The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Football GM: The Rams are rolling right now, the Packers rocking with Jordan Love and the Eagles not quite in panic mode yet

Episode Date: December 23, 2023

In this week's edition of the Football GM Mike and Randy start their discussion on how the Rams are clicking on all cylinders. Then the discussion shifts to a look at a name that hasn't been thrown around in the upcoming NFL draft. After that the guys discuss the Packers and where they are right now with Jordan Love. And then we stay in the NFC to discuss whether or not it's panic time for the Eagles. Lastly, we end the discussion with the GM Notebook and Week 16 picks. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

the athletic football shows, Football GM podcast. Welcome everybody to the Football GM podcast, Mike Sando here, along with the GM, Randy Mueller. Randy, how you doing? Doing great, Mike, ready for Christmas, ready for the holidays, great time of year, a little more NFL. A few more of our days get filled up, but I love it, and that's why we're here, right?

Yeah, what do you think about that? So there's three NFL games on Christmas Day, and I think there's five NBA. I mean, the floodgates have opened here a little bit. There will be some in some houses who don't like that. I know that for a fact, but there are some of us that will, and I think you're an NBA guy too, right? I like the NBA. I will watch it. I don't know if I'll be able to squeeze it in between NFL games, except that I am not a peacock subscriber. So when does that come into play?

Isn't there a game? Is it this weekend that's only on peacock? I'm bad on that, but fortunately and unfortunately, I think my wife has subscribed us to every possible thing that exists. So I'm usually covered on these things. I don't know, though. Yeah, that the stuff does come into play. I feel like I've got, I did make the switch to YouTube TV this year. You're on YouTube TV, right? Yeah, yeah, I got that.

No problem. I got that. This is off the beaten path, but you're talking about all these subscriptions to all these streaming. Aren't we kind of re-engineering cable TV? Yeah. Is that the whole idea? It's completely re-engineering it, right, from the backwards in.

But what's happening now is people are like, you know what, I think we could bundle some of these things and save some money. You're seeing these companies come together. We're going to be right back to where we were before. All of a sudden, it's the college transfer portal. It's everything's on the board. You can do anything, you know. I tell you what I love, though, to me, just having these games in HD is so great.

How did you guys used to watch the film back in the projector days, Randy? Could you even see anything? I didn't mean the dates like that. How did we watch the film win? Well, I'm saying this. I can remember when we went to HD TV in about the mid-2000s. about 2005, and I was beat reporter at the time. And you couldn't record in, you couldn't record in that resolution.

So you couldn't, even if it was broadcast that, I would record the game when I got home. I'd want to watch it. You couldn't see it. So to me, being able to have all of the film, even the films in HD now, it's amazing. You can see a lot. I wondered how they used to do it back in the day when the Seahawks and Tom Furmstad was coming back with the 16 millimeter films, where Al Davis snipped out three of the key plays of the, the game. I mean, could you even see anything? The experts could because I became the guy who

everybody brought their film to glue it back together. In those days, when you'd watch the film, when you'd watch the film, you'd take it back in four, six times, and it melts through it. The light melted through it because it's on a projector. So I was the fixer. I've always been the fixer. They just bring it to me and I'd fix it up. Most coaches can do it too, but anybody in the scouting end would just say, hey, Randy, fix this for me, so I became an expert on fixing, not videotape, fixing film per se. You know, that's great to know, because I think we have some old family films from, you know,

from 50 years ago. 8mm? Yeah, they're sitting in a box here. I'm going to come over. I'm going to have you look at these and get these together for me. I appreciate that. Appreciate you offering your services there. Here's what I'm going to tell you to do.

Put them in that box, like you just said, and then take them somewhere where they can make you a CD. Everybody does it. We did it 30 years ago. Oh, yeah. I've done some of that stuff too. Yeah. But you're right.

It is a, it's a way to keep it that, you know, Yeah. Most fought in the early days. I like all the, I like the general TV set up. I like the games. I like being able to watch them in the high quality. I got one of those OLED TVs, you know, it's great.

And I could see everything. I just like staring at it. Even if there's not even anything good on, I just like to look at it. So unless I'm a Saints fan in the game last night, Randy. Rams 30, Saints 22. It wasn't that close. And we'll get to the Saints.

Yeah. Yeah. We'll get to the Saints in a minute. But there's a lot of buzz around the Rams right now. And if the playoffs started today, the Rams would visit the Lions, which would be delicious, because we'd have Stafford against Gough, we'd have Gough against McVeigh. And really, Randy, I think I know the answer, but who would you rather be right now? The Lions are the Rams in that matchup, amazing.

Well, I would rather be the Rams for sure, because I think all the pressure is on Detroit. And I agree with you. The Rams are a little bit of a spoiler, much like Buffalo is in the AFC, where I don't know a lot of teams that are going to want to play them. I think people actually fear McVeigh. I think they fear his scheme. And I think they obviously fear Matthew Stafford. Because you can say whatever you want about Stafford. And it always ends with, well, if you can keep him upright or well, if you can keep him healthy.

He's throwing the ball really good, maybe as good as anybody in the league right now. And he's got weapons on the perimeter. We know that. We've seen that. So, yeah, I would rather be the Rams. I think the telecast did right last night by spotlighting Les Sneed as well, because I think Les has done a really good job of drafting in mid to late rounds. And that's a, that's an art, that's a skill.

And I think the Rams have done, and a lot of it's because they've had to. So they've kept players that maybe some wouldn't, but they've had to be patient and they've had to hit on those guys. And I think for the most part, the Rams have built around some cap issues to find a way to still be relevant. But I agree with you. I think it'd be fascinating if the Rams go to Detroit and have to play. because I think Detroit is kind of, I don't want to say leaking oil, but they're still learning how to deal with prosperity, adversity, all the things that young teams do, including the coach.

And I think the Rams would go in there with house money, throw caution to the wind, and just spin it all over the place. And now, with this Williams kid at running back, they can run the ball now. He runs downhill as good as anybody in the league right now. So I like where the Rams are for sure. That's what I'm noticing is I feel like when Sean McVeigh got Matthew Stafford, he went a little overboard with the dropback pass game, fell in love with it, and he got his quarterback hurt, you know, and they probably didn't have, you know, Pukinaku and some of the pieces that they have now.

The running back might have been a little bit more in flux, but I feel like the lessons McVeigh learned last year when he kind of had his existential crisis and was thinking about retiring or walking away and all that, I think he's back. I think he's fully engaged. And I think with this run game, he's just sort of recalibrated his equilibrium in everything. In his coaching, in his life, we know he's married and has a child now. And then in his run game, balance, this is a balanced Sean McVeatomy.

