The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Football GM: TNF recap, good start for C.J. Stroud, and the Jets leadership

Episode Date: September 30, 2023

Mike Sando and Randy Mueller recap the Lions Thursday night win over the Packers along with their thoughts on each team. A look at C.J. Stroud's start to the season. What the guys see in the Jets leadership. The Browns are looking better. And which of the four remaining winless teams will still be winless after Week 4? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

is the athletic football show's football GM podcast. Welcome everybody to the football GM podcast. Mike Sando here with the GM, Randy Mueller. How you doing, Randy? Doing great, Mike. A little bit of fall into Northwest, so I'm always looking forward to the weather cooling down, and we have that. It's legitimately crisp air and football weather, so fired up about it. I know. I've told you this before, but I like to go to high school games. I like to go to college games. So there's nothing better than a Friday night under the lights and I just like it when it gets cold. It kind of seems like football, you know? You know, it's funny. I've been going to high school games for years because my kids were playing. This is the first year they're not playing. They're both coaching. So it's a little bit of a different

perspective on going to high school games. I haven't gone as much this year as I have in the past, but I think we'll be going to one soon. It's fun to still watch the boys even when they're coaching. On the on the football front, non, and if I had to ask you, Mr. Gene, of the Seattle Sea Dragons of the XFL, there was some news this week with XFL and USFL, you know, merging. And I guess we don't really know all the details of all that, but I thought of you for sure. Yeah, no, I have no idea what's going on. Those discussions are way above my pay grade. I'll say that.

And I don't know how it's all going to work out. It was announced that the XFL and USFL were going to combine forces. So it'll be interesting to see how that works out. as you know, I'm a Seattle guy and the Sea Dragons are in Seattle. Thus, that was an easy commitment for me. So we'll see how it all shakes out at the end of the day. Absolutely. Yeah, a lot of stuff going on there and hopefully it works out for a stronger league or stronger situation and good opportunities for players to show off what they can do and a good place for NFL teams to look and see guys who get some experience, which has obviously been a needed thing

for a long time. So we'll see how that shakes out. We did have, with our new slot here later in the week, we do get to look at the Thursday night game in the rearview mirror. It's still fresh. Lions, 34 to 20 over the Packers. The first half of this game, Randy, I was looking through the archives to see how many times have the Packers been down, you know,

whatever, three touchdowns in a first half. And it had happened in 2018. Actually, Detroit was the team that was up by three touchdowns. in the first half. Aaron Rogers had suffered a concussion early in that game. It was the Mike McCarthy was out. Joe Philbin was leading the team, so certainly an odd special circumstance there. Before that, I had to go back to, I think, maybe the 06 season was the last time that the Packers at home had trailed by that much. And we know it's a new era in Green Bay with no Aaron Rogers. And we sort of felt that already. It was almost like it wasn't Rogers last year either.

He wasn't as good. He was heard. It just felt like it was kind of done. But as that, I guess it sunk into me a little bit more that it's a new era when that was in our face of Detroit, you know, being up by three touchdowns in the first half of the game. Man, that was different. Yeah, I think you're right. I think it had a total different feel and vibe, even for those of us watching on TV. It was, I'm not sure it was even as close as the score.

It seemed like total domination to me, especially up front, really on both sides of the ball, which I'll be honest, shocked me a little bit. I had studied the Packers' offensive line the week prior to, and I had thought their two fill-ins at left guard and left tackle had actually done a pretty good job in their game against the Saints. And they digressed big time, and I think Detroit just overwhelmed them in almost every way. And so that was a definitely different feel. I thought the whole Lambo experiment wasn't what I had ever seen. I didn't remember the games that you had referenced. But when you come out and lay an egg at home like that, and we've all been on teams and had teams that do that, it's a bad feeling.

And it's a worse loss than even the score indicates because it's just the mojo. Your guys feel like you can't get out of their own way. And that's hard to overcome. So we'll see what happens as far as we've talked about Matt LaFleur and his leadership ability being different when Aaron Rogers was there because early Aaron was still to face the team. As we're finding out in New York and we'll get to later in the show, there's really a void of leadership with Green Bay as well and who's going to step up in these tough times. And this is definitely a tough time for them. These seasons are long. Is it the end of their season?

No. And I get a kick out of people saying, well, the Packers are what we thought they were. They're two and two. Okay, whatever. it is a long grind still. It's a long grind. So we'll find out. But a lot of that is determined by leadership and how they respond to the adversity.

Yeah. I think the Packers are, even though LaFleur's been there and had success, it is a new era for him. So this is almost, it's not a new regime, but it's a new leadership challenge. Last night after the game, I was just looking through my social media feed. And, you know, that's obviously there's so much great wisdom on social media, wink, wink. but I thought Albert Breer had a really cool thing that he had posted on there. I'm just going to hit a little bit on the contrast of Dan Campbell and Matt LaFleur. Obviously, there's many ways to be a successful coach, and Matt LaFleur's record is outstanding,

albeit with Aaron Rogers. But I thought this was interesting. Albert had caught up to Pete Carroll after Seattle had gone into Detroit and kind of surprisingly won at Detroit. And this is what Pete Carroll said about Dan Campbell. He said, I love coaches that can affect the team like Coach Campbell has. He's changed this program. He's given them life and the mentality and the approach. I have tremendous respect for the guys that can get that done when it's obvious,

meaning it's obvious. You can see the results. The particular one is really hard, and you got to build and make it. He's done that. And so we take a lot out of the fact that we got them, meaning they won at Detroit. they're on the rise and they're flying and we're fortunate to get out of here. I thought the, you know, Aaron Rogers has been such an X-factor for so long.

It's just like no matter what Dan Campbell did, you wake up at a deficit when you're playing Green Bay because of that. I mean, it's such a huge advantage. But I could feel Dan Campbell and feel Detroit in this game. And so we'll see. Matt LaFleur was a little upset. after the game. He was chippy. I mean, he sort of pulled a Sean Peyton and kind of, you know, got mad at the questioner a little bit. I mean, it was like Pete Doherty was asking a perfectly fine question.

