The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Evan Silva fantasy stock market, a Carolina Panthers Team Visit with Joe Person, and the Kevin Stefanski Offense in Ted Nguyen’s Film School

Episode Date: October 14, 2020

First up, Establish the Run’s fantasy football guru Evan Silva joins the show to evaluate the fantasy season so far, including his biggest miss, early season victory lap, whose stock he’s buying and selling right now, slow starters, dynasty picks, and much more.Then, The Athletic’s Joe Person stops by in this week’s Team Visit to take a closer look at the Carolina Panthers’ pleasantly surprising 3-2 start and discuss the defining characteristics of Matt Rhule’s coaching style, Joe Brady’s incredible impact on the offense, Teddy Bridgewater’s play changing the narrative about the season, and more.To close things out, in Ted Nguyen’s Film School, the guys break down the Kevin Stefanski Offense, Bill Callahan’s details oriented approach with the offensive line improving things dramatically from last season, how a play action heavy attack has helped Baker Mayfield adjust to a new offense early on, and more.Get a 1 year subscription to The Athletic for just $1 a month when you visit http://theathletic.com/footballshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. I'm Robert May's really fun show for you guys today. Ted Nguyen is going to join us a little bit later to talk about the Kevin Stefanski offense and what that means. There's a lot of interesting background to where he's come from and what that offense looks like in Cleveland with the Brown's hot start. We're also going to talk to Joe Person about the Panthers because they're a really surprising team right now. I think they could have been a bottom five team in the NFL. They have been extremely feisty over the first five weeks of the three.

the year. So I'm really excited to talk to him about that. Before we do any of that, though, I am thrilled to welcome my buddy, fantasy guru and all around just football nerd king, Evan Silva. Evan, how you doing, buddy? Bays, I'm so glad that you asked me on your show because it's become very quickly in a short amount of time. One of my must listens every single week. Oh, you're too kind. Excellent content. You know exactly the guys to bring on your show. Ted and Joe are you know, just exemplify that. So thank you for including me. Well, I could say the same about everything that you guys put out at Establish the Run.

If you haven't checked out Evans' work and everything they do at Establish the Run, you absolutely should. It's an invaluable fantasy resource. So I thought that five weeks into the year would be a good time to kind of take stock of what the fantasy season has been like so far and just kind of pick your brain about what has happened and what you expect to happen. And I thought the best way to do that would be to kind of hand out some fantasy superlatives for the early season. So we're going to kind of go rapid fire here and just go through a bunch of different categories so people can hear what your thoughts are and use that insight to kind of shape their teams over the next 10 weeks. Because I'm sure a lot of people with all of the injuries that have happened are freaking the fuck out right now and trying to figure out how to salvage their season. So this is going to be step one to doing that.

So before we get into the good stuff, let's start with your biggest miss from the preseason. You guys put in so much work, you especially for your top 50 coming into the year. Where were you most wrong coming into the year? Definitely DeAndre Hopkins. And I mean, we can go back and revisit. I mean, this is like the worst miss I've ever had. And I've been doing this for like 15 years. You know, it was primarily based on the fact that wide receivers,

that have changed teams in the offseason have struggled in their first year with their new teams historically. Especially elite guys. Yes. And I mean, they typically lose about 20% of their production. And, you know, from, and I mean, DeAndre Hopkins had just massive target shares in Houston and really wasn't competing with anyone in his own offense for targets. You know, it would be a little bit of willfuler here and a little bit of willfuler there.

But for the most part, you know, had no target competition. I thought that Christian Kirk would pose more target competition. I thought the Kenyon Drake would pose more target competition. Larry Fitzgerald could not have posed any less target competition than he has through the first five weeks. And I actually think that that narrative has been turned on its head, the wide receiver changing teams, in a year where offenses have just been forced to simplify because of the limited practice and preparation time. Like maybe in previous years, you know, they go through the OTAs. They go through the mini camps. They go through a full training camp.

And they're still making sure to incorporate the guys that were already there. This year with guys like DeAndre Hopkins and Stefan Diggs, they were just like, we're going to throw the ball to our best players. And we're not going to worry about, you know, worrying about including the complimentary players that had been there. We're going to get the ball to our best player that we really, really, invested in. And we've seen that with DeAndre Hopkins. I mean, the entire passing offense has been built around DeAndre Hopkins in Arizona. Their passing offense was not very impressive in the first four games, was against the Jets. But the entire passing offense has really

been based around hitch routes to DeAndre Hopkins that finally hit him deep a couple of times last week. Christian Kurt got going a little bit last week. So I do think that the trajectory is pointing up for their passing offense. But, I mean, 53 targets, 45 catches like DeAndre Hopkins has been absolutely insane. That was a massive, massive miss. And I'm sorry. It's funny because I was out on him in correspondence with his ADP and auction values, but I was super in on digs, which is just completely incongru- there's no congruency there

from me with my thinking because I've seen the same thing that you've seen. Brandon Marshall is really the only guy that's changed teams and man. to kind of keep on going with the production that he's put up. Historically, he has been bad, but with Diggs, it just made sense for how he was going to fit in there. I could just see him being dropped in with those other guys. With Hopkins, it was just harder for me to imagine what the role would look like, what the offense would look like.

Maybe that's just a lack of imagination. But now that you've seen that from these two guys, do you think it'll change your thinking moving forward if a team gives up a lot of draft capital for a big name dude? Like, let's say Julio gets traded next offseason. Do you think you'll think about Julio differently because of what you just saw with Hopkins and Dix? Everything is just going to have to be case by case. And they're going to be misses and there are going to be hits. And historically, you know, it has been true that wide receivers changing teams has not been a good formula and not a good recipe for immediate success.

But I truly think that the coaches there, they're smart. Cliff Kingsbury, Brian Daibald, they're smart guys. I think Brian Daibble might be a head coach in 2021. and they did smart things and they just patted their offense to make sure to get the ball to their best players. Yeah, I wrote about that essentially two weeks into the year

when they were just force-feeding those guys and the way they were using Hopkins. I wrote about for the athletic. I just thought it was fascinating because of the history and because of how quickly those guys hit the ground running. All right, let's transition to a good note for you.

What would you say your kind of early season victory lap has been, something you were hammering in the preseason that worked out for you? Certainly Josh Allen, has been a big victory for me. I took out 60 to 1 and 51 MVP tickets on Josh Allen. Talked about it all offseason.

You really did, man. You deserve a ton of credit for this. I cannot imagine. You were by far the loudest guy in this corner. Why did you think that? What led you to believe that this could be possible? A lot of different factors. Number one, I was an original Josh.

Alan Dauter coming out of college. I think that was almost the only way to be, although in hindsight, those guys that were above market on him are going to look smart. But I love the way that the bills have built. They've built extremely analytically. Like you understand that you had,

well, first they started off making mistakes, the same mistakes that Dave Gettelman did with Cam Newton. And we draw that comparison because everybody that is, you know, making decisions for Buffalo came from Carolina, Sean McDermott, Brandon Bean, foremost among them. And I have no doubt that they saw a lot of Cam Newton in Josh Allen when they drafted him. But they have built so in and they learned from their mistakes.

They treated a third round pick from Kelvin Benjamin. If you remember the way that Dave Gettleman wanted to build in Carolina, he wanted to surround Cam Newton with wide receivers with large catch radiuses in order to almost minimize the inaccuracies of Cam Newton. Which sort of, it made sense on the surface. It doesn't make sense though. It doesn't make sense. Everyone that thinks like that is not, just think about it from a math perspective.

Having six more inches in your arm length or having two more yards of separation, which one is better for an inaccurate quarterback? I've never understood that thought process. And they've overcorrected it in the right way because now their entire wide receiving car is built of smurfs that get open really well. It made sense at a very, very surface level. I think. But when you understand that what happened with Cam Newton is that he lost Kelvin Benjamin that one year, he's still in a Ted Ginn in Philly Brown. He's the MVP of the league.

