The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Football GM: The good, bad and ugly

Episode Date: September 23, 2023

Mike Sando and Randy Mueller discuss the good things and bad things they've seen from teams. Have the 49ers found their franchise QB? A terrible injury to end Week 2. The plan for Justin Fields in question. And an unexpected 2-0 start for the Washington Football Team.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show's Football GM podcast. Welcome everybody to the Football GM podcast. Mike Sando here from The Athletic, along with the GM. Randy Mueller. How you doing, Randy? Doing good, Michael. Another weekend of football. I get fired up about this time because I know college is coming around the corner on

Saturdays and we just had a Thursday night game. So it's a good time, good time of the week to be us, right? Yeah, it is. How do you watch college games? Are you, you know, on the couch with a bowl of popcorn? Or do you... I'm just a fan. I'm going to view as many games as I can.

And, hey, if something comes up, I like to watch better, I'll switch to a different game. I'm a local guy, you know, I'm a Northwest guy, kind of like you. So I always tune into the Huskies and the Cougars and sometimes even the Idaho vandals. And in a few of the national ones as well. How can you not watch what Coach Prime has going in Colorado now, you know? I love it every week. I was on the edge of my seat. It's like, I don't remember the last time I watched a Colorado game.

I was watching that. game against Colorado State. It was awesome. In fact, I couldn't wait for the postgame handshake. I was like, all right, what's going to happen here? You knew it was coming. You knew something crazy was coming. Yeah, it was like a rivalry game anyway. Yeah. I have to transition from saying Dion because I think

of Dion as the player, but Coach Prime. I'll give him Coach Prime. I've been to that Mile High Classic a few times and it used to be held in the Bronco Stadium and they kind of played a neutral sight. I don't know when they changed it, but it was interesting to see it at one of the home fields, that's for sure. It was. Well, we had a different kind of rivalry in the Thursday night game. The 49ers Giants has been a rivalry, a great rivalry in the NFC over the years. Somebody posted

last night the shot of Leonard Marshall hitting Joe Montana in the back and basically ending his time with the 49ers. And I was watching that game last night because Wink Martindale, the de-coordinated of the Giants, was really coming after Purdy. But when I saw that, that hit by Leonard Marshall, it reminded me, reminded me how much the game's changed, probably for the better for some of these players. No doubt.

That would have probably got him fined and tossed out of the game. Oh, yeah. And a whole set of podcasts analyzing that one, that's for sure. Although I would say this, I think Leonard Williams had something in his coffee yesterday.

He was coming after those guys. He was, he body-weighted Christian McCaffrey nicely and kind of grabbed him around the neck and got a nice shot on him purdy, so he was upset. But it kind of feels like in these first few weeks, Randy, like, no matter how frustrated the Giants get, it just hasn't been falling their way. And some of this is the schedule.

You got to play at the 49ers on a short week without Sequin Berkeley. I mean, I don't know. I think you could read Brian Dayball's mind there. He wasn't, he's upset, but like, what do you expect? They weren't going to probably go win that game. Where are you at? I'm just curious on the Giants because, you know, we talked a lot about them before the year, kind of liking, you know, generally their direction, the way they've gone about things. but it just hasn't looked good.

Yeah, I agree. I think they've been a little bit of a victim of, one, their own success, and two of this season scheduled, like you mentioned. I haven't really sorted out where I feel they're going to end up yet, because I think now with Barclay out, it's really hard to judge. And we saw it last night. They have no ability to push the ball downfield. For one, they can't protect well enough. And two, if they're not going to target Jalen Hyatt,

or at least put him in there to stretch the field. He's the one guy they have that can really run. And without Barclay, the one guy in the backfield who can, you know, change the way people defend you, that was a big miss for them last week. So I was a little set back by the way the telecast started. I want to say that, and you know I'm not a big fan of the analysts on Thursday night football, right? It's usually third grade, Ned to third grade reader can, can, in a different way and I usually do. But in this case, the first thing these guys said, and it kind of

made me open my eyes, was it's hard to prepare on a short week. And this came after their meeting with Brian Dayball and Week Martindale. Very hard to prepare on a short week. You know what? Everybody has to prepare. The 49ers have to prepare as well. So it kind of set the stage for me where are the Giants making excuses right off the bat before we even get going here in the production meeting the night before about how hard it is and they elected to stay in. Arizona, which I would have done the same. But don't tell me how rough the water is, like Chuck Knox used to say, just get in the boat. So I think they're a little bit frustrated. You can tell that. They're a little bit toward the excuse making. And I don't know that it's a blatant excuse,

but they're kind of ready in for some rough water before that game even started, in my opinion. And so now they've got, you know, Seattle at Miami, Buffalo, you know, Washington's playing well. we're going to play the Jets who are good on defense. Maybe they're going to have to learn to live with some adversity here too, unless they can, maybe they can pull it together on 10 days' rest or even more and play Seattle in a primetime game. Is this a team that maybe just needs one decent win? And maybe reading too much into losing to Dallas and San Francisco,

who are so good defensively, that they can really make it look bad for a team like the Giants that is gamed up a little bit. They're not a dynamic offense. they sort of have to play on their terms. Maybe they can get some different opponents, play on their terms, and we'll see the Giants team from last year. What do you think about that? Well, I mean, you said it.

They just lost the two best teams in the NFC. So let's don't be too discouraged. We have our best player who didn't play with us in that game, the last game. So they have some things that are going to come around their way eventually. They stole the game in Arizona, which they should feel pretty good about. They did get some answers there. But yeah, I don't think it's time to hit the panic button at all. I don't think this team can play any different than what was successful for them last year, in my opinion,

which was keep it close till the fourth quarter, manage the game, they tried to do that last night. They just had a better team that they faced. Wink Martindale tried the blitz, and I thought that was my takeaway and we'll get to the 49er side. He tried the blitz. He tried everything to make things happen on defense. It didn't work. That 49ers handled it well. So I just think, hey, we took our swings if I'm the Giants.

we swung, we missed, let's go back to the drawing board and see what next week brings. And yes, the schedule hopefully does get a little easier for them, as does the travel. Yeah, and the injuries they have are real. They're significant in some cases and forcing them to play a little bit of a different way. But that jibes also with the idea that a lot of things sort of fell right for them last year. They won a lot of the close games. And so we'll find out more about them over the course of the season. You mentioned that shoot, they blitzed Wink Martindale.

of blitzed the heck out of Brock Purdy and the 49ers. 82% blitz rate, according to true media. That is top five blitz rate in a game in the last decade plus. It's really unusual to come after people that much. I actually think Kyle Shanahan likes it to be blitzed like that. I think he likes to play the quote-unquote unsound boom or bust defenses, but only if he has a quarterback who can get the ball out quick. This is a nice little trial by fire for a young Brock Purdy, wasn't it?

I think it's giant for the kid's career. I really do. I think it sets a standard now where teams are going to be nervous about blitzing these guys. As a quarterback, the number one thing a quarterback has to do is process information. The number two thing he's got to do is deal with the blitz, and you have to make people pay. When teams come after you, guess what? They have weakened themselves somewhere else, and this is elementary football, but a lot of times a quarterback can't handle it, and the blitz will just keep coming until he does. It's like in baseball, if a guy proves he can't hit the curveball, guess what he's going to see?