If Pete Doherty's been doing this for, you know, from the Green Bay media, he's been doing this. If he hasn't been doing it for 20 years, he's been doing it for 30 years. I mean, he's doing it forever. And Matt Lefleur, like, jumped him and said, that's a BS question. Like, he was showing a little bit of saltiness. I don't think it had anything to do with Pete. Probably, I wouldn't think. But where's his, identity? Where's his leadership? What's it going to look like when it's tough? Right? Yeah, no, that's exactly. We're saying the same thing. I agree. I think we've said it here on the show for the last couple of years. Coaches have a chance to define their teams when they can affect them, especially on

game day. Now, I think in your case, Dan Campbell has affected his team Monday through Sunday, every day. And that rebuild that they've done there with the new front office has been really reflective of where they're at. They started it two years ago and have come a long ways. But I think you're right. I think we're going to see in Matt Lefleur how he can affect his game. We're seeing coaches not have an effect on their team around the league. And that doesn't bode well at the end of the day because players want to be affected. They want the head coach to make a difference, either schematically or on game day in decision making, managing games, all that. Dan Campbell took a lot of heat for his bad clock management in the past. He's kind of overcome that a little bit now. So he has,

has a trend that's headed in the right direction. I don't think we have a trend yet for Matt Lefleur as to how he's going to react to this kind of stuff. And a huge thing is how you are up front, and the Detroit's done a good job building that offensive line, and that's kind of their edge. And we thought, you know, we expected better from Green Bay's offensive line. Obviously, David Bacdiar, is going on injury reserve, and who knows, he's out until next year. I mean, I don't know how much they can count on him. So there's a little bit of, uncertainty there up front for them, even though you liked what they'd seen earlier in the year. Maybe they get that back.

I think it's a one-game picture. And so we can't get too far down any road. I think there's some of this blame for the performance of the Packers in that, and I wrote this this week for the athletic, you've got to be able to stand prosperity as well. And they came back and beat the Saints in comeback fashion being down 17-0 last week. Then they had a short week to prepare for this one. I don't know how they prepared. I don't know how their practices were.

So I'm just saying prosperity is a thing. It's real in the NFL, just like adversity is. So they didn't do very good responding to the prosperity of beating the Saints last week. Let's see how they respond to adversity. And maybe some teams are just better at responding to one or the other. But eventually you're going to hit both if you're a decent team in the NFL. Absolutely. So we have back-to-back weeks, though, down 17-0, down 24 to 3.

That's interesting to me. And we'll see maybe it's nothing and maybe, hey, just two tough games. But I wouldn't say the Saints are any kind of juggernaut. And they're a fine team. They're just not amazing. So that's two games in a row at home. You've been down by a combined 41 to three score early in the games. You can't let that sort of thing.

It's already concerning. Yeah. It's already concerning. And I think they've got to learn from that as well. I just didn't feel like this team was ready for the fight for whatever reason. You know, maybe they were thinking about last week. Maybe they weren't. I don't know.

But however it was, they weren't ready for the fight. And your point is correct, it's two weeks in a row. Yep, it's two weeks in a row. So look, they're going to visit the Raiders in week five. You probably like their chances to be three in tow going on the by. They visit Denver home against the Vikings and Rams. So you could easily see this team sort of being maybe what they thought they were going to be a notch above 500. at the midpoint of the season.

Maybe we see some second half growth with Jordan Love, developing a rapport with Christian Watson, who hasn't been out there. And we move ahead. But I was thinking after that game, Randy, as the Lions fans were just about filling Lambo Field and chanting as the Lions players were being interviewed on the set, the Amazon set.

Wow. If the Packers had an owner, he would have been really ticked off. off by that. There might have been some uncomfortableness in the hallways the next morning around the facility. Maybe not so much without an owner, huh? Yeah, sometimes it can be an advantage. That's for darn sure. But I do think in this case, that's usually what we see from Packer fans when they're on the road. A little bit of a takeover of the home stadium because, as we know, they travel well. And a lot of their people do go places. And I thought it was really a reversal of fate to see the Detroit people. I mean, I don't find it surprising that they got there. I'm

surprised that they got the tickets. That's the big thing for me is how did, you got to be willed a ticket to a Green Bay Packer game sometimes, some years. And this looked like a lot of tickets that had filtered out of Packer fans' hands into Detroit fans. And that's shocking. It shows you, though, the excitement around Detroit. When they, when they played that Seattle game and they'd just beat in Kansas City, it was like a Super Bowl atmosphere. I mean, the fans were, or a playoff game atmosphere. The fans had ski masks on and Lions Colors, and it was a big party. So they lost that game. It was a tough setback, but now they've come back and really dominated Atlanta, which was a decent upstart team, and now they go to Green Bay and get sort of the win. They thought they were going to get

against Seattle, and their fans traveled. So that component of, you know, when a fan base is excited about its team. Now with the aftermarket ability, the easy ability to get aftermarket tickets through electronically. Yeah. Really makes it now if you're willing to pay, if you're a Green Bay fan there and you can make back, you pay for your season tickets or make a bunch of money

off of one game that's maybe on a Thursday night when your kids have something going on that you can't go to anyway. Yeah. That's pretty attractive. on a one-time basis. So I thought it was really cool for Detroit and good for them, a good step sort of for them to show that they really are building something later. Now, that said, we talked a lot about Green Bay.

How good do you feel about Detroit? Do you feel like this is a team that could be in the NFC championship game at the end? Or do you have some big concerns still or what? Well, I don't have big concerns, but I'm not ready to throw them in with the Cowboys and the Eagles and the 49ers at this point. I do think their defense, I didn't think it would overwhelm people like it has. And they've been pretty sound in the back end. They haven't been fancy. They've done some things that execution-wise, they hadn't shown in the past.

And so they've done that. I think in this case as well, and I'll just make one more point on Jordan Love, as it was reflective of the defensive effort by the Lions, Jordan Love is not an experienced quarterback still. I know he's played well enough to where everybody says, oh, they're on from two Hall of Fame quarterbacks. Maybe they got another one. I'm not ready for that yet.

