NFL Stock Exchange: An NFL Draft Podcast - 67. Expansion Drafting A New 33rd NFL Franchise (Part 1)

Episode Date: July 18, 2022

Hosts Trevor Sikkema and Connor Rogers embark on a journey to create the 33rd franchise in the NFL via an expansion draft. In Part 1, the two first come up with where the franchise will be located, the team name, and color scheme. Then, just like in the NHL, they establish protected player lists for every team in the NFL before the big expansion draft next week.

This episode is brought to you by our good friends at NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV. I'm sure by now you've all got back into your Sunday routines, but they could be even better. With NFL Sunday Ticket and YouTube TV, you get the most live NFL games all in one place, every game, every Sunday. And you can even watch up to four different games at once with MultiView, one of my favorite inventions of this decade. It's exactly what you need to catch all the action. Make your Sundays more magical. And also, YouTube TV is great. I got it this year.

It's awesome. Sign up now at youtube.com slash BS, device and content restrictions apply. Local and national games on YouTube TV. NFL Sunday ticket for out-of-market games excludes digital-only games. Welcome to the NFL Stock Exchange Podcast. In this episode, we're opening up the imagination a little bit. What if the NFL had an expansion draft like we have seen happen in other sports most recently, the NHL with the Seattle Kraken. Teams around the NHL

had a protected list. They could protect a certain amount of players, and then the new franchise was allowed to draft their team from players that are already in the NFL. Well, we are going to go through that exercise today on this episode. Connor and I are forming a brand new NFL franchise. We're going to establish where the new franchise is, how they're going to fit into the NFL, which conference. We're going to talk about a mascot, a team name,

a color scheme, and then we're going to go through the NFL. Every single team and collectively pick four players on offense, four players on defense for each team that are protected. So eight total players for each team that are protected. So eight total players for each team. And then in next week's episode, part two, we're going to be drafting from the players that remain, bringing us to the 33rd franchise in the NFL. I'm Trevor Sycamore. With me is Connor Rogers. Let's ring that bell. welcome to the opening bell of the nfl stock exchange podcast i'm trevor sycamore that

is connor rogers and today we have a very special mock draft monday for you it is part one of a two-part series that we're doing here on mond. So part two won't be out this Thursday. It'll actually be out next Monday. But essentially, Connor and I were thinking the other day, we're like, you know what would actually be really cool? What if we did an entire projection of what would happen if the NFL had an expansion franchise? Now, it's only one, so that means that it's an odd number of NFL teams.

So we're not really working through that logistic. But we're big NHL fans. They just had a recent NHL expansion draft because they had a new team, the Seattle Crack, come in. So we said, hey, what if we went through that exercise in the NFL? And I think it's going to be a lot of fun. We're going to go down every single roster in the NFL. What we're going to do is we're going to have a protected players list. We're going to protect guys from every single team. That's what we're going to have a protected players list we're going to protect guys from every single team

uh that's what we're going to do on this episode we're also going to come up with where the new expansion team is going to be we're going to give shout out to some cities maybe some mascot names we're going to figure all that out and then eventually on the next episode on part two we're going to actually draft from around the nfl to form this expansion team kind of i feel like i've been talking way too long already for an intro on the podcast but buddy i'm very excited to uh to get this one going. There's a lot involved, but it's going to be a lot of fun. It was much needed. I mean, it's a very specific kind of series we're doing here. I have not seen somebody project a lot of this. We know there's been rumors going around for a while that it's not really rumors. It's kind of the obvious that the NFL will only want to get

bigger and better because there is money to be had on the table by doing that you're 100% right it's tricky that you know will they when they expand again will it be two teams that's something that you and I can't predict but for this exercise we're going to do it similar to the way the NHL did it with Seattle where it's one team coming in there's protect obviously protections each team is going to protect four offensive players and four defensive players but before we get to that we have to pick a place for this team to play that is going to be the most important talking point when this becomes a reality however many years down the road yeah that'll be that'll be kind of

the fun creative part is you have you and i going back and forth figuring out where this team is going to play what they're going to be called maybe some color schemes some jersey ideas that we might have and you mentioned it there the format that we have for these teams so the way that the NHL did it is they had every team in the NHL protect eight skaters and a goalie I believe is what it was or you could do what was it seven forward three defensemen and a goalie so i think yeah you might have been able to get a little bit of an extra number or maybe it was nine and one i can't remember exactly but i think it was eight skaters and one goalie is how a lot of teams did that and if you kind of do the math that's nine total players in the team they've got anywhere from like 45 to 48 guys that they could come up with and you have used that same kind of number for a NFL team

53 man roster you know a game day roster is a little bit less than that if we do four on offense four on defense of protected players for every single team in the NHL that keeps the ratio about the same for impact starters that you're taking away so we kind of went went off that blueprint in all honesty if the nfl did this i feel like it would probably be five and five for each i think i think they'd have more yeah or they or they would probably say like hey pick any 12 players as you're protected like doesn't matter offense doesn't matter defense but we wanted to but we wanted to split it up to have a little bit of fun with it and honestly give our expansion team the chance to maybe get some steals here we didn't want to make a dog shit team it's as simple as that that's actually a great way to put it we didn't want to make the team we don't want to be like

hey here you go take off the platter and it's garbage we've done like three hours of podcasting over the two the two-part series. And at the end of it, we just go, here's the team. And everybody goes, they suck. So we're trying to avoid that. We're trying to give ourselves the opportunity to put some teams in some tough situations because we wanted to have those talks too. Because, you know, contracts go into these things.

Age for the players go into these things. Where the team, you know, like what we're thinking their direction is all that goes into who might be protected so we thought it would be fun on that exercise and then of course how we are going to go about the team building strategy yep or the expansion team on next monday's episode yeah so today what you're going to get is you're going to get where this team is playing you're going to get what their color scheme will look like, and you're going to know what players were protected by every single team in the NFL. That's the bulk of today's show. The next episode, you will actually get to see

what this expansion draft looks like forming the legitimate roster. So it's going to give everybody listening a week if they want to mull over what players are out there in the pool that they think we should take in a week, which fun we know you guys are are uh crazy passionate about this podcast which we absolutely love and are thankful for and you know when you we're going to be able to set the table for you guys to throughout the week like connor just said if you want to come back to us before next monday's episode and tell us what your team would look like after the protected list that we kind of established here in that this episode, that would be a lot of fun too.

We'll try to, if you got, if you, I'm just thinking about this in my head, maybe this is something that we can do at the end of next episode. If you guys go through this exercise after we established the protected list and form your own expansion team with the guys who are available still, if you put it in like a notes format and screenshot it and tweet it at us, we can put that screenshot up at the end of the show and kind of say like, hey, like this is what you guys picked and all that.

So we can do all that if you guys want to do it. But let's start with the city. All right. Do you have like a specific city in mind? Did you have a list that you went through some options that you mulled over i have five okay i kind of divided up into i guess a top five but it was really just five to discuss but i wasn't sure if you had one that you absolutely loved or if there were a handful that you were thinking so i narrowed it down to three and i really think at the moment in this exercise only two are realistic so I'll give you the one first

that I love uh I've been there for an NFL weekend I just don't think we're unfortunately there yet where it's a reality in this exercise for one team and that's London and obviously there's a lot of special things about London for an expansion NFL team one the passion of the fans over there. And it's not just the citizens of London. It's the citizens of Europe that come into London for NFL football. That's a huge question mark that the NFL needs to ask themselves when they're looking for this city and is the market. And London is a home run as a market financially. You're going to sell out. You're going to be a destination city like we've seen Vegas become. There's so much you can do. But the logistics of it being a full-time NFL destination

are just not hammered out yet. And I think it's going to take a full global expansion. I think when you cross that bridge, when you cross that pond, you need to do it in a gigantic way. Like, I think we're going to get a London team, a Germany team, maybe two or three teams in the UK or a team in Ireland. So they have their own division where there's not as much flying as it's going to take at the moment.

So I love London. I don't know if they made your top five, Trevor. I just don't think it's possible in this very moment right now, unfortunately. Yeah, they did make my top five. In fact, they are my number one team. And I have, look, I don't know how realistic this might be, but we can get a little crazy in the lab. And I want to tell you my proposal for how this might work.

Because it's a little weird. I'm all ears. It's a little weird, right i'm all ears it's a little weird right right we're adding a 33rd team and that puts us at an odd number so you go like okay like what converts are you adding were they playing yeah like who are they playing all that i have an idea and i i just thought of it i haven't put a ton of time into workshopping it but i loved it and i would i'm gonna tell you what it is but before that are there any other cities that you want to throw out there because i'm i'm just gonna let you know i'm gonna tell you what it is but before that are there any other cities that you want

to throw out there because i'm i'm just gonna let you know i'm gonna take this london idea and i'm gonna put it up against whatever the best other probably north american idea that we have so what are some other cities that yeah it's not gonna take much because i wanted london the most okay so we might be in on this so two american cities that I narrowed it down to, and they edged out a couple other ones. They edged out Oklahoma City. They edged out San Antonio, stuff like that, was Austin, Texas. Love Austin. Austin's in my top five as well.

Austin is really a no-brainer for the NFL. Austin has a huge population, an ever-booming population. They are in the top 10 in U.S. population. They are growing. There's a lot of financial bonuses there in terms of stability for the economy, for people moving there to work there. It's a young city. It has great food, great places to drink.

You can walk around. It has Texas football that people are passionate about but texas is hasn't been very good lately and texas is never gonna be a you're talking about the university like the university of the longhorns as great as a lot of the good things texas has done lately they're not like tuscaloosa where in tuscaloosa people just care about alabama football right i think there is an appetite to hold an NFL franchise there in a big-time way in a big-time way and you have people coming to visit their kids that go to Texas that will also go to an NFL game so you have the

external market I think the internal market of the city can hold it the one it's up against and they have a tougher hill to climb in this cell but i just love it from a unique perspective would be portland oregon oh okay yeah i thought a little bit about portland too portland is i think top 30 population wise in the u.s i think there is an appetite for pro sports i think the scenery would be magnificent. I think there's a little bit of a boom there for the food and drink industry, which is very important in my eyes for people going to a city, visiting that city, and then going to a sporting event or living in that city. So Portland's my a little bit more, this is a fun place.

This would be really cool to have NFL football there versus Austin that I think you could put an NFL team, honestly, where Texas plays today, where they're building a city. And it would be a huge success. No, I agree. I agree with you 100% there. They are in my top five. The other U.S. city that was in my top five is San Diego, because I think that San Diego, you know, old Charger fans still probably feel they're very burned for not having a team anymore. So I feel like that's a... St. Louis is another one that I thought of

that a lot of people talk about as a potential for an NFL franchise to go back there. But I like the allurement of San Diego more than St. Louis, but they're both right there. The two other North American cities, Toronto and then Mexico City, are the other two that I thought of that I would throw in there

where if you're going to go past U.S. borders and it's not to London, you're gonna go past u.s borders and it's not to london you're talking about those couple of cities and obviously like toronto has had pro sports uh already established in in where they are with the uh with the blue jays and the maple leaves you're down the street from the bills yeah the location right so i mean like all that is right there too so you got to think about that but that was my top five it was mexico city san diego toronto austin and then i had london there um i actually came up with do you come up with any mascots for each or is there a specific mascot that you want to say no matter what team do you have any ideas on mascots no i have color scheme okay i got mascots i figured we come with mascot

once we pick city but if you have mascots for each, I would love to hear them. All right, I'll say it sounds like we're honing in on London, so I'll just say the other four. Mexico City, the Caracara is the golden eagle, which is the national bird of Mexico. That'd be cool. And, you know, it could work great as a mascot there. You know, if we're talking color schemes, probably like green, white, black, maybe a little red,

maybe a little gold in there. san diego i have is the rip i don't love this one as much but think of it like surfing you know like on the water the rip tie the rip current all that so i have like the san diego rip so i thought that was kind of unique there uh toronto avalanche just because i love the mascot the avalanche, and I wanted to get it in there. You could get away with it. Couldn't really think of anything else. And then Austin, I just have the Mavericks,

because I think that's kind of a cool – I know there's like the Dallas Mavs. That's the issue. Because they're in the state of Texas, it might be – Might be. Or, yeah, you're right. Probably that wouldn't work. I'm just thinking out loud here.