Like, he's on it. And that run game is a huge component for Matthew Stafford. How many times do we see Matthew Stafford sort of have to do too much when he was Detroit or even last year with the Rams. He's got he looks great. He looks healthy. He looks vibrant, doesn't he? Yeah, 100%. I totally agree. I think the part that I kind of jumped out at me last night in all of this chaos that we now see with the Steelers and their receiver room. Did you see the blocking? And it was pointed out on the telecast as well. The blocking that the Rams receivers do, and we highlighted it early on in the season with Nakua as part of, this is a bigger dude, right? He will

block. He'll put his body on people. All of their receivers are asked to be involved in the run game, and I think you see the results of that. And yes, that is a credit to a reconnected, a recommitted, I think you're right, in Sean McVeigh. Just seems like he's having fun again. And people need to understand, this job is hard, man. Being a head coach is hard. Being a gym is really hard. And it is a weekly grind with the world kind of trying to pick you apart all day, every day. And we all have years like that. We all have times like that where you just say, shit, I don't know if I want to do this. I know the money's great. And everybody says, oh, I would do it. The guy's getting paid 10 million dollars, whatever. It's different when you're in that chair because it is a burden. And I think sometimes

the burden gets heavy. We're all human. And I'm not making excuses for guys to not give effort or or take a sabbatical. That's not yet. Right, right. I'm just saying, I understand when we have lulls in a lot of our, you know, ways we do things and our processes. And maybe that's what happened to I agree with you. I think he's back. I think they are exciting to watch. And I think whoever they play in the playoffs, it's going to be a really tough out. The Rams are going to be a tough out. You know, what you said there about the, you know, the Steelers' receivers issues and then, you know, the contrast to how the Rams receivers plays. To play wide receiver for Sean McFey's offense, you have to block. That's always been a thing. Cooper Cup is a 200-pound guy, 6-2, you know, a bigger guy. And remember Robert Woods was there. You know, it wasn't like Robert Woods was the. absolute best at this or that of as a route runner or a deep threat, but he blocked. He really fit their system. I think culturally that is an awesome thing because as you know, when you watch you watch to see the business decisions that are and are not made, right, the way people tackle.

Like I thought, I thought one of the big changes of why Seattle won the game against the Eagles was suddenly their corners wanted to tackle. And they've had to bench Tyreek Willand because they don't tackle. He wouldn't tackle. But that, to me, those types of things, are the vital signs of your program, right? How you're, how you tackle in the secondary, how you block it wide receiver. Isn't that a big indicator? Well, it's a giant indicator. And that's how you, you see these groups, and I think we're seeing it in Pittsburgh now,

groups of divas. And it just makes you appreciate that there's a lot that goes into playing football. It's not all what everybody just sees, targets, catches, all that stuff. There's a lot of things that are involved. And it makes you appreciate it because I've said for years, culture is not generated by those of us who are the bosses, it's generated by the players in that locker room and they have to feel it and they police each other.

That's one of my issues about Pittsburgh is you can try to blame Tomlin, you can try to blame the coaches, and there's probably some blame to go all around. But the players have to, they have to police their own locker room. If they can't get their own people in line, because players who don't buy into the culture

usually get cold out at some point because they can't survive in their own locker room, not because some GM or a coach comes down on them, it's because the locker room won't take it. Football is interesting like that, Mike. It is a different sport, I think, than basketball or baseball, because the players can police their own better than any other sport. It's just the way it is. They can police their own physically, because if you're not in mentally, you might get hurt. They may come after you in practice. They may come after you in a game.

It's, they police themselves more so than any other sports. So I think it's definitely the epitome of a team effort to build culture, but it's got to start with guys that get it and their DNA in the locker room. Well, let's flip that around to the Saints because I don't know if you saw Derek Carr's last interception, but he was real slow to get up. Did you see that? Slow to get up. But on the replay, it didn't really look like he was lit up, if you know what I mean.

Yeah. That stood out to me in the game for them and what they've put into him at that position. And then there's three times they have fourth down and plus territory, don't get it, throwing short of the sticks on a fourth and whatever it was, seven. and I don't like the look of that. And we've talked about it. Certainly it was a subject earlier this season in another primetime game the Saints had,

but their DNA and their culture, we don't necessarily see those same things that we're talking about with the Rams around the perimeter or around just the way the heart of the way they play, right? Yeah, I would agree with that. I think we've seen it not only in the Thursday night game, but we've seen it throughout the season, and especially when it comes to Derek Carr.

And we saw it someone who's with the Raiders. Oh, yeah. It's the bottom line, though. And I agree with you. I struggled to watch it. I struggle to condone it. But when it is the leader or the so-called leader of your team, it is harder to police. But here's an example of we saw what Sean Peyton was able to do in Denver with Russell Wilson.

In a lot of the same issues that their locker room couldn't police Russell Wilson's ego, couldn't police his presence, his false. Making too much money and just his platform and all of that. It's going to be a different solve, I think, for the New Orleans guys, because, but much in the same way, you're talking about Derek Carr who has a no trade clause, fully no trade, and 30 million guaranteed next year. He's probably going to be on their team, but it surely wouldn't stop me from putting

together a plan or at least a succession plan. And that has to be known, I think, by all involved. And if he doesn't buy in, he can always go elsewhere, that's fine. He's going to give up some money, which I don't think at the end of the day he'll do. Although when he was questioned with the Raiders, remember, he took his ball and went home. He got benched. He didn't hang around for any part of that. So I don't know how it'll go.

I'm with you, though. I don't like the optics. I don't like really what they're doing offensively, but that's a story for another day. I just think they do have some cultural issues. when one, your best player's question, and two, your quarterback, there may be some locker room issues with him. That's all. Yeah, your top two paid guys probably just off the top of my head on offense would be

Kamara, probably the running back and Derek Carr. And I don't know if through style of play you're getting the visceral component of your team that you necessarily want. And you talked about that. They should be in the market for tight ends and try to do something. something to get physical in the run game. But there's just a lack. Unless this is what they want to be.

Yeah, maybe this is what they want to be offensively. It wouldn't be what I would want to be. Yeah. Yeah. They're going to have to make some changes to vision, to their vision, a more focused vision on offense. Just my opinion. Yeah, absolutely.

So that'll be an interesting, you know, that's going to be a very interesting place. I think that division, the NFC, South, whoever loses that division doesn't win it is going to have some tough questions to answer. Obviously, Frank Reich already had to answer. answer those, yeah. Could all of those coaches be changed at some point this year? I know somebody's got to win the division, but it's probably going to be with a sub 500 record. We've already seen Carolina make a change. Could there be changes in the hole? Has that ever happened before? Yeah, I kind of, yeah, exactly.

I thought, yes, I would have, like a week ago, I would say maybe even likely, I think if Tampa Bay is going to go to Green Bay and win and is going to, you know, now if Tampa Bay loses out, that changes it, but I don't know if they feel like a loseout team to me. They've had a success story with Baker Mayfield, and I think they've been, they're of those teams. They're probably the one that most outsiders had finishing last in the division, or maybe third,

but a lot of people had Carolina above them. I feel like they have outperformed my expectations a little bit while the other ones have fallen short. Do you buy that? I guess to a point. I don't think they're a deep playoff run by any means, but I guess you can measure progress a lot of different ways. I know if they play Jacksonville this week,

and they could easily lose that game. I don't know what their last two games hold for them, but I assume there's some division games in there at some point. I don't know if they've played New Orleans twice yet. It seems like they played them early on, I know, and beat them in New Orleans. Yeah, I got Tampa right here. So Tampa's going to play home Jacksonville, home Saints at Carolina.

So to me, I see a two and one finish. Yeah. I think they get two of those. I think they're Jacksonville could be 50-50. Saints could be 60-40, and then it's 75-25 for Carolina. I think they get two wins, and that'll put them at 9 and 8, winning the vision in the playoffs, probably losing the first round. Yeah, they run it back.

