiefs have been mentioned on the network at all. Wow. You really have no one to blame but yourself, Bigfellow. Ever since perfecting your five-yard slant and a cloud of dust offense, and signing Alex Smith to a lifetime contract,

the general public has only grown vaguely cognizant of your existence. Justin Houston is the perfect player to lead your franchise into a bland vanilla future. But I don't want to sound like this is all bad. You and I both know you have this entire football existence figured out ever since you cheated your way to that punt pass and kick competition title at age 13. You can continue to win nine games every season, eat the best barbecue in the country, and wear as many Hawaiian shirts as you want in Kansas City until the end of time. and no one is going to even notice.

That's a hell of a lot better than Philadelphia. Signed Marty Schottenheimer for some street's reason. Wow. He knows where you sit, huh? That's weird. I don't know why Marty was so concerned. He knew who he could get it to get it publicized. Yeah, so there you go.

It sounds like the chiefs are going to firmly stay planted on Dan's pain rankings, though. That's true. If not climb higher. Well, they're going to continue to win nine games, but I think for Andy, it's good news. that he's kind of got this perfect group of guys that can just win nine or ten games every year that no one really will ever bother him or complain. He's better than Herm Edwards. It's better than Todd Haley.

The lifetime contract for Alex Smith seems right on point. Makes sense from that angle, from his, you know, from history. Well, it's a revolutionary offense when you can just throw the ball five yards, never go further than 15 yards in the air and still compete at the NFL level. Yeah, it's not good. I mean, can Justin Houston get a little? little respect that a lot of that you know it seems surprising but that when it when that actually happened with the 20 minutes of the NFL network thing is is true well god bless them they work very

hard put it for that show together so I'm sure they had their reasons for that they I mean he is arguably the second best defensive player in the league to JJ why no question about that and without him they have six sacks last season and I think his whole thing where he came close to the sack total was completely washed out down the stretch last year very little credit for that or attention. Well, and he's good against the run and the past. So if you looked at the player signed on Wednesday, Des Bryant and Marius Thomas,

they didn't get as much money as Justin Houston. No one knows who Justin Houston is, really, but they didn't get as much money because he makes a difference on every down, and they're really just, you know, they're going to make a difference on passing downs, and that's it. Poor Chiefs fans.

Yeah, it's a lack of justice. I think really what this letter spoke to to is that the Chiefs fans, who we didn't mention as the best fans in the NFL when we went around the room, they have to be right up there. They are. They're so supportive that it's almost like a restaurant with a perfect tourist trap location. Always has mediocre food. You know what I mean?

Because they don't have any incentive to have great food. They're going to print money regardless because of the beautiful ocean view. Right. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. And I mean, the endless supply of Hawaiian shirts for Andy Reid. Well, that too. And the barbecue.

I mean, I'm not trying to make a joke or anything. It's a great barbecue. Listeners did not know that they would get a five-minute rant on highway restaurant hearing from Greg. Not really highway, but like if you're in a tourist place, you never want to go. Usually the place with like the best location that serve in the fried seafoods. Yeah, they've been mailing and in.

You know what I mean? Yeah, you've left us breathless because we agree entirely with your point. I'm going to shut up. for the rest of the show. Let's, you know, now that we've visited the future, and that was a lot of fun, let's talk a little bit about other news of the day. Gasky, I just feel bad that he didn't even get a letter.

Well, we looked, and there was absolutely no update on his life from the days ahead. Maybe it went to Wes or Dan. That's possible. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. Would that be, it just seems like there was nothing out there at all. So I'm assuming with the Patriots,

they just sealed any sort of future information up or give it to Wes. They probably gave it to Wes. Gaskowski, for a Patriots fan, it's weird to think that he got the contract, first of all, that they never gave Adam Venetary. They always seemed weirdly like not wanting to give Adam Venetary a contract, even though he won three Super Bowls. Gaskowski's now been there for nine years. So if he stays for the rest of the contract, he'll be there 13 years.