But I do love the name the Mavericks because it's also like – think it's a young calf right is also known as a maverick so it just it makes total sense with it but you can't take texas and it's right there it's just too easy it's just too easy it's a cool mascot it was too easy it's right there i think you you whatever you name the team can be separate like gritty like gritty has nothing to do with the flyers really you're gritty it's just so entertaining you're that like i honestly like just have you ever seen mr red i know we've uh we've had a like the cincinnati reds yeah have you seen mr red he's just a giant baseball right no he's more than that he is the most terrifying mascot he's like he's like if mr met went on on a really bad bender and his life just fell apart.

Mr. Red, Cincinnati. He's scary. Dude, look at his eyes. Images. Images. Oh, this is the one with the giant mustache. Yes, but the eyes. Mr. Red is...

We have a tracker a little bit of pissing off Cincinnati on this pod, so I want to tread lightly here with the Skyline Chili incident. But I'm thinking we go really weird with the mascot. Whatever we name the team, we combine Gritty and Mr. Red and just make a total freak. Just like a total nightmare of a mascot. Like, don't bring your epic kids to the game. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Don't bring your kids. Every other franchise in the world is very family-friendly. Kids running the bases, all that. We're like, keep your keep your kids away 21 and up that's all we want in our stands bring i think london would embrace it bring people that'll buy beer that's it that's all we care about obviously where this is going so i want to hear your unless you really are die hard about one of the north american cities i would like to hear to hear the London proposal because it's the city to me that I find the most interesting for a new NFL team, but I just don't have the answers

of how it works without other European expansion. Okay. Part of this plan might piss people off, but it's also kind of intriguing, and I was trying to think of ways- What podcast does it? That's true. I'm trying to piss people off, okay?

I think we both agree that the NFL is eventually going to expand into Europe. We think that that's going to be the case. We think that it would probably take multiple teams for that to be the case, but we're only adding one here. I think London is the right location to make that happen. I think Munich in Germany,

there's a huge football following in Germany. So I thought about that, but London still makes the most sense. They've got the infrastructure. It's the easiest flight over there. I just think that the clearly already laying the foundation of a fan base to go to London. So you've got one team, right, overseas.

Here's how it could work. You treat the London team like it's Notre Dame in college football. It's an independent. So every year, we've got 17 games, right? 17-game season, 18-week schedule, so you've got the bye week. Every year, they are playing two AFC conferences, two NFC conferences. All right? So they're playing against those teams and then it flips the next year what happens is we got to work out on the schedule to where the london team is

playing four games at home four games on the road that's what they're doing now it doesn't necessarily have to be all of the division teams at once but there are four there are four games where the london team is playing at home they're just playing in london for four weeks straight and then they're over in america for four weeks straight so they're on and off so i feel like that's the easiest way to keep it even to keep it as a block and to make it easier on the london team specifically because of course like they need a hub trevor what do you mean oh they need like a they need a practice facility in the u.s they would they would for sure but like which is great fine that's what that's what they're like like for the eagles it like say like the eagles would

be going to london yeah it's annoying because they'd have to go from philadelphia to london or even worse like san francisco the niners they'd have to go from san francisco all the way to london but you can recover from that like that's just a couple of weeks where, all right, that's kind of a drag for you. The London team, you can't have them popping over to the U S like every other. No, no, no, that's not, it's gotta be a block. So we're going four weeks on four weeks off and then you kind of like have some random team,

however you need to make it work for the 17th game to make that happen. Here's how the playoffs work for this team. Again, you're treating it as if it's Notre Dame and independent college football. The London team, whatever record they finish with, if it ties a team that is in the wild card of either division, the lowest record, it kicks them out.

They are bumped out of the playoffs. So let's say the AFC is super strong and the lowest seeded team, the lowest seeded wild card is, what is it now? It's 10 and 7, right? So 11 and 6, 10 and 7, right. So the lowest seed is 10 and 7 i get where you're going and in the nfc the lowest seed is 9 and 8 if the london team finishes 10 and 7 they take that wild card spot from the nfc team they take them away. And then they are in the wildcard for the NFC

or you could flip it or whatever. So it's basically if they have an even or better record with any of the teams. And of course, like you'd have to come up with tiebreakers. Like if there's multiple teams in each division that have the same record, like you'd have to come up with different tiebreakers. But essentially that's the way it would work.

You would give them somewhat of an advantage where they would own the first tiebreaker over a one team if they had the same record on the lowest record of either conference. And so they could get into either the AFC playoffs or the NFC playoffs, whichever one it kind of worked out for them to take the lowest seeded team out of the playoffs. I love it. And I think that the caveat is in a good way,

this is just a temporary solution to what's going to be figured out in the longterm on its own by getting more teams in Europe or finding a way to really realign the divisions. Because let's not forget, like flying from London to New York is shorter than like when the Jets or Giants have to go to Seattle. You know what I mean? Like, we're acting like they're going to the moon.

That's not the case here. It's a lot of travel, and your solution is needed. Like, they need to have a practice hub based somewhere in North America that is central to the teams they are going to play every year. But the playoff thing is a really good Band good band-aid to me on like a paper cut like i think it i think we can sell this right now i think we're going to london all right so so we're making it happen so we're all right so our franchise is going to be in london all right we're going to adopt the playoff format we're going to keep it foam we're going to keep it interesting i am sure 100 the first comment on the YouTube channel is going to be

somebody somehow poking a hole in all of this, but that's fine. Or right now for right now, I'm going to live in blissful ignorance and think that this is a good strategy that they are the Notre Dame of the NFL, if you will, and kind of spice things up in that way. So for the mascots, did you have a mascot idea? Cause I had two for one. Yeah, I want a giant pint with legs running around. This is not a mascot. They're not going to be like, that's not what we're going to call the team.

That's just what I want the mascot in the stadium running around to be. They're not going to be the London Pints. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. We can do something way better than that. If you want to go with that, we can. Like a logo and a team. No, we're not going to name it. I feel like it's just too low-hanging fruit.

As much as I do love the idea of that's what the mascot in the stadium is absolutely going to be. So I think the three that really stood out to me are, and I did some research for this, so shout out to the people on Reddit.com who came up with certainly the Redcoats is one that a lot of people have liked over the years if there was a team in london the redcoats makes sense but i feel like i don't know a lot of bad internet jokes on that you know what i'm saying like that's just that's just too that's just too easy so they go to play the patriots and like the responses are just like so crappy to the team accounts like there's just so

i don't i don't love the red coats one okay the knights one makes sense right i don't like that that could that could make sense i also thought about just calling them the dynasty the london dynasty right i mean like royal family lines you get history so we're thinking crown maybe in this logo somewhere right like the crown could be part of the logo, right? I like that. There's not like a crown logo right now in the NFL, is there? No, I mean, all you have had is obviously the Kings and the NHL have experimented with that.

The Sacramento Kings, but that's in the NBA. Yep. No, the NFL's fine. The NFL loves animals. Like, they're all about animals. I kind of like the London Dynasty. Me too. I'm with it, and I really think we can get creative with the crown.

Yes, I'm with you. Like, maybe like a sword through the crown, something like that. Something. Something like that. And your mascot can still be a pint. We just got to put a crown on it. Yes, yeah. He wears an oversized

crown he's a pint glass with little legs little stick legs that stick out and maybe even the the crown has like a little bold divot and you could like he like beer is in there and he runs around shakes his head around beer falls all over opposing fans this is actually this is actually great that's the nfl is gonna listen to this and steal our idea. I'm ready for that. So for colors, I was thinking black and white are obviously staple. You've got to have black and white in there. But I was thinking red and gold.

It's funny you said that because the one color that I was kind of excited about more than others because of its lack of usage is like montana's maroon because i don't want to copy the commanders all right hold on hold on montana's a very dark maroon the commanders are a little lighter so i think it doesn't have to be the base color but you get that really dark maroon in there right interesting interesting i don't It's a lot darker. It's a lot different than the Commanders. It is a lot darker. You know what? I could be convinced on the shade of red, but I agree.

You can't look too much like the Commanders. And I think the Commanders, I guess the new jerseys, they've got a decent amount of black and white in there. Because the old Commanders uniforms, I feel like it was just their shade of red and their shade of yellow like that's just what i don't know the exact terms please commanders fans don't kill me i don't know the exact terms for the colors but like i feel like it was just a lot of the primary colors in there and it wasn't enough of the secondary colors i feel like we could get real creative with this one with like black being a

primary color on like i think so too and like you've got like black and gold as a main or things like that. I think we can work with this. People out there, you guys can convince me, us, I guess, on the different shades of colors. If we've got any graphics design people who want to take a stab at this for fun, would be awesome.

We're not telling, certainly not telling you to do anything for it. Don't get fired for your job doing this instead of doing what you need to do. Go ahead and do what you have to do. I know for a fact there are people out there listening to this podcast who are a lot more creative about bringing things up here in the mind to life on the screen that we could actually see. So I'm thinking some sort of black, some sort of white, some sort of red,

some sort of gold. Do you agree? Yeah, I'm with that. I would even say maybe we can think a little bit more chrome for the black so we don't just use the traditional. There's something we can get creative here with maybe the helmet or maybe the pants. There's something here.

I knew color would be the hardest because there's so many NFL teams already that the color wheel we were working with is very limited, that the design with the colors is more important than the colors themselves that differentiate it from whoever we came the closest to. Do you remember Ohio State's gray jerseys? Yes. The gray ones like when JT Barrett and Curtis Samuel and them were still there? That's basically what I'm thinking of as a potential main.

Or Ohio State's black ones. Just like the straight black ones with the red and the white. I like almost all of their color combos. They don't miss. I'm looking at all things of JT Bear right now. They never miss. They never missed on a uni.

Okay. So we feel pretty good about that right now we have a baseline for this franchise yep yep the london dynasty that's the playoff format and we're about to try to set the table for the rest of the nfl to protect their players so the dynasty can't come in right away and steal a playoff spot from either the nfc the AFC. Where do you want to start with protected teams as we go through this here? And if you want to remind everybody exactly of the rules. Okay, so the rules here are that every team

has eight total protections, but they have to use four on offense and four on defense specifically. They are, now you don't have to worry about specialists in this. I'm just going to be honest right out of the gate. I didn't pick a keeper for a kicker. Yeah, I didn't protect any specialists. So it was a very even split.

But there's nothing special in here. There's no rule that you have to protect a quarterback. It's just four offensive players and four defensive players uh trevor i just the way i wrote my list if this is easier enough for you i did start with the afc east of course and i yeah i just went right down the board all afc and then all nfc great no that works for me we can start right there we can start with the afc east and uh for you guys out there listening and watching connor and i went through every team in the nfl individually yes and i have four on offense i have four on defense for every team that i've already picked

connor has his four we're gonna kind of go through the teams and collaborate a little we figure most of the list is going to be similar but then for some teams there might be one or two guys where we might be a little bit different to have a little bit of a discussion kind of as we go through this thing so i'll let you start. You can pick the team and, and you can talk about which, which four guys you kept. Okay.