He can see a lot of curveballs. And that's what they're going to do here. But I thought the way they stood up and the way Purdy stood in there and made some throws versus pressure coming right in his face are going to go a long ways toward how people play defense against them the rest of the year. Now, the great example of that is he's got good players around him. He's got a really good scheme and a play caller. this is an organizational answer to, you know, an aggressive blitz tactic that you just said hasn't

happened in years like this. So I think it's all pluses for the 49ers. They learned about even more what they have in Purdy. And I think that bodes well. But it's going to dictate how teams blitz them in the future. And I think it's giant for the team and for Purdy's individual growth as a quarterback in the NFL. So they're now in Purdy starts, including playoffs, they're over 29 points a game, you know, and if you go back to the Jimmy Grappler era, which, you know, was a lot more games, so it's harder to hold up great numbers over a lot of games, but it was 25 points of game. So that's a nice little uptake. You know, obviously they have good defense and a lot of good skill players and stuff, but we're not seeing a falloff with Brock Purdy. Do you think he's better than Jimmy?

Oh, I don't think it's even close. I think you can see it in the way Kyle manages the game. We've said it here on the show, Mike, in years past that Garoppolo is different when he gets pressured. He was pressured in the mistake after mistake too often. And I think that's why they soured on him and even drafted Tray Lance. Now, Tray Lance is a whole other story. But the fact is, Jimmy can't deal with pressure like this kid can. And that is a fatal flaw if you can. And so I think Kyle had to call plays different. He had to manage his offense different. when Jimmy G was in there, and he doesn't now. He can keep the throttle down. This kid can handle it, and last night was a great indicator that he proved he belongs

against a pass-happy defense like Wink Martindale has. Now, he's not going to see that much in the future, but it's going to make defensive coordinators second-guess themselves when they decide to pressure, especially if you can get the ball to Debo and some of these other guys. Now, Ayuk didn't even play last night, or they didn't play Thursday night. So these run-after catch guys who you can get it too quickly and accurately, they can really make a defense that rushes and that gambles pay. Well, yeah, last night, the average past depth, you know, for them was really low. But that's because, hey, we'll get it out quick to these guys and put the ball in their hands that are difficult.

The great athletes like Christian McCaffrey, you know, Debo Sandel. Make them tackle them. Yeah, make them tackle them. Exactly. You get those guys going with the ball in their hands against a blitz. That's a nice outlet, so pretty good situation for them. I think the main thing for the 49ers is, you know, like you said, Brandon Ayuk is banged up, Debo Samuel has a history of getting banged up, Christian McCaffrey has a history of getting banged up.

Trent Williams is going to play forever until he doesn't. I mean, there's a certain point with his age. So I'm very interested to see them in terms of how they maintain throughout the season, because I think right now they are as good as anybody in the whole league, not just the NFC. Right. We saw an example last night of the acunem of the details that that staff coaches to on offense, and whether that's Kyle or his assistants or whoever.

They brought a kid that they drafted in who played in his first game, the receiver Bell, number 10, who caught the touchdown. Well, if you look at that play closely, Mike, Purdy is under siege. He throws it without his feet being set, and he throws it way early in and before the guy even gets into his break, much less comes out. of it and he hits him perfectly for a touchdown in the corner of the end zone. We see offenses around the league week in and week out with people that have played together for weeks and sometimes years that can't do that. This was this kid's the receiver's first game and he

was on the same page with the quarterback. I credit coaching for that. I really do. Coaching matters. Drill work matters. Comfort in the system and to be on the same page mentally matters. And I think they do that with the 49ers as well as anybody on offense especially. So Brock Purdy is famously the last player selected in his draft class. Ronnie Bell, receiver out of Michigan. That's the guy. He went 253rd overall. So there were only six, I think six players taken after he was in that draft.

One, two, three, four, five, six players. So that's pretty good. That's pretty good. Scouting department, Randy, if you're sitting in there going, hey, we got the last pick in the draft throwing a touchdown pass on primetime to the guy picked six or seventh from the bottom of the draft, that's pretty good combination, huh? Damn good. And it's a great credit to, I think, the coaching staff for getting them all on the same page.

People forget sometimes, it's not all plug and play. It's just not a matter of drafting a guy and rolling them out there. They've got to be prepared. They've got to know exactly what they're doing. And I thought that was a great example of a kid that never played in a football game before at the pro level. That mattered. Hey, I want to segue, this isn't even on our menu today. But you wrote a column this week on the Rams receiver, Puka Nakua, who has a ton of catch. for the first two games, what you said right there about getting young guys up and getting guys ready, that really dovetails with the team in the division. The Rams, no one thought the Rams were going to do anything this year. They come out of the gates. They hammer Seattle. They're very competitive with a good 49er team, take them pretty much to the wire with this young receiver who isn't going to be the fastest guy in the 40-yard dash, but the little things, right, the details

make a big difference for a young player. A hundred percent. And I agree. I agree. with you wholeheartedly. And yes, when I sat down to look at Puka, I was amazed at the skill set that I came out of the film session with, as opposed to what I thought I was going to get when I sat down to look at it. You're exactly right. I think McVe's offense in the passing game may be even more detailed and nuanced than Kyle's. I think Kyle maybe has a running game advantage in that matchup, but I think McVe's passing game acunum and the way he teaches it and the way his players execute it is top-notch. And you're right. This kid was a fifth round pick out of BYU. He's a transfer from Washington who six one and a half, 200 pounds, ran four, five, six, something like down on his pro day. So you're right. His measurables are really common, really average. But when you watch the kid play, you think you're watching Steve Largent. Only this kid blocks. He's kind of the new hybrid position that everybody's looking for a running back slash receiver. Well, this guy's kind of a receiver slash tied-in slash h-back. They run him in the passing game

to where he runs people off. He was chipping Nick Bosa in the game against 49ers a week ago. And I guarantee you, after the game, that's one of the thing Nick Bosa said, I guarantee you he said to his buddies, he said, this kid, he's a nuisance. He was, he heard his pass rush. He screened him off on running plays. Not to mention, the Kua kid has 35 targets in the passing game. That's 10 more than anybody else in the NFL. And this is the first two games he's ever played. 25 catches, 35 targets in two weeks. But the numbers don't really describe how instinctive and how good this kid is and how he has kind of found a niche just after these two games. I think just natural instincts. And then the details that the coaches have brought to the table with him. Yeah. I love the contrast in

comparison between Sean McVeigh and Kyle Shanahan in the same division, two really good, kind of offensive-minded coaches who have their own stamp on things. And I agree. Like, I feel like if there's one thing I could make better with the 49ers offense, it would be their drop-back pass game. And just the dimensions of that to take it to another level. And we'll see if Purdy can rise as high as he might. Whereas I think McVeigh, now granted, McVeigh has had Matthew Stafford,

so that's a little bit of a different deal. But I feel like they have a bigger component in that realm. And so that's just an interesting thing to watch here as these two teams compete in the division, especially when no one really gave the Rams much of a chance. But I think there's some good coaching going on at both those places and we're seeing it. You know what it tells me? You know it tells me who I don't want to be? Pete Carroll. I don't want to be Pete Carroll because I've got to find a way to defend both these teams twice a year.

And these are probably two of the top five coaches in the league. And they come from our division. So that's four of our games right there. So, hey, credit to them. You're right. These offenses are special, but someone's got to defend them, and that's hard for teams. It's funny, you know, in that division.