Vinetary was only there for 10. That makes me feel old, Colleen. Wow. Yeah, I mean, you're not old. Don't worry. But like my career spans this entire, you know, career. It's weird how long he's been there. The last item of news we're going to talk about is an item we got from Seahawks.com that Marshawn Lynch in the middle of his camp, which he should be totally applaud for. It's a really good article. I'm not just saying that about his camp.

He has 1,100 kids there, a lot of, like, at-risk youth. He spends a lot of time with them. And that's all great, and that shouldn't be lost in the mix. But the thing that really caught my attention was in the article, it's a sunny day out there. At one point, some worker comes out, gives Marshawn Lynch some chicken wings. And he has a few. But he's in the middle of coaching. He doesn't want to be distracted, and he takes some of those chicken wings, and he puts them in his sock.

And he continues to keep coaching. Minutes later, when he's done coaching, you know, you take the old chicken wings out of the sock and you eat them. Well, it's a convenient pocket. Yeah, and it's actually a really secure pocket. I don't know what my point or question is here. I just wanted to bring it up for the floor. I mean, you know, a lot of times Marshaun Lynch is getting dinged for all sorts of behavior that seems a little off the cuff to people. But this just feels sensible to me.

I mean, I'm wondering, I have a lot of questions about the wings, if they were dry rub, if there was sauce involved. I don't know how logistics evolve this, yeah. Yeah, like how messy were they? Yeah, are they like super, super sappy wings with a lot of like barbecue sauce on it? That just doesn't sound comfortable like around your ankle. It also might not come out in the wash with those socks. That might just be it. I don't think he's worried.

Sox probably people. Yeah, he's got plenty of stuff. He's getting, you know, an endless stream of sportswear. But I think if the socks were new and the wings weren't overly messy, not it's not the mess. You're going to lose all the stuff that goes on the wing. And as a vegetarian, I don't even know why I care about this, but it's like, it seems like a really good deal. And I think he's, again, a wise move.

I think it's the convenience factor, too. I mean, you're in the middle of something. I mean, haven't you ever done anything like that? You're in the middle of a podcast. Well, I do probably go towards the line of doing disgusting things in terms of food. Like, I don't mind. I'll just eat it if it's sitting around or whatever. Whereas most people would think, oh, is that, you know, you got to wash your hand.

You got to do everything the right way. A lot of rules. I would just grab. If I see some food kind of lying there at my house, you know, just grab. or whatever. So I'm more on the Marshawn Lynch side of things. Mark looks horrified. I mean, also, I think he cared about the kids more here. It's like, do I need to keep eating or do I need to coach these kids up?

I just am going to miss Marshawn Lynch whenever he goes away. Like, he is a... Did the future tell you something else? No, but he's a delightful character. He can't play forever. I just want to enjoy the time we have with Marsha. This is like the first time I've ever agreed with Greg on food about anything because I don't understand.

You're in L.A. oh, we've got to wash that apple under the sink. So, oh, yeah, we've made that apple better by putting it under like a gallon of L.A. tap water. That's one of the... That's a perfect example of where I... That's the type of thing. My wife's like, oh, did you wash that apple?

Give me a break. How many different things had to happen to that apple before it got to me? It's probably good for your immune system. I mean, are we in central Wisconsin? We're in L.A. You don't wash anything. You don't use the water. So there you go.

And that's it for the news. It's a different type of news. Yeah. No, that was great. I mentioned the pain rankings before. Before we move on to our senior superlatives, senior superlatives. And I forgot to even mention at the top of the show. Or are you kidding me is back this week.

Oh, that's one of my favorites. Conoror is on the line and we're going to call him in a little bit. That's right. I mentioned the pain rankings before. I did also want to mention we've hit the top five of our Making the Leap series. Mark, you had Honey Badger early in the week. Give me Honey Badger in 10 seconds or less. He's going to have a better year than his rookie season.