So the dolphins first year I kept, this is an interesting one to start with. I'll say that because they are on like a lot of other teams. I kept Tyree kill Jalen Waddle, Teron Armstead, and Mike Kisecki. I did not keep a quarterback for the dolphins, which is pretty rare territory.

And then on defense, I kept Jalen Phillips, Xavier Howard, Javon Holland. The last one was a little tricky, but I did ultimately keep Jerome Baker. Okay, so we have one different offensive player. We have one different defensive player. I kept Christian Wilkins instead of Jerome Baker because Christian Wilkins has been really nice lately.

It was pretty flexible for me. I thought they had a couple of players in that fourth spot. Brandon Jones was another guy. They had a couple of guys that were really up and eligible for this one. And Wilkins is a former first rounder. So those are the guys you lean to picking. They did pay Baker, but it's not outrageous yeah so I'm pretty open-ended on that one but the offensive ones who is your other offensive one it was Tua I think I get it I think it I think

it has to be Tua I don't know how I don't know how like we've got to keep Mike Gusecki in here because I agree with you with Tyreek, Jalen Waddle, Teron Armstead, but for what Tua can still be for you. And the fact that he is on a rookie contract with years remaining, that matters more to me than, than anything else. Like all of the, all of the Tua hasn't been great up to this point stuff, which I do agree with. He has been disappointing to this point,

regardless of whether the offensive line or the offensive weapons haven't exactly been ideal i still think that tua has been a little bit disappointing i think that's a very fair assessment even with that being the case even with me believing in that tua being a potential franchise quarterback on a rookie contract is is the most valuable thing in sports. So I think we've got to still have him in here. I think he has to make the list, even if it's been a little bit disappointing to this point. It kind of comes down to this. You can protect Tua instead of Gusecki,

and then you have to envision Tua in this offense without Gusecki, but everything else is the same. Or you can risk losing Tua, and then you have Teddy Bridgewater stepping into the offense with Gusecki. I don't really think either option is overly exciting. The problem is that if you lose Tua and you have Teddy Bridgewater,

Teddy Bridgewater can be fine for you next year, but then you have to draft the quarterback next year no matter what, right? And if Tua hits, then you don't. You don't. You don't. But if you don't protect Gusecki here, let's be honest, he's gone. But you are protecting Tyreek and Jalen already. You are, who are great.

So I think that goes into it. I think we've got to keep Tua. Okay. I think we've got to keep Tua. I like Gusecki for the expansion team. I'll say it right now. Okay. So let's keep, so we're going to keep Tua over Gusecki.

You guys, just one more reminder. So Tyreek Hill, Jalen Waddell, Teron Armstead, and Tua were kept on offense. On defense, Jalen Phillips, Xavier Howard, Javon Holland, and Christian Wilkins were kept on defense. Okay, Trev, let's keep this moving because it's going to take a while. The Jets, I kept Elijah Moore.

No surprise there. Elijah Vera Tucker. Zach Wilson. So their first three picks from the 2021 draft, I kept. And then Garrett Wilson. And then I kept Sauce Gardner, top five pick from this year. Quinton Williams. Jermaine Johnson, first round pick from this year.

And Carl Lawson. The last one I thought was very debatable, but I did end up keeping Carl Lawson. The only one that I disagree with here is I have George Fant instead of Elijah Moore. That's an interesting one. Because Elijah Moore moore like elijah moore is good but i i have garrett wilson in here because i think garrett wilson's gonna be better and would i rather keep an offensive lineman or wide receiver like i think elijah moore is gonna be really good but like is he gonna be a superstar you tell me though i was gonna lean on you for this one i figured we might be a little bit different I wondered if we were gonna have the same defense we actually did um interesting

do you tell me like is it actually a debate between George Fant or were you always keeping Elijah Moore no matter what it's tricky I just went with the player that's younger with the bigger ceiling and it hurts the Jets if they lost Fant in this situation because you have the bad injury luck with Becton and questions there and then not a lot behind him besides Max Mitchell. But I would keep Elijah Moore because I think what can make this offense potentially good one day is that they do have a really diverse wide receiver group with Moore and Wilson. So I would keep the younger player and try to replace Fant

in next year's draft or free agency rather than going back to the wide receiver well for the millionth time again. I would just have some stability there. All right, that's fine with me. That's fine with me. The defense, you were the same.

Nothing gets a surprise. Yeah, we were the same. I had Quinn in, I had Carl Lawson, I had Jermaine Johnson, I had Salas Garner. Yep. Okay. Yep.

All right, so the Patriots. I kept Mac Jones, no duh. Mike on Wenu, a little, and Cole Strange. I kept both of them to give some stability on the offensive line. And then Hunter Henry at tight end, I kept. Defense, I kept Matt Judon, Christian Barmore, Kyle Duggar, and Devin McCourty was the most questionable keeper for me on this list because of his age. I know, but I just wanted to keep the stability of him on the back end so you had you had barmore you had jude on you had duggar and mccourty and mccourty uh we are different on one player on each side i instead of hunter henry i kept isaiah win because it was tough if isaiah win is healthy he's he's he's great absolutely more valuable than hunter henry so i have him in there instead

um and then i have josh uche instead of mccordy because it was it was really difficult to me for to find a fourth defensive player for the i know i'm like i don't know who they would prioritize like mccordy's been there forever clearly what you said is correct like he gives them stability but um i went with the younger player and josh uche the pass rush specialist because i don't know how much mccordy has left in the tank anyways you don't know does mccordy not feel like the biggest captain of the expansion team of all time like just if we get him in there he feels like the guy that goes to an expansion team is the captain for one year, and then he retires.

He's like, I'm not doing this anymore. So I'm obviously okay keeping the younger player in Uche. What I would counter with, if this team doesn't have Hunter Henry, I don't know who the hell Matt Jones is throwing the football to. No, it's... That's my biggest question. Extremely fair. And that's kind of the hole that they put themselves in.

Totally. I know people that are Patriots fans, I get it. Like, you kendrick bourne i jacoby myers i get you like those guys but oh man hunter henry almost had 10 touchdowns last year yeah that's stability for a young quarterback i say when played in 15 games last year but are we keeping three offensive linemen i mean if they're the only good ones i know this is this was hot they were a hard team they were but are we keeping three offensive linemen? I mean, if they're the only good ones, I know this is, this was hard.

They were a hard team. They were one of the hardest teams for me. I will let, I will let, I'll let you decide here. Cause I got Uche on the defensive side. And I think that that's probably, I think that's probably what they would go with. Cause McCourty is,

man, this is, this is really hard. This is really, really hard this is really really hard mccordy mccordy's 34 yeah he yeah i would swap those yeah we got it we got to get like i said he was a very questionable one for me what was hunter henry's pff grade last year hunter henry let's see he's 27 okay so he's got some he's got some i wouldn't bet it's 75.9 receiving grade i would keep hunter henry i just can't i just value

him so much for mac i know you could tackle matters too for mac but okay so we end up keeping mac jones on when new cole strange hunter hunter henry matt judon christian barmore kyle duggar and josh uche all right to round out this division the buffalo bills this one was not very hard in the offense josh allen, Stephon Diggs, Deion Dawkins coming off a great year. Yep. This is actually a tough one, but I went Dawson Knox.

And then defense, I went Von Miller, Trey White, Micah Hyde, and Kair Elam. I had an awful time picking the fourth defensive player. Hold on, give me these four again. Von Miller, Trey White, Micah Hyde, and Kier Elam. Okay, we have one guy similar. Holy what? Okay.

Let me guess. For the Bills, did you keep Edmonds? No. You didn't? No. I went Young. Okay. Did you keep Ed Oliver?

Yeah. Okay. And then I. I went young. Okay. Did you keep Ed Oliver? Yeah. Okay. And then I kept Russo. Wow. Okay. And then I kept Matt Milano because I think he's really damn good. Milano's really good. He's really damn good.

I think if you lost him, you hope that Terrell Bernard can fill that role. The only reason why I didn't pick the safety is, and this is going to sound like Buffalo Bill's safety erasure right here, but it's just because they're above 30. don't know how much well i don't know how much longer they're going to play they're so freaking good no i know they're awesome michael hyde's if i was going to pick one i was going to pick michael hyde yeah and i wasn't going to not protect the guy at the corner they just took in the first round that they moved that they moved to get that's a good point too that's a good too. But they spent so many resources on the defensive line.

What, are they just going to not protect any of them? Trevor, they have to lose someone. They're so good. This is what happens to the good teams when expansions happen. You're a Lightning fan. You just had this happen to you. Oh, all right. With a Kraken.

Okay. I will say I want Trey White and Matt Mil matt milano kept okay you can pick the other two you pick the other two i don't care you can't not protect von miller they think he's the guy that gets them over the top all right okay we're protecting you get the then you get the other one we got to make it even are you uh brutal spot i would not keep their d-line i don't think I'm going Kyrie Elam because you're right. I don't think, you've got to think about what the expansion team would take. And I don't, there is, it is less of a risk that they would take either of the safeties and you could get to keep both of them than Kyrie Elam being.

Okay. So Von Miller, Trey White, Kyrie Elam, and Matt Milano are kept for the Bills. Offense, were you okay with Josh Allen and Diggs? Yeah, of course. You got to keep Deion Dawkins,kins right it means their franchise left tackle yep uh i had dawson knox gabe davis thing was a little tough i had gabe davis as the other i just thought he's more replaceable than dawson knox because of the position he plays that's fair i don't think dawson knox is a better. I think that it's value.

Look at it like this, Trevor. So say the expansion team takes Gabe Davis. Then it's going to be a combination of Jamison Crowder or Khalil Shakur coming into that spot. If they take Dawson Knox, it's your boy OJ Howard. My boy OJ Howard. Dawson Knox got 71 targets last year. Gabe Davis got 63. But Cole Beasley's not there.

Emmanuel Sanders isn't there. Dawson Knox had nine touchdowns. Gabe Davis had six. All right, we can keep Dawson Knox. All right, that's fine. All right, moving on. That was the AFC East. We are now on the AFC North.

Ravens. Lamar Jackson. Yep. Mark Andrews. Yep. No-brainers tyler linderbaum and ronnie stanley that that one was a little tough because he's been hurt but he's so good and important when he's healthy marlon humphrey wait who did i have as a fourth yeah i'm oh i had dobbins just because i love dobbins but love Dobbins. But he's coming off injury. I mean, you could keep Kyle Winterbaum.

That's fine. The problem is they just took him in the first round. Okay, so defense was Marlon Humphrey, Marcus Williams, Adafi Owe, and Kyle Hamilton. I had the exact same four. Beautiful. Yep. Okay.

All right, Bengals. Joe Burrow, Jamar Chase, T. Higgins. Jonah Williams. I struggled with the fourth player. I picked Joe Mixon, but it was between Joe Mixon and Jonah Williams. Jesse Bates, Trey Hendrickson, Dax Hill, Logan Wilson. Okay, so... There's a guy, though, I think you're going to say

that I could be easily persuaded to flip. Okay, who do you think that I'm going to say? One of the defensive linemen. Okay have dj reader in here yeah i figured to be one of the big boys the only reason why i don't have the obvious jesse bates is because right now like jesse bates does not like he's just he doesn't want to sign the franchise tag with the bangles and the bangles aren't giving him a lot of money so like do you think this is common ground? I don't, I don't know.