Jordan Love to me has shown flashes of being ahead of the game in most cases. But he's also shown some flashes of, to me anyway, when I watch the tape of a kid that has been told to get the ball out quickly, but his patience level isn't what it was. And there's a little bit of panic when he does face pressure, especially in his face. He will bolt early at times just to get away from it. and I understand that, but he's got to find a way to maneuver within the pocket in some of those same instances as well and not bolt out of the pocket. So there's a little bit of maturation process there. I love his skill set.

I love his arm strength. I love all the things he does. He's just not a comfort level, high comfort level guy in the pocket still. And it may take him another year too because time is only, it's only reflective of the reps he gets. And this kid's still young as far as live bullet reps go. What do you think about his footwork and fundamentals? Does he have the consistency needed there? I think he does, but what you've got to remember is his arm is different than most.

The off-platform throws that he can make, I don't think he'll ever be a fundamentally sound passer. He doesn't need to be, because his arm is like that. And I'm not saying he's Brett Farve or Pat Mahomes or Aaron Rogers, but he delivers a lot of balls in a similar fashion to where he does not have to incorporate his lower body. his legs don't have to match up. So anybody that's a quarterback guru that says, oh, his lower body doesn't match his upper body. I don't think he needs to. He can throw it sidearm and change his release points just like the big boys do. It's the rest of his game seeing, showing patience, reading coverage, not getting it out so quickly that he, if he holds it for a second longer, a guy's wide open on the sideline because he just hadn't freed himself up yet. Just the maturation process of only playing that will improve that.

in my opinion. At least that's where he's at right now. Interesting. Okay, I was like, do you notice the overthrow last night? You had the guy wide open down the middle. It seems like we've seen that a couple times this year where he's had guys well, well opened down the field and just flat missed him. He did it last week, too, in the Saints game. He missed a tight end running free down the seam. He will miss some people. And that is a, that is a flaw that is hard to overcome. Just think about it. We talk about how many offensive plays get run each week by each team. when you have 45 or 50 plays, you can't miss two or three throws. You just cannot. And that will define

like that. So you've got a hit on those plays and it totally changes the perception of the game and really could be the outcome of the game. So he's definitely going to have to be more consistent on that. But sometimes for me, that is less fundamental, more patience, more speed of the game, more comfort level. I mean, we thought Josh Allen was an inaccurate passer early in his career. Some did. I always said it's just until he learns his receivers and figures things out from a poise standpoint. It doesn't matter all the time that your fundamentals match. So I think that's part of the case with Jordan Love. He did hit on a nice one after the clock was end, zero on the, at the end of the third quarter. And for people, you know, who I had some questions about this last night, there's the officiating

mechanics are interesting in the NFL because the the officials always you always get about an extra second on the play clock usually in the NFL because by the time the official looks away from the clock down to the ball he just wants to see that the ball is being moved in so there can be sometimes you'll see the play clock zero and we'll have the play allowed to go that happens regularly probably almost every game but in this case the game clock was at zero. Let's just transport this, Randy, and say this was in a playoff game. You know, the Super Bowl was determined on this. I wonder, because that's not reviewable. That play is not reviewable. I wonder if this is the sort of thing that will be brought up. You know, probably

wasn't the difference in the game because Green Bay ended up losing anyway. But I thought, wow, that's the sort of thing that should be easily correctable, shouldn't it? We could all see it. Well, not only that, it's probably technology is going to take over there as well. And you can just picture that, you know how in basketball where the backboard lights up when it's double zero? We're going to see the goalpost light up at double zero. And an in-zone view of that is going to take all guesswork out of it, just like they do in basketball. So that's probably something that's not far away. And probably technology, you can do it right now.

Yeah, yeah, that could have been something. Well, let's talk about another young quarterback. We're just talking about Jordan Love. I was impressed and have been by C.J. Stroud. In his first game of the season against Baltimore, I mean, he almost didn't have a chance. Those guys were in there so fast and they ended up not scoring a ton of points, but I think you could kind of see the poise. They come back the next week and lose to the Colts, but I don't think we'd pin that on him.

And then here they beat Jacksonville, 37 to 17. I know coming out of this draft that if you had to pick one of those quarterbacks between Bryce Young and C.J. Stroud and Anthony Richardson, you would have taken Stroud because Young was a little too small and Richardson was just too raw. We're not annoying anyone, Randy, after three games and we realize that the three-game sample isn't enough to say a whole lot, but it's all we've got right now. And I just wanted to ask you what you've seen from Stroud. He's averaging over 300 yards a game. He has thrown an interception, played some teams that are pretty good on defense, has done better than I would have expected, given what's around him in

Houston, first time head coach, first time coordinator. Like you said, you're playing Baltimore, Indian Jacksonville out of the gates. This could have been a really overwhelming situation. You surprised at all? What have you seen? Well, I think you're right. I think it is a small body of work, but at the same time, and we said this from day one, and we didn't think the game was beat too big for him, and it's not. I think his poised and ability to anticipate are really the difference, say, even between him and a Justin Fields who came out of an Ohio State offense as well. Also, yeah.

You see this kid Stroud anticipating throws. And what I mean is the definition of being open is completely different in the NFL than it is in college. And a lot of these kids come out in college now and they are throwing to open receivers all the time. They're better than everybody else. Their schemes are better than everybody else. And there's big, wide open spaces.

In the pros, a lot of times you're throwing on trust, you're throwing ahead of a break and you're throwing into finer, tighter windows. And I think I've always thought that Stroud had some of that ability to anticipate, to let it go before a break, and to process information to get him there quickly in his decision-making. We've seen some of that. We'll see how he develops. But yeah, I would have to be enamored and impressed if I was a Texan fan for sure as to how he's handled this. I think the advantage of taking a kid like him or even Fields or any of these guys that come from big programs

is that they've been the face of their team. So the other stuff doesn't really affect them. And even the case of Bryce Young, the game itself, all the intangible part of it, that doesn't necessarily affect him because they've been there at these big programs. And they're big in college too. So that part never really occurred to me. But I do think anticipation throwing on time and sometimes early, and the ability to get the ball out with patience is something that is hard to find