He was blessed with guys, you know, pulling out the guy that couldn't separate. He was blessed with guys that could separate and create some level of separation. And that is what made him more accurate. Or that was what, you know, helped make him one of the best quarterbacks in the league that particular year. The bills made almost a. same mistakes that did Dave Gettleman. They also had Andre, they were running out Andre Holmes and, you know, big receivers with large cut radiuses,

but they got the picture that they needed guys that could separate. They went out, they got John Brown. They went out and they got Cole Beasley, who can create separation in the slot. They went out and they, you know, traded the farm for Stefan Diggs, who was the best deep ball receiver in the league in 2019. And Josh Allen was the worst deep ball. quarterback in the league in 2019. And that is just an extremely analytical way to approach team building. And they also had continuity in a limited and practice preparation. They're bringing back their head coach.

They're bringing back their O.C. They're bringing back their quarterback. They're bringing about everyone except for that, you know, receiver position where they had freaking Duke Williams from the CFL. It doesn't matter if he hadn't been there. Stefan Diggs is an upgrade. Exactly. And they just drop stuff.

Fon Diggs into that hole and, you know, Bing, bang, boom, we got an MVP candidate. Although I feel like I'm going to jinx them because we're doing this during the Titans Bill's game and we're not watching it. I'm not watching it. I don't want to know. I do not want to know. Full disclosure, we are not watching that game.

I'm waiting until we're done to watch the whole thing. And it's funny because I wrote similar stuff. I wrote it on the ringer. I remember you retweeting the thing I wrote about Stefan Diggs going to Buffalo. And I said similar things in that piece. It makes total sense for what they need and why they want a guy like that. But I still wasn't brave enough to go. all the way out on that limb and say Josh Allen was going to the MVP like you did.

So it's been a fantastic season and you were definitely driving that train. All right, let's move on here. I want to talk to you about, because I think this is the nature of fantasy. When you draft guys and you're watching them get used or you're watching Red Zone, you're like, how is this happening? You're checking a box score. Like, this isn't even possible the way that this guy should be being used to the way he is being used.

Who would you say through five games has been the most confounding player in the NFL in terms of his usage? I would say, well, there are probably players across the league that have been used in more frustrating ways. But from a fantasy standpoint, Kenyon Drake, and Kenyon Drake, you know, if you just looked at his last eight games, the Cardinals acquired him with eight games to go last year. And he was extremely efficient from a rushing standpoint. The Cardinals just haven't been as efficient on the ground as they were last year. But he was, he was extremely efficient. He's also on pace for like 60 catches over his eight games with the Cardinals. And he's certainly a player that, you know, going back to the way that he was used in Alabama behind Derek Henry, he's a player that you wanted to get in space because he's got, you know, he's got playmaking ability in space.

He's not necessarily a guy that you want to bang between the tackles on early downs. He's been an early down banger for Arizona. And that has not been a productive way to use Kenyon Drake. at the same time, Chase Edmonds has given the Cardinals coaching staff every reason to not use Kenyon Drake that way. So if you're looking at it from a real life football standpoint, you can understand why this is happening to Kenyon Drake. And now he's like a touchdown or bus guy in fantasy. He has six targets through five games. And Chase Edmonds is creeping up on him. Chase Edmonds, you know, if in a couple weeks Chase Edmonds is the leadback on the Cardinals, I don't think it should surprise anyone. It's the thing I was most wrong about coming into the year about fantasy.

I traded for him in our dynasty league at the trade deadline last year. I signed him on waivers for like $5 because I thought he might get traded. I always thought he was talented and he exploded. I thought I hit the jackpot. And coming into the year, like you said about the bills, there was continuity there. They were the number two team in the NFL and rushing DVOA last season. They were really good at scheming up space for him. He was their number one guy.

Everything pointed to him being a monster. this year in that offense again. And I went back and I watched some of the carries today. I don't know what's going on. There are not creating the same amount of space. He's not breaking any tackles. I believe he's 47th out of 55 running backs in yards effort contact per attempt, which is just awful.

He's 27th in rushing DVOA. And he's 12th in the league in the percentage of his rushes going into eight-man boxes. 12th lowest rate in the league and he's still not doing anything. So you watch it and it's like, man, this makes absolutely no sense. And sometimes that's how it goes. You look at the process, you think everything's lining up for this guy to just be a rocket, and it just doesn't work out. And Kenyon Drake, in my opinion, is that guy this year because it's not as if we couldn't,

there weren't elements and components of this that we couldn't predict. Everything is in line and everything has stayed the same, and it still hasn't worked out. So I totally agree. He's been a really, really weird one. All right. Who is the guy right now? Five games in, people are probably starting to think about tinkering. The guys they want to go get, the guys they want to sell their stuff.

stock in. So who is the guy that you would be selling your stock in right now if you were kind of looking at just the landscape of the league? So people that drafted Christian McCaffrey are going to hate this and it's going to be controversial and it might blow up in my face. But if you have bet against skill position players coming off high ankle sprains over the past five, 10 years, you just place bets against every single one. you would be a rich man and you wouldn't be listening to this, you'd be out on a fucking boat.

And you know, you wouldn't be listening to this podcast. But Christian McCaffrey would be the guy. So it looks like he is about to come back from the high ankle sprain. He is still valued extremely highly in season long leagues. Mike Davis has played at a very, very high level. I mean, about at Christian McCaffrey's level over the past three games, they have a chance to improve a four and oh this week facing the bears, their favorites against your bears.

This week, the bears, as you know, Mays are fraudulent this year. But, you know, have a chance to go four and oh with Mike Davis as their lead running back. And I don't, there's no reason for the, the Panthers to, you know, completely weed out Mike Davis. And one of the driving forces behind Christian McCaffrey being the number one overall fantasy running back in 2019 and being the number one overall fantasy pick in 2020. 20 is that he just never comes off the field. So I still think he's going to be good when he comes back.

But there is a chance that he isn't very good, as we saw with Saquan Barkley last year coming off a high ankle sprain. And Alvin Camara trying to play through a high ankle sprain. So, and I think you can get an absolute boatload for Christian McAfre right now. I think you get maybe a wide receiver one and a running back one and maybe even like, you know, a decent. I mean, you could get a lot for Christian McAfri. McCaffrey. So I think that now was the time to shop him. Who is the worst player you would trade from McCaffrey

straight up right now? I mean, certainly like I would take like Aaron Jones for him. You think you could get a top 10 back and you would take a lot of other guys in that three to 10 range for him right now because he's probably number two. I think at worst if I package like McCaffrey and like a wide receiver two, I could get Aaron Jones in exchange for him. And in in that sort of a scenario, I would also, be acquiring a running back who has already had his buy week. Yeah, that's a great call. And that's always something that you need to think about because this is a week to week game. You're trying to win weeks. You know, think about that. You're trying to win on a week to week basis. And Aaron Jones, with his buy week out of the way, I mean, he is a prime guy to try to trade for right now. I know that

his, his price is going to be really high, but trying to get guys that have already had their biweeks. I mean, you don't have to worry about filling in for him the rest of the way. That makes total sense. All right, who's a guy you're buying stock in for the rest of the season? Well, I guess that I'm going to go against everything that I just said and go with a guy, although it's not a high ankle sprain, but it is an ankle injury. It would be Dallas Goddard because I think that he could be acquired for cheap, number one. Number two, the Eagles are still desperate for pass catchers.

They're best pass catcher right now. Like, by a long shot is Travis Fulham. I don't know what Zachers. Mays, have you watched a lot of Zachers this year? So I have not. And that's what I was curious about. I went back and I watched all of Goddard's targets today from the first couple games. And they're normal with Dallas Goddard targets.