Like are the Bengals in a spot where they're like, okay, walk. Like we're not going to, if, if, if another team wants to take you and sign you and give you that money,

fine. I don't know where the Bengals are at at this point, because Jesse Bates is the obvious choice to have on this defense. He's the number one choice, honestly. I think you got to get something back for him if you so you're just saying you can't lose him for nothing that's my thought i agree that things are not good they're obvious very obviously from reading from afar but i just think that it's it's a you're looking at it as an asset

i'm okay with it i mean like they certainly should they certainly should so it's it's jesse bates trey hendrickson i i have dj reader in there i think reader's really good i think he is too would you replace logo you would swap logan wilson out with reader i have because you can't lose your first round picking iax Hill. I'm picking Dax Hill over Logan Wilson every day of the week. All right, so we kept Bates, Hendrickson, Reeder, Dax Hill, Burrow, Chase, Higgins, Jonah Williams over Mixon? Yep. All right, Steelers.

Yeah, you have to, right? You have to. Yeah, we saw what happens when they have a hole on the O-line. Yeah, I know. The Penny, Sewell, Jamar, Chase meme. I know. Steelers. Kenny Pickett. I know. The Penny Sewell Jamar Chase meme. I know. Steelers.

Kenny Pickett. You're right. I mean, you're right. Deontay Johnson. Chase Claypool. Najee Harris. I didn't keep a lot of running backs. Had to keep Najee. Dude, the franchise would pick Najee above literally anyone else.

Any human. But I did have the exact same four. TJ Wattmink of Fitzpatrickrick cam hayward alex highsmith as my fourth one we have the exact same you love to see it the browns alex highsmith he has to be because when you look at the rest of the defense there's talented guys there but highsmith kind of like we've talked about before on this podcast ascending the potential is too good right there is an edge rusher you got to pick him cam hayward i thought about for like 0.5 seconds and then i went no it's cam hayward yeah you don't you don't not protect him browns the sean watson nick chubb amari cooper jedrick wills i would be surprised if you went different here i did go different

oh what do you got i have one different name than you do you know who it is do you know who i'm not gonna oh you kept one of the interior offensive linemen it's it's not deshaun deshaun look for whatever we want to say on this podcast about the sean watson situation they just gave the man 230 million dollars guaranteed he's he asked me they're protecting him right right so you didn't keep chubb? No, I did. Did you keep Cooper? No. Wow. No. One of the interior offensive linemen you kept over him?

The best interior offensive lineman, yes. That's fair. I get it. Not the best in the NFL, but like one of, for sure. Okay. I mean, they got a great interior offensive line between Batonio and Wyatt Teller. It's Joel Batonio. Yeah. Because Joel Batonio also has the versatility to play tackle.

I would keep Batonio over Chubb. And just if Chubb gets swiped, then you start Kareem Hunt. Wait, so who's your four? Jedrick Wills. Yeah. Amari Cooper. Yeah. Deshaun Watson.

You'd keep Amari Cooper over Nick Chubb. Oh, yeah. No, absolutely not. You love running backs. You work for Pro Football Focus. Dude, yeah. No, absolutely not. You love running backs. You work for pro football focus. Dude, I don't. What do you mean I don't love? Hold on, hold on, hold on.

I easily got off the J.K. Dobbins one after you were like, Kyle Linderbaum. I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. That makes sense. That's your chapter in the first round. J.K. Dobbins is coming off the Achilles' hair. But I love J.K. Dobbins. I think he's going to be really good.

Dude, if Cooper gets swiped, look at who their wide receivers are. Brother, Nick Chubb's the best rusher in the NFL. Yeah, but Kareem Hunt is effective behind him. And Dearness Johnson was. Yeah, but are you going to invest? Ow. Bro, you cannot have David Bell and Donovan Peoples-Jones. David Bell fed the football at Purdue.

He's not a number one Purdue and was number one back in high school. He could replace Mario Cooper. How are we not protecting Mario Cooper? What's Cooper's contract? Well, he had to get the new one because they... Oh, no. They did trade him. He makes $20 million a year. And it's super... It's one of the low-key... All right. He's still

28. Flexible contracts. He's good. All right. Mario Cooper's great. All right. The war on running backs continues. How old is Kareem Hunt. He's good. Mark Cooper's great. All right. The Warren running backs continue. How old is Kareem Hunt? He's 26. All right, fine. All right, so Miles Garrett, Denzel Ward,

Jeremiah Owusu-Koromoa, and Greg Newsom. Let it be known that I tried to defend Nick Chubb's honor on this podcast. Let it be known. Trevor, we are building the expansion team. We want good players building the expansion team. We want good players on the expansion team. I know. And guess who my first pick is going to be?

Because it doesn't matter what order I pick them. It's going to be Nick and Chubb. Yeah, it's great. That's who it's going to be. He's going to be on every poster in the city of London with pints. Hey, real ground and pound football club they got over there in London. Yes, in the rainy weather. Fine, fine, fine.

Miles Garrett, Denzel Ward, Jeremiah Owusu-Cormoa. Miles Garrett? I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. Miles Garrett, Denzel Ward. I have Greg Newsome and Jeremiah Owusu-Cormoa. You'll love to see it.

All right. Wait, hold on, hold on. Can you give me one second? All right. Yeah, breathe. Jeremiah Owusu-Koromoa. Oh, sorry. Trevor is filling in our actual sheet.

Yeah, because of my own personal notes. All right. Denzel Ward and then Greg Newsome. I think those are the right picks. Those are the right picks. So the next team is one of the only teams that I only picked three defensive players to protect, which is so disrespectful.

So you have house money on this. The Texans. Okay. Brandon Cooks and Davis Mills. Kenyon Green and Laramie Tunsil were the offensive players I kept for them. Same. Cool.

Derek Stingley. Okay. Jalen Petrie. Okay. Steven Nelson nice little value signing for the Texans fine okay I didn't have a fourth player on their defense that I wanted to keep I was gonna leave it dude John Grenard John Grenard John Grenard played well okay well enough to keep yes yeah I'll throw my hands up on that one. I think Grenard had like eight sacks. Let me look.

Okay. John Grenard stats. Also Gatorade. So, I mean, like, you know. I knew that. Yeah. There's some Gatorade influence there. It's okay.

We cannot forget. God, will you just give me the stats page? That's why we call it Gatorade. He got eight sacks in 12 games, my guy. All right. Keep them. Got to keep someone. What wasacks in 12 games, my guy. All right, keep him. Got to keep someone. What was the pass rush grade? Now I got to know that.

This is a no-brainer for me that we were keeping him. Brother, 89.2 pass rush grade. Great. This guy's an ex-Reggie White. You almost left him off the list. I almost didn't keep Khalil Mack. That's unbelievable. Just inexcusable.

Colts. You just can't. That's like keeping a running back in this exercise. Colts, yeah. Speaking of. Who's the third? Jalen Petrie? We had Stingley, Petrie, Grenard.

Steven Nelson. Yeah, okay. All right. Colts. Jalen Taylor. Wait, wait, wait. Laramie Tunsell, you're going too fast for me here. I'm not a typist. I i mean we're still in the afc

i i know i know where we're at i know where we're at connor wait who's the davis mills laramie tonsil brandon cooks who else oh kenny green kenny green all right You may proceed. Okay. We are on the Colts. Jonathan Taylor. Yep. Matt Ryan. Yep. Quentin Nelson. Yep.

Michael Pittman. That is a beautiful four. Is it very easy? Beautiful four. I literally just wrote Quentin. I didn't even write Quentin Nelson. I just wrote Quentin. Hope that's cool.

Let it ride. Q. Big Q from Georgia. I could have just wrote the letter Q Hope that's cool. Let it ride. Q. Big Q from Georgia. I could have just wrote the letter Q. We would have been great with it. Defense is brutal. And I mean that. You're going to lose a good player from this group.

You are. DeForest Buckner ain't going anywhere. Yep. Darius Leonard isn't going anywhere. Yep. You got to keep Julian Blackman, right? Who's my fourth? Well, that's only three. No, I know.

I also don't want to lose Quiddy Pay or Kenny Moore. Dude, don't they have Stefan Gilmore? Yes. Dude, I'm telling you, this group is going to lose a couple of good players. I don't think I can lose Stefan Gilmore. He's such a

one-year band-aid to me that I didn't want to lose the stall. He's 31. And always hurt now. Did he sign more than a one-year deal? He only played in... Because mind you, we are, for everyone listening, we are being cap compliant in this.

So some protections that we're going to get to, or lack thereof protections, are hoping to get rid of a contract as well. Yeah. Okay, so he signed a two-year deal with the Colts. $23 million deal. 14 was guaranteed. So probably not a ton of guarantees in year two.

Then it's probably Julian Blackman. As much as I love Kenny Moore. Okay, so Defoe, Darius Leonard, Julian Blackman. Are you keeping Quiddie Paye or no? Yes. Leonard, Julian Blackman. Are you keeping Quidipe or no? Yes. Yeah, you have to. Yeah, you have to keep Quidipe. His potential is too high.

Okay, so you got those. Defoe, Quidipe, Darius Leonard, Julian Blackman. Brutal for the Colts to not be able to protect Kenny Moore or Stephon Hillmore. We're going to have our eyes on the Indianapolis Colts for our expansion draft. Wait, are we doing the thing where – No, I was thinking, like, can we only take one from each team? Right? Because that's how it works in hockey.

No, because you would need more players. Yeah, we need more players in that. I think you can take one from each unit, right? You probably have to – Yeah, well, then you'd have more right because 32 times 264 right so you don't need 64 players i think the way that it should go is we're allowed to take up to two players from any team but we but we have to take at least one from every team right so like some teams because we'll have 32 players and then like we've got to fill out a little bit more we've got to get

whatever it is like they also get the first overall pick in the 2023 draft this is true this is true all right we'll figure out those logistics for the next episode yeah but i i do think that that's the way that we've got to do it is we will have to pick one player from every team, but then you can pick at least like not at least one other player from you could double up on a couple of teams, but you can't pick more than two. Like you can't just ravage a franchise. I agree. So there's got to be a one from every team. But then on some teams, you're going to be able to steal two from them just because we're trying to make a good football team. I mean, that's the goal here.

Competitive team. All right, let's go Jacksonville Jaguars. All right, the Jaguars. Trevor Lawrence. Yep. Brandon Scherf. Yep. Travis Etienne.

I have him on there as well. Yep. Christian Kirk. I have Cam Robinson because, I mean. I'm pretty flexible with the Kirk pick, considering the money. Cam's not the best offensive lineman in the world, but I'd rather have an offensive lineman

than Christian Kirk, to be honest with you. Fine with me. All right, so we'll go Cam Robinson. Easy sell. Trayvon Walker. Yeah. Josh Allen. Yeah, easy.

Devin Lloyd. I also have Devin Lloyd. Here's the tricky one. The fourth one, you can get creative. I went with Foley-Fadakasi. I went with Shaq Griffin. Because if we're keeping one linebacker, I'm not keeping two linebackers.

Well, so it's tricky, right? Like how they play Trayvon. Because Foley is one of the best run-stopping nose tackles in the league. But what is the value of that to them? Wait, am I thinking of the wrong guy? You were thinking of Ola Khan. Oh, okay. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.

No, you're good. It is a little tricky. Foley's a good player. But... Yeah, but Shaq's good. Shaq's good.q's good i know wow and you don't want to just have like a patchwork back end who would who do you think gets who do you think gets taken first shaq or i think foley because you're an expansion team right so you're gonna you're

gonna stink like when you have a chance to get a player that is maybe the best at what he does in the NFL, and I know it's not extremely valuable, being a run-stuffing nose tackle. It's like, you kind of shrug. You still go get that player, because you're not going to have that opportunity at a lot of position groups. All right, it's fine.