and should top anybody's criteria list when it comes to evaluating. these quarterbacks coming out of college. Absolutely. Remember coming out, he had supposedly CJ Stroud scored low on the S2 Cognition test, right? Yes, that's right. Yes. So that could be something that's evaluated off this too. And that scared some teams. It definitely scared teams. I know that to be a fact that certain teams had graded him down because of this test. And I don't know the basics behind all the increments of measuring this test. But, and we'll see, we've played three games. But that's a big thing to NFL teams now is this S2 test. But what your eyes told you watching him was different from that, right? I mean, his anticipation was fine. He did seem to be able to,

you know, read stuff, right? I had this discussion with a GM exactly about this, because his team was the one that had struggled with him and his results of the S2 test. I find that the S2 test might be of bigger importance to some NFL teams based on decision makers sometimes trying to be objective and too objective and worried about test results, as opposed to, like you said, with the eye, evaluating with the eye, and seeing and just repeating what you see. And so it's reflective differently depending on the franchises and who is doing the evaluating and who is doing the decision making. Yeah, absolutely. So they continue to play some tough defenses there in Houston coming up. So we'll see how it goes.

But I think you, if you're worried about anything there, it's probably not him. And that's a great sign for a Texans team that, you know, was coming off of really a huge win against Jacksonville. And, well, what's been your impressions of them overall? Remember, they were always, Houston was kind of a, for a while, there was sort of a laughing stock franchise that couldn't get the Benin for the Doubt. And we had the, you know, the front office stuff and all of that. We haven't really heard much about any of that.

We haven't heard about Nick Casario this or we haven't heard. Really haven't heard anything bad out of there, have we? No, not at all. In fact, we all know this is a franchise that's fired head coaches after one year, the last two or three times around. So I think you're right. I think maybe Nick has learned. Maybe everybody's learned from their past.

And I think you're correct. I think DeMarco Ryan's has done a great job just as a leader. And I think standing in front of the team every day, he's authentic. And I think players you see buy into that really well. I think that has been the biggest change for me. me is the authenticity of the way these guys lead. I don't see that in some NFL cities. I definitely see it in Houston. And hopefully Nick Casario sees that as well. And he feels pretty good about staying out of the fray. And you're right. We don't hear as much about that part of it. In an ideal

world, I've always said when the season starts, let the coach be the face of the team. The GM should not be involved at all. That's just my opinion. People might think I'm crazy, but I always shake my head when Jerry Jones has a press conference after every game. I don't see how that can be good for your team. And I've always said that, and I haven't heard anything different to that since Ryan's took over in Houston. Absolutely. So, you know, we made the comparison, the contrast between C.J.

Stroud and Justin Fields. Well, look at Houston and Chicago. Chicago has had their GM already have to give a press conference because things are out of control. Houston was the type of place that you would have picked to have that happen for years. And now it's not. And I think you do have to give, you know, D'Amico Ryan's credit there. And C.J. Stroud's done his part.

And things are just have kind of calmed down there. So I think that's going to be a very interesting division to watch Shake Out. Because I've kind of liked some things. We've seen some from Shane Steichen, too, with the Colts. And we'll see if he can bring along Anthony Richardson. Jacksonville, we've loved what they've done over the last, you know, year, year and a half. It seems like they've been heading the right direction. a shaky start to this season, but still some real solid fundamentals there with,

with, you know, Trevor Lawrence. So I think that, that division in Tennessee was always the tough out. And now I'm not sure where they're going. It feels like they're going. They might be the odd man out at this point. Yeah, they're going in the wrong direction. But you mentioned the authenticity. And again, it's only a few games, but the authenticity of D'Amico Ryan's and what that means.

I want to use that transitioning into our conversation next to. about the Jets and kind of their leadership, because they've had, I mean, unbelievable season so far with Aaron Rogers and only getting hurt, but then he's far away telling the team it needs to grow up. We've got Joe Namath ripping Zach Wilson. We've got Robert Stahl, sort of backtracking on his previously unconditional support and enthusiasm for Zach Wilson now saying, hey, he's got to play better. I mean, this is just what makes this job different, isn't it? I mean, when Joe Namath came forward and said, but he said, like, where else does that happen?

Does Roger Staubach come out and rip DAC after a tough day in the red zone? I mean, you can't make it up for the Jets. You really can't. So I'll cede the floor to you on them. We've talked about them before. But what are you seeing there? Well, I see exactly what you're saying in a special test tube creation. The Jets are the Jets.

And New York is New York. When it comes to media, when it comes to fans, it takes a special person to lead them. That's why I said for years, Bill Parcell has never got enough credit for handling all of that stuff for years that come with. It's not any other job. I would love that that setup. There are some people that just maybe aren't made for it that it's just different for. I don't know that at the end of the day, Robert Sala, has enough authenticity, has enough leadership, has enough of the buck stuff. here to really get the Jets through this whole issue. We think of the Jets sometimes as a rebuilding team.

That rebuilding's been going on for five years. It's the same regime. Now it's the second coach, but they're still not good. They're still having a 40-year-old left tackle. You know, there's still a lot of other things. But the focal point and the low-hanging fruit is Zach Wilson. So everybody's come out to hammer him. And I get it. He's played bad. I'm not going to stand here and make a case for Zax. Wittleson not having played bad and deserving of this chance. I understand why the Jets have done what they're doing, but I think it's a giant leadership void more than anything else, whether it's, you know, Joe Douglas gets lauded like he's Ron Wolf, you know, with all of his selections of this and that. They have no wins to back it up. So they just aren't a good team yet. There is a

difference between selecting players in a draft and building a team. We've talked about that here as well. So there's a lot of moving parts still. I think at some point, we have to stop saying the Jets are great on defense when they give up what they do week in and week out. They have not taken over the team. I happen to agree with everything Aaron Rogers said from his bed 3,000 miles away. I totally agree. And that's probably why he's trying to make his way to the East Coast this week. I've heard the rumors that he may try to be there in person this week. I think they really miss him as a steady in force, whether just Zach Wilson misses him or everybody else. Because I don't see any leadership, especially on offense, that can fill the void.

