The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Football GM: Best draft fits, Packers’ homegrown defense, detailing Lamar Jackson’s deal & more

Episode Date: May 11, 2023

How do NFL teams determine the best draft fits? Mike Sando and Randy Mueller discuss the process and which players from this year’s class may work best with their new team. Then, they examine the first-round picks on the Packers’ defense, Lamar Jackson’s contract details and the latest in the Matt Araiza case. They wrap with another round of the GM Notebook and a question involving the luxury tax in sports. Follow Mike on Twitter: @SandoNFLFollow Randy on Twitter: @RandyMueller_Subscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube2:53 How to determine draft fits & which players work best with their new team12:08 The scheme fits for the drafted QBs21:10 Packers’ defense adds another first-round pick32:33 NFL schedule release35:49 Examining Lamar Jackson’s deal47:41 Details of the Matt Araiza case51:40 GM Notebook Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. Welcome, everybody, to the Football GM podcast with Mike Sando. That's me and Randy Mueller. That's him of The Athletic. How's your, what do you qualify for some special, you know, packages or anything yet with your seniority here, Mueller, a week on the job? I haven't got fired after one week that I know of. The best news I got was when you said the other day that they don't do job reviews daily. So I figured I made it through a couple days and no one said beat it back to Idaho.

As long as you're not named former executive of the year here, that could have a short shelf life, you know. I'm kidding, of course, because Randy always jokes. He was NFL executive the year and then he was not with the team. Doing TV and radio, yeah, eight months later. In this wild league. I had no idea why. We're still here today. We're still here today.

And it's funny, you know, we, the NFL. NFL calendar does hit some ebbs and flows. And sometimes, man, we got so much stuff that just happened today. We have to deal with it. I think today, though, with the draft a week behind us or more. And, you know, nothing just absolutely percolating up as a major news for today. It's actually kind of nice because we can take a breath and we can revisit, maybe hit on some things that we find interesting. Randy's latest column posted, I believe, today with a look at players that fit well with their teams, others that might need a little help. and kind of explaining what that means, how important fit is and how you determine it,

how hard it is to determine. That was Randy's one of his ideas for today. And then off of that, I thought, you know what, I want to go through all the quarterbacks in this draft. There was, I think, 14 of them, 14 quarterbacks. And just look at some of those fits because a lot of these guys aren't even going to play this year. But there's still some intrigue with a coach and a quarterback together, that type of pairing. We want to get into the Packers a little bit with their defense. The schedule release is Thursday, Randy.

We're not going to go too much into that because we know who's playing it. But I had a little spin-off up of that. Lamar Jackson's contract is on the book, so there's a couple of nuggets there. A few other interesting things. I haven't even looked at the GM notebook. I'll try not to steal from it, Randy. You say that, but I know you've already picked off a couple things there that we'll check. I'm going to look.

I'll check before we get to it. You know what? You didn't put anything in there anymore. I actually put something in there so you'd have something, but now he's been holding GM notebook items because I can't be trusted. I mean, I might use it. I'm not withholding, trust me. Yeah, yeah.

So your column about drag fits, why did you want to do it? What stands out as important to you and let's get into some of these players? Well, I think the big thing for me is a lot of people talk about fits, right? And there's nothing more prevalent than in front seven on defense. how players fit in schemes. And truly, every draft is similar. You have, I think, anywhere from four to five to sometimes 10 or 11 players in every draft that will fit no matter what. They're going to fit under any scheme. They're your, you know, and that doesn't mean they're better players. It just means they are more versatile. They can fit into some special categories and also

fit into base defenses. So there's always a few of those guys that need to be talking. through. And frankly, those are the guys that are at the top of most teams' boards year in and year out are the guys that fit without question. And that's easy to start on defense. But, you know, the Jalen Carter's of the world, the Christian Gonzalez's of the world, those guys will play in a three-four scheme. They'll play in a man coverage scheme, just as easy as they'll play in a four-three and a zone coverage scheme. So I think those are the easy ones. But then there are are players, for example, like a Collijah Cancy from Pittsburgh or a Brian Breezy that the Saints drafted from Clemson, those guys, I think you've got to fine tune exactly what you're going to do with

them. Doesn't mean they won't be just as impactful, but they fit better in certain schemes, and you've got to be cognizant of that. A Lucas Van Ness that the Packers picked out of Iowa, a guy that's an edge player. And I always fumble a little bit with talking about these edge players because they are really about fit. And they, they are asked to do sometimes things that just don't work for their skill set, probably more than any other position. And I don't know. I mean, some of these guys are going to fit better in other places. So that's all I wanted to do is maybe pinpoint a few of these guys and start with, you know, some of the guys at the top that are going to fit no matter what. I don't know if that makes any sense, Mike. But it does. I saw the names.

You had the fit anywhere guys. And this wasn't the whole draft. No. This was a lot of the guys at the top. You had two defensive linemen, Jalen Carter, Tyree Wilson. You had three corners. Gonzalez, as you mentioned, Devin Witterspoon, Julie Porter, Jr. You had two tackles in Broderick Jones, Paris Johnson. And then you had one running back in B. John Robinson.

So, you know, a pretty good group of players that were taken early. Porter's an interesting one to me. And I assume that's because he can play just about anywhere, right? Yeah. He plays multiple. multiple schemes. He can play press. He can play off. He can play bail. He can play zone. He can play off zone. He can play off man. And those are the kind of techniques that you look for in versatility that I think makes the guy like that play in every defense. Just like an offensive lineman where some of the guys we talked about early on and were drafted, they played one position. They're going to project to another position. I want a left tackle that played left tackle. Or I want a center. who played center. So you're not projecting guys around so much. So I think those guys tend to be safer picks because you're not projecting into a different scheme or a position. So let's look at

some of the guys who need to fit properly. You mentioned Collegia Cancy, who's with the Bucks, Brian Brisey, who's with the Saints, Van Ness with the Packers, Dalton Kincaid with the Bills was also in the column. How do you feel about where those guys are? Do you think the fit is going to be good? I actually think they're very good. And I think you'd have to study a lot of these guys and a lot of these types, I think, to sometimes understand where the fit is. I think a guy like Lucas Van Ness, who is from Iowa that the Packers picked early on, reminds them of Clay Matthews Jr.