All right, you convince me. Also, they took Tyson Campbell really early, not that long ago. Tough group. Yeah, I'm not keeping him but yeah you get the point okay the titans ryan tannahill king henry trailing burks taylor luan i have the same four i struggled with ryan tannahill because his contract's coming up and he's getting up there in age. Like, what are you going to do? But the Titans, the Titans wouldn't not keep Ryan Tannehill. That is just.

Yeah, I can't. If for as much as I want to, I want to madden the crap out of this and be like, no, I just give her the old guy. Yeah, I know. Just on the league willis. They'd never do that. So I think it has to be those four. Okay.

Robert Woods out there. Nice guy to be able to grab. All right. Harold Landry. Kevin Byard. Yep. Big Jeff Simmons. Indeed.

Imani Hooker. Yeah, those are my four. All right. We each went 4-4 on Titans. Okay. Broncos. Russell Wilson. Cortland Sutton.

Javante Williams, and Jerry Judy. I have Garrett Bowles instead of Jerry Judy. Pretty tough call. And I am very flexible on that. I love Jerry Judy. But to them right now,

Bowles is more valuable. Look, I absolutely think that Jerry Judy gets stolen if you don't protect him. So now, Bowles is more valuable. Look, I absolutely think that Jerry Judy gets stolen if you don't protect him. So does Garrett Bowles. He's too talented, but Garrett Bowles probably does as well. You already don't have the greatest offensive line. He's the best one that you have to boast. You probably have to keep him.

I'm with you. Because without Garrett Bowles, Denver's offensive line is suspect at best. It's suspect at best. I almost said that it's back to the days of the Seattle Seahawks, but Seattle had some pretty bad offensive lines. So I don't want to totally say that, but I think you've got to protect Garrett Bowles.

So I would say Garrett Bowles. I'm okay. You know me. I'll always go O-line when we need to do it. Okay. I know he's got the big contract, but like you paid him for a reason. He's the best O-line on your team. The next four I loved.

Like I was like happy to keep these guys. Okay. Sertan. Easy. Easy. Randy Gregory. Yep. Justin Simmons.

Has to. And Bradley Chubb. Easy. Yep. I really like those four. I was like, I feel good about keeping those four. I don't think there was another one that I really thought about. For a defense that I like Denver's defense.

Well, because they're so good as a unit. Yeah. Those were an easy four that stood out to me. Yeah, I agree. When you look at the rest of the unit, that was the four that made a lot of sense. Okay, so the Chiefs. Patrick Mahomes.

Travis Kelsey. Joe Tooney, maybe the best guard in football. Orlando Brown Jr. I did not keep a single receiver for the Chiefs. I have Creed instead of Orlando, and that's just because Orlando wants a big new contract. Oh, man, I forgot about Creed.

He's one of the best centers in football already. Already, man. And Orlando, like... Well, it's not looking good there. Right. The Jesse Bates situation. Right. It's a similar situation.

Because he's on the franchise tag, isn't he? Yes, he is. And I believe he has not signed it. Let's go Creed. All right. I'm reading the espn deal uh orlando brown jr to play under the franchise tag after sides failed to reach a deal q's final offer to brown was six years 139 million that was 30 million guaranteed

95 through the first five years i mean like that's a hefty contract what did he want i mean the problem was somebody did a good job explaining the annuals were like not in line with being a top tackle and that's what he wants sure so sure tricky business a lot of money to pass up all right so you want to go do you want to go creed or you want to go creed okay i like creed i like creed as a player better than orlando brown jr creed is certainly A lot of money to pass up. All right, so do you want to go Creed? Yeah, I want to go Creed. Okay. I like Creed as a player better than Orlando Brown Jr. Creed is certainly more dominant in his position, it seems like. I get the tackle thing. I get the tackle thing.

The value of tackle, we had to consider here. But ultimately, because of the contract situation, I went with Creed Humphrey. All right, cool. Defense, Chris Jones. This was tricky for me. This was very tricky. Chris Jones, a no-brainer.

Yeah. I did keep Trent McDuffie. They just took him in the first round. Also kept him. I kept Nick Bolton, who was really good last year. I think Nick Bolton's good. I did not keep Nick Bolton, but I could be convinced. And I kept Justin Reed.

I did not keep George Karloftis. So George Karloftis is who I kept instead of... So that's the battle. Nick Bolton versusorge carloftis yeah so george carloftis is who i kept instead of instead of so that's the battle nick bolton versus george carloftis i think george carloftis you're picking you're picking this dude in the first round yeah i know you think that the i mean he's he plays a more valuable position you've got higher hopes for him nick bolton i i love nickton. I think he worked out, but ceiling of George Karloftis and what the chiefs hope it could be versus Nick Bolton. Who's more valuable.

Who's more replaceable. Who's going to make more of an impact. I think it sucks to be a good team, right? I think Nick Bolton's a really good football player. You keep the, you keep the first round edge over the ascending off ball linebacker. Yeah.

It sucks. I really wanted to keep Nick Bolton. Well, you're,ton well you're you know look we can send him the real estate for uh london because he's probably gonna he's probably gonna get poached he's probably gonna get poached so yeah i agree all right cool let's do it i mean there's gonna be there's got to be some good players for this expansion team so welcome to the party pal the raiders you good for the raiders uh you want me to you want me to say no i just want to make sure you're uh yeah we know we're good we're the typist over here okay you got to keep derrick carr obviously uh darren waller and davante adams of course here's one that i will say at the time i was questioning this pick and i'm really impressed with how he's developed Colton Miller.

Colton Miller's really come a long way. Those are the easy four. Those are the easy four. Very easy for the only one that you considered Hunter Renfro is Hunter Renfro, but you're not keeping Hunter Renfro over your left. All due respect. I'm not keeping Hunter Renfro over. No respect. He's a slot receiver.

Sorry, bud. What do you mean? No respect. What do you mean? I know. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. I'm just having fun. But you gotta keep Colton Miller. Defense. This one's tricky. Obviously, Max Crosby ain't going

anywhere. I didn't think he was tricky. Really? Okay. Let's see how we match up. Max Crosby and Chandler Jones. Easy. Yeah. Trayvon Merrig. Of course. I kept Denzel Perryman. No way. Dude, he was good last year. I kept Denzel Perryman. No way. Dude, he was good last year. I'm telling you.

No. Who did you keep? I kept Nate Hobbs. All right. I mean, I'm not like dying on, the reason it was hard for a four was I didn't love anyone. I just liked a couple guys. Nate Hobbs graded really, really well.

Okay. Let me see see let me see what let me see what the pff all rookie team 2021 yes yeah he was he was fantastic listen cheap good at an important position we'll keep him he was dude okay he almost had an 80 grade overall he had a 78 grade and run defense a 78 pass rush grade which of course like he's just blitzing off the edge i was gonna add some but then but then but then a 70 76.7 coverage grade like he defense, a 78 pass rush grade, which, of course, he's just blitzing off the edge. I was going to say that's manufactured. But then a 76.7 coverage grade. He was just a good football player for them all across the board. All right, Nate Hobbs.

I think it's the strategies in play, too, a cost-effective corner that starts. Yeah, so I got Nate Hobbs in there. Okay, cool with that. Last AFC team is the Chargers, who were actually very easy in my eyes. Were they? Okay. Justin Herbert, Rashawn Slater.

Those are the two easiest picks you possibly could have gone with. Keenan Allen and Mike Williams. So, I have Mike Williams. And then I had a list of Keenan Allen, Austin Eckler, Austin Eckler, and Zion Johnson. If you were really that high on Zion,

Zion makes it a little tricky, but like, cause how old is Keenan? Keenan is still a very good wife. He's very good. That's the problem. Keenan Allen is 30. Keenan Allen is 30.

Where is he on his contract? He's got three more years of the deal. Oh, the deal gets rough, dude. Whoa. Oh, so this is an offload? Whoa. Okay. Okay, so he's 30, 31, and 32 in the next three years,

the first one being this next year. He is 19.2 on the cap, then 21.7 on the cap, then 25.8 on the cap. Yeah, and there's a good amount of guarantees in these. He cannot be, yeah, you cannot cut him this year. You can cut him next year, and you can cut him the year after that. I just, for me, I think I keep the first round offensive lineman. You'd pick Zion? Yeah.

I think that... I don't know if I'd pick Zion over Keenan. I don't want to lose. It's a pretty tough sell to lose Keenan Allen. If anybody, I think I would have picked Austin Eckler over him. Just because I would not keep the running back. You're right. You're right.

You're right. I wrote down Herbert Slater, Allen, and Mike Williams, but now you have me thinking about Zion. Okay, well, I would probably rather keep Keenan Allen than Zion. Let's do it then. All right, so we keep the two wide receivers. Shoot. It's very tricky.

Because if you're the Chargers, you're looking to win. Yeah. You're in win now mode. Dude, we're overthinking this. You can't take away Keenan Allen. No, you can't. And he's a legend, dude. Okay, so defense. They're not protecting Keenan Allen. This one, there's a lot of good talent, but I thought the four that were obvious

to me were Derwin James, Joey Bosa, Khalil Mack, and JC Jackson. There's no other way. Yeah, you're right. There's other good players you can't lose these four. You're correct. You're correct. I'm with you. Alright. That's the AFC. Yeah, you're right. There's other good players you can't lose these for. You're correct. You're correct. I'm with you. All right.

That's the AFC. That is the AFC. That's the AFC. All right, well, you think we can run through the NFC a little bit quicker? Yes. What do we got? We got a half hour left?

Let's do it. Yeah, we'll rock. We'll go right through this. Giants. Yep. Evan Neal and Andrew Thomas aren't going anywhere. Two very easy ones. I did keep Daniel Jones.

So I didn't, but like, I don't, okay. After Andrew Jones and, and, and Evan Neal, I did not know what the hell to do.

It's like, I have, okay. Same sake. I have Saquon Barkley and Kenny Galladay. I kept Saquon. I want to unload the Kenny G contract. Is it,

is it that bad? I know, I know it was big, but was it that bad? It's not helping any holiday contract. I don't know the long-term ramifications daniel jones is good man dude i know but if you take daniel jones off the giants this year what are they doing this year who's who's the bad tyrod taylor fine what do you mean no stop okay okay that's why i didn't put daniel jones down look at the kenny g contract tyrod

taylor look at the kenny g contract tyrod taylor i'm i i cannot believe out of every human on planet earth i am fighting for daniel jones yeah i i can't believe what has happened because it's incorrect i'd rather start tyrod taylor all right kenny kenny's contract he's 29 this year it's gross look it up he so many guarantees uh 21.1 on the cap this year 21.4 next year 21.4 the year after that um then he gets a void year in there he's he's 31 mil dead cap this year okay 14.7 the year after that and there's a little bit of an out it's only 6.8 but still not great i'm keeping i'm keeping i'm keeping kenny you're keeping kenny no i'm not that contract stinks daniel Daniel Jones isn't good. He's not good. Is Tyrod Taylor right now?

Like, I really fought the fight for Tyrod. Yeah, but what does it matter? If you think... Because they hired Brian Dable as like this, hey, maybe he'll figure it out with Daniel Jones and if it falls apart, we'll draft a guy the next year. But if they're just playing Tyrod Taylor this year, what are they doing

how old is tyrod he's 32 he's gonna be 33 all right fine keep daniel jones i don't care saquon got kept be bad i don't care cave on tibideau yep xavier mckinney correct dexter lawrence three three young exciting players And then Azizo Jalari. Oh, I have Leonard Williams as my fourth. That was some money that I was like, maybe you can get rid of this money, even though he's still okay. Yeah, but I don't think he's, like, get

rid of the money era or area yet. Dave Gettleman had some specials on here. Holy smokes. What is this contract? I love when people that aren't aware of this see it. Okay, so he's 28.