Sean McVeigh has Pete Carroll's number. Pete Carroll has had until last season Kyle Shanahan's number, and Kyle Shanahan has McVe's number. It's like this circular thing of how these guys go at it. So I'm with you. All right, so some good things we see with San Francisco, some good things we see with the Rams. Let's go to another great American city.

Chicago. We're not seeing the stuff that we're seeing in San Francisco or Los Angeles. We are seeing a mess this week, Randy. It felt like it got out of hand. The D.C. defensive coordinator Alan Williams resigns. There's not a lot of details coming out. We feel like there's something being withheld there as to what exactly happened. There's been a flurry of conflicting reports.

talking about FBI involved or maybe not, maybe this and that happened. But there's a lot of smoke around that. So something happened there that we don't know all of what it is. We're seeing, you know, the plan for developing Justin Fields be questioned. We're seeing Justin Fields be questioned. We're seeing now that you lose a couple games, everyone now is pulling on the fact they lost their final 10 last year. So, oh my gosh, it's 12 losses in a row. You're going to Kansas City.

You're a 12-1 underdog. Deep breath here, Randy. It's only two weeks end. What are your takeaways on Chicago? Well, you said it. There's a lot of chaos, right? And I'll start by saying what we have said a million times on this show. When GMs and head coaches get hired, there's an element to the criteria determining who gets these jobs that you really don't know.

And it is really how they deal with things like this. These things happen a lot in the NFL, probably more than people know. There's plenty of drama. There's plenty of chaos behind the scenes that are listeners that readers don't know about. And so when a GM gets a job and he has no experience at solving problems, that's always a red flag for me. In this case, you have a first time GM and a first time head coach. That can be problematic. And I'm not blaming them for what's happened here, but we'll just say these kind of shit sandwiches get delivered around the league.

It's part of the job description. It's part of what we have to do now as GMs and head coaches. So when a GM has to have a press conference before week three, in really the traditional way is that the GM doesn't even speak to the media during the season, he had to give a state of the union in Chicago in front of the media this week based on all the things that you said. It is a lot of drama. It's a lot of irons that are hot. and you mentioned a few of them,

you didn't even mention the fact that the defense has been awful from day one. The defense has not played good either. And so you can throw that in the mix as well. Then you have several different angles of how to deal with it. We're going to find out what kind of leaders Matt Eberfuss and Ryan Poles are, because that's what it's going to take. A steady end of the ship, I thought Ryan did a good job in meeting with the media.

But it also told me one thing, Mike, maybe Matt Everflus isn't the right guy to lead this group because we didn't really hear a lot of a lot of answers from him and the GM had to go before the rest of the media and the rest of the public world to kind of calm the seas. Does that make any sense? Yeah, I'm trying to find out what the plan is like who is deciding that we're going to have the GM talk. Who's deciding that when Justin Fields goes? out there, like, you've got to coach these guys up. Justin Fields is a sharp guy, but he's 24 years old.

So he's going out there with all this stuff's rolling around. And he, you know, he didn't really roll on his coaches, but he said something that was misconstrued or taken out of context, that he had to kind of walk it back. These are, these are just normal moments in the week. We shouldn't be having to. Yeah. I just don't know that it's a good sign that you have to have. I think you're saying this too, that you have to have that level of debriefing about it.

Guys, it's weak too. Yeah, it's definitely not normal. That's for sure. Project the calm. Yeah. Project the calm. Hey, look, we had to make it. We had a difficult situation with our defensive coordinator, Alan Williams, and I'm not at liberty to go into great detail on it.

But it's a difficult thing. And so we're making that transition. But look, I've called defenses in 102 games or make up whatever the number is. I can do it. And that's why I got hired. So we're going to be okay in that component of it. Your questions about Justin Fields are legitimate questions. We've struggled. And we need to do a better job as a group, putting him in position to be the player he can be. That's on us. Okay? It's early. That said it's early. We're two weeks into this thing. And we're not panicking. We're not throwing in the towel. Yeah, we've got a tough game against Kansas City this week. You know, you probably couldn't play a tougher team. in the league. So, but we're going to stick to the fundamentals. We're going to rally around our guys and we're going to play like, you know, mad. We're going to be, we're going to bring it. And and, and we're going to get better. So any questions? Yeah, all should have come from the head

coach. I totally agree. And I didn't hear that. Maybe it just slipped by us, but I didn't hear him. I heard the offensive coordinator in a rebuttal type set up with what the quarterback had said. and I saw him roll out the general manager as a way. So I think we are saying the same thing that where is the head coach in all this chaos? I've always felt this way in recent years about the bears. I was uncomfortable when Matt Nagy went up and talked. Yeah. And some of that could just be, hey, maybe it's who the coach is.

But I think there's a plan organizationally in how you message and do things that I just haven't seen from them across multiple coaches. And I probably have to look at it a little more. but, you know, somebody like a Lovie Smith probably knows how to do it when he was there, probably knows how to do it. And when you get guys that haven't done it before and don't have the right support around them, what are your quarterback, where you're the coach, where the general manager, who are the people above these people or around these people to make this come off more coherently?

I think that's what we're seeing. We're seeing an organizational failure. Yeah, I don't doubt that a bit. I mean, you have for the second time, two first-time head coaches in Nagy and Eberfuss, two first-time GMs in Ryan Pace and Ryan Poles. You've actually got two different presidents now in Ted Phillips before, and now Kevin Warren, who's the new president. The same, the overlying cloud over at all is really the McCaskey family and maybe some,

like you said, some bigger plan from 30,000 feet, but something's missing. There's no doubt. Something is missing. And so now let's talk to the. a little bit about personnel and football stuff about this team because they had the number one pick in the draft. I want to know, if I was the owner of the team, I'd be saying, hey, what can we hang our hat on? Where are we good? What do we do well? What have we fixed? Is there any area where we're a problem for an opponent? Have we acquired anything that's really elite and moves

the needle. And if I were to say that to you and you were Ryan Poles or you were Matt Iberflus, I don't know what your answer could be. What are we good at? Yeah, no, I totally agree. We kind of went through it before. I've been really on board saying that the defense has really been a mess from the day they got there. And I don't think that's gotten any better. I think Fields was much better the end of last season than he's been now. So he's regressed. I don't think that's a secret. And I think their offense, if you want to throw it all on Justin Fields, I get it. But this offense was bad the other day. I looked at it. And you can say we've tried to build through the draft, but here's something Ryan Poles is going to be judged on too. He drafted a kid in the first round from Tennessee, Darnell Wright, an offensive lineman, who gave up two of the worst sacks the other day that I've seen yet this season at Wright tackle. Shack Barrett from Tampa went around him like a freight train, stand, and still. I mean, it was embarrassing. And he gave up another sack later. And he gave up another sack later. And he, game. So I'll tell you what that does as a GM. We've all had our picks that we're proud of. Some of us have had some not so proud of. But it does erode the confidence of the players in that locker room when

they see the guy who you handpicked and you're a former offensive lineman yourself. So you're a guru of offensive linemen or so they think. And that guy's struggling. The right tackle is really struggling. The offense as a whole is kind of mistimed out of step. Obviously the quarterback's not processing, but he's not even ready to throw the ball. When he takes the snap, he lollygags back there, and he couldn't throw it on time if he wanted to. That, to me, is systematic flaws as well. Yeah, he needs to do better, but what are they coaching? That kid needs to get, he should be ready to throw the minute the ball hits his hands if we're going to be in the shotgun.