But the volume was, I didn't realize he got essentially 18 targets in two games, which is, I completely understand where you're coming from with that. I want to go back and watch more Ertz because people who know more than I do just say he's done, which is shocking because there were really no indications that that would be on the horizon, right? Yeah. Although he had always, he just really had one trump card and that was his route running ability and the fact that he was like, he's a big guy, but he's quicker than the linebackers that, you know, are, I mean, he knew how to run routes, right? And he still knows how to run routes. He was a guy who was getting a ton of targets. But he just, he looks like his feet are just stuck in concrete. And I also question where the motivation is, I don't, I hate questioning guys motivation. But I also understand in situations where you think you deserve a new contract and you're less motivated. Like we saw. this last year with AJ Green, where there were just so many rumors, even like from Schaefter, that AJ Green was not playing not only because of the ankle injury, but because he didn't

want to be out there because he thought he deserved a big contract and he, you know, arguably did. And Zach Kurtz arguably did. But, you know, the teams, you know, relatively are making smart decisions and not giving, you know, a 31-year-old tight end who looked like he's, you know, I mean, he's never been a big run-after-catch guy. He's never been a big downfield threat tight end. And now he looks like a guy who can't really make anything happen in short areas. And that's terrifying. If you look at the other top tight ends in the NFL, Kittle and Kelsey are so important to their offenses and have been for so long. Kittles' versatility. Kittal is the best tight end in the NFL. I like Travis Kelsey, but it's

Kittal and it's not even a conversation to me. But what Kelsey does is a receiver for the chief's important. Even if Ertz was the biggest volume guy on the Eagles offense, he wasn't the focal point of that offense in terms of them just building everything off the foundation that is him, the same way that we have with Kittal and Kelsey. So I can understand why the Eagles wouldn't want to give him that deal. And now it looks even smarter that they don't. So you're looking at Goddard, which makes total sense. He's probably going to get a ton of volume when he gets back. Is there a guy in dynasty? So you think a really long term that you think, you think, think you could go out and get right now on the cheap and just have him blow up over the next

couple years. I think that a guy whose dynasty stock has been in a very, very low, and I, sorry, Mays, I'm going to blow it for you, but AJ Brown scored the first touchdown. I saw the touchdown. I saw the first touchdown tonight. So I turned it off at like the five-minute mark of the first quarter. But AJ Brown, it would have been AJ Brown without any sort of even hesitation because of the, you know, there's like, you know, the, the, the run heavy concerns. There are, you know, Corey Davis played well concerns. They're early in the season. There are, you know, the injury concerns.

All that adds up to A.J. Brown being an absolute screaming by in Dynasty as a guy that, I mean, I thought he looked like Terrell Owens in year one. Because that's the biggest thing in Dynasty, right? In season long, opportunity matters most. Yes. In Dynasty, you want to bet on town. and traits. And while the circumstances don't necessarily line up to him being huge this year, if you

watch him play, that's the type of buy you want to make because, all right, I'm betting on that dude's talent carrying him moving forward because circumstances change. So that makes total sense to me. I think he's the perfect example of that. Yes. So I always like, listening to you guys and the things you guys write and talk about, I know that you get an affinity for some coaches. there are coaches that you kind of get to like

because of what they do for fantasy players consistently. Is there a most valuable coach from the first five games of the season? A guy that you've kind of developed a little bit of a crush on and you think, all right, I'm going to bet on his guys both now and in the future. There is one offensive coordinator who has overseen a career year from his quarterback,

a career year from his number one receiver, his new number one receiver who no one expected. And from a journeyman running back that was cut by the great Ryan Pace, 2018 NFL executive of the year. We've all lived the Mike Davis life. I can tell you that right now. We all are very familiar with it. So this is Joe Brady.

And Joe Brady has been just excellent. Scheming around not a great offensive line. I don't think, you know, Russell O'Koon has missed some time. They got rid of Trey Turner before the season. Moton has been awesome. We're going to talk about him with Joe Person a little bit later today. But on the whole, I definitely agree with you. Yeah.

So I think that Joe Brady might be a head coach in 2021. I mean, he already has NFL experience. He's, you know, technically a disciple of Sean Payton. Yep. And my goodness, he's been outstanding. And I had high hopes for him entering the season. He has absolutely outkicked my hopes. I love watching that offense.

We're going to talk more about it with Joe Persson here later in the show. Yes, please do. And also mention. please hammer this home maze that Robbie Anderson is the latest dude to get away from Adam Gase and just absolutely blow his top. So Robbie Anderson is a guy

I should have been higher on coming into this season because if you look at all the circumstances, right? Talent, undeniable. Post-Gase bump, undeniable. And I like, when I'm picking fantasy guys, I like following the money. If you get a big contract, if you're a guy that was drafted high,

because investments in resources often contribute to usage. That's why I'm shocked. Austin Hooper hasn't gotten more work because of how much they paid him. So I always try to follow that stuff. And with Anderson, you have a history with Brady. They gave him a decent-sized contract.

And that regime has absolutely no ties to DJ Moore or Curtis Samuel. They have no obligation to make sure those guys get their touches and develop them. So I should have been much higher on it than I was. He's a guy that where he was getting drafted, it was like wide receiver 47 or something. And I was like, that's way too well. He looked on paper entering the season like a role player, and Bridgewater had never had a high A dot.

Yeah, that's a good point, too. And so it looked like he would just be a guy who gave you, I don't know, you know, three, four big games over the course of the year. He's giving you a big game every freaking week at this point. And it's, they're doing it in different ways. He's got the deep shots, but they're hitting him on slants.

They're getting the ball in his hands in a way that you just haven't been used to seeing with Robbie Anderson, which has been cool. All right. Who is a guy, you know, not even preseason misses, just because it's hard to know everything coming into the preseason. Who's a guy that over the first five days you've watched and said, man, I just wish you were on more of my teams.

A lot of the rookie receivers, beginning with Chase, motherfucking play pool, who I loved, I loved him coming out of college. I still cannot believe that people were trying to convert him to tight end. Like, I don't think they watched them play.

I don't, there's no way that you watch Chase Claypool play at Notre Dame, winning on the outside as a perimeter receive, really winning all over the field. winning and contested catches situations, and then look at his athletic profile and just seeing what his ceiling could. I mean, to me, he was just Vincent Jackson all the way.

And I can't believe that people thought he was going to play tight end in the NFL. But he has been just absolutely sensational. He was a lay-round pick in every draft. And it wasn't easy to envision, even though there were great camp reports about him, it wasn't easy to envision him. having a big, big role in year one because you had Deontay Johnson, who I was, you know, very high on juju coming back.

They added Ebron, James Washington, I think is still a fine role player. He's probably like the best fourth receiver in the league right now. But I think Chase Claypool, I think there is an avenue for him to beat the Steelers number one receiver the rest of the way. And I would also throw in Justin Jefferson, who didn't even beat out Olibisi Johnson coming out of camp. but in week three, the Vikings were just like, screw it. We're putting in Justin Jefferson, and he has, I mean, I think he's transformed the

offense. You don't have a big game on Monday night against Seattle, but I think he'll bounce back and have a big game against Atlanta. He has really transformed the construction of that offense, which was looking ugly through the first two weeks. If you could have Claypool or Jefferson, also just a quick mention, if you want to look for, we're not going to talk about this because we're not going to have time, but yards per route run is such a great indicator of how guys are going to play

later. Jefferson's sixth in the NFL one yards per route run, Chase Claypool number two. If you're looking for a stat that projects into the future and say, all right, let's extrapolate these guys and figure out who's a value right now. That's often a good way to do it. These guys are right up at the top. If you had to pick one of them for Dynasty,

the rest of their careers, who would it be? I try to hit the home learn with Chase Claypool. You might be like Calvin Johnson. I mean, his athleticism is on par with Calvin Johnson. Like, that is not being... I posted a spider chart the other day. It's absolutely ridiculous. It's like a circle. It's unbelievable.