and they were all in with him. I get it. And it's unfortunate they only played four plays. But the construction of this team left no plan B or plan C in case this happened. That's borderline, you know, reckless in my opinion. You've got to have more leaders than one. I get it. But I just haven't seen Coach Sala be able to fill in and everybody believe in his plan, whether it's the waffling on Zach Wilson or anything else. Their defense just hasn't showed it. Their special teams haven't been great other than the first. game of the year when they won the game on return. It's just, to me, it's just still chaos, and I don't know how it ends. I really don't. Well, think about that. I mean, Rogers has been the king of chaos with his weekly McAfee and things and all over the place and everything. And we're saying his steadying hand of leadership from 3,000 miles away is really what they

need to help hold it all together. But I think you're right. I mean, I think, you know, some of the things we see happening on the sideline for them. Yes. Immaturity. Yeah, immaturity. surety. If Rogers were there, it could potentially help it, give it a little bit of studying hand. Zach Wilson, I do a radio show in Kansas City every week. He had the hosts, Seren Petro,

ask good questions. He put me on the spot. He said, how many more touchdown passes will Zach Wilson throw in the NFL? And it really crystallized in my mind. Wow. I don't know if that's a very big number. I don't think it is with New York for sure. I tend to agree. I think his time in New York has probably come to an end just because of all the other stuff. Just because of the locker room, the fans, the media. I don't think the kid can succeed there now. I really don't. Everybody has pinpointed him as being the problem. But if I were somewhere else, I wouldn't mind having the kid in a different environment, under different structure, in a different world. And so that may sound crazy to a lot of listeners, but I wouldn't mind having him in the bank somewhere else down the road just in case

he matures and gets things sorted out. I don't think it's going to happen in New York. So you were a big Mike White fan. He signed a two-year, $8 million deal with the Dolphins, $4.5 million guaranteed, and that are $8 million in incentives also available according to over-the-cap. So that was not a huge contract it took. I think if I read you right, you will, understand they kind of had to get Rogers, we don't fault them forgetting Rogers. So they get Rogers. They go with Zach Wilson as his number two, which, you know, probably made sense if Rogers were going to start the whole year, he can sit back and watch, take a breath. In retrospect, we're all, 2020 hindsight, right? So let's just be fair with this completely.

Should they have kept Mike White, let's say you pay Mike White that type of money or even more to keep him. Maybe it's just a one-year deal to keep them and you pay them more. Maybe you don't have the money for a 40-year-old Dwayne Brown as your left tackle, whatever, as a result. But you get Mike White in a role. Is that what they should have done? Or is that 2020 hindsight, Sanda? You didn't know that Rogers only in the last four plays. Well, I think GMs around the league always plan for the worst-case scenario, right? And so you have to have somewhat of a plan expecting it. So in a way, it's 20-20, but in a way, it's just doing your job. It's just the you know, doing business in the NFL. I thought, and you know this, that Mike White was their best

quarterback last year. So I do think you could have made a case for signing him for those numbers. I don't think he would have stayed, but you never know. I think he had his shelf life. He knew he had to get out of there. But I think he's a good player. And I think has made Miami better in that if two of falters at all or if he gets hurt, I don't know that they miss a giant beat playing Mike White, and I've said that. So that's been said before this newest set of circumstances in New York. So, yeah, I mean, again, it's as much about leadership as it is anything else. You had to know that Zach Wilson was not going to be able to lead your team. So if he had to play, the people around him have to be different, have to lead, have to have some, you know, it's not going to be Randall Cobb.

It's not going to be Alan Lazard. Those are guys who were brought in by Rogers. They're his boys, part of his posse and not really part of me building a team per se. So those were kind of favor signing. So I just, that's to me is the void, whether it's because you've made Zach Wilson your next best option or what you haven't built around him. I just think the leadership void is there bigger than, bigger than Dallas right now. Okay. Let's transition to a team that you wrote about a little bit this week and that's the Cleveland Browns. It looks like they're pretty stabilized by their defense. We've seen some signs of life finally. with DeShawn Watson and that offense.

And you start looking around that division. It's only three weeks in. We don't want to draw conclusions. But you probably feel a little bit better about Cleveland now than a week or two ago, huh? Oh, I feel really good about them on defense. I think their defense is for real. And I know it's a three-week window, but the numbers back up what I'm about to say. And I think they're as good as anybody on defense.

Have you ever seen this? The way they moved Miles Garrett around on the line of scrimmage and caused the other team to get to delay a game, and just absolutely pee their pants standing at the line of scrimmage. I mean, that was comical, right? Even Jim Schwartz was laughing on the sidelines last week in their game against Tennessee. Yeah, when Miles Garrett, you know, if he plays on this course and goes to the Hall of Fame, that'll be one of the things. Look, this guy was such a consideration.

He could get game delays on the offense by just moving around. What I think Schwartz has done is he's matched personnel with his scheme. And I always think that is the. missing ingredient with NFL teams more times than not. It's matching the personnel with what we're going to do scheme-wise. It is a detailed approach that Andrew Barry and his people have had to build the team based on exactly the schemes we want. And that's why the criteria should vary in evaluations around the league. That's why an independent source who evaluates for a living doesn't really know what a team wants, needs, or wants to incorporate. You can make congestion that you do, but you really

don't unless you're inside the building with those meetings. So I think they've done that really good. They have linebackers that are as athletic as anybody. They move them around. They communicate. They remind me of Cincinnati's defense the last couple years in that they communicate and are on the same page as well as can be expected, especially through three games. And I've always thought that was Lou Amarillo's calling card on the Cincinnati Bengals defense is they all know what they're doing. They communicate really well. And you're seeing that in Cleveland. I think, when you hold opponents to 19.5% on third downs, that's hard to beat. You're going to win a lot of games. That's best in the league. That's getting off the field. I think so much these games are about

matchups, not only with coordinator versus coordinator, third downs especially. Red zones can't be about plays. They've got to be about players. So you've got to win matchups. And I think the Browns defensively are winning a lot of matchups. They're not getting a ton of sacks. I think they might be 10th in the league in sacks, but the pressures are there. They're affecting office. offenses without a doubt. Opponents passer rating, 60.9, that's the third lowest in the league. So these numbers all back up what I see on tape with my eyes is that Cleveland's defense is a force to be reckoned with. Yep, absolutely. So one of the players you wrote about in there too was Anthony Walker, number five, inside linebacker. You wrote about him. And I think our Zach Jackson had a feature

on him, I believe, this week. You might want to check that out on the athletic. What have you seen from him? Well, I think first and foremost, he's very athletic. He is a, he is the communicator and the glue. He makes the calls. He gets people lined up. And that is a thing. It's not fantasy football where you can just plug and play players. They have to be able to communicate. They have to be able to play side by side. It is the consummate team game. And I think he's done a good job of communicating that between what Schwartz has given him and how he gets people lined up. So he's the quarterback of their defense. I was very impressed with him. And they haven't had to do a lot of crazy things. But at the same time, they all adjust and they don't have bus.