And that's not the case either. I saw DJ Moore, their receiver, who they acquired in the Bryce Young trade with Carolina, run a deep dig second quarter or so. And he's like clapping his hands, like, throw me the ball. I mean, like we're out in the yard playing catch. Who claps their hands? Like, this is NFL football. And in hope that the quarterback would hear him, there's 70,000 people in the stands. You know, what the hell are you clapping your hands for?

You know? And that kind of thing. I saw reactions of receivers in this game just dropped their head when the ball didn't go where we thought it should go. So there's a lot of, it reminded me of the Jets a year ago when Zach Wilson took all the blame or all the punishment. when their offense was a total mess. Well, I'm seeing kind of that with Chicago now. Off-kilter, not the right setup. They're running an offense that I don't even recognize.

I don't know what they want to do. I don't know their criteria for how they set up a game plan. I know this. Fields' best attribute is athletic ability and speed. And we don't ever see any of that. So that's not even part of the game plan. So I really don't know. There's so many angles to the chaos there.

on the field, forget about the off field, but on the field, that it doesn't make sense to me. And that gets back to my question, hey, coach, what are we doing well? Are we do, what have we done really well in personnel? What have we done really well in coaching? What are our success stories? Because you don't have to have the whole thing fixed in a year and a half. You don't.

They came into a bad situation. But you've got to have some progress. Something to hang your hat on. You can't lose every game forever. And just say, hey, this is a long-term plan. And we've, we've plugged some whole. holes, but we're just average at those spots. So, yep, that's strong after only two games, but when the GM has to have a press

commerce after two games, I think we're justified to talk about it. All right. I agree. Transitioning our next topic with Justin Fields being one of the young quarterbacks in this league. I wrote a column after doing some research, and you can find it on the athletic, talking about how the starting quarterbacks coming into this year are the youngest by average age since 1957. And really what I looked at was the really senior citizen quarterbacks that we've seen,

guys playing 15, almost 20 years, have retired. Carson Palmer, Alex Smith, Eli Manning, Philip Rivers, Drew Brees, Ben Rathesberger, Matt Ryan, Tom Brady, even some journeyman type guys, Ryan Fitzpatrick among them, are gone. And so there's not a group of guys about to join that bucket of the really been around a long time. And part of that's because Andrew Luck retired, Robert Griffin III retired, Cam Newton retired, Sam Bradford didn't pan out. Russell Wilson and Ryan Tannenhill

might be on their last legs of starters. Kirk Cousins may make it and still be playing, but that's just one guy who isn't even the most talented of all those guys. So in the meantime, we have 15 quarterbacks who were in their first four years in the league, and I think that's going to 16 with, Aaron Rogers exiting after only one game. So it's quite a shift, isn't it?

Randy and the league to go from basically having all those really old guys to haven't none of them. I think it's almost painful to watch, to be honest with you, and we talked about it. It's got scoring down. It's got points per play down. It's got offensive fluidity down. The paint-by-number schemes that we're having to come up with as far as offenses go to try to coax these younger quarterbacks

into being NFL players has set it back. I'll be honest with you. It's set back, you know, I think offenses. And I don't know how we change that. I do know one thing that comes to my mind is, I think we have to change a little bit of the criteria that some teams look at when evaluating quarterbacks that are coming out in the draft. Now, these guys that came out the last couple of years are probably somewhat reflective of the numbers you just gave. Then there's another group that have been in the league four or five years, the Sam Darnolds and those guys. So that's a little different group, but I just think our criteria has to be more defined. And we see a million guys nowadays that are draft gurus, guys that evaluate and aren't part of NFL franchises. We didn't really

see that before, but I'll say this, and some of them are really good. But when they pick a lane on a player and push that narrative, that adds additional pressure to everybody in these NFL buildings to kind of either push back or jump on board. And I think what we see around the NFL now is more teams willing to jump on board with some of the evaluators that are outside the realm of NFL offices. And I think that can be dangerous. I think you've got to find what you're looking for and stick to your criteria and what you want to do offensively. And if you have to take a quarterback who compromises that, it's probably not the right fit. And I think we see that, Mike. When we've talked about this enough on the show that every year the prognosticators come up

with five or six quarterbacks, for example, this year it's going to be a great quarterback back draft. Everybody's saying that. Well, my guess is when we weed it all down, there's going to be out two, maybe three that are worthy of being picked. So we label these guys as can't miss great college players when it's a total different game at the NFL level, a total different way of seeing the field, a total different game management job. So it's just really different and it's really hard to make that jump to the NFL level. So I think that adds into part of the reason as well that these guys are failing. And I, think everybody's reaching now for quarterbacks more than ever before and thus you've skewed the

age of starting quarterbacks down to a 50 year low. So I'll tee this up for you. Yeah, Randy, but the pro game's becoming more like college. These concepts are coming in. It's going to be easier to make the transition, right? I don't know about that. I mean, the concepts, yes, NFL teams are using more college concepts, but I still think what happens is the game itself is different. In, for example, let's just use Bryce Young. A lot of times, and not all the time, I'm generalizing here, a lot of times he's thrown to wide open receivers in wide open spaces. And it makes that field look like a CFL field sometimes in college. Alabama is so good. The field is wide open and these people are wide open all the time,

so it's easier to make throws. At the NFL level, the athletes are so big and so fast, it's almost like the reverse. It's like you're watching a game on an ice hockey. because the windows aren't open. They close fast. The receivers don't have wide open spaces to run to. And the margin for air is so slim. You have to put the ball on pinpoint for these receivers to run after the catch when you don't in college. So my point is, in general, it's just harder to play at the NFL level. It is really hard. And some of these guys just can't make the jump, one, based on their skill set and two, or two, transferring their processing ability to the next level. level, which is like going from high school to grad school.

And then three, having the right people around you or the right coaching plan for you and all that. Yes. Organizational as a whole. Yep. Yeah, absolutely. I would love to see, because we've talked about like the limitations of some of these quarterbacks or, hey, Justin Fields has to prove himself as a pastor. It would be interesting to me, though, if he was like spending three years on the bench and

with Andy Reed, like what would he come out like the other side? You know, would it be a big difference, you know, as opposed to just having to take the mantle of a city in Chicago where you got nothing around you and no one seems to know exactly what they're doing all the time. But does that factor in then? Should that factor into your criteria? Knowing what we're just saying as being, to me, it's got to be part of the reason to select one and not based on a guy's talent level that he played grade in college. And our need. That's what it is. There's just not enough of these guys to fill all the needs. need trumps everything. So I guess at this point, you know, in the absence of having some of those

guys I mentioned who retired that were established for the most part really good players, would you rather look at, you know, let's just say, would you rather, the choice, like the Panthers made a choice basically between Bryce Young or Derek Carr, right? That was kind of a, because they brought in Derek Carr to look at. So Derek Carr, we sort of know what he is. He's probably not going to be ultimately what you want at the highest level, but he's floor's pretty high. You know, you're plugging in something solid. Would you rather do that than take a little bit of a lottery ticket, right, one of these young guys who maybe can't do it? How bad does the veteran option have to be before you reach, you know, on the front end with the draft? And I think it's a great

point. I think a lot of teams would do it differently. And that's not to say anybody's really right or wrong, but philosophically, I think I would probably have a solid NFL quarterback, and if it's Derek Carr, so be it, then take one that's flawed. Now, or that has restrictions physically on what he can do and how he can grow. So that's just my opinion. It doesn't mean I'm right. Just other people obviously think different. So I do think that's a discussion that happens in a lot of NFL rooms a lot.