Hasn't been healthy since. I like that. I had Anthony Barr was number three. Teddy Bridgewater was number two. And we're going to unveil our number one player making the leap on Friday. So everyone check that out. I also want to say something we often forget to, which is that it really helps us when you leave comments for us on iTunes,

when you give us high ratings and stuff. Every podcast I listen to, they give this reminder like every time. And it really helps. And I've seen our ranking, our little thing, go down a little bit. Have you guys left comments? No.

And I don't even know how to access it, but I would. I'm just saying if it helps us out. I will. To leave a comment about my own performance. I can't leave a comment about myself. But, you know, leave a comment, rated five, you know,

subscribe on every different device or something, tell your friends. That's all. Why not? That's all I wanted to say. Let's go to the senior superlatives. Greg's doing a hosting perfect game right now. What's up?

Quick question going into the senior superlatives for everybody in the room, including the Irishman. Did anybody win a superlative in high school in this room? I did. You did as well? I did too. All right, let's go around. Okay, so Sully, I don't think we had them. Really?

I could have just been tuned out, which sounds possible, but I'm pretty sure we didn't have it. Is that a band reference? No. I just mean, like, I wasn't paying close attention to what was going on. He was tuned in. I'm pretty sure they didn't have that in my yearbook or anything like that. Wow. Guys sound organized at that school.

Good way to sell. Sully, what were you? I'm going to guess, best mustache. No, I didn't have a mustache in high school. I went to private school, actually, no facial hair allowed. But no surprise. I'm wearing orange shirt and an orange socks today that I also won most school spirit in middle school and high school. and I probably would have wanted to college if they had it.

Wow. That's surprising to me. Yeah. I could totally see that. Yeah. Not a surprise to anybody. They have like a, I would have gotten least school spirit.

I feel like I don't know. You were a got, you were a goth dip. Actually, I was pretty active. I was in all the clubs. That's why I don't think. What were all the clubs? No, I mean like.

The clubs in high school? I was kind of like in Rushmore, you know. I didn't, my grades weren't great, but I was like in every club, you know, like model Congress and mock law. Wow. All those sorts of things. You had a big resume going in a club.

We started the Bachi Club. I directed some plays. You were chasing after a British widow? What are you? Are you Max Fisher? I wish I was. You're Max Fisher. No, I'm just saying in a lot of clubs.

What were you? What were you in a house? I don't recall what it was. I remember winning something. Oh. I really don't. It was just some low level. I think they're like, oh, we have to give everyone something.

So this guy got something. Where were you calling? Would you go to the school of like 10? Give everybody something? Oh, sally. No, no, I'm saying there's not that many superlatives to hand out. Most artistic. Yeah.

Interesting. Awesome. What was, like, painting or what was the art? Everything. Paint. I drew. No, no, no, no. Just like painting, drawing, you know, I don't even.

Pottery. What if you have ever guessed you become a sports? Yeah, this wasn't the plan. I was supposed to be an art teacher. Wow. This kind of happened. I could do that down the road potentially. Yeah.

Could do that. that or I'd be out of a job. Yeah, if this podcast goes terribly wrong. Our teachers are always the happiest. It's not a bad. And Jerry Jones has you fired four hours from now. Yes. Let's do our senior superlatives. Because we have to have a little music cue with every segment. Colleen, let's start with you. Okay. Biggest Dreamer goes to Trent Richardson. I mean, he's aiming high and that's great. and I think that he is going to prove everybody wrong this year, just like he hasn't, every other year before this. So this is looking forward, really,

and you're saying for the 2015 season, he's dreaming. I mean, that's fair. I think really it's the rate, it's Reggie McKenzie that's dreaming. Why did he give him that contract? And why are there only four running backs on that roster? One of them who no one's heard of, and Rent Richardson and maybe two other guys that make it. He's going to make the team.

The MVP of the off season is Trent Richardson's agent. How did they give him that contract where they guaranteed him money when there was no way there was any team competing for him in that same? Yeah, I don't understand why he's there. I mean, they have Roy Huloo there as well. Hulu, Latavius Murray. Murray Richardson. And then a fourth guy that I'm not convinced as a real person.