And that's a credit to the guy who's calling their defenses on the field. They know what they're doing. And that sounds like a hollow statement, but you'd be shocked at how many NFL teams, especially on defense, I used to laugh when I'd say, can we just get 11 out there? There's too much chaos around the league nowadays, especially on defense with people getting lined up. And they don't have that problem right now in Cleveland. I think they're one of the three or four best.

Yeah, I agree. And that really buys you time for the. Deshawn Watson, the offense, all of that come together. And we've seen some signs, a little bit of signs of life maybe from Deshawn Watson last week. So we'll see if this is a team that can kind of grow over the course of the season with that defense kind of just being a steadying force. It really helps you play the game more on your terms when the other team didn't just score on the last two, three drives and you're not behind. And not only a steadying force, Mike, but they have had to overcome adversity like no other team. They lost their best players.

a week ago. You know, the Jets lost their best player and have handled it however they want. Nick Chubb going out changes really a lot of things dynamics for the Cleveland Browns, but guess what? Their defense stands up. It came to play even more so. So they've been able to overcome adversity like you would want as a GM, like you would want as a head coach, and it's affected him. So I give him credit. I think they're, Deshaun Watson is still a work of progress. He's only started nine games for the Browns. I think a lot of people have jumped to the inclusion of he stinks, he can't do this, he can't do that. He's improved. He sat on the bench for two years. Now he is improving. I worry about his health because he does take off and does put his body

in some crazy predicaments. I think he's banged up a little bit this week. Their run game is going to be the same. I like Ford. I like the guys, Kareem Hunt. They're going to still run the ball with that offensive line. I will say this about that group, though. They're better run blockers than they are past blockers. So sometimes Deshawn Watson has to get away from stuff. I saw a couple Houdiniacs last week to get out of pressures and extend plays. And his throws downfield have been few and far between, but he did show, like you said, a little improvement last week. He made one great throw to People's Jones on a corner route or a little fade route down inside the 10-yard line. His downfield throws are starting to come around because these are things he did well with the

Texans. And when that happens, I think their offense will move forward as well. Yep. Let's hit on four winless teams this week, Randy. There's four teams 0 and 3. They play each other. Do we have to? Do we have to hit on these? Well, we're going to go quick on them because we've talked about a bunch of these. We talked about some of these teams.

I'm kidding. So we've got Denver at Chicago, Minnesota at Carolina. So I was kind of looking at their preseason win totals, the Vegas preseason win totals. And Minnesota, Denver, eight and a half, their 0 and three. Chicago and Carolina, seven and a half. That seems high for Chicago. I guess you and I weren't buying the hype on them. I think we clearly would have taken the under on that.

But which of these teams would you kind of most want to be? Oh, I think in this case for me, I probably would like to be Denver. I think Denver has a better roster. I think they're led by obviously a Hall of Fame legendary coach, who I think probably needs a little help to manage the whole thing. I think he's wearing a lot of hats. it's spread thin. So we'll see how that comes.

Obviously, we know about the debacle last week in Miami. They gave up, you know, 70 points. The first time we've seen it in our lifetime. So obviously they have issues. But they don't have a bad team, a roster of a bad team. They've got to obviously tighten up some things on defense. But of these four teams that you mentioned, I think Denver has the best chance of at least advancing a little bit.

I think Russell Wilson has not been a problem for them the last couple weeks. he seems to have stuck his finger in the dike as far as his leaky play. He hasn't cost them much. I think Minnesota is probably next for me, and Minnesota has played with a rabbit's foot all last year, as we know, to win 13 games. Now those same things that caused them to win games last year are shooting them in the foot. The fact that they lost that game to the Chargers last week after it was gift-wrapted by Brandon Staley to them in the last second decision to go for it on fourth down inside your own 30 at the end of the game. They couldn't even get off snaps. I blame Kurt Cousins for that debacle as much as anybody.

At some point, the quarterback has to stop holding his hands over his ear holes because he can't hear and just call a play. Let's go. You know what we're doing. Just stand up there and call a play. Shoot, I had times in college when I was a quarterback where I acted like I couldn't see the signal because I wanted to call the play. So I would put up my hand. He should have done that seconds before that. He should have ran three more plays on his own.

Just be a leader. Go call the play. Don't be a robot and have to get it. get it from the sidelines. So anyway, I'm going on and on. That's a great observation. I didn't see that anywhere else. I love that. Well, I just think Minnesota is probably the next in line. I don't know what happens with Chicago. I think to answer your question on the over and under prior to the season, everybody was looking at the way Justin Fields finished last season and the offensive scheme that was actually taking advantage of some of his athleticism. We don't see any of that now and we see just

more deer in the headlights than anything else. Though that's a struggle. So, Those are kind of just my thumbnail sketch of those three of those four teams anyway. Yeah, absolutely. Some Minnesota's playing Carolina. So we'll see if we get to any of those in the picks. I haven't looked at your picks yet this week. What's in the GM notebook? What do you got?

Well, there's a couple things I think. And we've talked about some of this as we're approaching the quarter poll or what used to be the quarter poll for week four. For one thing, trades start to be an issue. If you're a GM, you have this in the back of your mind. You might start to identify right now some places. where replacement parts have exceeded expectation. I'm sure you've got a number for that somewhere, where a team has had a guy take over and play really well.

And the veteran, you kind of think, wow, does that guy get back on the field? Would they ever move him? You know, identifying some of those targets who may be worth evaluating these next two or three weeks. We have a little more time with a trade deadline than really when I was a GM, when we had to do it after six weeks. I believe now it's eight weeks. So they have time to still focus on this. but it's never too early to start figuring out ways to help your team.

