OverDrive - Palmer on Allen's pursuit of the Super Bowl, Darnold's stance in Minnesota and Sanders' possible coaching in Dallas

Episode Date: January 14, 2025

TSN NFL Analyst Jesse Palmer joined OverDrive to discuss the headlines around the NFL playoffs, Sam Darnold's dud against the Rams and his next steps in the league, the Ravens and Bills' showdown and Josh Allen's skill set, Deion Sanders' possible coaching outlook in Dallas and more.

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Let's go. New year, new you. New you. New you. Explore it all. Feel brand new. At iHeartRadio.ca and on the free iHeartRadio app. The wild card weekend is over. Thankfully it was awful.

In the NFL it was terrible. We had one good game Sunday night and even that, like I said earlier, kind of felt a little bit unfulfilling because like two botch snaps basically ended the game for the Bucs. By credit to the commanders, good for them. Jaden Daniels, that's a win. Rookie quarterback on the game for the Bucs. Like credit the commanders, good for them. Jaden Daniels, that's a win rookie quarterback on the road in the playoffs, amazing. The other five games were horrible fourth quarters. Like they just were not compelling.

Let's hope that changes this upcoming week. To chat about it, we're joined now by former NFLer, good Canadian boy, our TSN football analyst, here's Jesse Palmer. Jesse, where do you stand on Sam Darnold and maybe what happened to him in terms of his future, whether it's in many or the rest of the NFL, based on his last two starts? Yeah, it's crazy. You know, it's just amazing to me how much can change in such a short sample size at the end of the year in those last two games. And I know

a short sample size at the end of the year in those last two games. And I know it's, it's, you know, everyone's talking about now, you know, is Minnesota going to resign him or they let him walk in free agency? And, and some people are even asking, you know, can this guy even start again somewhere else based on what we've seen these last two games? Right. I mean, to me over the course of an entire regular season, it's really hard for me to ignore over 4,300 passing yards and 35 touchdowns over that stretch of games. He was just so good up until the last week of the regular season against Detroit. And then obviously what we saw this past weekend as well. And I just, the scariest part about what we saw unfortunately is that's the stuff you saw when he was on the jets and the Panthers. It was missing throws,

guys wide open and then taking way too many sacks against the Rams. He held the ball on average. It was something like 4.7 seconds on those sacks. It's just way too much. And I mean, there's check down throws all over the place. And one of the first things quarterbacks are taught is just take the profit, take the two, three yard gain and just keep second and third down manageable moving forward.

And those are things obviously Sam Darnold having played enough in the NFL knows. I'd like to think that he's gonna get a chance again to start somewhere else. I don't think it's gonna be in Minnesota. I think this team is eager to give JJ McCarthy a shot. But it's, I mean, that was Jekyll and Hyde. That was incredible to see the regression

in the last two games for Sam Darnold versus what we saw in the regular season. Crazy, man. Like he couldn't throw a screen pass the last two weeks. Like forget a pass down the field. This guy was under throwing balls into the flat. Like it was crazy to see. And you mentioned McCarthy,

who they picked in the first round this year, and he had the ACL injury, he missed the whole year. You watched him closely at Michigan. Like if you're a Viking fan and you're trying to find some sort of solace here because he did have a good season but ultimately it went nowhere for you, can he not necessarily, he's not technically a rookie I guess next year but he will be in terms of actually playing in the NFL. Do you think he has what it takes to step in and take a team that's very good, very

well coached and actually elevate what Sam Darnold did this year. Yeah, I mean, I do. And I think he has a skillset that's pretty unique. I mean, you saw that throughout his career at Michigan. He's got elite arm talent, a much better arm than Sam Darnold does. He's also a much better athlete than Sam Darnold is as well. Now, he's way more inexperienced.

That doesn't necessarily mean he's just going to go out and throw to Justin Jefferson for 200 yards a game, you know, and throw a 35 touchdowns the way Sam Darnold did this year. But I think his ceiling is definitely a little bit higher. And we've seen quarterbacks, you know, especially this year, rookies, Jaden Daniels, you just mentioned them, who kind of have that, that similar skill set. I mean, JJ is is a special athlete at the position And and I think this offense can look a little bit different based on his running ability and the RPO game and zone Reads and maybe some more design quarterback runs as well