A guy who wasn't even a starter his senior year much, but played in a role that they will be able to duplicate in Green Bay. Same with Dalton Kincaid. Dalton Kincaid's probably not going to be the end of the line tight end that they use for a lot of running type games. But at the same time, they'll split him out. He'll be a slot receiver. He'll be the move guy with Knox, the other tight end there, that'll allow them to have a two

for one and play a lot of two tight-in sets, which they haven't played in the past. So a guy like Kincaid opens up the Bill's offense because of the fit that he gives him and the skill set that they haven't had in the past. So different reasons for these guys to fit. like Kansy from Pitt, think of, you know, Aaron Donald. Think of Warren Sapp. Guys that kind of need to be on the move, need to be asked to penetrate, be on the edges of blockers, not too gaping, not taking guys on down the middle.

That's the kind of fit that you've got to look for, a little more detail as to how we're going to use them, if that makes sense. Now, Clay Matthews had a great career with the Packers, obviously has amazing bloodlines there. what do you think of Annette's? I remember you mentioned him when we looked at front seven players, but I can't remember exactly how much you liked him. I liked him. He was in our top five, defensive linemen for sure. And that's strange because he didn't. He's not a full-time player at Iowa all time. Like I said, he started very little. I like him on the edge. I like him rushing. I don't like him

going backwards. So my guess is that Green Bay will have a lot of defense in there for him going forward. that's something that, again, those front seven guys, if they get asked to do a bunch of stuff that accentuates their negatives, they end up struggling. And therefore, Bill Belichick has made a living of this. Nick Saban has made a living of this and become the best in the business at fitting players into their schemes and then accentuating the positive skill sets that they have to do certain things and not making him do the things that he can't do. So it sounds simple, but it's easier said than done when you're talking about schemes and really playing players in positions that give them a chance to excel. You had the Steelers with maybe the best fits you could find of any team and the quality of the players too. Why? What did you like?

How do you see going for those guys? I just like what they do on defense and they've done this forever. They have a more of a organizational philosophy than a coaching staff philosophy percent. They have went after the same type of players, really on both sides of the ball, but especially on defense for 20, 25 years, I swear. They've identified exactly what they want, and they build their defense inside out. They want a nose that can two-gap. They want a nose that doesn't get knocked off the ball. Very similar to what Bill Belichick did with New England and Nick Saban does at Alabama.

They have a certain type of nose that they use. And I think the Steelers got that in Canaanub Benton. They drafted him in the second round. He'll be a point of attack, not get knocked back type player for them. And then we talked about Joey Porter. We talked about Broderick Jones being a full-fledged tackle. And you know, I like this kid, their third round picked Darnell Washington, the tied in from Georgia because he's a fully skilled, you'd say in baseball,

he's a five-tool player. Well, Darnell Washington is a blocker. He's a pass catcher. He can block at the point of attack like a tackle. And that's some things that they have been missing up front in their running game. They become a little bit of a finesse running style game under Matt Canada, their offensive coordinator. And so I think Washington, as much as any, now you couple him with Broderick Jones, two guys that are going to get them back to playing Steeler football, more physical, more running downhill.

Just really good fits for, I think, what they've been missing and what they want to do on offense. So Darnell, Washington, why wouldn't he be drafted earlier? I don't know. That's a shot. I thought that the whole time, not being an evaluator, but just looking at the traits, even what people thought. It's like, I want that guy. No doubt. I want him too.

And I had him rated as my second tied in behind Dalton Kikade, but I think he's going to be a much better pro than he even was in college. You're talking about a freak. I haven't seen a guy like this. 6'7, 267 pounds, runs like a deer, got a really good catch radius. Now, they had another really good tight end at Georgia, and that probably made it harder for teams to evaluate Washington because he didn't play a ton. I think he only has like 44 or 45 career catches. So there's a little connecting of dots there behind the scenes, but I saw enough in his

skill set and what he can do that to me, he would have been worthy of being picked a lot higher than the third round. Just so happens that the Steelers got him in the third round. And that's why I think they did as good a job as any as identifying fits for what they want to do. Yep. I think that's going to be really fascinating to watch. There's been a lot. And we've, we've complained about, you know, some of the things on offense there recently. These are a couple nice pieces and we'll see if they can make use of them with their young quarterback. So, hey, as far as the drafted quarterback fits, so I got this list here in front of me of the 14 quarterbacks. There's three in the first round,

Bryce Young, C.J. Stroud, Anthony Richardson, of course. Second round, only one, Will Levis. Third round only one. Hendon Hooker. A couple in the fourth, Jake Hainter, Stetson Bennett, and Aden O'Connell, who went to the Raiders. There's four, maybe four in the fifth, another in the sixth, another in the seventh.

Whenever these quarterbacks get drafted, our eyes kind of go to who is the offensive play designer, the caller. Fandy Reed takes somebody, we're maybe betting on that guy saying, ooh, you must see something. we know he's going to use them right. I was just thinking of these 14 guys.

And you've obviously talked about Bryce Young and C.J. Strav. Let's put them off to the side because you had them near the top of the draft regardless of the position. Were there any of these guys that with their fit, you know, if you had to maybe put their name on an envelope and we revisit it in five years and this guy might have a chance, who you bet on? Well, I think there's a couple things. One, the qualities that you look for in quarterbacks that are picked early are no different

when evaluating guys that may not have all of the whole toolbox of traits, but still the most important things for me are the ability to process information and the ability to throw accurately. So those are the two things I still consider as kind of, if you don't have those, you have some fatal flaws. And I'm going to consider Hendon Hooker as my top. choice just because you know how I felt about him going in. I think he's a starting NFL quarterback, and the fact that he went in the third round to me is a steal for Detroit. I think at some point he's

going to push Jared Goff. Now, obviously, he's injured, and that may have had a lot to do with him falling as low as he did, but this kid's a starting NFL quarterback, in my opinion. And you team him with Ben Johnson, like you did on your chart, who Ben Johnson is not only an up-and-comer in this league. I think he'll be a head coach at this time next year. That could be a lethal combination. Depending on what happens with Jared Goff's contract in Detroit, who knows how long Hindon Hooker is there. If Ben goes somewhere else, that could be a potential move for Hendon Hooker as well. But time will tell on that. That's not the purpose of our exercise here. I think the two things for me in your list of other quarterbacks that were drafted, the two names