I think after four weeks you kind of know what you are, four or five weeks, you kind of have a sense for what you are. So then you can identify parts from other places that may be a fit for you. So I just think that was worth mentioning as an item in the notebook, what some of these GMs might be doing right now. Which leads into your second item here. Well, I think the big thing is for me is at some point I want to get on the road as a GM. I want to go do some scouting.

Sometimes that's hard to do when you have a lot of chaos. going on in your building. Sometimes it's good for you to get away just to get away from that chaos too. So there's some personal agenda in there as well. You find I found no better piece than being on the road, to be honest with you, and going to visit some colleges and seeing some other dynamics of team building and processing and of how teams are run. I used to learn from that exercise. So I made sure I got on the road. Some of these GMs now don't even leave the building. I don't know how they develop as evaluators when you never gather information on your own. I think those are tentacles you need to sharpen and keep sharpening as a GM.

So I would like to find a way to get on the road. And this is about the time I would feel comfortable enough doing it for the most part. The other note I had, and we alluded a little bit to it, was Miami's game against Denver last week. When I broke down that tape, I was expecting to see a lot of exotic things from the dolphins offensively because of their speed factor, because of how they do things. But what I saw really was a basic run game that ran for 350 yards on Denver based on a tight end, a full back, regular personnel, one back, two backs, one tight end in the game, which you don't see around the league anymore. It wasn't five wide outs and recess for the most part. They did a really good job of out executing and really making it simple on offense. And Denver didn't know where these blockers were coming from. But Miami executed at his high level, in the passing and running game, and it makes sense. I mean, listeners are probably saying, sure, they did you dumbass. They scored 70 points.

But I'd like to see how and why, and I see it with execution. I saw a simplistic passing game as well. When they are faced with zone defenses, their receivers and Tua are on the same page. They know exactly where they're going. They know the soft spots that they're running to. They know who they're stressing in zone defenses. And when they're faced with man-to-man defense in the secondary, Tua's accuracy has been unbelievable.

He has been clinical, putting the ball where those receivers can catch it and run with it. And I think those elements sometimes are overlooked. Everybody wants to see Miami as this high-flying circus act when sometimes they're just executing the basics of football, both in the running and passing games. So that was fun for me to watch. One of the interesting things I thought, and I wrote about the Dolphins this week, that Mike McDaniels said, you know, they're using pre-stamp motion three times as much as a league average, I think 60% of the time.

But one of the things that McDaniel said was last year they did that, and they had a ton of pre-snap penalties. I went through and looked, tried to look up all the pre-snap penalties and motion and all of that. They had 20 penalties last year on motion plays that were pre-snap fouls, okay? And they've got one this year. So that tells me that, and McDaniel talked about this a little bit at his Monday, I think it was his Monday news conference, that it was one of the first things he showed the team coming this year was those videos of those penalties. because when you're going to do that much motion and have guys running around, a lot of the reason coaches don't want to do that as much is because it's hard

and you get penalties and you can't you screw up. You have a hard time doing the basics when you're, when you got guys running top speed in ghost motion or jet sweep motion. But I think the way that they do that before the plays and then it may just be a simple handoff, but it's going the opposite way of the dressing, right, on the play. and it just create, I thought they had a great one in the red zone where, you know, the motion is coming across the formation left to right. And then the back, Mostert steps to the right. So you're really sold this thing's going to right.

And then they pull two, they pull two guys from that side to the left and they run the other way and the guy just walks in. It's just the precision of that, the cleanness of that, you know, and we'll see. It's a great test this week because they're going to go to Buffalo. and it's going to be, you know, louder and maybe it'll be harder for them to do that. But just for me, looking at them, I think that's been impressive, impressive that they're cleaner in it

in their execution of the offense. And then, well, the things I wanted to know was, okay, is this sustainable? Because last year it wasn't. Two got hurt and all that. So two has been hit three times in three games. I looked at the three hits. They weren't going to make anyone's highlight.

Billifights. Yeah, they weren't. I mean, one of them, a guy kind of awkwardly rolled into his legs a little bit. It wasn't like, I mean, he sort of tumbled. It wasn't like he just, he hasn't been rocked yet. Right. So I think that's really encouraging.

The other thing is they, they're the only team in the league that plays four of their final five games at home. I think that's a big deal when you're this type of team and you're from Miami. No doubt. So they're going to get Miami weather, which could be rain, but it's not going to be ice for four of their final five games. If Tua's healthy and not getting hit as much and you finish. like that, think about this team. What if this team had home field advantage in the playoffs?

I mean, it could be pretty good. So, you know, don't want to get ahead of myself here. Shoot, who knows, maybe they lose to Buffalo and don't look good. But there's some really positive indicators there, aren't there? There definitely are. And this, let's face it, this will be their toughest division game all year long, is always going to Buffalo, right, the last few years. And it's one where, you know, nobody wants to talk about revenge. Even Mike McDaniel said it doesn't factor in. But I guarantee you they went up there last year with a 22 to fight a battle that was, the other team had tanks because they were injured, too was hurt.

They didn't have all their people. Well, they have all their people now. I know how these guys think. It's a group that I think will go up there confident. And in the back of their mind, they may not be talking about revenge, but in the back of their mind, they'll be a, factor of, hey, let's do what we can do. We didn't get a chance to do that last year. And if you remember, they hung in there last year to the end with the parts that they had as minimal weapons as they were.

That's what I was just looking at because the final score was 3431. Yeah. That's pretty good. And it was that close when you watch the tape. It was that close. It was a dog fight the whole time. They just kept hanging in there surprising to most of us. But the dolphins have come a long ways. It's funny. As you know, the same guys that are running the Dolphins now worked for me when I was the GM and yeah. Chris Greer, some of those guys. Yeah, Chris Greer, the GM, Adam Engroff, Anthony Hunt, those are all their directors and they were all there when I was there. And those guys used to laugh when I would daily, I swear, bitch and complain about how slow we were and how the team that we inherited couldn't run out of sight in two days. It's one of the reasons we drafted Ted

We were trying to increase our speed. We drafted guys that could really run. But now I just harken to the team where they're at now. And maybe the fastest most athletic team ever put on paper or on the field. And I just laugh when I think back of those days. Maybe they actually did hear me back in those days. Not that I'm taking credit for anything. I'm just saying this team is dynamically 180 degrees different than what we had back there.