I know they guaranteed him money, but it still wouldn't. It's hard to outchuk that savvy Raiders front of. $600,000 guaranteed. That's just at the borderline where you just eat that money after seeing how poor he was. We've heard with Trent Richardson that it's really like the off-the-field stuff

that some of the Colts were, brass was concerned about. Not like he was like a bad guy or anything, just like he was really distracted and he had 30 people showing up to every game and he was worried about all that kind of stuff. If you're not going to produce in the Colts offense, how in the world are you going to do anything with the Raiders?

It's not going to happen. Mark, what's your first superlative? The one I have is, let's see here, worst couple. You know, there's couples in high school that think they're... Worst couple. They're going to ride off into the sunset and they're not. It's Jay Gruden and RG3. And I just, I don't like, you know, I've sat near them in class during part of the school year,

and I just don't like the interaction between them, the energy is... What have you seen? Well, one thing, because I think Jay Gruden is sort of the dominates relationship. and plays this thing with other people around him where he'll pretend to show confidence in his mate, but then he does not. And it's like this relationship is heading south, and I think it could be by October, November,

these two break up. Do they hold hands down the hallway and then, like, fight? Whatever they do to give those kinds of signals. Well, anything positive seems false, and anything negative seems just at the cusp of what's really going on. It's interesting because if they were giving out these yearbook awards, in 2005, maybe it was John Gruden and Chris Sims, or John Gruden and Jeff Garcia,

or John Gruden and whatever... There's a theme here. Whatever McCown brother they had in Tampa. I mean, the Grudens go through quarterbacks, like, I don't know. And they're quarterback gurus, apparently. And, you know, the best one that either of us had is Andy Dalton. He's like that guy at the high school that's just rolling through girlfriends, one after another.

Marshawn Lynch and the chicken wings just over and over again. Were you a good couple in high school? Like, were you a good boyfriend? Did you have girlfriends and whatnot? I had a number of them. I mean, obviously, if I was really good, they wouldn't have all ended in some sort of. Well, obviously, it's going to end, but you were kind of, you know, you were a boyfriend, you were a couple kind of guy. You don't ask me if I was that.

You ask the other people. They'll probably give you a much more colorful account. How was your high school dating situation calling? It was pretty much non-existent because I cut off all my hair. So, yeah, there was... Hair is that important? Yeah, apparently. I was going through it.

It was weird. Yeah, I don't know. My uncle cut off all my hair. I was a figure skater. It was a weird period of my life, I guess. We're learning a lot. Kind of like the... I'm trying to think who...

Like, who is the cool short haircut of the time? Oh, nobody at all. So my friends called me Ellen for a little while. It was fine. I got through it, I guess. I got through it, I guess. Yeah. That was me.

How about you? I peaked in high school, I would say. Relationship wise. Relationship wise, because I was, you know, I was, you know, I was, I had the confidence going, but, you know, no one had noticed how, you know, short I was and annoying my voice. You know, I just, in high school, all you have to do is be willing to talk to girls and then you'll be fine. at some point you need more than that and I would say in high school I had that yeah I think you peaked now you're happily married with two children

I'd say that's a high point compared to whatever happened at Roosevelt High Fair point I was Minichag Minichag Regional Less catchy Indian country Biggest flirt That's going to be my

First of Perletive Biggest flirt award That's going to go to Jeff Fisher I'm giving that to Jeff Fisher And that seems a little confusing But I'm going to unpack it for you Jeff Fisher is the guy who's flirting with all the reporters from around the country. Oh, Michael Silver, no.

Your hand gesture. Adam Schaefter is perfect. And everyone's wondering, oh, what, how come Jeff Fisher's had like three winning seasons out of 17, but no one ever seems to notice or care or wonder what exactly Jeff Fisher is bringing to the table. He just has this entrenched reputation as a great head coach. And I think that's because partly. because he's the biggest flirt around. Second head coach you picked on with mustache today.