You can't tell me, and we talked about this earlier, that somebody like, Bill Parcells would draft a 5-10 quarterback that weighs 180 pounds. It's just philosophically against it. And it doesn't mean that all of us are old guys and that we're not open to the young athletic different style of quarterback. That's not it at all. It comes down to the fact that we want to do certain things offensively and have durability and have a guy around every week. I mean, we see already Bryce Young in week three probably not going to play. Got a sprained ankle. So there's a lot that goes into this. And all I'm saying is you should use that as part of your criteria for what you want.

And everybody does get to pick what they want at the end of the day. When we go in Baskin-Robbins, we pick the flavors we like. So just keep track of that. And those that choose and it ends up being correct should be the guys you want running franchises. Okay, I want to talk a little Atlanta Falcons defense because this is a column you wrote this week. One of the things I love about the athletic app is you can go in and search by author. You know, so if you want to find Randy's columns, just go into this little search bar up there. And you can search by author, just start typing in Randy or Mueller.

It comes right up and you'll see his weekly column going around some stuff around the league. And you let it Randy this week with the Atlanta Falcons. And we've been somewhat critical of some of their team building and just the, prioritizing of certain non-premium positions early in the draft. And so we've had some questions. And so I've got the little headline I've got here on our item this week is, hey, are we warming to the Falcons team build or just the defense or what? What do you think?

Well, I think that criticism is valid. I think those are things that people talk about, again, internally for days, for weeks and are really the decision-makers' philosophies on how they want to build their team. I think in this case, I'm talking about the Falcons defense. I still have some questions as to where they're going to go offensively and how much of a ceiling they have based on their quarterback and that run-based scheme. I don't know if there's a second or third pitch in the bag, but there might be.

Time will tell. But when I sat down to look at the Falcons, I didn't sit down to look at the Falcons. They played the Packers last week. And I looked at, I sat down to look at Jordan Love, the quarterback of the Packers. to see how he played against the Falcons. I was 10 minutes into watching film, and I said to myself, I'm burying the lead here. This is crazy.

This should be about the Falcons defense the way they're running around. And then I dove into what they did to rebuild it. And this is no news to anybody in Atlanta. They all get this. I understand. This is a national perspective that I don't think many people really realize.

When Terry Fontno came from the Saints to the Falcons two years ago, him and his staff were, they sat on their hands for two years because they had no cap flexibility, they had no ability to maneuver money, no ability to bring in free agents or spend any money. Plus, they had to make some tough decisions. They had to get rid of Matt Ryan, which I think if you gave them truth from them, they got rid of him a year sooner, but they saw an angle to do that based on the Sean Watson contract and their ability to get involved in that. And if you remember, right, once Matt Ryan found out they had a slight interest in Watson, he wanted out of there.

So they played on that to move him, I think a year even before they thought they could. They knew he was going to have to go, but his contract was an albatross form. So they've really had to bite the bullet cap-wise for a lot of reasons, but mainly for that. And they had a bunch of sunk costs that they had to get rid of. Yeah. This year was the first time Fontenot was able to do anything, and he spent time on defense. And having been in that seat before, when I went from Seattle to New Orleans, I brought several staff guys. I brought several players with me.

I brought some commonality and some friendly faces that I knew and could trust and would help the learning curve quicken. And that's what I saw when I broke down the Falcons defense. I saw Terry hired a defensive coordinator who he knew well from New Orleans, Ryan Nielsen, who was a co-coordinator with New Orleans, but he hits the ground running with Fontno and the way they want to build their defense. He brought three players with him this offseason. two defensive linemen, a middle linebacker, Caden Ellis.

All are playing. All are playing well. So that helps with the transfer of a reforming defense. They kind of built it around two guys that were there already in Grady Jared and A.J. Terrell, the corner, both really good players. They went and signed a couple guys for depth. They brought some guys up off the practice squad that they believed in. They had made a deal for a Starbucks for Jeff Aku to the corner, who was a former third pick in the draft from Detroit who had fell out of favor there. Now, he's been heard. He hasn't played yet, so he doesn't

even factor into this analysis yet. But I was just impressed by how quickly they transformed this in one offseason. And again, it tells me, if you play your cards right, and if you have conviction for evaluations and have any business sense of how to acquire players, it's one thing to evaluate them. Then you got to acquire them. I thought Atlanta did a great job in rebuilding this defense kind of overnight and changed the way I feel about them. Now, it's early. We were only into this two weeks, but I think this defense is one of the better defenses right now in the league. Yeah, and they, you know, they did play Carolina who doesn't have weapons. Yep, I get it. Green Bay, who has talent but was missing their back and, you know, it does have the young quarterback.

So I think the next couple games they're going to have at Detroit, at Jacksonville, you know, if they can pick up a win in one of those or their defense is really representative and they play, you know, keep them under control, and it'll be kind of an interesting good next test for them, won't it? just to yeah without a doubt see and really the basis for my breakdown was i just like the style and the direction that and the timing of which they went after this rebuild and put these parts together if you can have familiar people with you when you go from franchise to franchise as long as they're very competent it it it it quickens the learning curve and the results on on the the next job you know when a total rebuild can happen a lot quicker if you can do that Like I said, I brought guys with me when I would go from one team to another, and it just helped. Plus, it helped institute a defense that these players had played in already, these three guys from the Saints.

So that helps in their perspective rooms as well to spread the word. You know, it's like a backup quarterback in a room that knows the offense, but he never plays. He helps the teaching part. Well, these guys can do that on defense, too. And I think the Falcons did a really good job in identifying this and then acquiring. Green. Good, good stuff there. That column also includes some notes on offensive line around the league. A quick look at Baltimore and some good things from Todd Monkin and Lamar Jackson there. The Ravens are doing that offense. And a couple of opinions on good and bad coaching jobs around the league. So make sure you check that out on the athletic.

Kyle, Randy, we talked about the prime time game Thursday night. Monday night was so tough. You know, the Nick Chubb knee injury, which I'm glad they didn't. I saw a snapshot of it. I wasn't trying to look at it, but it came up on my feed. I just hate to see that. Just a terrible knee injury reminded me if you go way back to that Napoleon McCallum entry where the knee just goes the wrong direction and you just, ah, horrific. I mean, this is a player in Nick Chubb. If you look at his production to this point in his career,

he's one of the few current running backs who had a chance to be like a Hall of Fame type trajectory, you know, because it's running back by committee a lot of places. There just aren't that many guys that are special. special, but he was kind of one of them, wasn't he? Without a doubt. And really just piggybacking on what you said, I have not seen the play. I kind of have refused to watch it, and I was watching the whole game. And I just happened to have my head turned away when it happened. But as soon as I heard the reaction of others, I said, nope, I don't need to see this. And I have not watched it, and I won't. I just hate that

kind of stuff. It's bad, obviously for him. It's bad for his career. It's bad for the Browns. just when you thought you might have a gauge, like you said, on where the Browns were headed and what was going to happen, it was terrible. As long as we're talking about the Browns, and I think you and I hit on this a little bit, the Deshawn Watson stuff to me is perplexing. And that's only going to get more prevalent now without Chubb, just because his game is different. Yeah, I kind of wanted to ask you because, you know, they really, you know, the Watson deal was so abrupt and so counter-tub. to the way they'd set up their team, right? So all of a sudden he comes in, and because of his money and the expectations,

this sort of has to become his team. No doubt. But Chubb is the best player by far. He's better than Watson. But now that Chubb is not going to be able to play, the Brown's transition around Deshaun Watson becomes interesting to me, purely from a football standpoint,

in a different way. because I think Chubb is the type of player that is so good that you need to gear things around them, right? That and the offensive line. I mean, their offensive line's played really well. They've already lost Conklin the right tackle, but they haven't missed the beat, to be honest with you. They've played really good up front. And yes, the combination of that is really their bell cow, right? That's what they have to hang their hat on.