I was, and I didn't follow my own advice. We have a three-round fantasy or rookie draft in my Dynasty League. And I went, I picked Michael Pittman because I was like, he could be their number one receiver next year when Hilton's gone. And I did pick traits. When you're going with rookies and dynasty, always go with traits. And I shouldn't have done that. And I saw the same thing you got, you did with old B.C. Johnson. I was like, if Jefferson can't get into the starting lineup now, is that a guy that I want?

And I was just completely wrong. I always bet on the spark guys. And I didn't this year. And it's coming back to bite me. All right, let's, before you get out of here, just for the rest of the season, I want to, a couple slow starters I want to talk to you about. Is there a slow starter that you're legitimately worried about that you think this is just, this could be the end here. AJ Green, I don't even think any analysis is needed. Yeah, it's kind of crazy.

It's kind of over. It's kind of over. Yeah. I was high on Tyler Boyd just because I thought he could be the number one guy in that offense in a Joe Burrow offense. It seems like he's going to be, but I'm just shocked at what AJ Green has looked like. Do you think he's just done? Do you think if he gets traded and he's in a different role or he's on a winning team, it could inject some life into him or you just think it's over here?

The like historically big receivers that are at his age are in really, really bad, you know, statistical projection terms. So, you know, and he's got the injury history working against him. I do think, though, that if he gets out of that situation, he'll at least have a chance. but he is not wanted any part of that Bengals organization now for multiple years. And I think he's going to milk. I think he should, and I think that he will milk this hamstring injury. And I think we won't see him.

We're going to see T. Higgins be the number one outside receiver and Tyler Boyd be the big time slot receiver for Cincinnati. I think probably the rest of the way. I would love to see if he really does still have one more year in him, if a really good team could go get him for a year at probably a reasonable price coming off the tag with absolutely no production. He'll be a Patriot next year at one year, one year, one year, $1.25 million. It's so true.

God, it's going to be awful. All right. Who is a guy that started slow that you are not worried about? Clyde Edwards Hilaire. Clyde Edwards Halear. What about him? Gives you that hope? I think that he's breaking tackles at a really high rate.

He's seeing targets at a really, he saw eight targets last week. He's, you know, he's just been kind of like slower to get incorporated, like fully into the offense with Patrick Holmes. I feel like sometimes they're not on the same page in the passing game. And they've had some injuries on the offensive line. It just hasn't all come together, but I think that he's a buy right now. Let me throw one back to you, though, Maze, because this is a guy that after Marlon Mack went down, I thought was going to absolutely destroy. And that is not all come together for him now. But we'll end it on this. Jonathan Taylor, give me your analysis. I'm surprised because he's actually down near the bottom of the league in yards after contact per

attempt. I think he has the second worst rate in the NFL, second or third. And one of his teammates is right down there with him, Nahim Hines. That running game, I thought they would just hit the ground smoking because of how much talent they had at front and what he looks like physically. But it hasn't happened. I got to go back and watch their offensive line a little bit. I've been watching their defense a lot more than I have their offense.

So I want to see just from the end zone what that running game looks like because I'm like you, I'm very surprised. If you told me after week one, I think, that Marlon Mac would be out for this season, where I would put Jonathan Taylor for rest of season rankings, he probably would have been a top five running back for me. So I'm absolutely shocked that it hasn't worked out pretty much at all so far. All right, I think that's all we got, buddy. I sincerely appreciate it.

I know I got something out of this. This is going to inform my decision making as I kind of figure out my fantasy teams going forward here. Guys, please go check out the work that Evan does and establish the rest of the rest of. I'm telling you, it is invaluable fantasy input. They do tons of podcasts. Evans matchup columns are online and in audio form now. You can go get those.

I listen to 90 minutes. It's like the stock marker for football. I do it while I'm cooking during the day or during the week. And it's hugely important. Please go check that out. Evan, thank you so much for the time, man. Really appreciate it. Always good to talk to you.

Absolutely. Let's do it again, like sometimes in the playoffs or something. First round of the playoffs. We'll bring you on our show. Works for me. I'm always around. All right, buddy. Thank you.

All right. Later, dude. All right. It's time for this week's team visit. When I was thinking about doing this segment before the season, in my head, it was a way to talk about and think about teams maybe we're not thinking about. And the Panthers were a perfect example of that this week. You kind of pick your head up.

It's like, it's like, the Panthers are three and two? What are the Panthers doing? So I wanted to go back and watch what they were doing and learn a little bit more about them. And that is why my buddy Joe person is here from the athletics to talk about. the Panthers. Joe, how you doing? What's going on, man? I am doing great. I'm really looking forward to this because coming into the season, I think you could make the argument that the Panthers were one of the most fascinating teams in the NFL because they hit the hard reset button

on the roster. No more Cam Newton, no more Luke Keekeley, a couple guys that are still there, Shaq Thompson, but for the most part, a group that was starting over and starting over with a college coach and a college coach with a pretty interesting background. There was no one scheme he comes from. He didn't do things a certain way. So the Panthers were one of those teams where it's like, and you throw Joe Brady into the mix. So it was kind of a thought like, oh, they could be anything.

Who knows what they're going to look like? So when you were coming into the season, what did you expect from this team? What would you, when you were thinking about it, what did you think the 2020 Panthers season was going to be about? You know what? The word I used a lot, all often was rebuild because that's what it felt like. As you said, just flushed out the whole roster year over year on the 53, man. They had a 60% turnover, which is just unheard of.

I mean, even in a league where we see so much roster turnover, that is just obscene. and but but the thing is when you would talk to people in the organization Matt Ruhl, Marty Herney in particular, Marty Verny wasn't all about that. Matt Ruhl and here's how I think some of that narrative really kind of got some legs is because of what he did at Temple and Baylor where he went in there took over struggling, struggling programs and was given a you know a huge big window I think his first

Temple team won two games. His first Baylor team won a single game. And so, I thought this team was like heading to 5 and 11, especially when you looked at their defense. Offensively, with Joe Brady higher, with Teddy Bridgewater, with Robbie Anderson. I mean, they went out and got some guys on offense. They traded for Russell a Coon. They already had the best running back or one of the best running backs in football in Christian McCaffrey. So you thought offensively, this team's going to be fun to watch, but they're going to give up a ton of points on defense. That hadn't been the case. Their defense is still clearly not up to the same speed as their offense, but it's been good enough to win three of their first five games and make me rethink what this is all,

what this season's all about. So I want to talk about the offense and the defense. Before that, though, what have just your initial impressions been of Matt Rule? What would you think his defining characteristics have been either in talking to him or the way you've heard guys in the locker room talk about it. Terrific communicator. I mean, really just a guy that really tries to connect with his players on a personal level, which was part, of course, this offseason with doing what you and I are doing with Zoom. But he made it a real point. You talk to players who have played for him before. That helps his message get across as are in the locker room or on their Zoom calls

are on their group texts vouching from that rule with the few holdovers that they did have. And, you know, rule just, he knows a lot of football. And he said this in the open. He didn't really come from it on either side of the ball in terms of I'm going to be the guy that calls the defense or I'm going to be the guy that calls the offense. But he has done a ton on both sides of the football throughout his career. So he can, somebody told me, I forget who it was it. that rule can walk into any meeting room in the building and know exactly what's going on,

like the nuances of the offensive line play or the linebacker crew. And I think it does give him some real credibility from the first guy on the roster to the 53. Yeah, that's amazing. And I think that's the exact type of head coach you want. I think them giving him the deal that they gave him kind of surprised some people, both the length and the money. and people kept talking about him as a program builder. He's a program builder.