I'm seeing what you have against mustache. What's going on here? Explained it well, though. There's some fire there. So, you know, Jeff Fisher, I actually think the Rams are going to have a good season this year. I believe in these Rams. And so that's only going to raise the flirting even more.

So now instead of, you know, we'll get interesting articles where no one's criticized Jeff Fisher, now when they do well, and I do think they're going to do well this year, now we're going to start hearing about, Wow, what a job he's done turning them out. Oh, in the GM with the perfect team. I'm worried about that offensive line.

Mm. Well, they just drafted five rookies. Exactly. So you have so many unproven guys on your offensive line, and you're going to try and run the ball with Todd Gurley if he's healthy enough. How are you going to do that? And then who are your receivers? Kenny Britt.

Davon Austin. It's a weird group. It sounds like he'll be protected from the press side of it no matter what happens. Yeah. That's what I was getting at. Colleen, you're up next. Oh, okay. Um, most likely to crash on your couch, Josh Gordon.

I think this one is pretty self-explanatory. Yeah, it is dead on. Well, he's got to go somewhere after working at the car dealership. Yep, he's pulling hard hours at the car dealership. And it's a perfect set. He's in, he's in Bere, Ohio, needs a couch to crash on. Yeah, he just needs to, you know, get through the time and, you know, just needs a place to stay. Mark would definitely love if Gordon was crashing at his house.

It would be a total situation where Simone after a week or two would be like, well, Mark, maybe we should think about, you know. Does he want to get up at 5.48? I guess the question is. You'd be like, he's on the Brown. The Brown's like, you can crash on couches, but whose couch? Because that's all going to depend whether we ever see or hear from him ever again, basically. Yeah.

Mark, what's your next one? All right, most likely to blow up the men's bathroom with homemade explosives. Oh, this is getting weird. It's dark. It happens in most high schools at some point. Okay. No one's hurt. Is this what happened at T.D.'s house?

That's possible. I'm going Joe Filbin. I think there's a lot of pent-up anxiety and angst in Joe Philbin, and he's, you know, he's, oh, sitting around thinking, everyone tells me I've got no personality. I make no dent on society. He's sensitive. Yeah, I wear cords in a white turtleneck and carry a briefcase. You know what? I'm going to go, I'm going to make my voice heard.

I'm going to make my voice heard, and it's going to be in a completely undisciplined childish way. Blow up a bathroom. I feel like Gronk would be a good answer for that one. Just kind of a brotastic. But it would be unintentional. Like he didn't realize that was going to happen. My next one's going to be most likely to be president,

which really is one of those that you get in everywhere. And I was trying to think who is the most likely to be president of all the NFL players. I'm going to go with Russell Wilson because as TD, alluded to a little earlier. There's something political about Russell Wilson. There's something that could appeal just enough to, I think, a big mass audience. He seems like a guy who would want to put himself out there. Now he's kind of branching out, raising his profile.

Yeah, I think that's solid. Most likely to be present. Becoming a little trendier at this point. Before he had the good guy vibe going. I think it still does. It's definitely got to be a quarterback. Yeah, has to be a quarterback. Tom Brady.

I'll go with Peyton Manning. Oh, I cannot deal with press conferences. That's pretty good. I don't think he, I don't think he likes football too much. I don't think he would. Oh, he'll be a head coach one day, I'd say. I think Payne Manning will be one of those, one of those guys who enjoys his retirement plenty. I think he knows, he knows, he's from New Orleans. He knows how about Tom Brady, first lady, chiselle.

That would be pretty cool. That wouldn't be hard. Let's do some more. Yeah, he's got a lot of skeletons, though. But I've seen you have a long list here. I want to hear some more. Okay, you two. All right.

Worst driver, that goes to Jay Cutler. He's a terrible driver. He really can't stay in the lane. He has trouble focusing. He's one of those guys, too, that hesitates. So, you know, if you're not aggressive when you're driving, you get yourself into trouble. So if you don't trust yourself, then that's when things happen. You know, you stop, and then there's their bus there, you know.