Because I sort of have liked what they've done a little bit offensively. To me, Baker Mayfield is one of the few sort of upswing guys in the league, you know? Yeah, I totally agree. I mean, you've got to give them credit going to Lambo last week, just in one week alone, having a perfect passer rating. First time it's ever been done at Lambo, I. There's been a few quarterbacks play at Lambo, hasn't there? There's been a couple, a couple good ones.

It's been around a while. Well, no one of them have ever done what Baker did, I don't think so. That's amazing. Let's stay on the quarterback theme, Randy, because you sneaked in, you sneaked in a little column this week. The headline here is 10 NFL draft prospects to watch in bowl games, colon, J.J. McCarthy's. Big opportunity.

I love this column because I love this column because I, I am not a draft neck. I feel like there's so much, for me, Randy, not being an evaluator and having to rely on other people who do the evaluation, there's so much out there that I've just sort of learned to tune it out until kind of, you know, we get closer to the draft and maybe more of the teams have looked at everybody. And I have enough contacts with people that I can kind of get a lay at the land. But this is what I love about having you here, because it's like having somebody from a team

who's looking at it. and we can just go to you directly during the season. And so along those lines, my son and a few of those friends would like to thank you. The Dynasty Fantasy League owners who took Ty Chandler off of your preseason recommendation would like to thank you. The people that picked up Isaiah likely, who no one was talking about, would like to thank you. And now I would like to thank you for bringing up some possibilities with J.J. McCarthy

being, if he enters the draft, maybe a lot higher. I've heard talk of him, but not in the realm you talked about. I'm going to let you take it away here, but just a little snippet from your column. The film does not lie, and his skill set might challenge for the best in this year's class, even perhaps, with Caleb Williams. Take it away. Well, I'm not ready to pronounce J.J. McCarthy is the threat to Caleb Williams' throne of number one pick. I get it.

Right now, yeah. Yeah, right this minute. I think we're, we've got to put him in the conversation, but I'll add a couple caveats. One, if the evaluation is 100%, I would say in, I can only speak for myself, I'm about 60% into it. There's still some things that I think he'll pass, but I don't know intangibles, I don't know mental, I don't know the stuff that NFL scouts will know that will be raped through every fine tooth comb will have their say. and that'll all be part of it.

What I said in the column was that I think if JJ has a good playoff season in which there's two games left, we know Michigan is up first. Michigan plays Alabama. Let me just remind folks, that's the best college coach in the history of college as far as I'm concerned, and maybe the best defensive coach that this guy will have faced any place, any time. So my point was if he shows well against Alabama, in the playoff game, a Nick Saban coach defense, it's going to get a lot of NFL types running to the film room. And the reason the evaluation isn't necessarily complete, even in NFL film

rooms, is because this guy's a redshirt sophomore, three years around. As you know, coaches, some GMs don't even dig in until late in the season. Coaches for sure won't dig until after their season. So this is a name that you don't hear banning around because nobody really knows yet. No one's put the spotlight on him. Nobody's really dove in yet. I see a few media projections of this guy maybe be a first round pick, but I don't think anybody's been bold enough to really dive in. And the other thing is, he plays in an offense that it's not archaic, but they run the ball. I mean, they played Penn State and he had 11 passes. So I'm not looking at that film. I'm not looking at Bowling Green way through three interceptions. Whatever, you can have those. I'm looking at recent

history of which the biggest game of his career will be against Alabama. So I just see a kid that skill set-wise, he can run, he's got a rocket for an arm, he's accurate, he can make stuff out of nothing. I'll clean it up for the PG version. He sent, in my opinion, he has vision for the whole field. He can beat you from the pocket. You know how I am with that. They process, they ask of him to process enough information to where, hmm, I'm thinking, this guy kind of gets it, right? Not kind of. That's disrespectful. He gets it.

He understands. He finds and locates targets. The one thing about the college game that I don't know if most fans realize is we all know that the field is different. But when you look at a quarterback, the hashes are way wider. So he's going to have to make some harder throws in college than he will in the pros. Because in the pros, you're basically snapping every snap from the middle of the field. In college, the hashes are wide.

So if you're on the right hash and throw a medium distance out to the left side, that ball goes a long ways. This guy zips it like Bert Jones, right? I mean, it is on the road. Oh, I love Bert Jones reference. Everybody look up Bert Jones, 1976 MVP, Baltimore Colts. He is on, he's throw things on a rope, and it made me say, wow, a couple times. And not that that's the sole judge for me, but I'll watch a lot of tape on a lot of players,

and I find myself kind of ho-humming through a lot of it. But when I even stop myself and write down wow in my notes, that gets my attention. I saw a lot with Caleb Williams. One of the reasons I'm not big on Drake May is I really didn't see any wows from Drake May. And again, I'm not saying Drake May won't be a good pro. He might. He's just not my flavor. I guess all I'm saying is, and I'm long-winded and getting here, is that I like the J.J. McCarthy flavor with what I know right now.

So take it for what it's worth. tune into the playoff games. I think some teams are going to have a really hard decision. And if I see it, I know NFL teams see it, because I happen to be around those NFL teams before. And I think they will see the same thing. And it'll be exciting. It'll be exciting.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And we have talked about maybe being a little overrated in some of the early discussions, you know, nothing against him. But you're looking at certain things. And the traits you're looking at with, Jay J.J. McCarthy appeal to you in a manner that makes you say, hmm, okay, if this checks out, we could be really comfortable going in that direction.

And then, like you said, who knows, once we get through the process deeper, especially if he plays well against really good competition. And that's a big caveat. He's got to do that. He's got to play well in these playoff games because he's a sophomore. He's a redshirt sophomore. But the fact that he has, he's completing 74% of his passes this year, Mike. And in his career, he's got 46 touchdowns and 11 picks.

There's enough body of work there to, to comb. through. But you're also talking about a kid that can't even order a beer yet. He's not 21 and won't be till mid-January. So all of those are pluses in my mind, all of them. And I think he's kind of a secret. And I think NFL people, if they ever listen to this podcast, and I don't know why they would, but if they do, they might be cringing that we're even talking about him. Because I think this is one of those cases where if I can just keep him under the radar and keep people from talking about him, I might be able to sneak and get him in the top 10 somewhere. I just don't think that's going to be real at the end of the day. I think they're going to have to be a little richer

up the food chain to get a guy like McCarthy. Yeah, you know, he could have bought alcohol in Idaho years ago. Remember, it used to be 19. 19 was the limit. You could drive a credit. Oh, is that right? I didn't know that. I mean, I know you knew that. They didn't car anybody back then anyway, so you were okay. Well, I was gray at 22, so I looked apart probably at 19 growing up in Idaho. Were you great? How old? How old? No, no. No, I was just going to say. My grandpa was, I had a grandpa like that who was like gray from age 30. Luckily, I'm not. But yeah. When I went to the Saints, when I went to the Saints and I was 38, I think at the time. I had started to turn gray a little bit. When I left the Saints, I was fully gray. That's right. Cove, you want to get gray hair a couple

years in the GM chair. We'll do that to you, won't it? And you guys went to turn it around right away. Went to the playoffs. It's a grind. Like I said earlier, it's a grind. Trust me. I get it. Hey, great column, by the way. There's other nuggets in there so we can get to some of those as we get further along in the process. But be sure to check that out. It's a great first look, at least for me, some of the prospects and what Randy sees and what he thinks is important. I wrote this week about Jordan Love and the Packers situation with him. Of course, we're well aware of the comparisons to Aaron Rogers in terms of how the Packers have gone about trying to find their next quarterback.