And I just didn't know what that meant because it's just, we're not used to it with NFL head coaches. We're so used to certain specific archetypes. Guys come up this way. These are the guys that typically succeed. And he's outside of that. Even Cliff Kingsbury, he's a college coach, but he still follows the same model of hot shot play caller.

It's going to be his offense. They're going to score points, figure out the defense later. Rule doesn't come from that. And that's why it was kind of hard to understand exactly what this might look like. But in terms of the qualities you'd want in a head coach, that's exactly what you would want. Is somebody who could go into any part of the building, be a good communicator, understand what's going on, have a nuanced understanding of both offense and defense.

I mean, Belichick's a defensive guy, and I don't mean to make this comparison with the guy that's three and two, but it's Belichickian. It's understanding every aspect of what you want to do. And that seems to be working out for them so far. Yeah, you know, it's funny you bring up Belichick. because Matt Rule, as you know, does not have a ton of NFL experience to draw on. He had one year with the Giants. And so occasionally, of course, we do hear reference Tom Coughlin.

But way more than he's talked about Tom Coughlin, he has made reference to Pellichickian things. And he's trying to run it just like Bill. He knows what it takes to be successful. So I was a little surprised that Matt Ruhle did not go out and get an experienced head coach, a guy with head coaching experience. He did talk to a couple guys like that. Talk to Mike McCoy, talked to Ben McAdoe, ultimately did not hire either one of them. And frankly, the most important hire he made, in my opinion, is Joe Brady. We saw what he did at LSU. It was phenomenal. There were some of us, you know, kind of wondering, was he going to, how would this translate to the next level?

and he has been just nails on offensive game planning. He's a bright young coach. I think he's already being talked about as a potential candidate for the Falcons job. He's been an NFL coach. He's been a coordinator for what? Five games. Yeah. It'd be interesting.

The returns have been unbelievable. They're seventh in offensive DVOA through five games, which is incredible when you consider what this team was supposed to be coming into the season. Teddy Bridgewater is 11th in EPA per play. He's fifth in completion percentage over expectation. Ben Baldwin from the athletic does a great kind of composite of EPA and completion percentage over expectation. It's a really good quarterback metric in my opinion. Teddy Bridgewater is eighth. I mean, he's playing extremely well right now. So I want to ask you this because I have my thoughts. I went back and I watched a couple games today. But what has jumped

out to their offense about their offense? What is the number one thing that you feel like has been surprising to you or noticeable to you. I'll say two things. One is that they had three or four touchdowns in the last two weeks, I think, where guys have been wide open.

It isn't Teddy Bridgewater throwing into a tight window in the end zone. It's like Joe Brady scheming Mike Davis wide open on a little naked bootleg with the running back going out with bridge and and it's just like okay this this end up blown coverage this is just Joe Brady and Teddy Bridgewater working and you know harmony here and then the second thing is just how many

people are getting involved the only position that has not been involved is and we wondered if that you know if they had enough at that position I'm starting to think that's just not a position of real need in the Joe Brady offense yeah other than other than Ian Thomas and Chris Mannhurst or one and two tens. You look at her stats sheet most Sundays, Robert, and it's like eight different guys catching the football. Curtis Samuel running the football, catching the football. And those two things that stuck out to me off.

The number one thing going back, and I watched the Falcons game, start to finish today and a couple other just clips from other games, is how much conviction Teddy Bridgewater is playing quarterback with. The ball is coming out of his hands so quickly as the same. six fastest time to throw in the league, and that tracks to the tape. And some guys, when they have that quick time to throw, it's because they're dinking and dunk it. And he's doing a lot of short throws in the way that Teddy Bridgewater does.

I think his average depth of target is like 6.6 yards. But they're mixing enough deep shots, and he's just throwing the ball right on time. As guys are coming out of their breaks, he had a throw that I put on Twitter today. It was a deep in to DJ Moore in the Falcons game in between like four guys in his zone. And that ball is coming out as soon as Moore is making his break. There was a throw that he hit early in the game against Arizona. Same kind of deal.

Play action throw deep out hits DJ Moore as he's coming out of his break. And I'm starting to think, like you said about Matt Rule being a good communicator, watching Joe Burrow last year and Teddy Bridgewater this year, it helps that those guys are very smart. But I have to think that Joe Brady is really good at articulating the motivation behind plays to his quarterbacks because his guys seem to understand what they're trying to accomplish on specific plays, and that really shines through with the way that Teddy has played.

I mean, he is playing at a really high level right now to the point that I'm kind of wondering, when they signed him, I thought, oh, bridge guy. He's literally the bridge over the water here. They're going to get him. He's going to play this year. They're going to be bad. They'll be in the quarterback race. We'll see what happens with Teddy.

He's playing well enough, and they're going to win enough games where I'm starting to question that at this point. You and the whole fan base here. like we talked about earlier the rebuild well the other half of that was right down the road here is the school called clemson and it was the whole hashtag tank for Trevor and like that was the narrative like you know right from week one among the fan base and and it was can we at least see what the panthers have here in teddy bridgewater and joe brady and robbie anderson like before Or you start talking about the whole tank business, and that's a whole other discussion,

I know. But it's funny, though, to see how things, the narrative has flipped so quickly. And, you know, here's the thing. Their schedule is going to get some teeth in it. You're coming up pretty quickly. You know, there's a trip to Green Bay. They have a trip to Kansas City. So, they're not going to run the table here. We still are looking at it. a young team and particularly a young defense. But just the idea that after five games, they are tied with Tampa Bay and Atlanta atop the NFC South is way more than anybody expected out of this team, locally, nationally, pretty much everywhere, but inside Bank of America State.

And I'm not saying that Teddy Bridgewater is going to be a top five quarterback for the rest of his career. I'm not even saying that he's going to be a top 10 guy at the end of this year. But the fact that they can be a good offense, be a top 10ish offense with him at quarterback, I think changes the conversation a little bit. And I also think one of the more interesting guys on the offense beyond what Mike Davis has done, which we talked about with Evan Silva earlier today. But what Robbie Anderson has done, I think is very telling. Because with this team, when I was thinking about their expectations, their plan for this year, I think it's about finding your guys. And it's about having plans for your guys, building a nucleus you can move forward with.

They go out, the one guy they sign in free agency is Robbie Anderson. And they clearly had a plan for him, and they knew how they wanted to use him, and he has been the best part of their passing game. And that, to me, is the exciting part. It's the guys you're picking and being able to build that core players. And then sometimes you're going to stumble into them. Taylor Moton is playing extremely well at right tackle. Guys like that, it feels like this year is just about building an identity, starting to build a culture, and stockpiling players they're going to be part of your core moving forward.

And it seems like that's exactly what they're doing on offense. figuring out who's good, right. Figuring has to work in these systems. And Rule has pretty much said that. He has this deal with the backup quarterbacks. He hasn't named a number two guy. He waits and does it like on Friday because he wants Will Greer and PJ Walker in this case competing.

He wants everything to be an evaluation. But to your point about Robbie Anderson, I think this is a great point, and I wrote about Robbie this week. we all knew we all thought we knew what robbie Anderson was about in New York first of all the guy made for four

offensive coordinators up there and all anyone wanted to do from Chan Galey on down the list was throw the deep ball to him he's really fast and he has pretty good ball skills to go up and he's good at that but you're right Joe Brady and Matt Ruhle

you know Matt Ruhle had him at Temple so I think this this conversation started with Rul then went to Brady and calling him somebody who could stretch the field vertically and horizontally and really just add a new element to this. B.J. Moore could stretch it horizontally, not vertically, not like Robbie Anderson does. And he's on this crazy pace. He's having what I think is going to be easily the best season of his career. He jumps out and then Motown is the other guy. Watching him play, there are splash plays,

especially as a pass protector. I mean, I believe he's in year four now, right? So this is a contract you for him, so they'll have to make a decision. But you can see him the light starting to go on. He's been a good player, but there are a lot of, and this is really getting in the weeds, but I was excited about when I was watching. He's jump-setting people in really authoritative ways. He's playing with his sets to where he's now keeping defensive linemen off balance. I mean, watching him today, I was like, oh, shit.