Leonard Williams is a good football player. He's okay. I think he's a good football player. Tell the people how Leonard Williams is paid to be Aaron Donald. Explain. Okay. Okay. He was on the cap for four. What's the cap number, Trev?

Hold on. Wait. He was on the cap for 9.4 last year, okay? Yep. Not bad. Great. You'll love to see it. This year, 27.3.

Wapow! The dead cap is 35.6 for this man this year. Next year, he goes to 26.3 on the cap, but there's only an $8.3 million dead cap if they move on from him. He'll be 29 at that point in time. This is just a heavily back-loaded contract. You could definitely stand to get rid of him, but you went with the z's as he's good

as he's good it's a young pass am i underselling aziz no he was really solid last year pff grade let's look it up let's look it up 58.3 that's bad all right we can't do that just we can't always do that i know it's a pff show we can't always do that hey i came for running backs earlier in the show okay i'm bringing a little bit of balance here you are dude we're not protecting leonard williams 80 million dollars for 2022 i will not okay as he's had eight sacks last year. Actually, I feel like a lot of them were cleanup, though. I did watch them. They were fine, for the most part.

They were not overly impressive. They were not complete nonsense sacks. He was a rookie, to be fair, on a line that had not a lot around him. He played with the unprotected Leonard Williams. Okay. Okay. he played with the unprotected leonard williams okay i do think aziz probably gets taken whereas there's a chance leonard doesn't all right we can keep his ease all right tibideau mckinney lawrence disease dallas cowboys jack prescott easy cd lamb yep easy zach martin easy still kept Lawrence Aziz. Dallas Cowboys. Dak Prescott.

Easy. CeeDee Lamb. Yep, easy. Zach Martin. Easy. Still kept Tyron Smith. I did too. You have to.

He's just too good when he's right. He's too good. Too good. Too good when he's right. Defense. Micah Parsons. Duh. Trevon Diggs.

Also kept Diggs. I did keep Demarcus Lawrence. I did as well. Here's my, like, hmm. I kept Sam Williams. Ooh. Just took him in the second round. Ooh.

I'd rather keep the young talent that I think can develop into a good pass rusher. Who did you keep over him? I kept Jaron Curtis because Jaron Curtis played really well last year. He did. Yeah. This was a little bit of like a, you could choose your own adventure. I choose your own adventure. Like a pop-up book.

I think we should, I am, I'm going to push for Jaron Curtis. That's fine. Like I said, he's really good. Well, I don't know, really good. He's a good, he's a good football player. We don't know exactly what Sam Williams could be yet. Certainly they have high hopes for him. They have high potential for him.

But I'd be going with Jaron Gersh here pretty easily. No problem. Cool with me. Cool. Ready for Eagles? Yeah, let's do it. You got to keep Jalen Hurts. Yep, you do. Yeah.

You do. We're at that point. You got to keep Jalen Hurts. Put some respect on the man's name. I'm curious as to who you kept Jalen Hurts over if there was a debate. I'm not happy about it, but this is a bad one. This is a, you're going to lose a really good player. You are.

Jalen Hurts, AJ Brown, Devontae Smith. I kept Lane Johnson. Dude, no. You got to keep Jordan Mailata. Okay, so one thing, I thought you were going to bring up the fact that they in this are losing freaking Dallas Goddard. I mean, I know that they're losing Dallas Goddard, but really good. Jordan Milata.

Jordan Milata is 25. I get it. Really good last year. I get it. What is Lane Johnson? Lane Johnson's like 33. He's 32. He's 32.

I think he's so good i think lane johnson is incredible he's been one of the best right tackles in the game for half a decade maybe longer but jordan my lot is your left tackle and he's 25 dude he played so well last year you know i get it to me you can't keep you cannot keep a 32 year old offensive lineman yeah i get it over a over a 25 year old offensive lineman. Yeah, I get it. Over a, over a 25 year old offensive lineman where they're both really damn good. Listen, I'm,

I'm a, I'm very, you know, I work with you on this. That's a good argument. Leaving, leaving lane pain to me, but I,

I think now it's have to do it. Here's the real story. Besides the fact that we're keeping my Lada. Now, at some point we're going to have to pick between Goddard or lane. That's very interesting. We cannot take two offensive players from the Eagles. You're only allowed to take one.

We'll cross that bridge when we get there. Well, I mean, we could pick two if we feel like that gives us a chance to win. Changing the rules, because it's our show, and we could do that. No, no, no. I said that you've got to pick at least one from every team, and then some teams you will pick two from. Oh, but I thought we could only do one from each unit. So, like, if we do double dip, it has to be from the defense

if we already took from the offense. Oh. See where I'm going? I feel like that's probably. I'm fine with not getting too insane. That would be some strategy for us. Okay. We have all week to think about it. That's the beauty. for us. Okay. We have all week to think about it.

That's the beauty. We do. We do. But if people come up with their own teams, I want to be able to set the rules. So maybe we'll set the rules at the end of the podcast. The official rules. Okay.

Okay. Who's defense? Fletcher Cox. You didn't keep Fletcher Cox? No. There's a pick them here but this was a very interesting one for me darius slay uh yeah 100 yeah jordan davis i also had jordan davis yeah hassan reddick or james bradbury i have james bradbury the other the other pass

rusher i have is is derrick barnett. Wow. Oh, I wouldn't do that. But, like, I wasn't jazzed about it. Yeah, I wouldn't do that. But I'm also, like, Hasan Reddick's – I feel like Hasan Reddick has been like, okay, well, if he's been at the right place in the right scheme in the right situation, he's absolutely gone the F off. But if not, then he's been forgettable.

So I'm like, do I keep Derek Barnett over that? I wasn't really sure. So we're going to keep the corners in Jordan Davis. Yeah. So it's between Reddick and Barnett over that? I wasn't really sure. Brandon Graham's obviously one of these three. So we're going to keep the corners in Jordan Davis. Yeah. So it's between Redick and Barnett and Fletcher Cox. I think I'm leaning Redick. What's his contract? They just gave him three years, $45 million,

if I remember that off the top of my head correct. Yeah, $15 million a year. How old is he? He got the Carl Lawson deal. He's 28. Fletcher's on a one- barnett i thought he's on a two year yeah it's a really short term oh hassan reddick's had 12 and i just don't think barnett i don't realize that i didn't realize that i i didn't know he i didn't i forgot that he had back-to-back double digit

yeah he started to figure it out yeah Yeah, you got to get Redick. I'll put Redick in there. All right, Commanders. I'm going to start to boogie here a little bit. Okay. Commanders, Scary Terry, no doubt. Easy. Jahan Dotson.

Okay. You do have to keep Carson Wentz. No. Do you? Do you? And I also, I did keep Antonio Gibson. I also kept Antonio Gibson. you didn't keep wentz no i just i went with often i went with two offensive linemen okay who'd you go with i just went with sam cosme and chase really a

man i just don't want to go into the i we can nitpick the wentz move as much as possible all right so who else did you have? You had Jahan Dotson. Jahan Dotson. They just took him in the top 20. Yeah, they do love him. You're right. You're right.

You're right. Scary Terry, Jahan Dotson, Antonio Gibson. So we like their skill guys a lot. Do you like the offensive lineman or you hate Wentz? No, I just, I'm way out on Carson Wentz. So we wouldn't even take him in the expansion? No, no. Oh, so they don't even need to protect him here?

I'm not. I'm not taking Wentz in the expansion. I would be shocked if I'm taking Carson Wentz in the expansion. Quarterback. Maybe there's no other quarterbacks that are going to be available. So, all right, fine. Okay. We'll keep the quarterback.

We'll keep Carson Wentz. I'll write his name down. Move on to the next team. Well, we still got to confirm their defense here. That's true. Chase Young, Montez Sweat, Jonathan Allen. Fourth one I was a little stuck on, to be honest. Who did you like?

I looked at the corners and Kendall Fuller. I picked Kendall Fuller. That's who I wrote down. I picked Kendall Fuller. Yeah. I love Cam Curl, but again, corner, safety. Unless you really think that Cam Curl is way better than Kendall Fuller,

I went with Kendall Fuller. Chase Young, Montez Sweat, Jonathan Allen, Kendall Fuller. All right. Now move on to the next team. Bears. Okay. Justin Fields. Chicagoago darnell mooney cole commit okay kind of stuck i have tevin jenkins is the other one i'll do it because

they they gotta keep some kind of stability on the offensive line and he's a guy that can be really good i love picking cole commit like i don't no but there's just what what else is logical montgomery is the only other one but i yeah i think you keep i just think you don't keep the running back would they keep the running back no would they keep the running back though no but would they keep the running back though no they have cleo herbert okay all right yeah so there we go okay good fine okay go commit defense i just wanted to see how far we've been going for like an hour and a half we're getting loopy at this point yeah we're gonna we are gonna power through these last few divisions all right the bears uh kyler gordon and jaquan brisker the two guys they just took oh i don't have either of them

wow uh roquan smith yeah and i still did keep robert quinn i guess we're not powering through what did you i have roquan smith eddie jackson jalen johnson and Travis Gibson. Jalen Johnson is a miss by me. You got to keep him. You have to keep Jalen Johnson. Don't feel that strong. Oh, man.

Dude, when Eddie Jackson's healthy, he's like one of the best young safeties there is. Was he that good last year, though? I feel like he kind of... I definitely... I don't think he was as good last year. No. I know he was great. Let me look at the grades. Let me look at the grades. 2018, he was first-team All-Pro.

I don't think he's been the same player since. But I get the fact that doesn't mean you just don't protect him. Yeah, 2018, he was... Holy hell. Four years ago. He had a 93.2 grade uh in 2018 i guess i'm i guess i'm misremembering him being bad is he not bad just not he's not the same guy i don't think he's bad no i'm not even fighting against keeping him i'm just wondering how you don't keep

like don't you have to keep brisker here what's what's a jackson's contract out here okay he's got Don't keep, like, don't you have to keep Brisker here? What's Eddie Jackson's contract at here? Okay, he's got three years left in the deal. It's fine. I mean, he was barely a cap hit these last two years. Now he goes up to 15, 17, and 18. So it definitely goes up.

If they think Brisker or Kyler Gordon can be more of the future for them. Look, you know what? For where the Bears are, I think it might make sense for Brisker to be the pick. They're far away right now. Yeah. We know we're keeping Roquan. I wrote down Eddie Jackson. You're right. I kind of let Jalen Johnson we got to keep.

I missed on that. Eddie Jackson is difficult. I'll write let Jalen Johnson we got to keep. I missed on that. Eddie Jackson is difficult. I'll write down Jaquan Brisker. It's fluid. That one's tricky. Maybe Bears fans can yell at us. I actually would like to know where their heads are at on that. I have Travis Gibson because Robert Quinn.

It sounds like they've been trying to trade him as it is. Right. I feel like Robert Quinn's not meant for Chicago. I'm fine with that because they obviously want to get rid of his money anyway. Hold on. The guy had 18 and a half sacks. Yeah, as I'm saying, you just lose a guy that had almost 20 sacks for nothing? For nothing?

He's 32. He's going to London. Let me say that right now. Robert Quinn is going to London if we do not protect him. He's 32. He's going to London. Let me say that right now. Robert Quinn is going to London if we do not protect him. He's 32. What's the contract? Again, like if he's got a monster contract, then they'll probably not protect him.