that jumped out at me were Jake Hainer, fourth round to the Saints, and Max Dugan, seventh round to the Chargers. I was less concerned with who drafted him, more concerned with their personal skill set in that Jake Hainer, I know, you know, he's a University of Washington transfer, went to Fresno state, very good at processing information and very accurate. You could see that early on at UW hasn't changed a bit. He just got to play at Fresno when he never, he got to, he got to to play very little at Washington. And the same with Max Dugan. I think his strengths are processing information, showing up in big games, and then accurately

throwing the ball where the ball is designed to go. Those are the two kids out of that group of, what, six or eight there that have the skill sets that I would be looking for. Maybe some of these other teams are looking for something different. I mean, DTR, Dorian Thompson, Robinson from UCLA, Cleveland drafted him in the fifth round. I saw inconsistent accuracy from him, but I also saw a great athlete and a guy that can make people miss and run all over the field. So everybody's criteria is a little different. Mine is I got to have someone that can process info and accurately deliver it. So if I was going to answer your

question in a long-winded way, which obviously was very long-winded, I would put Jake Hainer's name on an envelope and Max Duggan's name on an envelope and put those in the bottle in the backyard. And let's say, let's come back and talk about him in a couple years. Yeah, it's interesting. to me that you are you are betting on those traits more than hey this guru's going to fix them right or this guy is going to shine a good light on him even though obviously with a ben Johnson maybe that would be nice for hand and hooker if you were there but i think that's interesting to me because i would uh i would probably not not being an evaluator i would probably look at those coaches more right but uh some of those things are fatal laws yeah it's definitely important that they're missing

that's a deal breaker for you like yeah like it's like it's just unlikely they're going to suddenly generate those two things, right? I think so. Again, if they do, it's one of those things where, and we've talked about these guys in the past, he's a year away from being a year away, you know. Yeah. I think you've got to have some of this when you start the process, otherwise you're spinning your wheels. And I think, and there'll be others in this list, but I'm most familiar with those two, and I'm most confident in the skill sets of accuracy and processing within those two guys that I mentioned. Yeah. One of the draft-related thing before we move on in the next item, one of the things I was curious about, we always hear this in the draft, Randy, is like, you know, these teams that are out-maneuvering each other, you know, like, hey, hey, the Steelers got ahead of the jets and got their guy, or the bills got ahead of the Cowboys and got their guy.

And then we can't really always prove it. Sometimes those things are a little self-serving, you know, hey, aren't we so smart? And you look back three years later and they got somebody who wasn't any good. But I'm just wondering as a GM when you were doing this or even just when you're in the draft room, did you like, with what degree of certainty did you know you outmaneuvered somebody or were you kind of just guessing, you know, how much is real? Could you find it out later that you actually did out maneuver them or, you know, what's your, maybe it's a level of intel? Yeah, I think it's definitely a level of intel. And I think you can, you can pretty get a pretty fine focus in the first round.

Beyond the first round, I think it becomes more of a guessing game. because you don't have the intel. All we have is we spend a lot of time internally with our pro scouts on, you give me the needs who you think, you know, the Cardinals, what they need. And so these are all subjective opinions. So you really don't know what a team might think they need. What you think they need might not be even in the ballpark. So I think first round picks you can because you can speak with a lot of people

who have information that is valuable about first. around players, positioning, strategy. Beyond that, I think it's a little bit of a crap shoot. But yeah, I think we've all can remember a time or two when we maybe jumped ahead of a team. A lot of times you want to, Mike, but you just can't find a dance partner. So it may happen once every six or eight years where you actually can jump ahead of somebody and have it really mean something. So it's not like it happens every year, that's for sure. But those times when you tried and couldn't get up, then you actually get to see the answer to the test because you know who they actually took. And in those cases, do you feel like a lot of the times it was who you thought it was going to be in the first round?

Yes, but I also know this from history too. Some of the best deals I ever made were the ones that I couldn't make. Because you think you know and we're going to do this and that turns out to be that player wasn't what you thought he was. So sometimes those are the best deals. You can outthink yourself too and think you have all. the answers when you really don't. So it is not an exact science for sure. That's kind of one of the, you know, if you do enough studies on the draft, you look at those players that people trade it up for. And by and large, it's probably not a huge advantage, right? I mean, it's, you're probably

the players that got taken in the old spot might be just as good. So a lot of people have kind of concluded, hey, you should always just be trying to trade back. How much do you trust your eval? You know, do you, you said you admitted, you know, a little bit that, hey, sometimes you want to move up and you really shouldn't have. Do you think, though, you have a good enough batting average that if you could have moved up every time you wanted to, you'd be coming out ahead? I think so, for the most part, yes. I also think that the supply and demand at a certain position of need might dictate your aggressiveness in willing to go up. And sometimes, let's just say there's two running backs and you want to make sure you get one of them. Sometimes you have to

throw caution to the wind and give up what it takes to get them, you know, to make the move. So there are insinue other circumstances that come into play there. It's not as simple as, well, we got to get ahead of the chargers to make this pick. We got to get ahead of everybody because there is a giant falloff after this in quality of play, especially at that position of need for us. And when it's a giant fallout, you can see it. You're not wrong in those evas. Correct. I mean, and maybe the player isn't the quality. you thought he was going to be, but the option was even worse. Yeah, yeah, that means it was a good.

It was worth taking a shot. It was worth taking a shot because your odds got a lot better. Yep. Speaking of taking shots in the draft, I think it was interesting. One of the things that was picked up upon, and I wrote about it in my piece Friday looking through all 32 teams, was just the fact that the Green Bay Packers, after taking Lucas Fanness, now have eight homegrown first round picks on the roster on defense. And what I mean by homegrown is they were drafted by.

the Packers in the first round. And they're all pretty much projected to be starting or, you know, maybe in Van Ness's case, you know, a key rotational player, which is unusual. I went back, Randy, the 1978 Steel Curtin Steelers defense. I would have thought they would have had a bunch of their own first round picks on it. They had two. Joe Green and Ron Johnson. People don't even talk about Ron Johnson among the great Steelers.