And some of the comparisons are pretty stunning in terms of, statistical production and where they rank at the same points in their careers. Yet when Aaron Rogers was at this exact point in his third season, or in his first season as the starter, 2008, the Packers wasted no time. They did a deal with him, I think, in the seventh or eighth week of the season, made him a top five paid quarterback between Peyton Manning and Tom Brady. And this year, the Packers could have done something on a higher level with Jordan

love and have not. There's some limitations for them because they did rework his deal in May. I think they could, they could, if they're going to, if they're going to change the cap number on it, I think in 2024, they would, they would have to wait until May of next year. But they could, they could have still done something this year and they may still do something after the season. And I know you have advocated doing that.

What do you think about where they're at with him, don't have a great. team record. He's shown some flashes, a lot of young guys around him. Where are you at on Jordan Love? I think the points you've made are all valid, and I would confirm this by saying, I think what the Packers have done to this date with him is right on. I think everybody's in line, at least with what my line of thinking would be. Let's don't forget, this guy is a first year starter. It is a little different in deciding to pay Aaron Rogers, 10 million, and comparing that to paying Jordan Love 40 plus million. So it's different. The money's different. So I can see the hesitation. You want to make sure, I get it. There's no coming back from, you know, overcommitting that kind of dollars.

Let's just say, there it is, but it definitely sets your franchise back. So they want to make sure if you're wrong. Yes. The different world for me is that, you know, He presents challenges because it's the first season he's had to experience ups, downs. The plane won't be smooth. But I think I've seen enough of his skill set to know that all the physical stuff are there. I love the fact that he seems to be even keel. I like that in my quarterback. I don't see a lot of erratic or a ton of emotion, good or bad.

I've always said that Jalen Hertz, Dak Prescott, those guys have perfect intangibles for the job. I think Jordan is a little bit like that. I think his skill level, I think the talent is there. His skill level is a work in progress. But to find all the talent that you want, I think will be challenging elsewhere. So I think the Packers' options will be limited. And I think eventually they're going to have to marry themselves to Jordan Love. What I'd like to see, and I would do this as a GM, I want to see how can we play this

cap-wise to be the most advantageous for us to continue to build. As a GM, you're always going to add to your team. You're always going to want to get better. We could be 13 and 4, and I'm still going to want to tweak and spend some and change some things. And let's try to set this up, if we can, to our benefit. Now, we all know that signing a guy to a long-term deal allows you to plan, and those numbers then are in pen, not in pencil, and allows you to build your team around those numbers. So that's the caveat to start with. I think you can even tweak it more. But I think he's checked a lot of boxes to where I wouldn't be opposed to having this

conversation start in the offseason. And if it carries into the first part of next year, so be it. One thing, if you're in the building, you probably know if this is your, you should know more if this is your guy. Like when they're watching Aaron Rogers in practice and all of that, Ted Thompson and those guys are probably like, we got a guy, right? They sort of can make the move confidently. So whatever the Packers do,

they're going to have a little bit more knowledge. I do think it's interesting, though. The decision makers there have never really been in a situation to miss on a quarterback. Everything's worked out great. And so there could be this feeling that, hey, we got our next guy. Let's go. Let's do it. Now, one of the things that's interesting to me philosophically in sort of encouraging the Packers,

hey, it's okay to maybe do a deal. You also felt it was okay for the Giants to do the Daniel Jones contract. It doesn't mean you thought Daniel Jones was the greatest quarterback. but one of the points you made was, look, you're not going to find somebody better, most likely, and this is your guy. And like you said, let's start to build and plan around them. And then you also don't want to sort of get into that situation where you're franchise tagging them and then it freezes some of your assets, right, and you've got a big number.

And then you've got a, then feelings get involved. We kind of saw that with Lamar Jackson. It can get a little dicey. And suddenly you're trying to work your way out of it. But that being said, I got two kind of questions on that. Once you do the deal with a Daniel Jones and a Jordan Love where you commit, how, if at all, does that affect how much you're still looking for a quarterback? Looking to get better, because I'll give an example like the Chiefs could have been happy with Alex Smith.

They were a playoff team, a winning team, and maybe his skill sets different than Jordan loves, but maybe it's similar to Daniel Jones, I don't know. How do you bounce out? Are you still looking? Are you still drafting a, you know, a Hennon Hooker from Tennessee or somebody if he's available in the third round? How do you do that? Well, I think it's subjective for one thing.

I think it depends on the player who you may or may not be trying to replace. And I think it depends on the skill set of what you're looking for. I think a guy like Pat Mahomes, it was evident his skill set was rare. It was also evident that he was, to me, going to be an advancement of the Alex Smith, you know, positioning as your quarterback. So that one was a little bit easier for me. There are, I don't want to say every other year, but every three or four years, there may be a guy like that where you can say this clearly is what we're looking for.

Now we've got to mold him. I actually think that's what the Packers saw three years ago. They saw the loose arm of Jordan Love. They saw his ability to make throws off platform to create. gate things and throws that 80% of the guys in the league can't make. So when you see that, Caleb Williams, maybe J.J. McCarthy, maybe the LSU kid, these type of talents or set of talents then have to be molded into playing at a high skill level.

That's the challenge. You just want to grab one of those guys. And I agree with what Green Bay has always said and the people that have come and gone from Green Bay have always said. the best time to look for a quarterback is when you don't need one. And there's a lot of pluses to that. There's also a downside in that when you get a quarterback, you don't play him for three years, and now you're stuck with this decision having only seen him play one year. So there's pros and cons to both of that. But for them, the downside was two years of MVP Rogers. Well, shoot, we'll take that.

You know, that worked out. Otherwise, they would have gone to Jordan Love earlier if Rogers had been hurt or just wasn't playing good, you know. And I've said this and people are going to criticize me. I don't really care. I think they benefited from drafting Jordan Love because I think it up the game of Aaron Rogers who had not played like an MVP those two years prior to that. And they had just said, hey, we got it. We got a look to the future. So that's, they got him on point. They got him kind of they kind of got him on point. He was surly about it, but he played good. So the other point I want to make on the contract with regard to Green Bay and how they should view it, Mike, is for me, this is when cap guys can be really valuable. And I don't know the cap people or,

or the person at Green Bay, but if I was Brian Goodecustin and wanted help, this is where I would go. I would want that cap guy to run all the models that what if? What if we do this and how does this fit with the rest of our roster from a cap standpoint? I want to know, what if we took a hit of $50 million next year? And I know they don't have that, so it's not real, but we might create it for one year so that we don't have in three years a $60 million cap or a 50, you know, a giant cap hit next year. The traditional quarterback deals always end with 65 million, 68 million at the end of it. What if we can work it to where we used to do this initially when we had to eat up cap room, we would front load contracts so that we would have room on the back end to add more players to it.