Yeah, so I'm just, I guess I'm, you know, the Deshaunne Watson thing has been so underwhelming on the field so far. how does it change, I guess, with Chubb going out? And what do you just feel when you watch them? Well, I have felt since watching him, and we all know he was rusty last year, so I won't even talk about that. But when you watch where he is as a player this year, it's somewhat like the Russell Wilson deal. I mean, it's, he kind of lost his mojo.

And they've made no plays downfield. He obviously can still make plays with his legs. That's part of it. We know from the past, though, that Stefansky's offense is a little bit of a grab bag when it comes to the passing game because he does want to play action. He does want to play it tight to the vest. I just don't know that I've seen Watson's decision-making and his accuracy come up to speed from the old Deshaun Watson from where we've seen him in Houston. And those are the two, I guess, the perplexing part of it for me is he's kind of throwing the ball all over the place. He's not accurate at all.

and I thought his decision-making was very inconsistent as well. Here's a veteran player that has been around there for over a year now. It's not like he should be learning this offense. He's been there plenty of time to be comfortable now. I think he should have this offense down, but it still looks like it's very elementary. They've been bailed out by the running game and by the O line, and I think we'll continue to lean on that.

But at some point, Deshaun's got to make some plays, and they've got to open up that scheme to throw the ball down field. So that's the part I'm not sure of yet. So think of this contrast. We saw this week that Patrick Mahomes did another new contract. He's got this 10-year deal, a true partnership between a player and organization that came about organically the right way. Hey, scout and develop this guy, have a conviction, make a move, have a great plan to develop him behind Alex Smith. And then when you get him, you got the coach with the coaching.

is really solid and you've got a plan for him and he's just the right guy all the way around. You feel great entering into a 10-year relationship. And you know what? There's so much trust that hey, if after a few years he's not at the top of the heap for average salary, you know what, we'll make it good by him. He doesn't have to worry about it. And likewise, at the end of the deal, you know, we can add all these years because he's not going to want to try to get out. We're not playing any games. This is like a real marriage, right, that came about the right way, and it's for life. And then you contrast that with Cleveland, where I don't even know that Deshaun Watson wanted to go there. He was going to, they basically put a deal on the table he couldn't refuse. It was just a money

play. Wasn't he going to go to Atlanta or wherever? Yes. He had already told them he was out, and that's why they came up with this deal, remember? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So can you imagine, imagine entering into a marriage and you say, you know what, I'm not going to do it. I've met somebody else. And then the other party in the marriage says, hey, I just got a great lake house. And then you go, you know what? I'm in. That's great. Summers at the lake is something I've always wanted to do. Well, that's not going to be a great marriage, right? This is not a natural organic pairing to me. And it's not a perfect fit at all with the coaches. And I think you're plugging. him in sort of because you have to. And then he's had all kinds of the bad stuff off the field that

certainly has to have taken away some of his, you know, mental bandwidth, you know, and credibility in the building, obviously. Credibility. Yeah, credibility and everywhere and just how everyone feels about everything. So this is a much different challenge. And then, you know, as talented as as Deshaun Watson is, he's not Patrick Mahomes either. So this is very much a, work in progress where I'm almost like if you had to bet of whether this thing works or not you're more inclined to bet that it won't right yeah I probably if I was squeezed I just always go back to that offensive line and being able to give them a chance and and I think they'll be able to run the ball still without chub but I just don't know if the passing game will ever advance to where it's

beyond remedial it's just not it's not there and Cooper okay nice player some of these other receivers they have, nice players. I don't see any really anybody stretch in the field. I don't see any Sean McVeigh type design where we're going to do this in order to open up that. I just don't see that. So I guess time will tell. I think the defense is a little better. We'll see. But it's just a lot of unknown still for me with Cleveland. I'll be honest with you. Yeah. Yeah. We mentioned some of these else around the league, some of these highly drafted or young quarterbacks that are going to miss games, right. Bryce Young, Anthony Richardson is not playing. CJ Stroud is on a pitch count of some sort.

But I might have missed one in there too. I don't know if I know. Those are the ones. But one of the backup quarterback situation, staying in the AFC North, shifting from Cleveland to Cincinnati, is in the news this week because Joe Burrow, the quarterback for the Bengals, may not be able to play against the Rams on Monday night. And so on their team, they have Jake Browning as the backup. and then Will Greer was on the practice squad, but guess what? He's going to sign with the New England Patriots on their full roster.

So I wanted to ask you, Randy, as the GM, about backup quarterback plans based on how good or bad your starter is or his injury history. You were very high, for example, this offseason on what Miami did. They had Tua, Tungavala, who they're excited about, who they think is a good player, but he's had durability issues, so they signed Mike White, somebody who you think as they could win some games with and would be better than a backup quarterback. Not everybody, Randy, can have Steve Young behind Joe Montana, right? It's a hard thing to do.

But if you were the Bengals, everyone loves their quarterback, tier one all the way, but the one thing you worry about is his durability. And then he had an injury in camp too. Jake Browning is the number two. Will Greer gets signed away? What's the plan for having a backup for a team that should be a playoff caliber team. Well, it's, it's, there's history on both sides. And I would be very uncomfortable if I was Cincinnati if, if I knew that Joe Brill was was on thin ice to play anymore.

I mean, we all know Jake Browning, being Seattle guys, great kid, played really good with the Husky, started as a freshman, I believe, has been accolated everywhere he's been. I just think there's a lot of physical limitations when you go to the next level. And we all know, we just talked about how the NFL kind of shrinks everything down. And I don't know that Jake's arm strength and everything else is going to make him successful, especially like you said with a playoff ready team, one that is thinking they're going to the Super Bowl. So that would make me nervous. We see around the league teams prioritize, backup money, totally different. I said for years, remember when Indianapolis was in their heyday, we said forever if Peyton Manning gets hurt, this is a 500 team. Because they really

weren't set up with depth. And guess what? He got hurt. And I think they won two games. So they were worse than 500. So that's that's the commitment that I would make for a backup quarterback. I think it's a must to commit that kind of money. I like that way of thinking. I would want to pay money for a backup. You see what Denver did this year in hedging their bet with Russell Wilson. They paid... You're at Stidham. Stidham good money who ended up finishing the season last year as a starter for Vegas. different teams handle it different. I would not sleep good at night if I hadn't acquired a good backup and actually paid him.

And I'll just give one example. I think this is the case at any level. I don't care if you're in high school, college, XFL, NFL, NFL, it's all based on two guys. I think you've got to have two. One year, two years back in the XFL when we were drafting our team in Seattle, we picked quarterbacks for the first two picks, knowing only one guy is going to play. So you might think that's completely idiotic. Why would you do that?

I just didn't want to put everything else at risk if the quarterback goes down. That's what you're doing. You're putting the rest of the franchise at risk. And in a way, that's what Cincinnati has done, in my opinion. They put everything else at risk if they have to play Jake Browning for a period of time. I just don't know if I could do that. I hope that makes sense. It does.