That's two. The 85 Bears had four. Dan Hampton, Refrigerator Perry, Otis Wilson, Wilbur Marshall. There might be another guy who's a first round pick from a different team, but four of their own. 2,000 Ravens, great defense, also four. So I'm just curious here with eight of them now on the Packers. And when you look at him, it's not like there's just a bunch of busts. You know, they're all on the team going back to 2016.

What are you maybe expecting as this Green Bay defense loaded with these? high picks. I think we're going to hear about that a lot this year. Entering its third season under the coordinator, Joe Barry, a couple middle of the pack defensive seasons. You know, I look at this year and I'm like, I don't think people are going to be holding Jordan Love accountable for what happens. That defense, with all those first round picks, got to be pretty good. No doubt. I think you've got to be somewhat careful about what you wish for

because now you do have your handpicked players. I think in this case, and we all know Joe Barry is the, the second coordinator that Matt Lefleur has employed there. He had Mike Petten first off and now Joe Barry. There's some pressure there. There has to be because last year their defense didn't start out great either. They came together, played a little better in the second part of the season. But I think we're going to get to see a complete different makeup on the Packers,

whether it's at quarterback, whether it's decision making, whether it's in leadership, ship, completely different set of dynamics now without Aaron Rogers. And some of that's going to be on defense. I do think that Matt Lefleur is going to have to probably set himself up to be the face of the franchise. We all know that for what the last three or four years, Aaron Rogers has had the cachet, right? He's been the leader of that whole organization per se.

He's gone. So I do think that kind of prioritizes Matt Lefleur now as the guy. he's going to have to face the music. He's going to have to be tougher on everybody. Not only just on his offensive players, he's going to have to be a leader of the defense as well. So that kind of pushes him into some unfamiliar ground. But to answer your question, I think their talent on defense is good. The fine line for me always, especially on defense, no matter how many first round picks you have, is,

can it be complex enough so that it's not predictable by the offense, but yet simple enough that we can play really fast and not get caught up in our own minds and have to think too much. That's the fine line of defense really at any level. And I'm not trying to oversimplify it. I'm just, that's the way it is. Guys have to play fast. You can have first round picks that are really athletic and run all over the place and that's what got them picked first. But if the system doesn't suit them and if they can't play to that speed and athleticism that got them drafted there,

there's probably something wrong with the system. So that's the rub, right? And whether Joe Barry can do that or not, I don't know. Last year, and I take Matt LaFleur's comments at the owner's meeting in March a little bit under consideration when I say this, because he was asked about Joe Barry and are they going to be any changes on defense? And he said no, he said our defense kind of came around at the end of the year. So he's putting his hat in the ring in that the last six weeks of that season, that's what they're going to get with their defense. whether they will get it or not, I don't know.

But it was also said that the players kind of went to Joe Barry and asked for some recommendations and wanted to do things different. And that did happen. So that tells me it got probably a little more simpler. They played with more aggression. They played more athletically. Players want to play fast. They don't want to think all the time.

And usually when I hear the players have gone to the coach and want to do this or do that, that means they want it simpler. They don't want to be caught up making adjustments for every time an offensive player moves. We got to have a check or something here or something there. That's what bogs them down. So it'll be interesting to see if the Packers come out of the gate with more aggression, maybe a little more pressure conscious, maybe a little more man for man. They have good players, but they've got to let them play.

And that seems to be what's held them back because you're right. They've been middle of the road for the last two or three years on paper, and that really hasn't improved. I think the interesting thing you're getting at here with Matt LaFleur sort of becoming the face of the franchise now that Aaron Rogers is gone, is that idea of you're the head coach of the whole team. And that means, you know, he made one change, you know, obviously from Mike Petton. Randy, that's an easier change than moving on from somebody who's your guy. No doubt. And so those tough conversations that the head coach has to have, I don't think we're.

we've seen Matt Lefleur lean into those or be eager to have those. He seems like a nice guy who maybe, maybe this is just hard to, when Aaron Rogers is there, you have to sort of defer and you come in and Rogers has all these skins on the wall and you're just a guy who's been a coordinator for a couple of years. I will be very interested to see if he is now able to assert himself and be a tougher leader of the whole team

and make the tough calls on somebody like a Joe B. or just on your staff. Because it was interesting. I thought of this when I think it was in Albert Breers column about the trade that went down between the Packers and the Jets. He reported that Lefleur and the Jets coach Robert Sala are good friends. And as such, they sort of agreed not to discuss the Roger's situation because it was an uncomfortable situation.

I think a lot of people probably looked at that and rolled their eyes and said, oh, come on. These guys are buddies. Of course, they're talking about all the time. And that may be true, but to me, watching Lafleur from afar, like, that wouldn't surprise me that he would just want to avoid sort of difficult conversation. You could kind of see him agonize, I think, in some of his answering of questions. And a lot of that, I think, is because it's Rogers. And it's a hard thing. You can't, you sort of have to walk this fine line because he wasn't in position to, like, put the hammer down with Rogers or be the tough coach, right?

But to be a great coach, you're the coach, the whole team, and you have to be able to do what's best for your team and make the hard decisions. Now that Rogers is out of the way, there's no reason for him not to make them when they need to be made. And we'll see. 100%. It's hard to hold everybody accountable. It really is. And like I said, the dynamics have changed to where now he's got to be the guy. He's got to hold everybody in the building accountable.

There is no crutch to lean on. There's no bigger face than him. Anybody else that, you know, he has to acquiesce to personality-wise. So we'll see. I think we're going to find out a lot about Matt Lafleur the next year or so. I would just say this, and this really isn't part of the discussion, Mike, but I did see, and maybe you saw the interview of Jordan Love. He met with the media on what I guess would be Wednesday as we record this.

I was really impressed with Jordan Love with the standpoint of how comfortable he was, how at ease he was, his body language, his demeanor. Not that this all matters, but I actually think it does matter to a point. I thought he handled it really good. I was impressed enough with that to say to myself, I think these guys are, they're okay. I think this kid is ready for this. He's definitely matured. And I was just impressed by the impression that he gave, one as a leader, two as a

communicator and three just as a as a level-headed demeanor for a guy that hasn't done a whole lot. But he's been in league two or three years now. Which probably surely helped him. I bet he's way readier now than he would have been before just as Rogers got a few years too. So, you know, maybe in the end of this thing, the Packers know what they're doing with these transitions. They're painful. Right. You know, the FAR thing was a side show too. But, you know, it ended up working out well. And, you know, I guess we'll see. To me, that defense has got to step up, though. because you're probably not going to have Hall of Fame level play on the offensive side at the quarterback position. I don't disagree.