So all I'm saying is I don't know that Green Bay can do this, but I would love to have the cap guys with whatever team I was with run all these models, and they have this capability because we had it, gosh, when I was the GM of the Dolphins, we had it. So I know these other teams have it now. You can run these roster and depth chart what ifs with a proposed contract in place to give you an idea of where we would be five years from now if we'd made this kind of a deal with Jordan Love. I'd want to see those numbers to see if something, we couldn't figure out something that's unique and different because we have a quarterback back in the situation he's in. I don't know if that makes sense. No, it does. It does. And Russ Ball does their contract. Yeah, Russ was with the Saints. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right after you, I think. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. No one well. Good. What he does. Yes. Yes. So the second part of this with the cap to me is, okay, if we're going to do the deal with Daniel Jones, partly because we don't want to get into the franchise tag thing and just have that. Well, let's look how much cap space Daniel Jones contract is going to consume in the future. The next year it's 47, then it's 41, then it's 58. It's like they're franchise tagging them every year now. And I feel like if I'm them, this is an interesting part to me. Because you would sit earlier in the year, the Giants don't regret doing the Daniel Jones deal.

You see that early in the year. But I sort of feel like if I were them, I'd be kind of strategizing as much to get out of it as I would be to build around them. How do you feel about that? Do you think that would you change your view of not regretting having done that deal with him? Well, I think it's, one, you have to always have outs if you can build those in. So I totally agree. It's not like Daniel Jones deal was a long-term deal. And when you said earlier, you probably can't find it.

They exhausted trying to find better. Trust me, they exhausted it. So in Brian Dayball's mind, in Joe Shane's mind, they couldn't find better. So there wasn't a doubt. There was no crack there. This was the best we can do. So let's make the best deal we can. And I think in their case, they did this for the shortest amount of time.

And don't forget, the dynamic of not tag him was also based on we could tag Barclay. So they had really come up with their two best players on offense at that time and had to solve the Rubik's Cube. And I think they did it. But I do think you have to have an exit plan in mind and always be looking for a better option. So I know this, and there'll be a lot of Jersey, New York people that say, well, we found him. It's Tommy DeVito or whatever. Yeah, yeah. That's not going to happen. That's not the option. They're not going to do that. So we can't say we'd rather have this guy than Daniel Jones because that's, to me, that's silly.

And I don't think that's going to happen. But they're going to find another option. Trust me, the Giants, I know Joe Shane well enough to know. He's been grinding on this. He's going to find a way to find a longer term option or they're going to get Daniel to play better, one of the two. They're not going to be sitting here three years from now and not know what they're going to do at quarterback. Yeah, absolutely. And they're going to have a higher. draft pick this year, so they may be in the mix to make some considerations, right? Yep. Okay, let's shift gears. Let's stay in the NFC East. One of the things that, one of the randyisms on the show is every team is three games away from a mutiny at all times. You feel that in the GM chair, don't you? Yeah, we definitely feel it. Trust me. So the Eagles have had,

until recently, a pretty great season. I mean, they went to the Super Bowl last year and they came back. I think they were 10 and 1. You say, hey, they've solved the post-Super Bowl lost hangover. Well, guess what? That hangover has hit. They have lost their last three games, 42 to 19 to the 49ers, 33, 13 to Dallas, 20 to 17 to Seattle, who had lost four in a row themselves. They've demoted their defensive coordinator. Then they watched Drew Locke go 92 yards for the winning touchdown against their new coordinator on defense. Jalen Hertz is talking about the team isn't committed enough. there's a lot of stuff going on here. What do you make of it, Randy?

Panic time? Well, I think the Eagles had been spoiled. I don't think they had run into a skid like this. And I firmly believe that, like you mentioned, every team is about three games away from a good mutiny. And guess what? They're experiencing the rest of the way the world lives. And you have to be able to deal with adversity, prosperity,

like we say on here a million times. The Eagles have had a ton of change. They have not played well. in my opinion all year long. They had a lot of things fall their way. I think the Eagles are at a point where they have to win games a certain way. And come back, cardiac kids, throwing the ball all over the field in the fourth quarter, that's not their way.

They control games up front. They control the pace of games as well as anybody. But they've had a lot of change in the positions that can control all this stuff. We've said it, new offensive coordinator since last year, new defensive coordinator. that's been changed again. It's not like Nick Siriani's got a whole pocket of cards that he can pull out from experience and play either. I'm sure if you asked him, he can tell you he can do some things different. Howie, Roseman, the GM, has been around a little longer, but you know Howie and I have a lot of respect for him. Sometimes he's willing to roll the dice. I used to tell, in fact,

they used to tell Mickey this all the time on our years together for many. Mickey Loomis, yeah. Yeah, he'd say, you don't want to gamble. I said, I have no problem gambling on this decision. I'll tape my ankles whenever we need to. I just don't want to tape them every day. And it seems like the Eagles have gambled. They've done a lot of things. They've changed a lot with confidence that they'll make it work no matter what. I think they've just made a couple decisions here that may set them back temporarily.

And they have to live in a world that the rest of the NFL is usually living in on a year-to-year basis. So I'm not ready to panic to answer your question. I'm not ready to hit the eject button or to change a bunch of things. stuff, but let's face it, they've got to come out and control games, and they've got to be able to finish games a certain way. And that's what I would look for them to try to do. Let's face it, I love Jalen Hertz. Most of our listeners probably do too. He's not a guy that's going to bring you back passing in a two-minute, you know, Matthew Stafford way, or Pat Mahomes way, or Josh Allen way. That's just not what he does.

And their big playability has been compromised, especially the last month. They haven't done things like they have in the past. So I'm sure they miss Shane Steichen. He held people accountable different than Brian Johnson might. So I guess my long-winded answer is just there's been a lot of change. And they've got to, I think, steady the ship here because there's when you hear Jalen Hertz say, like you said, we need better commitment. I just think there was a little panic in his voice there. He didn't really know what to say.

I don't think he's criticizing everybody else. I just think he's at a little loss like the rest of them as to what to do to fix the problems. I feel like I've seen this movie before. And we throw a lot of flowers to the Eagles personnel for, oh, best GM in the league and all of that. And so then what happens is when it doesn't live up to it, then the coaches, you know, end up paying the price. And I feel like that's happening now with the Sean Dessai thing. when to be fair to everybody, and I'm not saying he did a great or bad job coordinating,

but we know they've got Achilles heel on defense. We know their back seven's not very good, right? They're compromised at linebacker. They haven't put a bunch of resources into that, and they're having trouble stopping people. So, especially on third downs, yeah. Especially on third downs. So, but I do feel like they had a ton of staff turnover.

Now they're already, they're already kind of effectively fired. in the season during that. And it's like, okay, what's going to be the fix out of this? Because I don't, you know, maybe they make a deep playoff for him, but I'm not really seeing it. I think it's going to be, the season's going to end a little disappointing for them. And there's going to be, it'll be interesting to me to see what types of changes

are forced. And I bet you they have to do with the coaching staff. I just would hate to see them keep making changes during the season. So I concur with everything you're saying. Yeah. And maybe you agree with what I'm saying. just think the changes need to come to a stop and we need to do better everybody needs to do better in the roles at their end let's don't make any more heads roll we've already changed a lot of things we

i think you point out exactly on defense what their problems are um they have some guys that can't run like they used to and got exposed and especially when it comes to sub packages we've got to do better at that how about this we put them in positions where they don't get run by and we do some things a little different maybe we have to play more press to keep people from running by We have to get our hands on them quicker so that they don't hit side pocket throws like D.K. Metcalfe and Drew Locke did last week. So there's enough to work on internally that we don't need to doubt ourselves and keep making changes. I agree with that. Yeah.