I mean, his cap hit goes up to 17, 18, 17. But then he's 32, 33, 34. I think you're not protecting. Travis Gibson had seven sacks last year. Started nine games. Played in all 16. Third year. I don't think that... I don't, I don't.

18 and a half sacks is so difficult to let this dude just sit on the market. Just go for nothing. Maybe you do have to keep him and trade him. It's the, it could go back to being like the Jesse Bates argument. Look, you know what? I think it comes back to what you were talking about. Like if, if the second he became available, if the other team was like no brainer picking him up, you should what? I think it comes back to what you were talking about. If the second he became available,

if the other team was like no-brainer picking him up, you should probably keep him. Okay. Let's go Robert Quinn. All right. Packers. Aaron Rodgers, Elton Jenkins. Yes, yes.

I still kept Christian Watson, even though he's a second-round rookie. Oh, wow. Okay, I did not. And then Aaron Jones. I have Aaron Jones on here. Is Bakhtiari way more not healthy at all? He's never healthy.

Yeah, but the dude didn't retire, right? No, no, no. He's 30. When he plays, he's one of the best offensive tacklers in the game. Sure. He played a game last year. I don't think you can keep Christian Watson over David Bakhtiari. All right.

I would be pretty firm on that. I don't think you could do that. Especially for you having Aaron Rodgers here for another, what, two years? Yeah. I mean, you're going to piss him off. I don't think that you can let David Bakhtiari walk. All right. I'm going to be pretty firm on that.

This is where it's hard to podcast this because they know where his health is at and we don't. right of course right that's the honest part but just like on the outside of it no you're right 30 year old offensive tackle who yes he was hurt last year but when he's healthy cornerstone correct correct so i think you have to keep him i'm fine with that so unless yeah they knew something unless they know that like dude's not gonna play again i have to operate under the assumption that he will get healthy again he will play again he will be good again so that's my thought rishon gary yep easy gyre alexander uh super easy preston smith okay you kept pressing okay that's where it's hard you got like kenny clark out there

but i kept eric stokes so i kept i didn't keep preston sm, but I kept Kenny Clark and Eric Stokes. So we have the same three that we were thinking about. Yeah. Tricky. In my head, I think we should keep Eric Stokes because he's a young corner and that's important. Yes. But when it comes to-

Gary and Alexander are no doubt, like Jire are no doubters. Yeah, no doubt about that. I can go either way on Preston Smith or Kenny Clark. Kenny Clark's really good. I don't want to dismiss that. Kenny Clark's 26, dude. Yeah. Yeah, I think he's cute.

Probably 28. He's older, isn't he? He's 29. He'll turn 30 this year. Kenny Clark's coming off a Pro Bowl season. I thought it was Kenny Clark pretty easily. All right, we'll go Kenny Clark. And Preston Smith, look, if somebody picks him up,

they're picking up a hefty contract that comes off your books. Oh, yeah. Yeah, so it's a little bit of a deterrent. I like where you're – it's got a poison pill element to it. All right, Lions. It's not Tiger, but all right. Not easy again. Obviously, you're keeping Jameson Williams.

I kept Hawkinson. I didn't. I kept Penny Sewell. And I kept Amon Ra. Whoa, okay. I said this was not easy. I kept Jameson Williams. I kept Penny Sewell.

I kept Taylor Decker. And I kept Frank Ragnow. Ragnow was the one that drove me insane to not keep. I think he's one of the best interior offensive linemen in football. So you're letting Amon Ra go, right, you said? I am, and I think Amon Ra is an incredible football player. I think he's really good. I think he's going to be great for them,

and them establishing the slot presence, I think is really important moving forward. It gave them the flexibility to be aggressive, to go get Jameson Williams, like all of that. I don't mean as a slight to I'm going to Ross St. Brown, but he has a slot receiver.

Like you, like you can, you can get these guys. You can find these guys wide receiver. It's just every single year. There's so many good receivers that are so I would do this. We're keeping Jameson. Taylor Decker seems like that's the one that you didn't mention.

That's the one I'm saying that I actually pretty strongly don't know if I want to keep him. What's Decker. He was really hurt. He was banged up last year. He's 29. Yep. Big contract.

But his contract is really flexible after this. Yeah. 17.8, 17.6. He's got guaranteed money contract is really flexible after this yeah 17.8 17.6 he's got guaranteed money going all the way into 2025 that's a void year 2025 it's not really flexible but it's not like left tackle flexible i i would pick hawkinson pretty easily um as the guy that we would that we would sub in for tay Decker. That's what I'm thinking. Okay.

All right. So we kept Ragnow, and we kept Hawkinson. Yeah. Jameson and Sewell. And Sewell. So you and I met in the middle on that one. Oh, this podcast is all about compromise. You'd love to hear that.

All right, the next one. No idea what to do on defense. Aiden Hutchinson. Okay, that's the easy one to start not i kept i kept tracy walker who they just extended i i didn't keep tracy walker i kept a lean mcneil who i think is really good for the middle of the defense i knew that we were just gonna be like and i kept jeff akuda okay because i still believe in jeff akuda i also kept akuda because i think you have to because he has just the biggest payout and again this might be a

situation where if the Lions are like, no, we're out on Jeff Okuda, then we don't know that yet. So I don't know if that's the case. If they think that he can still play, I think he has to be protected. You put a top three pick into him, so I think you have to protect him. I also kept Amani Arroyo because I think he's turned into a really solid corner. That was a tough one for me. And I think that certainly if Jeff Okuda doesn't work out,

you don't want to be burned if you're going to lose. Or Waria if he gets taken by the expansion team. What was the other one I had? It was the fourth one. Did you keep on Zurique? No, I just kept Romeo Arcuara because I feel like he's the better pass rusher. Look, Alim McNeil I liked coming out.

Wuzirique, super versatile. If you want to go younger with it, you can. I'm pretty open to letting Tracy Walker off the list. My four were Aiden Hutchinson, Amani Arwariye. I would keep him. Okwara and Jeff Okuda. Yeah, I would go McNeil over Okwara, but I would let Walker go for Armani. That's fine.

All right, we'll go Aleem McNeil. Okay, Vikings. Justin Jefferson, Kirk Cousins, Dalvin Cook. I kept Christian Derusaw. So I kept Brian O'Neill because he's more established. My thing is keep a tackle. Yeah, yeah. Not Adam Thielen. Keep the tackle.'s more established. My thing is keep a tackle. Yeah, yeah. Not Adam Thielen.

Keep the tackle. No, I think you have to keep the tackle. Derisaw had a tough rookie year, it sounds like. He did. So I would pivot to O'Neill. You're right. He establishes the perfect word. I like Christian Derisaw.

I really do. I think the upside's awesome. But O'Neill's been doing it in the NFL longer. I think you have to keep that in bed on that. I'm with you. Defense I thought was very easy. Daniil Hunter, Zedarius Smith, Louis Scene, Harrison Smith. Oh, so I kept Kendrick instead of Harrison Smith,

because Harrison Smith's like 33. He is older. He's old, man. Wow, he is 33. Yeah, he's old. He's old, man. Wow, he is 33. Yeah, he's old. He's still really good for that age. I know he's really good, but the drop-off's got to be coming. Yeah, you're right.

I did not—33. Most safeties do not play at 33. Right, because what's Eric Kendricks? Probably in his upper 20s at this point. And Eric Kendricks is— Eric Kendricks is 30. He just turned 30, but I still think Eric Kendricks is one of the best linebackers. Yeah, linebackers play a little longer.

Okay. Good argument. So who were the four? Daniel Hunter, Z'Darrius Smith, Louis Seen, Eric Kendricks. Falcons, Kyle Pitts and Drake London. Hold on. Scrolling up, scrolling up, scrolling

up. Kyle Pitts, Drake London, Chris Lindstrom. Those three you have to keep. Okay. Yep. I really didn't care after that, so I kept Cordero Patterson. You could convince me between Cordero Patterson and Jake Matthews. Yeah.

Once again. No, neither one, like, fully moved the needle. What's the contract for Jake? Because I think Jake's good. Jake's a good offensive lineman. It's stability. Running back's replaceable. What is his contract?

This contract was year-specific. He goes $15.1 million on the cap this year, $33.9 million next year, and then $18, $18, $18. The guaranteed money goes away after this year. And then 18, 18, 18. The guaranteed money goes away after this year. He's 31. What do you think? Probably the offensive lineman.

Yeah, we kind of tend to go that way because it's just a spot you don't want to get flimsy. Defense. AJ Terrellimsy. Defense. AJ Terrell, duh. Easy. Grady Jarrett. I still have him, yeah. Arnold Ibikedi.

I also kept Arnold Ibikedi, yeah. And then I made the last one a one-on-one battle between Troy Anderson and D'Angelo Malone. Okay. I have Deion Jones, but that's just because he's, yeah, he's kind of falling apart. He was once very great,

right? But they would love to get rid of that money. Yeah. So who are the two? We see Malone or Trey Anderson, both day, two picks from this year. Now you kept Eva Katie.

So do you keep Anderson instead of keeping two pass rushers? Or do you like the fact they do need a lot of pass rush out? You know, D'Angelo Malone's my guy. Let's just go D'Angelo Malone. Okay. Grady, Jared, AJ, Terrell, Arnold, David, Katie. What is Dion Jones' contract? D'Angelo Malone.

It's not good. What is this here? Oh, boy. Okay. He is a... He is a $20 dollar cap hip this year yeah i don't think he's going to london off ball linebacker they're stuck with him and then he is and then he is 18.4 next year sweet lord okay all right okay panthers who's next? Icky Aquanoo. Yep. DJ Moore.

Yep. Christian McCaffrey. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. I was worried that you were going to be like, this is really big. I kept Baker Mayfield.

No, I kept Taylor Moten. Moten is a good player, and I really wanted to keep him. I do not want to see this team run by Sam Darnold again. If you want to keep Moten, I'll do it, and we'll make this party a little fun when it gets to the expansion draft. That was the debate, right? I was like,

okay, is it Moten or is it Baker Mayfield? In all honesty, it should be Baker Mayfield. They cannot do this with Sam Darnold again. I'm thinking like them. That's frustrating god we're gonna have carson wentz on this goddamn carson wentz and teddy ridgewater step on over to london all right brian burns yeah easy jeremy chin uh-huh. JC Horn. Yeah.

Stuck between Derek Brown and Dante Jackson. So I actually picked Shaq Thompson because I think Shaq Thompson is like the last of the old guard. He's like the middle leader for them. Yeah, so that's like an internal one. They don't want to lose him. He's only 28. That's good. Right.

I'm not. Cool. I think we got to go with Shaq Thompson. Completely fine. Wasn't attached to anyone in that fourth spot. Cool. I think we got to go with Shaq Thompson. I'm completely fine. Wasn't attached to anyone in that fourth spot. Cool. Saints. Chris Alave.

Oh, I didn't have Alave, but I did have Michael Thomas. So I want to get rid of that money. So you're you now that you say that out loud. Remember, we did this whole thing. You are correct. You want to get rid of the money. So you're right. It's Chris Alave.

I kept Jameis. I did not not okay i kept ryan ramchick easy of course yeah of course and then i kept camara you have to you have to the only the other one that i have on here is eric mccoy because i think he's good he is but you just i don't think you could lose jamis we've seen that happen we got taste you got taste of milk yeah great who are they who i mean like i what was jamis's deal what did they sign jamis to i thought it was like a two-year andy dalton's his backup by the way two-year 28 million with 21 million in guarantees so you're probably keeping jamis let me look at the depth chart you said andy dalton he's their backup oh So they're probably keeping Jameis. Let me look at the depth chart.