I think, again, it's going to be a fun team to watch. I was just impressed with Jordan Levin. It sure makes me want to root for him because he came across as really a solid, good kid. Yep, absolutely. Well, before we move on in the next side, but here are those first round picks that they've taken. One of them was under Dom Capers, Kenny Clark in 2016, 2018, and 2018. 2019, there were three under Mike Petten, Jair Alexander, Darnel Savage, Roshan Gary. Under Barry, now there has been four in Eric Stokes, Devonte Wyatt, Quay Walker, Lucas Van Ness.

I kind of went through and looked, not that you would ever blame or credit as an individual player. I looked at their defensive rankings each year as they added these and they're pretty flat. So they'll be looking, I think last year they were 17th in, uh, the defensive EPA category. And so we'll see if they can get maybe towards the top 12, top 10, it just makes things a lot easier for how you want to play with your young quarterback. You know what it does for me, Mike, and this is an impressive list, and I had no idea, so I credit you for even bringing this up.

It sends me right to the film room when I get a chance. I want to see of these eight first round picks who is playing up to the potential, who is playing really good. And that takes a deep dive and some time to do. that. But I think this would be a cool thing to revisit, you know, in a few weeks, maybe around training camp or so and just see where some of these players are. Because you're right. This is an impressive draft list. Let's just see who is carrying the freight as far as playing up to the potential that got him drafted in the first round. I would love to see that. And then as we get into

training camp, we can see what Van Ness is doing is he, the rotations he's with and get some feedback there. So interesting team. They've been an interesting team. Now we don't. have to talk about number 12, I guess number eight now. Aaron Rogers, everybody got fatigued by the whole thing, especially in Green Bay. So now we can have some other types of conversations, but his departure is part of what they're trying to replace with the leadership of the floor, with the defense trying to step up, all those first round picks. I think it is an interesting conversation. Randy, the NFL schedule is coming out on Thursday. And I used to, when I was on a beat covering a team, I got real excited because then I could look and know when I was, I could

book my travel. I could look and go see what games were when. I still enjoy it, but the thing I noticed as the league was promoting some of these games that came out was that we know already before the announcement they were starting to talk about these

games on Christmas Day, Giants Eagles. The first ever Black Friday game is Dolphins Jets. We got a New Year's Eve game, Bengals, Chiefs. Jaguars and the Bills are playing in the UK on October 20th. And so the league, as they're putting out and promoting these things, what I noticed was in almost all of these games, you know, they're promoting, you know, they're promoting Burrow v. Mahomes or Trevor Lawrence versus Josh Allen, even Tua against Aaron Rogers. And I noticed in the NFC East that we had the Giants and the Eagles, Jalen Hertz right out there, front and center, one of the really ascending players, got a huge contract. maybe at Sequin Berkeley, who's excellent running back for the Giants.

But there wasn't Daniel Jones, the $40 million man. Do you think that changes a year from now, Randy? I know you liked the signing to get him going, as I recall. Do you think if we're promoting games next year, the league, is it Daniel Jones, the person they're promoting? Oh, I don't think there's any doubt about it. It's always going to be a quarterback-driven league. But think about this.

The league is obviously New York City centric, right? So they've heard all the criticism. They've heard the arrows that have been slinged at the Giants. So with regard to the Daniel Jones contract, I don't have any, I think he's going to be fine, but I don't have any doubt that was done on purpose. I thought it was funny that they picked Saquan Barclay, who's unsigned and who knows when he'll be there, if at all. So that's the route they took.

But yeah, I have confidence in Daniel Jones. I still think it is a good signing for them. I don't think this is a slap in his face. I just think perception, the league's not above playing perception, both from a positive standpoint and a negative standpoint. And I think this was the case in this regard. It was what was funny about it too is, you know, so Daniel Jones signed a deal for $40 million and you go, oh my gosh. And then you look at where $40 million ranks. It doesn't rank where it used to rank.

And it was kind of funny. As I looked at all these quarterbacks that are earning more than that, they're all guys who would be on the billboard. Lamar Jackson, Jaywin Hertz, Rogers, Russell Wilson, I mean, maybe that's going to go off the billboard. But we'll see. But Kyler Murray, Deshawn Watson, Mahomes, Josh Allen, those guys are all above. And when you get to $40 million a year in the NFL now, now you're into Stafford, Dak Prescott, Daniel Jones. Maybe they could be the face.

Maybe it's Aaron Donald for the Rams, right? And then you get under that, you're into the Cousins Gough-Tanahill world. It's just amazing what $40 million gets you now. Nothing to those guys aren't good quarterbacks, but it's not the top of the heap, the deal that Daniel Jones did, as rich as it was. isn't in that realm. Life and times, man. Life and times.

You can't get what you used to get. They don't make them like they used to, and they pay them a lot better. I know that. Yeah, absolutely. Well, one contract that is a real contract at the top of the league was Lamar Jackson. And I think his deal getting done before the draft,

it was kind of like, it was almost like that, you know, when the Cardinals and Eagles announced that they had some sort of tampering sanctions. It happened right before the draft. So, like, you didn't even have, time to really dive into it. But the numbers are in on Lamar Jackson's deal five years, 260 million. And my joke, Randy, I know you and my wife both think my jokes are very funny, the listeners do too, as everybody rolls their eyes. But I think that's an absolute bargain

now that we know that Lamar's going to pass for 6,000 yards in a season. Did you see that comment? I did. I did. I would love to see Todd Monkins live reaction. Six thousand. What are we doing? It's a pretty high bar. Yeah. I think he said that tongue in cheek. You do it was kind of crazy. But you're right. I mean, he's, the expectations are now there.