Yeah, and they're in a tough spot. Yeah, a tough spot. Oh and two start to the season, playing an upstart, Rams, team that's very well coached. It's going to know exactly what they do. Obviously, Sean McVeigh, you know, there. So that will be very interesting to watch. Hey, I wanted to ask, before we get to the GM notebook, which is overflowing as usual, I haven't dumped in the, before we get to the picks where Randy's undefeated this year, 4-0-1, he had to correct me because I actually was wrong on one of his. I'm getting a little nervous with all the flowers you're throwing me during this podcast, Mike,

I feel like I'm going to get slapped upside the head here at some point, but I appreciate your Kind words. Yeah, yeah. So I did want to talk to you, though, hey, Washington commanders, 2 and 0, 27 and a half points per game. So you have been a big believer in what Eric B. Enemy is bringing to the commanders in terms of no nonsense accountability, a willingness to make people uncomfortable, to sort of pierce the friends and family culture that you're talking about existing there during the

Ron Rivera regime. I did see a graphic and had to chuckle in my social media feed the other day showing Washington 27 and a half points per game with Bienomi, the Chiefs or whatever, you know, 18 without him. And I laughed a little because even though we're big fans of what BNM is bringing there, we're not falling for a two-game sample size. So I went into the archives at True Media today, and I was like, hey, when's the last time Washington averaged 27.5 points per game

through two games? And guess what? It was way back in 2022. Last season. Really? Exact same average. Carson Wentz to Terry McLaurin, 49-yard touchdown versus Jacksonville in week one,

Wentz to Dotson, 40-yard touchdown against Detroit in week two. So that surprised me a little bit that they actually did this last year. That being said, let's throw away stat boy stuff. And let's just ask you, as a GM, what do your eyes tell you? What is your experience to tell you about the job Eric Bianneymy is doing, Sam Howell, a two-and-o start that wasn't really expected by Washington? What do you think?

I think they've done a great job. I'll be honest with you. I think the first thing is when Riverboat Ron was very critical of the style that Biena Me was bringing on board, and I think we talked about it. I think he has to welcome that. I would think he'll back that up by saying Eric has done a great job because I think it's exactly what they needed. They needed accountability there.

They didn't need the nice friends and family plan, like we said. And I think he's done a really good job. Plus, I think Sam Howell has actually been way better than any of us. thought. The instincts, the anticipation, the processing are what I always come back to, and the kid has done that well, and I think he can improve on it. You may indeed end up with a Brock Purdy type dude at the end of all this. We made fun of Rivera for saying that before. I don't know if he knew when he said it, but he knows it now. He may be right. He's also the guy that said, I watch practice and never knew how good this kid was. So he kind of was indictment on himself.

He was a big, he was a big Carson Winst fan too. So, you know, it's not like he's betting a thousand, they may have, they may be onto something here though. Yeah, I totally agree. And I think the defense has always been talented. Let's see if we can play complimentary football against really good teams and kind of see where it goes this next couple, three weeks. Yeah, they're just an interesting team to me. I'll definitely be watching them.

All right, GM Notebook, what you got in there? I'll try to be somewhat brief because I've been way too long-winded on this pod, and I apologize. The one thing I did want to bring to light is, and you know this, and you may know more about this than I do, the NFL put forth a grievance this week, or, I guess it came out a week ago against the NFL PA for suggesting that running backs kind of a kind of take a knee and make sure they're 100% healthy before they return to action. And the NFL took issue with it.

They seem to think that's a little bit of a concerted effort to try to raise leverage of these running backs contracts. As we all know, that was an offseason hot button where running backs are devalued. And I think that by filing this grievance, and I have never seen a grievance like this, I don't know if you have, Mike, but I haven't. No. Where they came after the NFLPA and have a pretty good case in the amount of reading I've done on it against what they're saying is, hey, you cannot hold withhold services. You cannot withhold your ability to come perform and use that as leverage to get better contracts.

So I just thought that was interesting. I felt like it might get lumped into a bigger picture in that I've always said the one loose. that's available now to holdouts in the NFL is this hold in situation that some teams have been okay with I think at some point the NFL is going to do away with that loophole as well and so this this kind of takes me to the Jonathan Taylor deal was he a hold in was he withholding services is he hurt is he not hurt I know he's on pump now but that whole that whole situation might dovetail into this grievance and they may be able to solve all these issues with one big ball.

That's my only point. Yeah, absolutely. Good one. What do you got next? The other one I was talking about that has happened this week is just a personnel move. As some of us know, the Rams traded Cam Acres this week to the Vikings for really what was a trumped-up waiver claim. You know, it was a conditional six for a conditional seventh. I mean, just give him a Starbucks card and move on.

A lot was made of it. A lot of prognostications as to what he is, what he is. I thought, what are we really getting in Cam Acres? So I went back and looked at them some tape. I don't know what they're getting. I think the, and this is just my opinion, I think the Vikings have two backs that are better than him. That's what I was going to say.

Yeah, something that's happened with McVeigh and him that has made that relationship icy from a year ago. So there's something that we don't know there that might change the way we feel about it. But in Cam Acres, I saw a nifty kind of small guy who runs to daylight, not a behind the pads guy, not a guy that really wants to run inside. So a little bit of a different, you know, one-back spatial awareness type back, different than what the Vikings have. Obviously, I know he played for Kevin O'Connell before. So there's some familiarity there that the

Vikings get with another back. But I'll, and, you know, I like the Vikings back. So I just, I was unimpressed with this deal even being made. Obviously, there was no market for him or they would have got two Starbucks cards instead of one. That's all that was available. The first thing I thought was, hey, when Dalvin Cook left, you know, we were like, you know, hey, this Alexander Madison looks pretty good, but don't sleep on Ty Chandler. Yeah. I'm questioning what is Kevin O'Connell thinking here?

Because they don't have a run game. They don't have a real desire, looks like, to run the ball a ton. And what's their e-val of the running back? I think these are things to kind of evaluate as a season goes along. Yeah, something's a little bit of mist to me about it. I agree. That's why I threw it in here. My last thing was, and I don't want to pick on the Raiders or be too negative,

but as you know, the Raiders' offense has been leaking oil, taking on water. They ran 39 plays against Buffalo last week, and when a team runs 30-some plays, it always puts up a red flag for me, like, what the heck are they doing? What's going on? But then when you really think about the Raiders offense, they've got Devante Adams, who's one of the best receivers in the league. They have Josh Jacobs who led the league in rushing last year. Offensive line, very shaky. Systematically, I don't know about the scheme.

But I just thought it was kind of a, what is going on? 39 plays. Have you heard anything about hangups? I know we're trying to change the culture still in Vegas. And it's been kind of a rocky road for Josh with his people skills, kind of rubbing people the wrong way at times. But there's obviously something missing with the. offense and you know how I feel about the side of the ball where the head coach has his expertise involved that that seems like quite a mess there yeah I wasn't sure you know

the Denver game even they won it they scored 17 points so they've got 17 points in week one 10 points in week two and they're going to play Pittsburgh in the next game so something to watch anyway yeah yeah I would like to see some progress from them too I yeah I think the thing that's bailing them out is they're one-on-one so it's taking a little bit of the heat and attention away and then you think okay you go at Buffalo hey that's a tough for anybody, but 39 plays. Not good on offense. So we'll see on that.