And it's just, it kind of is a snowball effect. Right. He can't really anticipate what other cars are going to. do like he has no clue he has to see the car moving until he really believes it um most of his offensive coordinators have been in the other car that he hits like they're all end up gone after a year he drives really fast though so that's cool there's a cool factor he drives really fast right but it's just

it's sort of dangerous almost you don't you don't want to be in the car with him let's just say that what did you did you guys have cars in high school uh yes i did at the tail end the very end i had what was it Honda prelude I had, I had two, I had a really old boxy Volvo that was my cousins that the roof was classic. I had to like put the tack on it to get the roof to stay. And then I had my brother's Transam, which later the tailpipes actually fell off of while I was driving. The prelude I had, it came to an end, I believe, when it rolled out of, I had a house that was up on a hill over our neighbors.

And I came home one night and I don't know what happened. I was walking up the walk and it just rolled in the middle of the night out of my driveway over a rock wall into my neighbor's yard, crossed the yard, hit a tree, and uprooted the tree. It seemed like a sign of some sort. You know what? Something very similar just happened to you recently where a car rolled down and hit your car, right? In the middle of the night. Maybe that was cosmic forces sort of equaling themselves out.

I don't know. You know what I mean? Trying to get the insurance back on that one. I drove my old grandfather's car and all my friends called it the Sub-A-Jew. That was like the only Jewish person in town. Irish Catholics surrounded everything. Mark, you're up.

Class clown. I mean, some of these it's just so obvious that you know it before the yearbook's printed. What's happening? Ritchie Incognito. Why is that obvious? Good sense of humor, but he knows boundaries. Like he's like when he gets in trouble,

he understands and he's able to take a joke a certain distance and then temper it down. I think he's got, he's a perfect candidate for this. He's not some, you know, you can respect his humor. I want to, I'm not going gronk on that? I would go gronk on that. I wouldn't vote. I want to, right, I want to keep my, you know, facilities and not get in any more trouble.

So I'm not even going to comment on Richie. Let's do one more each quickly. Okay. How about most forgetful? This one is, it's given out every year. And it's actually, this is a repeat because he repeated. So, RG3, he gets most forgetful. It's weird, but he just can't remember how to be a quarterback.

Wow. He's had a bad senior year. It's a lot of RG3. I know. Most likely to win a Nobel Prize, Odell Beckham, because according to what's happened this offseason, that wouldn't be hard for him, and she's probably already done it. What about the guy?

There's the guy on Baltimore, offensive lineman, who just produces scholarly math papers for, like, MIT's academic thing. You know what I'm talking about? That guy. It's Monroe, isn't it? No, no. I forget his name, but I feel like he could be a good thing. He does that for fun?

He just does it for fun. He, like, submits academic papers on really complicated mathematics. I don't know who else would win it. I think Beckham is clearly superhuman in every trade. John Ursch. John Urshel. Wow, well done. Nice.

And what is it that he submits? Did he check that? Something with math. Yeah. Okay. I don't know. I don't know numbers. Glad we got that straightened out.

Well, that was a delightful little segment. This was great, guys. I think we should do it again. We should do it again. But before we go for the day, it was a great idea. We do have to get one of our favorite segments of the week. Always our last segment of the week during the off season. And of course, that's the segment.

by the name Oh, are you kidding me? Connor, or are you there? What's going on, everybody? Well, I got to admit, this is the part of the show I'm the most nervous for because, you know,

just the excitement that Hansis brings to this and the finger-pointing that sets off the guitar, I don't know if I can really replicate that as well as Dan does. I'm sucking traffic in Newark, so I'll really bring the energy.

Plus, he'll be offended because I was going to give Dan best hair with the superlatives, but I guess I just did. Although if in high school you had salt and pepper hair, I don't think people would think that. Well, back then, you know, I doubt he did. All right, Connor, well, if you guys haven't listened to the show before, Connor, he's a small man, but he's solid, he's thick.

And, you know, this is going well. People sometimes treat him, you know, without the respect that they really should. And he's there in the New York area. He's out getting reports. He's competing against other reporters. He gets a little upset. And he's got to let go of that frustration. And we let him do that in a little segment we like to call.