The money is out there. When I did really get to see the breakdown of the deal, I advanced right to the point where I thought this thing kind of went as planned. And I give Lamar credit in that he pivoted off of that fully guaranteed deal in time to get the best deal he could. could get, which is what I thought he should do the whole time. Get the amount of guarantees that makes sense. You're going to get a redo in here. They even built some structure in here for automatic cap relief in years three and four of this deal. I mean, it's a fair deal. Lamar can can trumpet the

$52 million a year on average. That's tops in the league. Highest payer, player, blah, blah, blah. The Ravens don't give the full guarantee that nobody thought they would to start with. So I just thought it made sense. I thought it was interesting that Eric DeCostas said that they may have considered drafting. Was it Will Levitts, a quarterback if they didn't have, if they hadn't have got the Lamar signing? So now we're going to see how Will Levis works out to see if that deal that they thought they were going to make might not be a good idea that they didn't make, you know. It's a hard one, isn't it? You know, when you've got, you have a player that you really like that is, that is, you know, on his best day of star, but has some issues, too, with the injury.

and stuff and you really there's not an in-between deal here. The Ravens didn't get a situation where, well, if he gets hurt this year, they can get out. No, you know, they're in. You have to come in. There's no bridge. There's no bridge deal for this one. But I think they had drawn the line where they knew this was going to be a big money deal, just a matter of how it was structured.

I went right to the, what is it, 26 and 25 and 26, where the cap numbers go to, no, it's 26 and 27. 26 and 27 where it goes to 74 million. I'm already thinking, how are we going to get out from under this? What are we going to do at $74 million, you know, $74 million cap hit? So maybe that's the cynical part of me, but that's where I focused on is, oh, boy, now what are we going to do? Yeah, I think Jason Fitzgerald of over the cap does a nice job in analyzing these things. You know, I liked he put together a table that showed what the actual average per year would be after each season, if like the team moved on from him for some reason.

And it's not likely most of these quarterback deals are kind of virtually guaranteed. You're not going to move on from a guy unless, well, we may see the Russell Wilson maybe the test for that. Right. If he has a really bad year this year. But this would be the Lamar Jackson AP Wives after each year, like I said from Jason Fitzgerald. 135 million after one year, 78 after 2, 62 after 3. So right there, if the worst case scenario for him, he's doing great. You know, and then $52 million after four, okay, because the market's going to move past.

I mean, Mahomes will probably redo something and come up higher, but this sets a sort of a pace in the league at the quarterback position for Lamar Jackson. So a pretty good job for him. Hey, one of the things we heard about with him, too, a lot was let's just put this one to bed. Oh, he did a great deal. Didn't need an agent after all. He didn't have one. So what do you think? I think it probably made him more money in the end by not having an agent.

And I say it only because this. If he would have had an agent two years ago, he'd have probably signed a deal because they would have been recommending him to sign a deal. Now, where it got him was, and in the end, his cash over the term of the deal will catch him up to all the other quarterbacks. He just had to wait three years to get that cash. So he did put his body at risk. He did put his career at risk.

And I think an agent probably would have pushed back on allowing that to happen. So that would have been another reason to have made a deal. But he bet on himself. He threw caution of injury to the wind and said, I'm going to do this. I'm not sure that in an agent would have got him anymore at this point. I think the numbers come in where they should. I just think the timing of the payout probably would have happened sooner had he had an agent. And I don't know if that's good or bad.

Yeah. Yeah, I don't see a ton of holes in it. Now, the thing, see what you think about this. I always said that he needed the agent to manage the opportunities, right? That was more, hey, walking around at the combine, knowing what's out there. But let's just play the devil's advocate's side of that and say, okay, Sando, you think he was going to go line up a bunch of things. Did those things really exist, right? Do you think with, because the franchise tag is very limiting.

So do you think, because I said this a lot when he was going without an agent there. I said, you don't need an agent to do a deal. You need an agent to navigate through a stormy night, right, to say, hey, to be able to have candid conversation with teams to really find out what's out there. So we will never be able to fully answer that. We don't know and can't find out what might have happened if a Dave Dunn or one of those guys had been in the back channels at the league meetings figuring out what could possibly happen. Maybe he could have put more leverage against the Ravens or not.

What is your sense? Do you think that in retrospect, knowing what deal he got, did he miss out? did he miss out not having one then? I just think it's it, he missed out on the amount of information that was attainable. And I don't think he was able to attain, like you mentioned, all of those things, because he didn't have an advocate, he didn't have a partner. But I can make that case for any player when they hire an agent.

They all think that they're hiring someone to negotiate their contract. It's really, that's part of it. But it's really a partner to navigate the, shark-infested waters are professional sports in every way. So you're really hiring a partner, an advocate, a messenger, an information gatherer. There's a lot more to this. And I hope players, when they do hire agents, understand there's a lot more to it than just negotiating a contract.

So I don't know. I guess Lamar would be the only one to judge that. Does he feel like he needed more information or left some information on the table? I don't know that he left money on the table. he left the timing of when he started to go to the bank on the table because he could have gone to the bank two or three years ago. Then you're talking about present value of money being a factor in the deal as well. So, you know, I don't know. I just think some people are okay with the information they have.

Some want more. I happen to be one of those people. I want as much information as I can. I may decide at the end of the day I don't want to use it, but I want the information just so we have that base covered. Obviously them are. What I'm excited about is just having them in. camp without the, you know, I don't want, excuses is probably the word of like, oh, late to camp, so we're not on the same page or doesn't know the law offense.

I love the fact he's in there now. They've gotten a couple players to catch the ball. There's some excitement. There's some possibility now, you know? The excuses are over for the Ravens, let's face it. Because what they did offensively now, and Eric DeCostas said it the other day, he said I did a poor job of surrounding him with the right kind of players to help him excel. that sounds like it comes from somebody who might have just signed a new contract, admitting that he hadn't done his job well in the prior couple years.

Not many of us could do that because that's really what he was saying is I didn't do my job in putting the players around him that as good as I should have. But they signed Nelson Aguilar, they signed OBJ. They drafted Flowers, the first round pick who I think is a good slot receiver. They have Bateman coming back, a former first round pick. They have Andrews. they have likely. There are six options right now for Lamar Jackson that all should be effective players at the NFL level.