Yep. Hey, are you all in on Buffalo again here? What do you think? They've beaten the chiefs, cowboys, everything good in Orchard Park? I believe that Buffalo is a team nobody wants to play. I think they've galvanized themselves a little bit behind the criticism of the coach. I don't know how real that is. it's working temporarily. I think the first time they hit a skid, we may see some of the fingers

come back to start pointing it at McDermott. I just think that's the way that's going to go with him and his personality. So he may have to always operate as if this is us against the world. And that's fine. But I do think you've got to give Joe Brady some credit for what he's doing. I loved Josh Allen's comment after the game last week when he said, I feel like I just did a class project and got a and I didn't do anything, had no input in the class project at all. That's an awesome quote. He completed seven passes. So absolutely love it.

I think Buffalo's going to be a hard out. I really do. I mean, look at who they beat the last two weeks. They don't have any fear of these good teams. They know they can do it, just a matter if they can pull it off, especially if they're going to run the ball like they did with James Cook last week. Yes. And I think multiple things can be true here.

We did think that Ken Dorsey was scapegoated by McDermott. the defense was really the problem. But that doesn't mean that Joe Brady hasn't done some good things. 100%. Maybe has done, and maybe they could be better off right now, certainly the way that they played with being able to run the ball, loved the Josh Allen sort of self-aware quote. I just like that a lot.

Now, battle being said, I think they're a similar team that they've been, and I think the problem they will get will be the same. I think their problem is when it's a close game. and I think that they mismanaged the end of the Kansas City game, and they screwed up the clock bad, and that would have been the death-nale game if it wasn't for, if officials were not so good at calling the offensive off-sides,

which everybody always wants to have called all the time, and screaming for years. Can we guys, these guys line up right? It should be a point of emphasis. It really should. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that call let them off the hook for issues that I think are still there. So when they're rolling, when they're rolling, they can be in anybody by a lot.

But they're going to be down the stretch or in the playoffs at some point. They're going to be in those games again. And if they can get over the hump then and not have to be bailed out by incredible, you know, by a call or something like that, they will have cleared a hurdle. Otherwise, I think that they are kind of what they've been through this whole time, a tough team to play. They're tough. But they go in ebbs and flows.

and they have three or four games where they're not turning it over, and we think they're amazing. And then they have three or four games where they're turning it over all over the place. I just don't think that you change your personality forever. And so when's it coming back? When's that going to happen again? How do they react then is sort of what I want to see. Yeah, I agree with you.

I also think they're a team that builds and feeds off their own confidence or not. And when they're confident, they play better. And that comes from the quarterback and that gunslinger mentality, when he's running over people and doing things that nobody else can do, they all feed off of that. So that's, I hope, not going to change. He just has to be fairly cautious with some of his attempts to make big plays. This is not a super talented team on the perimeter. I know we talk about Diggs.

If you ask me, Coach, I don't think Diggs has had a great year. I see Diggs is making a few drops. I don't like the body language at times. And he's become a little bit of an excuse maker. I think he's a good player. Don't get me wrong. I just don't think he's having a phenomenal year. And that perimeter crew around him probably needs to be massaged because of it.

So these are things that will be taken care of any offseason. But what they have, they have talent to beat anybody. So that being said, Buffalo, if they get in, has just as good a chance as anybody, I think, to ride it to the end. Hey, when they sign that receiver or draft them next off season, I'll be checking all the social media accounts of Diggs to see how supportive he is of that. I'm sure he would welcome someone else to come in and get some touches, don't you think? Yeah, that'll go over like a lead balloon. Yeah, we'll see what the shelf life is there. It'll be a delicate situation for sure.

They're a little bit of a delicate team, but good for them the last couple weeks because it really could have gone the other way, and you do have to give them credit for the way that they've played, loved it against Dallas last week, just really took it to them. Sorry, Cowboy fans, but that was an awesome game for them. And they should be able to do. 49 runs, pushing them all over the field. It's impressive. And the style in which they did it.

by just imposing their will. Yeah. It was definitely revealing of what is possible for them. Yep, absolutely. Hey, let's dive into the GM notebook, and then we'll talk about, well, before we get into the picks, we'll preview a couple of these games, Dallas, Miami, Baltimore, San Francisco. I think there's some interesting stuff there.

But let's get into the GM notebook first. Sure. There's a couple things that we haven't talked about yet that probably weren't bringing up. The biggest one for me that I saw during the week that I've tried to understand, and I'm not saying it's crazy, but I just don't really understand it, was the Jets activation of Aaron Rogers to their active roster.

I've tried to make sense of that, and maybe you can help me out. But those of you that don't know, the Jets activated him and gave him a spot on their 53. To do that, they had to release another player who they hoped to get back on their practice squad. They may have done that by the time this airs. The only thing that can make sense to me about doing this is that it does clear the decks for Aaron to practice full speed if that's what they choose for another three weeks or to the end of their season. Yeah, I mean, how many reps are you going to get them?

Yeah, I don't know. Maybe he runs the scout team the whole time. I don't know if we're trying to send a message of hope, more hope for next year, and that's why we're doing it. You're not going to play this guy. I've never seen a roster spot taken up at the end of a season by a player who you knew was not going to play. usually you are valuing those and I see other teams doing this you're valuing those roster spots

to bump up a guy that's been on your practice squad all year long that you can then control his rights and give him a little bone of three weeks and get his year of pension in so there's a lot of ways to use roster spots I just I don't understand why giving Rogers one makes a lot of sense but the only advantage I can see is he gets to practice for three weeks whatever that's worth if you see it can help me out that can be worth something I think it's mattered to him to have, be able to say he made it back, right? Remember he predicted to come back. I think he's been invested in that narrative. And then he runs, he's running their team. So kind of whatever he wants to do, if he wants to be active, that's probably, they're probably not going to sit down and

say, we want to get, you, we want to do this or that for this special teams guy or something, would be my guess. So there could be some value, though, in the, in some sort of practice component to it, I suppose. You would know that better than me, though. You're out of practice more than I have been. Would, I just can't envision. there'd be a lot of reps when you're trying to get ready for a game, you know, like we're going to have a side practice or something, right? He could throw on his own anyway. He could throw with a, what would he be allowed to do if he was not on the roster?

Could he throw with some of your receivers off to the side or no, he can't do anything? He would have had to do individual work only, and I don't believe he could do it as it within the full team at all. So that 21-day window when he could practice has expired. So this allows him to do whatever. He can run full 11-on-11, but I just didn't see a lot of value. that. I just thought, what are we trying to do here? And you're probably right. Maybe it was a personal goal of his to say he came back from this. I don't know why I'm suspicious of him having an agenda. I don't know why I just didn't make sense to me. And I feel for the practice squad guy that's

trying to get a year on his pension versus trying to take care of a diva quarterback who, you know, wants to do this or that to send some other message. I wanted to run scout. This week, your Sam Howell. Next week, you're Joe Flacco, and the week after that, your Bailey Zapi. Can you imitate these guys for us, Aaron? There you go. You have to throw left-handed. You have to throw left-handed. You have to do that. All right. What else you got in the notebook? One other note I had is we've heard and seen the Steelers issues this week, mainly coming from their wide receiver group again. Oh, yeah. This has been going on for several years in their receiver room. We've seen others, whether it was Deonte Johnson, whether it was Claypool, who they sent on his way.