Are you kidding me? Connor Orver. What are you got for us? Greg, I would like to know why. Someone thinks it's okay, especially when you're in a suite, to sing at the top of their lungs at a concert when you ask them not to. standing at the top of a concert? What concert was this?

So, last week, I went to go see Rush, and I was very excited, very awesome rock band from Canada, Legends, 40th anniversary tour, might be their last one, and I was in a suite with this guy who had all the tour here on. I knew he was going to go nuts, but it's a small, full-person suite, so I said, I'll make a compromise. Anytime they play something off of moving pictures, you don't sing, but the rest of the time go nuts. And he didn't adhere to that at all.

It's ridiculous. More proof that Connor Orr is not a millennial, despite his age. He's at the concert shushing the other concert goers. Okay, I thought you said stand up. So you're saying singing at the concert is really the big problem. Yeah, that's my problem. Because, you know what, especially if the lead singer has a unique voice like, that you're not better than he is and i'm paying that guy no one sounds crazier than rush

connor do you have other rules that you you know lay down the law at concerts with i mean what what other rules do you have here uh i would say no uh you can you can go to the bathroom during ballot but other than that you have to you have to stay in your seat because i don't want to be interrupted i don't want my flow to be interrupted connor says you or anyone no no one no one can leave my road. We're learning a lot about Connor. Connor says, sit down, listen to the music. It's Rush.

By the way, Rush is terrible. I mean, that's my or are you kidding me? Who wants to go see Rush? You know, honestly, when I was playing this segment, I knew. Like, I absolutely was 100% certain that your biggest objection to this would be Rush. I didn't know that you didn't like them, but I figured you wouldn't like them. They were just one of those bands that people were into that were old. It was before my time really as well.

And I never quite got it. And we pulled our newsroom after Connor. After you went to the concert, you mentioned on IM on Slack that you went to Rush. And we asked like half the room, and it's a young newsroom, at least 50% had never even heard of Rush, which not surprised me. No, that makes sense to me. Really? Yeah. I don't know.

I've heard of them, but I wouldn't seek them out. No. Not that there's anything wrong with that, Connor. I don't want to upset Connor. I'm still convinced Connor is quietly like 39 years old. Once again, people are doubting Connor or the rage is building inside of him. Connor, do you have one more thing that you need to get out for us this week? Well, all of that makes me want to say, or are you kidding me?

So good. Connor, thank you again. It's always so delightful to hear from you, Connor. We'll even call you up and talk about football one of these times. That's cool, and the pleasure is all mine, so thank you. I appreciate it. That's Connor or well. Good luck with that traffic.

It really is an art form to get the sound drops and point it all right. You were preparing for it before the show. I was a little worried, and I'll be really excited when Dan is back next week. I think you've done a fine. You've done a very solid job. Well, we had DJ host the show on Tuesday. That was controversial. That was great.

A lot of people were upset about that. We haven't heard anything between Dan and DJ on that, which really is a bad sign. Well, Dan did ask on Twitter if DJ had won a contest. Like, how else did he get in the studio was Dan's coming? But we're going to keep them apart. That was our chance to have DJ in the show. We're going to bring Colleen on the show whenever we can. So we don't know Dan gone for that.

So we'll do that throughout the season. throughout training camp. We will be back with the Around the NFL podcast on Tuesday next week. We'll do one more week with two shows, Tuesday and Thursday. And then training camp's really going to get going the week after that. We will be back to three shows a week for the rest of the year after that. And I'm excited about that. Colleen's excited about that.

And really, that's it for today. Mark Sessler, thank you for coming by. I love this drop, by the way. Colleen Wolf. It's great. Thank you. Of course, we've got Sully behind the mic. TD was here a little earlier.

We got Brandon McGinnis. We missed Dan Hansis. We miss Chris Wesleyan. I'm Greg Rosenthal. We'll be back on Tuesday. is an iHeart podcast.