Like, this guy is really starting to get it. And that's really important. When you're trying to find building blocks, the idea that you could have your right tackle of the future and how. an elite guy at that spot moving forward, that's a big win. And I think on defense, the same process is happening. Like you said, the defense was always going to be a work in progress. They really tore it down.

I mean, this is a young, young defense. And it shows at times. But there are splash plays. So if you could just kind of, if you were doing a review on the early season defense, who's jumped out to you and who do you think that they're most excited about when you talk to people in the building? Jeremy Chan is terrific. He is a big frame guy.

I mean, he's 6'3. He's not a finished product. As you said, I mean, he's had some coverage lapses. He doesn't miss many tackles. He kind of arrives at the ball with a nasty attitude. He is kind of like he calls Steve Atwater his uncle. They're not, he's more like a family. But he kind of plays like Atwater.

Yeah. Like, you know, not quite that much of a headhunter, but a good player. I don't know how much you saw. trying to think what he did in that Falcons game. But the week... I went back and I watched the Chargers game today. We could talk about it. So I think, you know, we all went with the top 10 picks, especially the thing, they want to

see a guy that's going to go in and have like 10 sacks. And that's not Derek Brown. I mean, he, you know, I think he's going to get a couple of sacks. But he wasn't that guy at Auburn. But he's doing the same kind of things he did in the SEC, which is take centers. and guards and just throw them around like rag dolls, meet the running back in the hole, and stand them up and put him on his back. And, you know, he's occupying blockers.

And I think those two guys among the rookies are everything that Matt Rule and Marty Herney had hoped they would give him. So with Chin, he clearly is lost sometimes. But what they're putting on his plate mentally is so much for a young guy. The fact that he's playing multiple roles. and you see him, some plays he's lined up just like a normal will linebacker, just behind the guard playing linebacker. Other times he's at safety.

It's hard for a guy just to play linebacker as a rookie. Most highly picked linebackers struggle with their rookie year because of how much is going on around them and how fast the game is in the middle of a defense. I love the plan that they have at that they're throwing these guys to the wolves. Letting a young guy like that fail in real time and get the reps, I think is the exact right way to develop your players when you have a really young defense.

So I don't mind it at all. And he does flash. Brown, there's some plays he made in that Chargers game, man, that just make your hair stand up on your neck. Just stacking defensive linemen shedding, making plays a yard deep in the back field. He's, I think, tied for 15th in the NFL and run stops on the year. He has eight.

And it's flash plays, but again, he's a rookie. So the flash plays are what matters. Gross Matos is funny to me because that strip sack he had against Arizona. he moves like Brian Burns. They're built in similar ways. They got those long limbs. They're really explosive. So it's kind of fun.

You have those two long, wiry edge guys that just are explosive but can use those levers. You have brown in the middle. You have chin moving around. That's the thing with this team. It's about really calibrating expectations. And these guys don't have to be finished products yet.

They don't have to be killing it every game. But the flashes are there to the point when you're getting excited about it. And just stepping back, overall, I think that's why you have to be excited about this team. Because whatever expectations or whatever rubric you had for success or failure coming into the season, they're checking the boxes right now. Going in, I wasn't sure what I would think going back and watching them.

Are they really three and two? Have they been exciting? Have they been impressive? And the answer to every single question essentially is yes. I don't think you could feel any better as a Panthers fan than you do right now about the early returns on the Matt Rule era. Yeah, no question about it. I mean, you can feel the excitement building.

And nobody's expecting this team, you know, to go 10 and 6. But the fact that they're even thinking about that is just in turn. This is a team that drafted all defense in the, you know, seven guys on defense. About five of them have been playing. And four of them have been playing a lot. Definitely Matt Rule has brought a lot of excitement. And we asked Ted Bridgewater about this on a Zoom. How is it coming to a new city, a new NFL town,

and you can't really connect with fans? And he said, yeah, he said, you know, it was interesting. He said, that's kind of been how, that's sort of how I've been my whole career. He said in Minnesota, it was a little bit of a wait and see with that fan base. They love them now. And New Orleans, you know, he was Breezes backup. So it's, he's got a cool attitude too, man. Bridgewater, just the way he carries himself, like,

he and the moment's not too big for him. I mean, even if they finish seven and nine this year or six and ten, if they keep doing this, if this is the team they are for the rest of the season, it's a win. It doesn't matter what it says in the win-loss column, because that's not what's important right now. It's about establishing the foundation,

both personnel-wise and with how the building feels for what you want to be moving forward. And again, I was extremely impressed going back and digging into them. Joe, thank you so, so much of the time. It's always so good to pick your brain. I sincerely appreciate it. Please go read Joe, was working in The Athletic. It is invaluable if you're a Panthers fan and a football fan.

He does some of the best work out there. Joe, thanks for the time, man. We'll talk to you later. Appreciate it, buddy. All right, it's time for film school with Ted Nguyen. Ted is back after missing last week. And Ted, I felt like I wanted to talk about something this week that you recently wrote about of the Athletic, and I paid a lot of attention to you because of how much I've written

about him in the past. And that is the Kevin Stefansky offense with the Browns. You guys can't see me, but I'm using air quotes. And the reason I'm doing that is there isn't really a Kevin Stefansky offense in terms of what he was bringing to the Browns. The idea is kind of nebulous and it's a lot of things pieced together. So I wanted to dig into it because the Browns are four and one, obviously, which is a surprise to a lot of people.

But even beyond the record, the results have been there on offense. They rank fifth in EPA per play over their last four games after that stuff. thinker against the Ravens. This is a team that I think a lot of stat nerds, football nerds, just everyone that likes nerding out about the NFL and kind of digging into stuff has been interested in so far this season for a lot of different reasons. Yeah, and just looking at the offense, I thought we're going to see a basic outside zone offense,

especially early in its development, you know, with no preseason. And this is going to be his first year, obviously, coaching that team. I thought we're going to see a really basic outside zone offense. But I was really surprised at first, how diverse the run game is. And I think a lot of credit has to go to Bill Callahan, a line coach, for putting together this run game. Yeah. And I think that it's a great point about the diversity of the run game because I think if you talk to a lot of people coming into

this season and you would ask them, what do you think the offense will look like? Their answer probably would have been something revolving around outside zone, play action. Gary Kubiak's name would have been brought up because that's what we saw from Stefanski and his loan full season as the Vikings' offensive coordinator. But if you look at his career, he's taken a pretty strange path to this point. He came to Minnesota in 2006 under Brad Childress. So he was with the Vikings for 14 years, which is very rare. Usually you see coaches bounce around between franchises and they stick in one system.

They come up in one type of football. And Stefansky didn't do that. So he's worked with several different types of coaches. You know, Brad Childer's is an old school. West Coast Andy Reid type guy. Then you have all these different kind of coaches go through. Bill Musgrave was there and Stefansky was doing different roles in different places. So the fact that he doesn't come from one particular system, I think is pretty fascinating.

So when you were watching them last year, Ted, when you're watching the Vikings play, did you just assume that that's what Stefansky had run for most of his career? Yeah, I thought that was his bread and butter. I thought that, you know, he was directly from that Shanahan, McVeigh type of tree. and he's going to stall this same offense with the Browns. And obviously the outside zone is still a huge part of what they do. It's going to be their main run play. But they've kind of taken approach to where they're just going to run a bunch of different concepts

and refine as the season goes along, which I thought was pretty surprising. I mean, they're running counters. They're running G-lead. They're running duo. So there's just a lot of run concepts in there. And it's hard to. really zero in on as a defense. And Calihan has that line going and blocking these schemes pretty well early on.