It just seems to me like the concern here is an issue culturally. Tony O'Brown going back before that. Yeah, Tony O'Brown. I just think a lot of these, and we hit on some accountability issues earlier, that I just think the locker room needs to do something about it as much as anybody. But I did have one interesting idea. I hear analysts talk about what they should do with this, and everybody says this shouldn't happen.

Heinz Ward would never do this and they bring up great receivers from the past. I think there's one way to fix it. Hire Hines Ward as your receiver coach. He's free. He's a coach. And I know that because he spent time coaching the San Antonio team in the XFL. Maybe that's too easy. But I could sure make some sense of Hines Ward walking in the room and trying to sort it out.

Oh, my gosh. Wouldn't you love to see the film session when these guys are languishing around and not make an effort plays? Yeah. I mean, he might hurt somebody. He might, but it might be what they need. That's all I'm saying. I would love it. He's been used as an example of this would never happen.

Just hire him to oversee what they got going in that room. What's so funny about all this is that Mike Tomlin is a wide receiver. We think of them as defensive coach, but he was a college wide receiver. He broke into coaching as a receiver coach. So, you know, obviously he's coaching the whole team. He's not even a, he's not the play caller. He's coaching the whole team. And we perceive him to be this enforcer of culture, right?

That's one of his strengths on the team. and yet this is happening in the receiver room year after year after year, and you played wide receivers. So, yeah, I'm with you. They got to do something there. Anything else in the notebook? No, I think that's it. We talked a little bit about the Bears in previous segments here,

and they've got obviously some tough decisions to make. So we'll see how that shakes out. They've got a coach to decide, an OC to decide, a quarterback to decide on. There's some futures at stake here the next three weeks. I always said that let's have our vision for what we want to be on offense made from an organizational standpoint. And what do we want to do? And this really speaks to and about Kevin Warren, their president. He's got to decide what he views as what kind of an offense do we want to run. I said it's more complicated than just if we want Justin Fields or not. We've got, we've hired

Luke Getsey and I don't know him from from Adam, right? But he came from Green Bay, as you pointed out in one of our earlier calls to run a certain offense. Doesn't seem like they're running at now. Let's run what our coaches want to run and what our vision as an organization is. And let's use the quarterback that best suits that with his skill set. So nothing against fields. You know I've been a supporter of his from day one. I think the progress has been up and down, not all his fault. But I just think what kind of offense do we want to run? If the decision is Caleb Williams fits that skill set that we need better or somebody else, let's go with that route. Yeah. I love what you're saying because if you have Justin Fields, you do need to tailor it to him. That's what good coaching is.

But as we step back now and maybe have some other options, what you're saying is let's assess because look, let's face it, Justin Fields hasn't played well enough that we have to stick with him and his style of play. We have to now reassess and say, okay, how do we want to play? What's our brand of ball going to look like? And is there a different, better option than Justin Fields to do that? And no doubt about it. No doubt about it. Because it has been an uncomfortable fit. I think Luke Getsi was criticized correctly early on in the Justin Fields tenure because they were trying to run the Green Bay offense and it wasn't going to work with him. And then that's what Luke Getsy wants to run. That's what he's done to make his living. So that's

crazy too. Yeah. Yeah, it is. But the whole thing was just a little bit of a misfit from the beginning. But they also wanted to see if Justin Fields could do that. And he obviously, it wasn't a great fit early on. And there were other issues with their line and their weapons. But they've added a couple pieces. I kind of feel like just staying on this Chicago for one second. I feel like it's a really interesting job. If they were to make a change at head coach, I would find it to be a sneakly attractive place because of they've got some draft picks.

They've added a couple pieces in DJ Moore and Montez Sweat. You could say what you want about the sweat trade. Should they have done it? Should they have paid him? But guess what? He's a good player for them. and now with those picks and maybe being able to get the quarterback of your choice in the draft and be in Chicago a great football town with a really great tradition of football, that's kind of cool.

You know, Matt Eberflus doesn't want to give this thing up. No, there is no team that is better equipped to retool than the Chicago Bears. And some of that, you have to credit Ryan Poles for making a deal last year, although, you know, he did pass on C.J. Strout. The fact is they have tools with two top five picks. as we sit here right now, multiple picks still coming from other areas, from other teams. They have a lot of tools. They have a quarterback that's probably valuable to somebody else. So my point is there's a lot of tools that they can use to build this team. And you mentioned a great point. If it is a new coach, let's just take it one step further.

Kind of remember our earlier conversation. Let's say they did hire a Jim Harbaugh. who might you think he would want to push as his quarterback well jim harbock could bring in greg roman and get put justin fields over the top you're going to say j jay i don't think he's going to do that mike trust me i don't think that's going to bring in jj well i don't know who's going to bring in but i'm just we're we're playing fantasy world right and so yeah yeah my guess is that he he might want the one he's been coaching for the last three or four years so i don't know that'd be interesting just the just the topic for discuss down the road that's That would be interesting.

Yeah. Oh, you know Jim Harbaugh would love to coach the Bears. Oh, are you kidding? Yeah. Wow. Yeah. That's great. Good one.

Well, we were barely going to touch on that one in the GM notebook. It ended up being very interesting. So let's get to the super interesting. Maybe we can just skip the pick section then and just move on. Oh, my gosh. Well, we've had real hit and miss weeks where we're four and oh, then we're 0 and four. Maybe it's just been that type of season.

Or you know what? Maybe that's just the way picking against the spread is. And that's maybe why there's a lot. all those shiny buildings in Las Vegas, for sure, because it is hard to do with the point spread involved. But it's fun to do. And sometimes we look at these games, and even if you miss the spread, your feel was sort of correct that, okay, this team's going to play it close or whatever. Before we get into those, Dallas, Miami, let's hit that. What's interesting to you? That's a big game. Well, it's big for both teams. Obviously, the narrative around Dallas is they can't win on the road.

I got news for you. They could have played the game against Buffalo down here at the city park. A little town where I grew up in. They could have played it at Taj Mahal, wherever that is. They could have played it anywhere, right? I don't think the results would have mattered. So we can say they can't win on the road. That's for real. History shows it there's no evidence that they can, that's for sure.

But unless they tighten up what they do, especially on defense, and play things in a different matter that actually allows them to adjust, they're going to get lit up again. Miami, as you know, has explosive offense. But they also, when they were rolling, can run the ball. And so I think it's a fascinating side of the ball to look at is Dan Quinn versus Mike McDaniel. And the games that I, you know, I have no idea what's going to happen here. But this one has my attention because of that.

I think you know what you're going to get with DAC. You know what you're going to get. They're going to score some points on offense, Dallas is. I think the part that I don't know how the matchups are going to go yet is McDaniel against Quinn. And it's going to be fun. I love Fangio against Dallas. after Fangio sort of took Dallas to the woodshed a few years ago. I know it's a different offense, but our different coordinator with McCarthy.

The other thing about the Cowboys on the road, okay, they've been underdogs three times this year, the Cowboys, and those are the games they lost at San Francisco, at Philly, and at Buffalo. So like you said, like, I don't know that there's some magic trick to the home of road. It's just, hey, they weren't expected to win three of those, and they lost them. And that's just the way it goes when you go on the road against the game. Well, they kind of got beat down, so that takes a little bit of the emphasis of the narrative as well. Yeah.