But I mean there's not a throw in that playbook that JJ McCarthy cannot make. I think the and you said it, they have all the pieces around him for him to have success. The big question will be, can he just sort of keep it in the fairway, especially early in the career, kind of put the driver away at times and just and just not lose games. I think that'll be the biggest question. But the upside to JJ McCarthy is just through the roof. Jesse, on the other side of things in that game, how seriously now do you take the Rams? Well, listen, I mean, I've always taken their offense

seriously. And as long as Matthew Stafford's out there, and they're healthy at receiver with Naku and cup, I mean, they can go up and down the field and they can outscore anybody. And we saw that this year late, late in the season, we saw that against Detroit. They'll, they'll score with anyone. The biggest question was the defense. Now, you know, we just talked about Sam Darnold taking nine, you know, what was it? Nine sacks in that game. I think he lost like 87 yards, which is a postseason NFL record. But yeah, listen, I mean, if, if Neville Galmore,

another good Canadian boy from Ottawa, and those guys can step up and do what they were doing in that game, then yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm a believer in them, but I just haven't seen it enough during the regular season. I don't think it's consistent enough. I think that was sort of a one game thing and to me for the Rams to win and get to the Super Bowl that they're just going to have to keep scoring at a crazy pace and Matthew Stafford's

just going to have to play play lights out but I know way she had performed and I'm a believer in the Rams defense at this point even after that performance against the Vikings. And they're going to be the appetizer on Sunday for for game, you know, Sunday night, that's going to be Bills, Ravens in Buffalo, and it sets up beautifully. Again, the wild card weekend was, it wasn't, it wasn't very compelling. It wasn't very entertaining. I'm not sure the Saturday games are going to be great. We'll get to those momentarily, Jesse, but what's interesting is if you look at the spread,

it opened Bills minus one and a half half it immediately got bet and it flipped where now the Ravens are favored can you reason with that do you see Baltimore as a favorite going into Buffalo on Sunday night? I do not and I you know and I don't know if that's more people kind of going back and thinking about what happened earlier in the season when the Ravens absolutely hammered the bills, but there were so many things that happened in that game that I think really sort of determined the course of, of what was going to happen in that game, especially from a play calling perspective, you got to

remember Baltimore after three possessions, or 21 points that first game around. And Buffalo had only scored three. So all of a sudden their, their balance on offense and their ability to run the ball was sort of taken away in that game. I think James Cook only had eight carries, um, in that game. And, and, and, uh, you know, a big, a big factor, obviously now with the Bill's offense is their ability to run the ball and have balance. And, and you saw that against the Broncos, one of the better run defenses,

the NFL, by the way, and Buffalo completely just mauled them and pushed them around. And they've tweet things as well on offense. They they're playing a lot more with that, you know, that jumbo set where they bring in the sixth offense alignment and a lot of those different sets. And they're just being physical and they're just pushing people around. So to me, this time around, uh, it's going to feel and look a little bit different. I think certainly for Joe Brady and as a play caller, uh, to,

to make sure they're running the ball a lot more frequently, you're in the postseason, which means quarterback runs always go up, always, doesn't matter who you are, what offense you are. You're going to see more QB runs, more Josh Allen. And it makes sense, especially when you're playing a team like Baltimore, because you want to keep Lamar Jackson on the bench period. You just want to limit the amount of plays he'll have. The fact that they're playing at home, the fact that, you know, we were talking about

Josh Allen a few weeks back. This is the best Josh Allen we've ever seen. The way he's playing, playing at home, builds mafia. The only thing that scares, well, and it's the biggest thing that scares me about the Ravens is just how hungry, I don't want to say desperate, but it's almost desperate, how Lamar Jackson, I think, is feeling right now about a Super Bowl. Because it really is the only thing missing from his resume, right? I mean, he might win his third MVP.

He has the Pro Bowls, he has the records and the accolades and the stats and all those things, but the only looming question we ever have about that guy is what happens to him in the postseason. And I almost think he just kind of, you know, I think he's just sort of on cruise control during the regular season to get to this point now where I really feel like he's about to turn it up, which is scary. So I don't know if that's what betters are feeling and thinking.

Um, maybe Joe Brady's thinking about, you know, becoming a head coach. Uh, it's hard for me to fathom him not taking this game seriously though. Though to me, it's still Buffalo should be the favorite. Well, Jesse, I'm looking at that box score and you're right. James Cook ran nine times. On the other side, Derrick Henry ran 24 for 199. So how do you think having Derrick Henry might change things for Lamar?