So obviously the outside zone is the biggest part of what they do. And when you kind of trace what Stefansky has done in his background, he told me a story last year when we sat down and were talking about the system he was trying to put together around cousins with Kubiak. And you know this, but I don't think a lot of people do. In the offseason, lower level staff members on offenses are put on projects. So remember Matt Lafleur told me this, this summer. we were talking about something, he said, essentially, everyone goes and watches the Saints every year.

You go and watch what the Saints do in specific situations because of how diverse and interesting their offense is. So in 2009, when Stefanski was an assistant in Minnesota, one of his offseason projects was to just go watch all of the keepers that the Texans used under Gary Kubiak. And as he was watching it, he just kind of fell in love with it. And he just saw how effective it was. And he's like, oh, man, that's amazing. And he filed it away.

And he told me last summer that whenever he got the chance to run his offense, he wanted to do something that incorporated that Gary Kubiak Keeper scheme. Particularly, Gary and I are visions a lot. And I say that because as a young coach in this league, I've admired him from a feeling like a lot of people have. And you watch that scheme in certain things that they do is just really good and fall. And that's kind of where as a young coach, I looked at that office and said, that's what I want it to be whenever I get my chance.

So you can see that Gary Kuback influence in some of the things they do. But like you mentioned before, there are several departures from it. And where that's most obvious five games into this season, and we'll see how it evolves over the course of the year, is absolutely in the run game. So you wrote about Bill Callahan last week for The Athletic. You said that he was the Brown's MVP through the first four games of the season. Beyond the diversity, what did you learn talking to people about Bill Callahan

and kind of what he's brought to this Brown's running game? I think he just is a very, you know, this word gets, I think, tossed around a lot, but he's extremely detail-oriented. And you can say any coach is detail-oriented, but I think he takes it to another level, especially talking to guys that have coached with him or guys that he's coached. And even just, you know, going back and looking at some of his offensive line clinics, he just goes into, like, the smallest details, like how much pressure you should be putting on your big toe and things like that. And you can see it really helped this offensive line. I mean, this offensive line was among one of the worst units in the league last season, and they're among one of the best units to season. And one of the biggest projects they have is moving Tristan Warf from right tackle

or left tackle in a season without a preseason. So that's extremely impressive. And just for them to pick up the scheme, and I don't think they're running a lot of the gap team stuff perfect. I think there's some room for improvement. But just the fact that they know their assignments and they can execute at a pretty reasonable level at this stage of the season is extremely impressive. You look at the run game results. I mean, they've been absolutely incredible. They're fourth in rushing EPA per play through five games.

They're fourth in rushing DVOA. I mean, the results are impossible to argue with. And they're allowing their really talented backs to have creases in the run game. Chubb and Hunt are both in the top seven in the NFL in rushing yards after contact. And that it helps to be really talented to get those. numbers in those results, but also helps when you're running through arm tackles because the holes are there, the openings are there, and guys aren't getting to square you up. So when you're watching those backs kind of melded with this run game, how do you think the way that they're building the run game

has helped unlock those two guys? Yeah, like you said, they just have huge lanes. I actually think that they can't get better at their reads on outside zone. I think there's some holes in this. I think they could be a little more patient pressing the front side. And those kinds of kind of thing. So I think this run game is not where, you know, the potential for it to be even better is, uh, is out there. So, you know, we're just seeing the beginning of this, uh, this Brown's offense, which has to be pretty exciting, uh, for Cleveland fans. So the kind of diversity of the run game and the bag of tricks that Callahan can go to, is that unique for an offensive line coach? Because it feels like a lot of teams have one or two concepts. They really like

to hammer over and over again. This is a team and a coach. If you look back at his history, I'm thinking of like the 2014 Cowboys, for example, who had that great offensive line. They seem to have so many different ways they could hurt you in the run game. And I think that goes two ways. One, it allows you to put your players in positions to succeed. You can graft your talent up front onto concepts that fit them.

And two, it gives them a bag of tricks. They don't have to solve certain running plays in one specific way because there's so many different options and so many different ways you can block things. So how have you seen? the diversity in the run game kind of accentuate the talent that they have up front so far. Yeah, I think you hit it on the head. I think that the Browns have some strong offensive linemen, physical offensive linemen, that can't run gap scheme stuff.

I think, you know, if you just kind of look at them in a vacuum, you could say these guys are gap scheme type of offensive linemen. Because they're bigger. A lot of times zone blocking offensive linemen are small or quicker. They've got some huge dudes, like Wyatt Teller being the number one. option, but they have some bigger people that you typically see in a zone blocking scheme. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, outside zone is going to be their bread and butter, but to be able to play their strength and run these gap schemes and mix it in at a good rate, it's just playing to

these guys' strength. And it just makes you harder to defend. I mean, you know, if an offense, if a defense is used to just defending outside zone, flowing outside, you know, trying to clog up those lanes, and all of a sudden you run a gap scheme that hits quickly right in. into the A or B gap, it's tougher to defend. That's more things that think about. So, yeah, it plays into their strengths, and it just gives defenses more to think about. So obviously, the natural extension of the running game is play action. I mean, those two things are always melts together.

If you have a heavy run team, your passing game is probably going to be heavy play action. And that's what we've seen from the Brown so far. Baker's play action rate is 34.1% of his dropbacks, the sixth highest rate in the NFL. Play action was always going to be a huge part of this. offense, no matter what other influences were coming into it. Here's Kevin Stefansky again, talking about why he believes so ardently in play action as a baseline of your offense.

You know, I come at it from a defensive perspective. I played defense back in college a long time ago and not very well. But I think about what it feels like as a defender. When you're staring at that offense and you're watching a play unfold and you're not quite sure what's about that. That's ultimately what we are charged to do. That's ultimately what we're trying to do is make. ourselves difficult to defend, specifically make ourselves difficult to defend on those first

few moments of the play. When it may be this, it may do that. What stuff have you seen from their play action scheme and how it's helping Baker along as he learns a new offense? I think Baker's skill set really fits that bootleg keeper scheme. And he throws really well in a run. He's pretty athletic. So just being able to do that is going to really help his development because it gives him something he could hang his hat on. It gives something he could be successful at doing early on while he's still learning the nuances of the dropback passing game, which could be a little more difficult for a quarterback to pick up, I think, especially with this offense.

So you're going to see a ton of bootlegs from them early on more than, I think even more than you would usually see in this style of offense. And when they pass deep or when they take their deep shots, it creates a ton of space. It doesn't give him too many options. It's usually just one or two deep routes he has to look at. And then he goes to a checkdown. So creating space, giving him limited options and just letting him show off his arm strength on those deep shots. If you watch Baker on a play to play basis right now, he still has a lot of the same bad habits that he had last year. He's indecisive. He's drifting a little bit. There was a play against the Colts where he had a one-on-one with Jarvis

Landry going down the right side. And he pumped it for no reason, waited, drifted, and then through it late. It's like, geez, man. I literally said out loud, yuck. Because just throw it. Just throw it right away. You see that. He's having some trouble processing. And I think that it's because he's really new to this. And if you think about how we kind of strange and different the stuff he did at Oklahoma was and how not useful the stuff he did over the last two seasons were, it was he's really learning on the fly here. And he's a really young football mind when it comes to this sort of stuff. I think your point about the shot plays is great because that's where you see the Kubiak stuff come into play.