He's never had the volume like that. Now, I'm assuming they're going to still want to run the ball. That's always been their MO. Their offensive lines, still a little bit of a work in progress. But you're correct, Mike. The excuses are over.

This is the team. They're all going to be there. Let's see where this thing can go. Probably the biggest question of all that is how does Todd Monkin fit in? How does his system fit in? How does that get taught and how much of a buy-in do they get from the players? The coach might be as much of a question as anything else there right now. The 6,000-yard comment, Randy, even if it was a throwaway line, it got my attention because, as you know, live in the Seattle area.

I used to cover the Seahawks, follow them probably closer than some other teams because I just live here. And I watched the whole Russell Wilson thing, let Russ Cook, hey, we're going to throw the ball over. Pete Carroll kind of has a vision for how he wants to win the game. Do you think that John Harbaugh's vision for winning the game has changed at all this offseason? That's a great question. I don't know that his philosophy can change at this point. What I'm saying is, let's just say they have some ups and downs like a lot of teams. It wouldn't surprise me if the ratings are going to have ups and downs.

Let's just write it down. That's a fact. Yeah. Well, they could be eight and nine. they could be 10 and 7. They could be 12 and 5 for all I know. But there's a lot of possible outcomes with this team. And so I think I'll be interesting to see if the offense is stumbling a little bit

or if it's run heavier and Lamar Jackson is not perceived to be throwing the ball enough. I saw how that went down in Seattle, let Russ Cook, all of that. I'm kind of interested to see how the Ravens, because that stuff kind of came up with Russell and after he really got paid. So I'll just be interested to see. All of these guys, especially when you get paid at the top, they have a vision of how that you get respect in the league. And it's, it says, it's the age-old adage.

Yeah. Respected by beating people from the pocket in the NFL, period. Eventually, yeah. That's how all the guys get respected by defenses, all of that. It's just true. And that's what they all want to be. No doubt. The narrative there in the past has been the same.

And Greg Roman really took the fall for it, the former OC who was let go. I said from day one, is this the system that Greg wants to run? Or is this the system that Lamar's skill set, it's best for him to excel? Now, they got better players, so they have improved that, like we just said. But for all intent purposes, the excuses are over. So we'll see. I don't know. I'm very interested to see, you know, how it plays out.

Yep, I agree. It'll be a fun place to watch. And just to see how things come together there. They've got a lot of positives going. Time will tell. Yep, absolutely. And we saw what they looked like when Lamar Jackson wasn't in there. So they're certainly going to look better than that.

And I think it just makes them a compelling team in a good way, as opposed to a compelling team in a bad way, like it has been a lot of this offseason. Before we get to the GM notebook, which, like I said, don't know what's in there. I wasn't able to steal anything out of there this week. It's where I get all my best material. I thought I want a GM perspective on the situation with Matt, or Rises. Okay, the punter, who was drafted by the Bills in last year, 2022 in the sixth round. And he was going to come in and be the punter.

Now, since then, in March, the Bills signed a new guy, Sam Martin, to a three-year contract. So he looks to be their punter. But they drafted Eriza thinking he would be the punter. And then shortly after he was drafted, it was alleged that he was involved in a horrific crime, involving the rape of a 17-year-old girl at a party. And suddenly the organization, there was no time for a trial. We don't know if there's proof.

We don't know if it's just an allegation. But the seriousness of the charge, the allegation, led to force the bills to kind of make a quick decision. And I think they made the decision that a lot of teams would make with a six-round punter. They just released Horizon. So there's a couple of things of this that I'm interested in. One is, obviously there's different sets of rules.

If he was a first round quarterback, maybe they'd put him on some other list. We saw Deshaun Watson's situation. He got a different level of treatment and big money. So it's not applied it evenly to everyone. But I'm just curious, something like that comes down and you don't really know what the truth is.

Who's involved in the decision of, you know, owner, whoever, you is the GM. And then the second part of that, I want to ask you is, like, now that he's, been cleared potentially as a player, like, would you have any problem signing? Would there have to be a discussion to sign them? Just curious how that would work. Yeah, I mean, really, the whole deal is kind of a sad tale, any way you look at it. A decision like that would definitely have ownership implications. It would definitely have coach and GM implications. I'll be honest,

I don't think the Buffalo Bills had any choice but to do what they did. And it's not saying that anything's fair or not fair. It was just that's that's probably right or wrong. And again, I may get crucified for just saying that. But no. At the time, the information they had, there was no proof of innocence. Now there's information out there that is to the contrary. I don't know. I think they did what they thought was right. Now there's a new set of, you know, facts out there that says he wasn't even there or a part of it. So do I think he will get signed by somebody? I do think he probably will. I think you probably have to take some time now to do some research on Matt's background, see where that folder and what it looks like. Are there other

character references that are willing to take the stand for him? I think you're probably a little too early to extend an offer of any kind. But I do think at some point he probably deserves to at least have an opportunity. There's got to be some time that passes to make sure there's that the dust truly does settle and that these are all the facts of the case. So I don't think anybody is going to rush to it. But probably in another year or so, again, I don't know what the time. I mean, if there's a need at a position, you bring in everybody. You know, that's the thing. I think It's not like you bring 10 to camp. No, but I think at the right time, he probably gets an opportunity, which he probably should,

as long as the facts are what we perceive them to be right now. Yeah. There's just a, you know, there's decisions that are made, but these are humans, you know, that are involved in their careers and their livelihoods, you know, off of something. And I agree. I think they had no choice at the time to do what they did, just an unfortunate situation all the way around. What do you got in the GM notebook this week? Not only do the readers want to the listeners want to know, I want to know.