Let's get to the picks because you're on fire with the pick. Season to date, Sando 3 and 2. Randy, this is 3 and 2. How about those Giants last week? Just hanging me out to dry against Arizona. Come on, guys. And Randy, 4-0-1. 4-0-1.

Last week, Randy won on Pittsburgh, taken 2.5 points against Cleveland. he won on Green Bay, barely taking a point and a half, and you needed that half point. My gosh. But a lame push with the Saints and Panthers where you had the Saints and you got, you had to give three points, right? You had to give three points with the Saints. And Carolina scores late when it's meaningless. That's better for you.

Total soft, wasted time drive that cost me that one. So I'm a little bitter over that one. I was two and one. I was a little nervous there. I actually texted Randy when Denver was way up on Washington because I had Washington and gay with the three and a half and Randy texted back, it's early man, this is not, watched the whole game and I ended up getting that one right. Also won on Pittsburgh and then like I said, I had the Giants and gave forward Arizona and

you know, they almost did it but couldn't quite do it. So last week, Randy, you love the picks. You love the games that were available. This week I sense maybe not so much. I might lose my NFL card, Mike. don't like the games this week at all. I just, I think there's a, and you know better than I do, you're more of a numbers guy. Look at this point spreads on some of these games. I know, 12 and a half. 12, 11, 9, 8 and a half. Wait a second. That's a lot of points in the NFL where parity rules.

And so I don't know. I found a couple games that I kind of like that I'd begrudgingly will pick. I'm going to take Green Bay at home as a one point, one and a half point favored over the Saints. I think the Saints have won a couple games not playing well. This is the home opener for the Packers who are kind of licking their wounds after the Falcons lost. I think Green Bay gets the running back back. He practiced yesterday. I think that's a huge. I think you're going to win on that one, yeah?

I hope you're right. And I'll take that. And the other one I'm kind of going out on a limb on, but I'm going to take Tampa getting five points against the Eagles. I was impressed with Tampa's defense last week, and I know it was against Chicago, but I think I told you on a phone call earlier this week, I had forgot what a force V-to-Vevaia was and how that run defense can really knock people for a loop. And they obviously did that against Chicago,

obviously doing against the Eagles is a totally different task. But they're getting five points. I think Baker might be able to get them a few points, and the Eagles have struggled on offense already. So I just think the style, which with the Eagles want to play might be conducive to the Bucks pushing back a little bit with their defense. Yeah. It's funny.

I went to visit the Bucks this off season and I know some of the guys there. And when I came in, when I said, you're going to pick us 33rd like everybody else? You know, they realized there's a transition period here. And they've had to get their, you know, they've had some issues with the cap, obviously coming out of the Tom Brady era. And the point that I made coming into the season, why I was a little skeptical in Tampa was more, hey, you have a first time offensive coordinator and Dave Canals. He may be great, but he's its first time doing it.

And then to Baker-Mayfield, I thought, could be anything. Could be good, could be bad, but I needed to see it. And so I thought it was a legitimate, you know, a legitimate reason to not be all in on Tampa. But I think the counter to that is, hey, look, Tom Brady wasn't at the top of his game last year anyway. So it's not like they're coming off of peak Tom Brady. They came off of a descending Tom Brady. So if they can get a little bit of an ascending again, Mayfield, the gap may not be as big as it would be just, our perception. So we'll see. This is a great test for them. I think the structure of Todd Bulls defense covering up the guys on the inside of the offensive line, you know, to stop the run is interesting against Philly. So this could be one of those games where, hey, Philly may have to

pass and hit some of those big plays that they were hitting last year. So I like that one. I'm going to pick three games. I'll probably be wrong. But Randy, I feel like you are. Wait, wait a second. You may be right, Mike. You may be 3 and O and everything will change. But you are abandoning me on this one. No, I'm not abandoning you. You are on this one. I'm going to tell you the game.

Okay, go ahead. Because all off season, all off season, Mueller's been right there to say, hey, you know what? The Patriots are the fourth best team in the AFC East. I said, what about after Rogers got hurt? Nope, they still are. Well, guess what? We can have the jets at home getting two and a half points against the Patriots.

And where's Mueller? He put his head down into the gopher hole. We don't see Mueller. He's not out there on the Jets this week at all. The Pats have won 14 straight times against the Jets. I mean, if that streak is forever, right? You get two and a half points, but it's... Well, I understand.

Yeah. Yeah, so I feel like, I feel obligated just to the listeners of this show. I'm not against it. I'm not against... I'm not confident in it. I'm telling me that, but I'm just saying, because I think, I think in you raised this last week, some Jets coaching question marks are really real.

And their offense and all of that. And so we're going to see. But I just felt obligated like, hey, if we're going to say that money where the mouth is, I'll take the Jets in two and a half and we'll see. Maybe we're wrong. If New England wins against the Jets, then the Jets are the fourth best team in that division, right? We have to admit that. We'll know where they are after three weeks for sure.

So I'm going to also take Miami and I'm going to give six and a half against Denver. They're at home. It's an early season game in Miami. I like it. Yep, I like it. Denver has played a couple of close games where, like, it's amazing. Like, their offensive stats aren't that bad. I just feel like it's House of Cardsy a little bit.

I just, I don't feel like the quarterback's playing great. I think Miami's a much more synced up team. And by the way, the Denver defense has not been great. So I will take Miami on that one. The other one I'm going to do here, probably against my better judgment, but I'm going to take the Chargers and a point against Minnesota. I'm interested in your thoughts on this one, just because I do think the Chargers are the better team,

and I think they've kind of maybe been as good or a better team in their first two games, and it didn't go their way, and they have to own that, they're accountable to that. Look, Brannis Daly deserves the criticism, but he's getting their defense hasn't turned the corner, all of that. I just feel like two teams that are O and two, to me the Chargers are enough better than the Viking. that if they can't win and I get a point, then maybe the issues are even worse than I thought.

What do you think about that one? Yeah, I don't disagree with that. I think this is the kind of game that over the last few years, the Chargers have found a way to go win, a game like this on the road. Seems like they have one or two games every year that nobody gives them a chance, and they go on the road and do it, much like Seattle does.

Seattle did that last week by going on the road and beat in Detroit. Oh, my gosh, no tackles? Yeah. I mean, that's just the way. they are and the Chargers have that in them. They can go back there and I agree with you. I think they have better players than Minnesota. I don't know about a better team, but they have better players so they can go back there and beat Minnesota for sure. So it's definitely a loser leave town match. Someone's coming away 0 and 3, right? It might be me this week. I might be 03 on my picks.

I wasn't insinuating that but I hear it. Look, I'm glad that we just pick them on the show and I'm not throwing a bunch of real money out there. But I think it's kind of, it's fun. This is a fun thing to do. And so we'll see. I had my different reasons on these. We'll leave it at that. And we'll leave the podcast at that, right, Randy? Sounds good, buddy. Always enjoy it. Looking forward to a great weekend of football. Yeah, me too. I always leave us on this note that you can find Randy's work and my work at The Athletic. Like I said, go to the app, search our names in the author search at the top real fast to see what we've been up to. I'll have my pick six column on Monday. You can look for that.

Randy, your next column will be... Wednesday as part of the cover seven. Absolutely. So check those out. You can find Randy on Twitter at Randy Mueller underscore. You can find me there at Sano NFL. And we will talk to everybody next week. Thank you.

This was the Athletic Football Show's Football GM podcast.