They hit a completion to Landry in the first half against the Colts where they're doing that sale concept, right, where it's a deep clearing out route from the outside receiver and it's another guy running a deep over behind it. And instead of running the deep over, Landry broke back to the middle of the field. And that is straight from the Kubiak playbook and Kubiak blueprint. It's actually the exact same play design

that the 49ers hit to George Kittle on that touchdown on Sunday night football last year. So that's where you see kind of the melding where even if the run game is a little bit different, the shots they're taking off play action are very similar and very familiar with anyone who's watched a lot of the Kubiak offense. Yeah, and again, these type of plays just fit what Baker wants to do. And like you said, last season or the last couple seasons, he just was an offense where he wasn't asked to be extremely precise with his footwork, with its timing, and his anticipation. And Stefansky's offense or some of the passing concepts that he uses requires all those

traits that he just hasn't developed quite yet. So these bootlegs and these deep shot keep keep this off into the flow as Baker begins to learn how to play more into the rhythm and offense. And that's going to take time. That's going to take reps. It's almost like keeping the training wheels on. It's not dissimilar, in my opinion, to the way that the rims, have used golf to some of the stuff that the Ravens have done with Lamar Jackson. It's what Nate mentioned on the Sunday show where there's a lot of crossers so you can see guys come open. It's a way to create space and you're not speeding up the decision-making process of your

quarterback. Mina Kimes had a great tweet. Our friend Mina Kimes, who was on the show, last week had a great tweet about how, and last year, Kirk Cousins had seven touchdowns and designed rollouts to his left. The rest of the NFL had five combined. Baker had zero designed rollouts to his left the entire season. And he already has that deep touchdown to Beckham from the Bengals game. You've seen him do it several times this year.

So you're seeing that. You're seeing them use the same sort of stuff with Baker that they used with cousins last year. And it's created big plays and it's created space as he figures out the rest of the offense. I think it's a really interesting example of how you fold in different backgrounds and different ideas and create a system that's new from different component parts. And that's the crazy amount of empty that they've used this year with Baker-Mayfield. If you look at what the Vikings. did with her cousins last year, there wasn't a lot of empty because cousins wasn't great at it.

From the people I've talked to in Cleveland, they love how Baker processes in empty. They think it's a real way to create more space for him in the same way that the play action game is. Were you surprised, based on Stefanski's background, how often they were coming out in those empty sets here in the first five games? I was a little surprised, but I think it was kind of expected as well just because, yeah, that's what Baker's good at doing. He's been doing it since he was in Oklahoma.

and he's just a type of quarterback where when things are more spaced out, he sees things more clearly and he can make quicker decisions. So I think it was a really smart decision on their part to work that in. And still, I think there's still times where he needs to throw with more anticipation and just see things a little quicker even out of empty. Because even in that first touchdown pass, he threw to Cream Hunt in that Browns' Indianapolis game, he had, I believe it was Richard Higgins running wide open on a return route. He looked to the right, then looked to return around.

And for some reason, he didn't throw it. He was looking right at it. And you'll see this with Baker a lot where, you know, you just don't know why he's not pulling the trigger, but then he goes out of the, you know, out of structure, makes a play and ends up throwing this wild touchdown to Cream Hunt. So I think it's a smart decision to use more empty for Baker, but he still needs to get better at his timing anticipation out of those formations. What's funny because you imagine the Cream Hut touchdown.

But then the Richard Higgins touchdown in three last week, that was perfect. timing. I'm sure you loved it because it was four verts out of empty. The same way we talked about the Mark Andrews touchdown after week one. They ran out of empty right near in the red zone. That's where they're using it a ton is in the red zone, which we'll talk about the second. But they had Richard Higgins going up the seam. The safety had to make a decision and he hits Higgins for the touchdown right on time. And that's the type of stuff that you want to see. So for every bad, there seems to be a good with Baker right now. And that's the hope is you can keep stacking up wins, keep stacking up positive plays as the percentage of those starts to drift in the right

direction. And the idea of using more empty in the red zone is really interesting to me because, again, it goes into how you build a staff and how that staff informs what your offense looks like. Chad O'Shea, who is the receivers coach for this team, comes from the Earhart Perkins Patriot system. He was in Miami last year, but he was with New England forever. And New England has done such a good job in the red zone with some of those designs. And they like throw into their running backs in the red zone. So you've seen those. Those concepts folded into what the Browns have done, even if Stefansky didn't do it a lot at his other stops or when he was the coordinator last year. So that's been the coolest part to me with the Browns is that the Kevin Stefansky offense wasn't anything before it got here.

He had ideas and concepts that he liked. But when you build your staff, you have input from those guys as to what their background is. What do they think work in certain situations? And that's what you've seen from this team so far. You've seen those different influences come together to build an offense that, really has put their players in positions to succeed. And it's been really fun to watch so far. Yeah, it has. And it's just a credit to Stefanski for being able to melt these ideas together. And again, you know, I think I wrote that Bill Callahan is the MVP for the Brown so far.

It's because the offensive line is clicking, which is making all these ideas work. And it's kind of masking Mayfield's inexperienced in this offense while he's learning this stuff too. So we talk about all this scheme and putting all these ideas together, but none of it works if the offensive line is not clicking. And it is right now. And it's pretty fun to see. And it's going to be interesting to see how these ideas continue to develop as a season goes along. When you're in all, especially a play calling head coach and a young play calling head coach,

the most important hire you can make. I would even argue more important than your defensive coordinator is your offensive line coach. Look at all of the guys we've seen succeed in. this role and look at who their offensive line coaches have been. Sean McVay hired Aaron Cromer, who came from Buffalo. They had two top five rushing offenses by DVO way his last two years there before he came to L.A. John Benton is the offensive line coach for the 49ers. If you look at John Benton's history, he was with the Texans forever when Kubiak was there.

So he's a ton of experience in that role. But he was also in Miami before he came to San Francisco. Go look at the stats of those Miami run games in 2014 and 2014 and 2015. Lamar Miller has ripped off five yards of carry, their top seven offenses by DVOA. Go look at what Sean Cougar has done for Arizona. They have top 10 rushing offenses by DVOA. He was amazing in Denver the year before he came to Arizona and designing the run game. And now you're seeing it with Bill Callahan and Kevin Stefansky. Having that guy with that background is really important because they do such a, it's a ton of heavy lifting in how the run game is designed.

And that's kind of what you've seen from the Brown so far. They've done a really good job of putting the staff together. And I think that has led to a lot of success early. And I think it's going to lead to a lot of success in the future. They are not operating at full capacity right now, but they're getting the most out of their players that they can in this moment. Yeah, I mean, it's almost like they're coordinating their own little mini unit. Exactly.

You got to spend money on these guys because you end up saving money because you don't overpay offensive linemen because you know your coach is going to develop other offensive linemen and fill these roles in when other guys leave. So, yeah, it's probably Safansky's best hire, I think, is Bill Callahan. It's amazing to watch it all come together. You have all these pieces and you have to kind of sift through what it's going to do, how it's going to influence you, what you're going to take from what. And I think that the Browns are a perfect example of how it can all come together in harmony. And they've really hit the ground running.

It's been one of my favorite units to watch in the NFL so far this season. Ted, as always, buddy, this is so fun. I always love doing this with you. Thank you so much for the time. And we'll talk to you next week. Talk to next week. All right, guys. Thank you so much for listening today.

Thank you to Evan Silva from Establish the Run for chatting some fantasy. Thank you to Joe Persson for breaking down the Panthers with us. Really exciting team. I loved that segment. I had a great time chatting about their future and present with him. Thank you to Ted Wynn. Really appreciate it, guys, as always. Please go subscribe to The Athletic.

Theathletic.com slash football show. The $1 a month promotion is still going. Please, for me, go rate and review the podcast on your favorite podcast platform. I would really appreciate it. We will be back tomorrow with Lindsay Jones. to chat about a Thursday night football game, I guess, and everything that's been happening with the news in the NFL. We'll catch you up on all of the COVID-related stuff you need to know.

Until then, thank you so much for listening to Athletic Football Show. We'll talk to you later. This was the Athletic Football Show.