But they also heard it and saw it and understand. that speed kills. Well, sometimes it just takes the alignment of everybody and what they want to do and having enough time there. But I think they've really made a dramatic pivot from the Brian Fores' team, which was, you know, going to try to win with defense, with a defensive coach, to, hey, let's really empower Mike McDaniel here. Let's go get Tyree Kill.

And sometimes those moves, you know, when that move was made, I wasn't 100% sure, you know. Tyree Kill is somebody who's had some question marks and you could, you could have seen it. backfiring. So you have to take a chance to do some of these things. There's no guarantee it's going to work out well. But I have been very impressed by Mike McDaniel, who would have been easy to make fun of when he first got hired. He doesn't look at all like, you know, a coach from central casting. So I don't know if they got lucky with him or they really saw it ahead of time, but it doesn't matter because they've got a pretty good setup with a coach who, you know, seems pretty authentic and seems to really know what he's doing and the scheming part. I like his messaging.

He seems to understand what's important, not get too high, too low. It calls it like it is. So, you know, quirky for sure, but I've been made, you know, made a fan by it. There's no schick. It is authentic. It's him. And I think players respect that as much as anything. He's not trying to make anybody feel a certain way.

He's just telling it like it is. And his way of messaging is different than most. And I think players appreciate that. It's unique. All right, so we're going to head in the picks segment here. And thanks to Mike McDaniels Dolphins, that was one of my wins last week. You didn't like the games last week at all. You said that.

And yet we still sort of had to pick them. And man, you got robbed on the Green Bay one. You had Green Bay and had to give a point and a half. And they lost by one. But that's the life of points. That's the life of a picker. That's right. That's right.

So after last week, I was two and one. I got Miami given six and a half. I got the chargers with a point. And I lost on the Jets, but I was pretty up front. I said, I'm only doing this because we have said New England's the fourth best team. And we got proved wrong. So you're five and three on the year? I'm five and three in the year.

You're four, two, and one. You hadn't even lost. So you would also, you took a shot on Tampa Bay and Philly really impressed. I think Philly impressed in their Monday night game and really played a good game. So that one didn't pan out. But you're still four, two, and one on the year. We'll take that any time. I don't see any of any of picks that.

I wrote my picks down here. Well, I'm trying to keep it a secret. I don't like to let it out. I don't like to let you know or anybody know ahead of time. I'll give mine then first. So I'm going to take Cincinnati and the two and a half points at Tennessee. Joe Burroughs injury is a little concerning. But I think the Lou Anirumo defense of Cincinnati gets the job done and helps the Bengals win this game by three or more.

So I can win on that one. Your note said, Mike, just let me interrupt, your note said Cincinnati plus two and a half, but it's minus two and a half, right? It's minus two and a half, yeah, I meant minus two and a half. So I have to give, yeah, I think I said it, but wrote it wrong. So I have to give two and a half.

I'm fine. I think they'll win by three or more at Tennessee. I'm going to take Kansas City and give nine against the Jets. I see this as a 30 to nine or that type of a game for Kansas City. By the way, we didn't talk about the Chief's defense. And I know some of this is you're playing in Chicago, you're playing the Jets. But I think they look better this year.

And so that's a situation where, like we're talking about Cleveland, if their defense plays well while they figure out their offense, Kansas City, you know Kansas City is probably going to figure out their offense. I really like where they're at with their defense right now and think they'll have a big game, national TV, prime time game against the Jets. I'll give the nine happily. And finally, I'm going to, this could be, this is probably a little risky, but I'll take Miami in the two and a half.

half against Buffalo. I think the impetus is on Buffalo to show us what they got. Maybe they win, but I'll take the two and a half, because I think there's a decent chance for the dolphins win the game. What do you think? No, I like your picks. I think those are solid. And in fact, I'm going to piggyback on one of them. In all seriousness, the reason my picks weren't on our show sheet is I forgot. Oh. No ulterior motive, trust me. I just hadn't gotten that far yet. But I have two games, Two games that I'm okay with. One of them is your Bengals game. Bengals given two and a half at Tennessee.

I think Tennessee is just limited offensively so much that I don't see them being able to score enough points. And I don't care whether Burroughs 100%, 80%. They prove that they're better with him out there. And I think that showed last week. And I think it'll show again. So I'm with you on the Cincinnati pick. My other pick is going to be Cleveland.

I'm staying in that division with Cleveland given two and a half. They're the home team against Baltimore. I think Cleveland's defense will find a way to minimize some of the things in the middle of the field that Lamar wants to do. Again, I think these games are about matchups. There's no real secrets in this. And I liked where Deshawn has come around. Hopefully Deshawn Watson can stay healthy. That's the key for me.

I don't like where they go if he gets banged up. But I'm taking Cincinnati minus two and a half and Cleveland minus two and a half. So my little sheet said it was three for Cleveland, but it's a key for Cleveland. I trust you found two and a half. I trust you found two and a half. We'll grant two and a half. Do I have to reveal my source? No, you don't have to.

I know. You have good sources. You go, you find out of the way. Draft Kings. Sorry. That's a legitimate source. That's fine. So two and a half there.

I think that's a really fun game. Yeah, I do too. I just think it's in the division and everyone's watching to see, you know, what Lamar Jackson, that offense is going to do. And Deshaun watching that offense is going to do. and this is sort of one that, especially with Baltimore losing at Indy. It'll be kind of interesting for the Ravens

if they're just, if Cleveland's defense were to really hold them down to nothing. Right. I'll be watching the post game news conference in Baltimore. See how that goes. Yeah, good stuff. Thanks, Mike. I've enjoyed it as always.

Yeah, thanks everybody for coming along. You can find Randy's work and my work at The Athletic. You can find Randy, on X at Randy Mueller underscore. You can find me there as well at Sando NFL. Thanks everybody. Enjoy week four. We'll talk to you next time. This was the Athletic Football Show's Football GM podcast.