They weren't close in 49-er game. They weren't close in the Buffalo game. Yeah. And I'll save Baltimore or San Francisco for the picks because I'm going to pick that game. What are you going to pick this week? Well, as you said, and I'll double down on it. Last week was a disaster for me. I'm a couple games under 500 now.

I'm going to pick a couple offbeat games for me this week. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And I was initially going to pick the Jaguars. They're getting three points against Tampa. And you pointed out to me, that they may be without their quarterback, I'm still going to pick the Jaguars.

I just feel like Jacksonville has more talent. I think they don't always play to that high skill level. I think their defense is kind of feeling itself right now, and I do think they can carry the day in the matchup with Tampa. So I like the points. I think if Tampa does win the game, it might be by not much. I think it will be a close game, so I'm going to take the three points and take the Jaguars.

I'm also going to take Green Bay at Carolina. I think last week's Carolina win for me was more of a indictment of where Atlanta was and how they played. I think Green Bay is desperate. They've got to pull out all stops. Obviously, the defensive coordinator is under duress, under scrutiny. I think Joe Berry will do better because of that. And I like them. Green Bay is a five-point favorite at Carolina.

I like that game. And I am going to pick a third. game and and and who third game not it's not on our sheet here this is sneaking one in what do you got i'm going to take the colts over atlanta the colts are two point underdogs i trust shane stuyken i just think him versus arthur smith for me is is is a good bet i like minchu over heineke and so as they say i'm going to live and die by the quarterbacks here and and i'm getting points so i'm going to take the colts as well i really like that one too i think that's good. I think it's a good pick. Now, Jacksonville, what's interesting to me about them is they've lost three in a row, Randy. I know the injury situation with Trevor Lawrence will factor into this, but this is a team that really had high expectations, and they're eight and six, and they're going to play Tampa, Carolina, Tennessee. So realistically, they could be a 10 and 17, which isn't the end of the world. But, you know, if you end up losing five of your final six and go quietly in the night in the first round, I think there's some questions asked there in the off season that could be interesting, right? I mean, I don't know that there's going to be any big changes.

but that would be disappointing, I think, from where they were last year. I agree. I just think they're more desperate because of all that. And I just think they're at a point now where they've got a bow up or shut up. And this is it. Yeah, that's what we got to do with our picks. We've got to bow up or shut up with these picks. And we would be shutting up pretty quick here if we have another week like last week.

But I think I'll take San Francisco and give the five and a half against Baltimore. I think they might run the ball on the Ravens. I thought it was interesting that the Rams were able to do that and kind of started out. I think they, didn't they run on the first nine plays of the game or something like that? I wonder if, you know, sometimes there's differences in the run schemes and how that works. Can San Francisco do that? I'm sort of saying that they can. What do you think about that game? I mean, obviously it's a great game. A lot of people see it as a Super Bowl preview.

I do like Baltimore's defense, but I'll be honest, I like San Francisco is better. So I'm with you. I think San Francisco wins the game. Just so many ways to beat you, and I think the run game really matters. And I say that, and I love what Lamar's doing. But I just think, you know, don't forget, Baltimore has lost the fast kid, the 34, the running back to an ACL last week. And he was the one guy that they had back there to me that gave them some extra juice. They don't have that now. And so I'm with you on the 49er pick.

And losing, you know, losing Mark Andrews. I mean, they've really lost, you know, a lot there. And so I think they're probably a little bit easier to defend. and, you know, as good as well as Lamar is even playing and making this transition to this offense, I don't know. I think this could be a game where he gets put in a little bit more of the obvious past situations.

I think he's better equipped to handle that than he has been in the past through the weaponry and probably his own maturation, but I don't think it's how you want to play against the 49ers. So we'll see, maybe Ravens can do that to Brock Purdy too, and we can say the same thing. But I'm going to go with the 49ers. I'll give the five and a half.

we'll see how that goes. I'm going to pick two other underdogs getting a lot of points. I think I'll take the Giants in 13 and a half at Philly. The Giants lost 22 to 16 final game of the season last year to Philly. And I'll just trust Wink Martindale to maybe contain the Philadelphia offense, which is its own worst enemy right now. I think they're just a little bit easier to defend. So the 13 and a half to me, it wouldn't surprise me in a division game

if the Eagles won by 10 or something like that and maybe the 13 and a half helps me, gets me over the top. What do you think? I don't know. I'm kind of waffling on that one. I'm not a Tommy DeVito guy to score many points, but I understand where they're at. I do think it's a lot of points. 13 and a half is a pretty good cushion at NFL levels.

I think at some point Philly's going to give a beating to somebody. I don't know if it's going to be these guys or not, but I just think at some point they're fixing to come out and reestablish themselves. So I don't know. I can see 13 and a half being a lot of points, though. I get you. But it is at Philly, and I'm with you on DeVito. I mean, I'm not buying any of that, but I just have to take 13 and a half in a division game.

The other one, you know, I could regret all of these picks. We both could. Last week. But I'm intrigued with, I'll take the Patriots in seven at Denver. I just think we have a couple coaches that are playing it close to the vest. You know, New England hung with Kansas City. They beat Pittsburgh by three. They lost to the Herbert Chargers, the Giants, Indian Washington, I think,

by a combined 16 points or something like that, you know, four games by 16. So I don't know that they're going to win the game, but it wouldn't surprise me if, you know, both coaches sort of trying to minimize mistakes, playing conservatively, really relying on turnovers from the other team to get anything going.

It wouldn't surprise me if each team turned it over a couple times and maybe gave short fields. And we ended up with a close game that maybe Denver wins it, but maybe the seven points gives me a chance to be okay. I'm with you on that. I think style of play matters a lot. And in this case, I think, and I mean, I spent time with Nick Saban. I know how he thinks. I think I know how Bill thinks. When they're defending a team whose impetus is in the box, in other words, running the ball, seven-man, eight-man boxes, they do really good at that. And that doesn't scare Belichick, didn't scare Sabin. That's the way Sean Payton has to play. And I just think that plays into what you're saying. It plays. It plays. into New England's strategy and their strength. So I wouldn't doubt seven points. I'm kind of with you there.

Yeah. And I'll add Indy plus two. And I like that one too. And you bring awareness to it, I think, is kiss of death for you. I'm going to pick that. What's going to happen is the Colts are going to win by one now. I've had a few of those. Yeah.

Yeah. But I do kind of like that as well. Now, Atlanta should be in a more desperate situation. but I just feel like I feel like they're a little broken right now. I agree. And I just like where Indy's going and sort of the mojo and the energy.

And I'm big on Stuyken too. I think he's done a great job. So that's where I'll go with those four picks. I think if I were to get all four right, I would go above 500 at least, but we know that ain't happening. You never know. We're due.

I'm going to say we're due at some point. That's what they... I mean, what the heck? Last week I had Chicago and three points and they're rolling and then I get a push out of it. I mean, come on. This gambling stuff is brutal. I'm glad we don't do it for a living.

I wonder I don't do it with real money. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, I wouldn't be able to afford the Internet service for using to record this thing. All right. You got anything else here? I'm going to hang it up and enjoy these games this weekend. Yeah, going to be great.

Okay, everybody, happy holidays to you. And Randy, likewise, we'll talk to everybody next week on the Football GM podcast. This was the athlete. Football Show's Football GM podcast.