You said Andy Dalton? He's their backup. Oh, so they're not afraid to lose. So they have Taysom Hill officially listed at tight end. They don't have him at quarterback anymore. Dude, they have to protect Jameis. So we're protecting a Lave, Ramchick, and Kamara no matter what. It's the fourth spot.

All right. Yeah, but hold on. London, Jameis, think about it. It's fun for the expansion team. It's not realistic for the Saints. Come on, Connor. Come on. Fine.

Well, they'll keep Jameis. I do want this to be pretty realistic, so we'll go Jameis. Cam Jordan. Yeah. Marshawn Lattimore, duh. Yeah. pretty realistic so we'll go cam jordan yeah uh marshall latimore duh yeah i kept marcus davenport which i know is kind of flimsy because this is where now you run into a problem i didn't and i get i can be talked into not keeping him because now you only get to keep one of honey badger demario davis or chauncey gardner johnson and all three of them are really good they also have marcus may

don't they yeah but i i wouldn't keep marcus may over badger or chauncey gardner johnson marcus may is really good when he's healthy i know i know so we're keeping cam jordan and we're keeping marshall latimore i think you have to keep to mario davis you have to keep tomorrow davis he's the heart and soul of the middle of that team. Correct. I keep Badger after that. What did they sign Badger to? Probably a three-year.

Did they give him that much? I would think. I think that's what Marcus got, too. Who got more money? Marcus made May contract. Three years, $28 million, $15 million guaranteed.

Honey Badger got three years, $27 million. $18 million guaranteed. Wait, how much is guaranteed? $18 million. Oh, he got more guaranteed?

All right, we'll go with Tyron Matthew. All right. Okay, so that's the Saints. Bucks, Trevor, you have full authority on this one. Shot loose will shock you.

I kept Tom Brady. I kept Mike Evans. I kept Chris Godwin, and I kept Tristan Wirfs. Easy, yes. It feels good when I get that one right. Yeah, it was easy. Bedevea? Yep.

Shaq Barrett? Yep. Antoine Winfield Jr.? Who's your other one? Carltonrett. Yep. Antoine Winfield Jr. Who's your other one? Carlton Davis. Easy. Easy Carlton Davis. Wow.

I feel like I went kind of eight for eight. You're torn on the Winfield one. I'm torn on the Winfield one because to me it's either Winfield or Levante David. I'm thinking long term though. You're thinking heart and soul right now. I know you are. I mean Levante's great and he is. You're thinking heart and soul right now. I know you are. I mean, Levante's great, and he is... It's a pretty crappy thing to do, to not protect him here.

Right. Levante's in the final year of his deal. He's 32 years old. I think you probably have to keep Anton Wenzel Jr. Yeah. You're doing the right thing here. That was the one that, this hurt me. I was not looking forward to this.

This hurt me. But I think you do have to keep, I actually have, I have Levante David's name written because I couldn't not write it. Blame me. You're right. Don't blame yourself. I will, I will.

Cardinals. I always do. I always blame you kyler murray uh cardinals hold on i'm scrolling down okay kyler easy yeah uh dj humphries easy yep hollywood brown and d hop those are my four you love it all right defense jj watt i didn't keep jj why you don't need to okay but this defense there's not a lot of guys i'm like dying to keep okay i kept buda baker i kept isaiah simmons and then i didn't really care after that i i kept buda baker zavin collins isaiah simmons byron murphy i'm fine with that

because you're going young i just went young i just went young and like simmons not developed yet zavin collins is not oh no there's a lot of projecting here like there's not established jj watt how much is he giving you no it's especially especially with no chandler jones like how much is he giving you i don't know so i went with the young guys no problem there cool seahawks dk okay charles cross okay kenneth walker No problem there. Cool. Seahawks. DK. Okay. Charles Cross. Okay. Kenneth Walker.

Yeah. And Tyler Lockett with a question mark. No. Because I know that contract's really funky. No. Bad. Bad, dude. I know the contract's bad. We did this on this show.

We did. This is my Mike Thomas moment. Yeah, okay. Let's get rid of it. This is my Mike Thomas moment because Tyler Lockett is 30 years old. He is uncuttable for the next two seasons. He is $10 million on the cap and then $16.7 million on the cap. He has so much dead cap to him, $31.2 million, $21.1 million.

You cannot get rid of him over the next two years without trading him. Okay? Keep no offense. It then jumps to 23.9 million on the cap and 23.9 million on the cap. While he is 32 and 33 years old, you really do not have an out until the final year in which it is still $7 million against on the dead cap for Tyler Lockett. I kept Damian Lewis because he's an offensive line okay damien lewis just keep somebody that's young and right okay defense no if i couldn't

yeah it's not a bad pick but i went with damien lewis i think you're keeping both safeties jamal adams and quandary digs um i did not keep jamal adams but that's yeah after what they traded for him they got to keep jamal adams i i have jordan brooks quandary davis for sure sydney jones puna ford but i mean like obviously like jamal adams has the highest talent out of any of those dudes but do they do they want to move on from him i'll keep jamal over sydney jones okay all right we'll go jamal okay like that you had puna on the list. It's nice. Yeah, you got to do it. Be sure.

Rams was kind of easy. Stafford. Cooper Cup. Yep. Allen Robinson. Yep. Then I wrote Cam Akers with a question mark, but I think you have to keep Cam, right?

I went with Rob Havenstein because he had a really good year last year at offensive tackle. And that means more than a running back coming off an Achilles injury. All right, let's go with the offensive line. Yeah, I'll go with Havenstein because he had a really good year last year at offensive tackle. That means more than a running back coming off an Achilles injury. Alright, let's go with the offensive line. He's not like hell old, is he? No. No, he's 30.

Aaron Donald, Jalen Ramsey. Heard of him. Bobby Wagner and Leonard Floyd. I have Bobby Wagner and Jordan Fuller. Jordan Fuller is good i know but leonard floyd is so important to that pass rush dude they've been rotating pass rushers for like years bro he's a double-digit sack guy for them yeah so was dante fowler jr i know but wow like leonard floyd a lot that'd get thrown into your face like that did you didn't think i'd have that

kind of rebuttal did you you're fighting like hell for jordan fuller right now jordan fuller's good so is leonard floyd okay hold on all right all right let's check the pff grade oh brother i'm moving on to the niners while you check no wait wait all right leonard floyd okay 74.4 pass rush grade last year. Okay, okay, okay. What was he in previous years? I'll give him some longevity. We'll be fair here. All right.

That was the best pass rush grade of his career last year. Damn, he had 12 sacks. Nice. He had 11 the year before. Nice. Important piece for them. They paid him. Jordan Fuller, PFF. Safety.

24 years old. 69. 24 years old. 69.4 coverage grade. All right. All right. I could yield this. It's over. I could yield this. All right, Leonard Floyd.

Leonard Floyd. All right, Niners. I tried. I tried. You did. I give you credit. You really did try that one. You got to keep Trey Lance.

Duh. Wait, what are we talking about? Oh, Niners. This is the last team of the show. tried you did i give you credit you really did try that one you got to keep trey lance duh wait what are we talking about oh niners yeah this is the last team of the show it is the last team of the show okay good trey lance george kittle debo samuel trent williams easy yep nick bosa yeah of course fred warner yep eric armstead easy i struggled with number four and not insulting their defense i just didn't like I'm like, oh my God. This guy over this guy. The next players that I would like to pick talent-wise are a linebacker. But I don't...

Keeping two linebackers a little... Dre Greenlaw. Great. Dre Greenlaw is great. Even Samson Ebicom was good for them last year. Like they... Jimmy... I think you gotta keep Jimmy Ward though here.

Jimmy Ward is who I have. Or Traverius Ward. They just paid. good for them last year um jimmy well i think you gotta keep jimmy ward jimmy jimmy ward is who i have various ward jimmy paid how much they give to various words a really nice contract he's quietly a good player no i know he's a good player three year 41 million oh that's okay they think he's like a number one corner for them i think it's got to be char various okay all right all right all right all right oh jason ferret's on this team my guy you never keep it though i know aziz ashir is the other name that a linebacker that i really thought about that i like but you're i don't think you're keeping him over you're right chavarrius ward okay let me uh let me write this down

chavarrius ward there it is there it is whoo what a marathon of a that was a marathon worth it though this is like an hour 40 yeah it's a marathon you guys better not complain about content ever again ever no me and trev got to eat dinner yeah the wee hours of the night a microwave chili i don't know why was that the first thing that came into my head that's a weird thing why is that the first you don't actually eat that there's no way you eat microwave chili i'm not actually like very concerned i never have i never have there's no there's no reason microwave chili no reason for me to say that i mean your stomach handles sunflower seeds raw i guess it can handle it in microwave chili that was a lot of fun uh it's a really cool idea thanks everybody i love it i love it that was good uh the london dynasty that is the team that we are building next week

in part two of this expansion series let us know what you think led by matt corral stop we don't god dude i'm i swear to god if we it's gonna be better than that. If we have to pick Carson Wentz, I'm just starting over. I'm starting this whole series. I would take Malik Willis, someone like that. We'll figure it out. We're not going to give it away. We're going to figure it out next week. We would love for you guys to figure it out.

I think that that should be the stipulation, right? You pick one player from every team, and then you can go back and you can pick a second player, no more than two from one team. Do you want to say that we have to stay on one side of the ball certainly the more freedom we give ourselves the better team we get to build give me the week to do the math because it's going to get it's going to be very math heavy okay it might not work where we can add that stipulation the more i thought about it okay all right because you might run into like oh i did this i don't want to make it like not fun so it might be that you can pick from a team twice a unit twice we'll see why don't we

just say that why don't we just yeah yeah this team's not gonna be that good anyway so give us advantage every every advantage we have yes so all right i want lane johnson and dallas goddard so anybody who is out there who might want to take it into their hands to continue the second part of the exercise if you guys want to do that over the next week the rules that we're going to build off of are you got to take one player from every single team at least one you have to do that and then you get to pick a second player from uh from a choice number of teams until we get to do we want to do 53 53 is what we're going to go for 53 53-man roster. Or we can leave seven spots open for the draft. Oh, yeah, we do need to do that.

You're right. You're right. So we'll do 46. That was a quick math there. So we'll pick 46 players. Well, actually, are we going to go through the whole depth chart, or do you just want to do starters? Let's just do starters.

So then, actually, then at that point, we could pick anybody because we're not going to go through. Yeah. We're not going to go through the whole team. So let's just do the starting 22. Let's just do the starting 22 and then we can figure out the depth later. If we go through this exercise again, if you guys love it so much,

then maybe we can get even deeper with it. Let's intro to it. So there you go. If you guys want to build it, you're building a starting 22 out of who is remaining. You cannot pick more than two players from one team, right? Or do we want to say that you can't even pick more than one since there's 32 teams and we're only going 11 on offense,

11 on defense? One, because it's unfair to the teams losing the players. Okay, then we're just going one. One from every single team. That's how the NFL would do it. So I'm trying to emulate. Starting 22, offensive defense. Let us know what you guys think.

Let us know what you think of the podcast. This was a lot of fun for us to do. It was awesome. A lot of fun for us to research. This was great, but I'm excited to continue this. Next Monday, before we get to that, we've got another summer scouting episode in Tiered Defensive Linemen coming up on Thursday.

I'm Trevor. That's Connor. Thanks for listening, guys. We'll see you next time. Bye.