Yeah, well, I mean, obviously the he's a lot more on on derek henry and when we're talking about how quarterback runs go up in the post season a lot of that zone reached out to the r p o stuff for lamar jackson to call his own number uh... goes way up especially considering any playing in the cold words probably going to be really hard to throw the football anyway

uh... it makes sense for me if i'm Todd Munkin calling plays for Baltimore, um, just let the best player, let the best athlete on the field carried as much as he can. But the thing about Derek Henry too, is he just wears everybody down. I mean, defenses do not want to tackle that guy for 60 minutes over a game. And you see it almost each and every week, those, those two and three yard runs in the first quarter of those turn into like thirty yard jobs

by the third and fourth quarter people just just just don't want it anymore no doubt about it and in his presence i mean that's going to test the physicality of buffalos defense no no question with jesse palmer dion sanders head coach of the dallas cowboys what do you make of it if it happens

i mean it's funny right there's like this trend now with like former players coaching their former teams we saw with rod mayo and now mike rabel's in in new england and daniko ryan and deustin and obviously prime now getting consideration back at d Dallas where he won a super bowl. Um, I love it and I hate it. Um, I love it because, because coach prime is, is he's a star and I don't think any environment or situation is too big for him.

I think he can handle it. I don't know if, if Deon Sanders is a really good X's and O's guy from a game planning standpoint, but what I do know is that players want to play for him. Now in college, a big part of his success was that fact right there. When he was at Jackson State, I mean, he got his son and he got Travis Hunter, Tyson trophy winner to go play for him at Jackson state. And then when he went to Colorado, those guys followed him and he had all these transfers and everybody came in and they wanted to play for him. Well, the NFL is not necessarily like that. There's not, there's no NIL.

There's no portal. You can just jump in every year. There's free agency and a salary cap and there's parody best teams draft last. That's how it works. But I do believe there are a lot of free agents that are going to want to go play for coach prime if he ends up in Dallas. What I hate about it though, is that you're still not the star. If you're in Dallas and scary Jones, right? And I mean, he still runs that team and he's not just an owner.

And he's, I mean, he's, he's behind a lot of key decisions. I saw Troy Aikman talking about this this week and I agree with him completely. He potentially Jerry Jones, potentially handcuffs, how you coach and what you're allowed to do and what you're not allowed to do, because it really is at the end of the day, still about him, he's going to be in front of the microphone each and every week. at the end of the day is still about him. He's going to be in front of the microphone each and every week.

And you know, it's like, could Dan Campbell be Dan Campbell in Dallas? Could he go for all those fourth downs and do all the stuff he does? I don't think he could. I don't think he'd be allowed to. I think there's a leash. I think there's a leash.

So, you know, and I don't, and maybe Coach Brunton, listen, I don't know what kind of relationship he has with Jerry Jones from his playing days. It sounds like a really, really good one. And, and coach prime might be able to handle that, but, you know, I, I, I don't know if the Dallas Cowboys head coaching job is as attractive as everybody makes it out to be, to be honest. And so, you know, I could see it for sure.

I could absolutely see coach prime doing that, but you gotta remember too. Uh, you know, he's, he's losing some, some draft picks this year at Colorado, but if he stays Julian love the number one high school quarterback, um, he's got him coming in this year. He's already there on campus. Like he's got some really, really good young players, um, and a roster that that's getting more and more loaded by the year to make a playoff run. So he's also, he's risking leaving

a pretty, what's becoming a pretty good situation in the Big 12 at Colorado as well. So I mean, it's unique and it's because it's Coach Prime, of course, we're all going to talk about it. He's polarizing. The Dallas Cowboys are polarizing and it's an amazing, you know, it's an amazing story. So, I mean, that's a long-winded answer. I love it and I hate it. I want to see it so badly. I think it'll fail miserably. I just, I don't think Jerry Jones, to your point, can get out of his own way. He'll screw it up. I think the fact that Jones is even contemplating this, I am cynical, it's all about front page, it's all about clicks, it would be a click bait hire.

And that's with all the respect to Dion Sanders, it's just everything is about Jerry Jones. And everything's about getting people buzzing about the Cowboys, it's not actually about winning. That's what it always feels like. And to your point, like just hire Kellen Moore. Right. He's right there for me. Like, like just do, do what, do what 99% of NFL branches would do.

Get the guy that played for you also, by the way. And, uh, and as well as Dak Prescott's quarterback coach, and he was the coordinator and the play caller and was successful on offense this year, calling plays in Philadelphia bring that guy in But it's but to your point. That's not the sexy hire and the storyline is Is the on Sanders so man, it's it's a soap opera every year. It always is man. It always is Enjoy the division around Jesse. We'll do it again soon. Thank you for this You got it brother. Appreciate you guys. You got it. There is Jesse Palmer