Maybe there's nothing in there this whole time. Well, a lot of times there's not much in between my ears, so it could be that we make it up on the fly. I actually think the one thing that I thought was we're talking about was the rookie mini-camps that most teams have this weekend. Some had last weekend. But there's a couple different things that might interest some of the listeners. And what made me think of it is the John. top rookies that were in there last week didn't participate per se. They were around. They did some individual, but they were really limited on what they can do. And the way it works is, because

these players haven't signed contracts. And you know this, Mike. Maybe some of our listeners do as well. But they have to be protected before they do anything injury-wise. Because let's face it, there's a lot of money at stake with these guys' contracts. And we've seen an unfortunate event or two in the past that players get hurt before they even sign a contract. It used to be that they would just come sign a waiver that paid them at the average of one spot in front of them, one spot behind them, and you'd come up with a deal that kind of averages those three spots if they were to have a career ending injury or some type of injury, and that would be their contract. Now there's a little more legalese involved, and I did think it was probably smart for the

giants to allow their top three picks just to not even be involved in it. These rookie mini camps aren't the most important thing in the world. They're really important for undrafted guys and guys that, you know, don't have contracts that are there on a tryout basis, but you're going to have plenty of time with your top draft picks. And I thought it was wise that the Giants played the long game in that they didn't have their guys out there competing and doing anything crazy. I think you'll see more teams do that. For example, the guys that are competing, as you know, and some of our listeners know, I spent the last four months running the next F.L team, the Seattle Sea Dragons, we have 13 guys, Mike, that are in NFL mini camps coming up this

weekend. Now, those guys are competing for jobs. They're on tryout basis. They are at a total different level against players that were drafted in a first or second round. This is like a pickup basketball game. Maybe you and I go down to the park and we're playing and we want to have some fun, but there's a couple guys down there that are trying to make the NBA and, you know what I mean? They're fouling the hell out of us and doing this and doing that and putting everybody's physical know, state in disarray. So you have some of that, even in these rookie mini-camps. So I think it was smart by the Giants just to let their guys, their top guys, they're going to be on their team. We're going to have plenty of time to develop these players. Let's look at these guys who are

competing for jobs and for the fact that we do want to sign these guys to contracts or not. There might be 40 of these guys that are in the mix. So whether it's XFL guys, whether it's undrafted college free agents, whether it's six or seventh round picks, those guys are totally on a different level and being evaluated every move they make while they're in camp. So just, you know, I think most people understand it, but I thought it'd be worth least visiting about. I'm smiling because your pickup basketball reference reminded me of the time my illustrious NAIA practice squad career was affected.

My ankles were so bad, Randy, that by the time I was 20 years old, I would tape both my ankles every time I played pickup basketball. I just played basketball all the time. And my buddies from high school still teasing you out the ankles. Like, hey man, don't fall. I just was born with terrible ankles. So I was going to work out one day in a gym.

And a couple of my buddies were playing, you know, they needed one more guy to play some three on three. But I knew I didn't have my, I hadn't taped my ankles. I was just going to go lift. And I said, I know, guys, I can't. Well, you know, they worked on me. In one play, I broke one ankle and severely sprained the edder. I got undercut and came down.

And I'll never remember. It was February 1st. I won't say the year. It'll date me. It was a long time ago. But, yeah. That's your pickup basketball. Yeah.

Yeah, you're right. Different guys going at different speeds in that type of a thing. And you could be vulnerable. One of the ones that I remember, I don't think it was a mini camp, but it was a rookie. I think it was after you'd left the Seahawks in 2000. They had a defensive tackle by the name of Tim Watson. He was a sixth round pick from Rowan. And he was running around the,

practice field. Remember, they used to have those blocking sleds that had a sharp hook on the end where they would pull that with a chain behind the little John Deere tractor. And this guy went around the corner and fell, and that hook went into the side of his knee. Took off two inches of cartilage or something. He never played. I mean, it ended his career. So that's the most fluke freak type of an injury. And it's probably not going to happen. But you got to guard against the worst case scenario when you don't have a signed contract as a rookie in your whole career. It's fake.

It's a topic in NFL buildings. It has been forever about these injury waivers. And sometimes they were an issue. Sometimes they weren't dependent on the player of the agent. They've kind of become standard now to where, you know, again, I just think it's a good idea for those top guys not to participate. There's no reason to rush what you're going to get out of them. A three-day minicamp with a bunch of guys from the, you know, different agendas and

different levels doesn't make a lot of sense. Yeah. Yeah. You all know those players who are going through a walkthrough are playing fast because they're trying to impress the coach or something. Yeah. So, yeah. You got anything else in the notebook? I don't, but I saw a question in there for that you had.

Maybe asked the GM question. Was that? Yeah, we got one. I solicited. We got one on Twitter from AL, from AL Sailor 4. Says the NBA and Major League Baseball have luxury taxes if you exceed the cap. Would you favor the NFL doing that? He says he would not.

I think it kind of defeats or at least diminishes the purpose of the cap. What do you think about that? You do hear about luxury taxes and other sports. Yeah, I think those really, what they reflect is a soft cap. And as we know, the NFL is the one league that has a hard cap. In the NBA, they have bird rules or this rule for that. It's kind of, you can go over to sign your own players, you know, a softer cap. And in Major League Baseball, there is the luxury tax where you can spend whatever you want,

as long as you're willing to pay the luxury tax. The NFL doesn't have such a thing. And for that reason, I don't ever see them acquiescing in that regard. They want to make you count every dollar, and they'll find counting mechanisms to keep you underneath the cap. And it's, frankly, a better way to control spending. So I'm with AL. I don't think it's going to happen. And I don't think that the league will ever allow the CBA portion of that to ever be negotiated away from at this point.

I like it when people, you know, people explain that type of thing by. saying, well, you know, the league's about, you know, parity and letting all of these teams have a chance. Yeah, it's about money usually when it comes down to things like this, right? Cash matters, too. Cash matters a lot. Yeah. There's already a disparity as to what people spend just for those teams that are willing to spend cash as opposed to, you know, counting every penny every year as we go along. So everybody spreads out their debt, just like your family, my family, every family. We all spread out our debt, whether it's paid in cash or paid in credit card. That's, That's probably enough for these owners to swallow right now.

I think there's a luxury tax if we go over our lot of time here, Randy. I think we've about hit the end of the show for this week. I love being able to say you can find my work and Randy Mueller's work at The Athletic. How about that? Randy's on Twitter at Randy Mueller underscore. I'm on there at Sandow NFL. Be sure to check out Randy's latest column. If you just Google Randy Mueller, vathletic space, vathletic.com,

one word you'll find his archive. It comes right up. And you can read some of the things he's already written in the last whatever. What is it, about 10 days a week? Week 10 days? So far, 10 days, yeah. That's great. Well, we're so glad to have you on board in that capacity.

And we look forward to doing another show next week. This was the Athletic Football Show.