The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - In The Pocket: The Bill Belichick interview process, what we can learn from C.J. Stroud and Jordan Love, the nature of playoff rematches, and more

Episode Date: January 18, 2024

On the field, we're down to just eight teams still playing football this season. Off the field, we have one of the most star-studded prospective head coaching pools any of us has ever seen. Robert Mays and Chase Daniel dig into both the on- and off-field storylines on this episode of The Athletic Football Show's In The Pocket.Follow Robert on Twitter: @robertmaysFollow Chase on Twitter: @ChaseDanielSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. The athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays. Join me for this week's edition. I've been in the pocket. It is long time NFL quarterback. Chase Daniel. Chase, how you doing, man?

Good. Good, man. Really good. It's fun time of year. I think this is the best weekend of the year. And that's divisional round. Because you sort of, well, the super wildcard weekend should have been called super.

wildcard blowout weekend. I mean, there's one good game. And now you finally get to see the one seed's in action. Now you get to see everything come together. And, man, there's some really good matchup. So I'm looking forward to this weekend for sure. It's my favorite football weekend of the year because you only have four games to focus on, which is fantastic.

And the four games typically include the best teams in the NFL. Look at specifically the AFC, which we're going to get to a little bit later on the show. We were talking to last week, how many guys would you take over C.J. Stroud right now. the list is not very long. And the three guys definitively that I think you would put ahead of him on that list are Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Lamar Jackson. Well, those are the other three guys they're going to be playing in the AFC division round with C.J. Stroud this weekend.

So those four matchups, even if the Texans are not as far along in their team building process, they're not technically a wild card because they won their division, but they're a wild card in the AFC playoffs in terms of their place in the hierarchy. But even with considering that, their quarterback is playing at such a high level that you could argue those are the four teams you'd want to watch this weekend. And on the other side, even though the Packers were a wildcard team, I think you still want to see Jordan Love playing this weekend based on what he's been doing recently. So there's a lot of good football on tap. And we're going to get into some of that a little bit later in the show. But I want to start with some news and

some of the moments from the coaching carousel here over the last few days. This is a discussion I'd wanted to have with you even when I was thinking about him potentially leaving New England. And that's about Bill Belichick and his future. So Bill Belichick interviews with the Falcons this week, which is crazy in and of itself to read that. The Falcons have completed a head coaching interview with Bill Belichick. First of all, how does that go? What is a head coaching interview with Bill Belichick like?

Like, why the Falcons? Like, the second he was let go or fired or mutually aparted ways, whatever, um, He was linked to the Falcons. I don't get it. I don't get it. You got three good offensive pieces. I get that. There's no quarterback.

Their defense is just average. And I mean, they're in a winnable division. I guess that's it. I don't know. And when I first heard it, I was like, oh, yeah. I'm sure he flew all the way down there and went in person and did a whole interview. And they asked him, yeah, right. No.

No, like, I thought it was hilarious. honestly how the Falcons were like in one sentence, we have interviewed Bill Belichick for head coach on their Twitter. And I was just like, oh, that is going to make its rounds. It's got like 15 million views now. And this is how I sort of see it went down and see it happening. Arthur Blank flies up on his jet to New England area where Belichick is at. And Belichick interviews him.

That's how I see it. You don't interview the best coach of all time. I'm sorry. Like he's just stuck in his ways. He's like, Belichick's probably like, okay, come to me. What do you guys have to offer? How much are you going to pay me? What are our pieces? Am I going to have control over the roster? All that stuff. So coaches like that, which they don't come around very often, if ever, like this to go in an interview. I bet that's how the interview went down. And then the Falcons announced yesterday, too, that they had interviewed Jim Harbaugh. And I guarantee it was the same thing. Jim Harbaugh's interviewing them. So there's sort of

of type, there's sort of coaches up there in this little atmosphere that you don't really get interviewed. You interview the people and you interview the owners and you interview the GMs if there's GMs there. So it's, it was hilarious when it came out. And my first thought was like, first of all, Belchick and review, second thought was like, why the Falcons? I think the Falcons maybe because they have an urgency to get this done. They're probably going to pay him a decent amount of money. Arthur Blank is in his 80s. I don't think they would have moved on from. Arthur Smith just to make a lateral decision or a lateral move to another coordinator, let's say. I assume that they were going big game hunting in this process, and Bill Belichick was one of the

names that may have been on their minds. Going back to them interviewing or him interviewing them part of this, I don't think that's how it should go. Based on how things ended in New England and based on how the last few years went, if I was going to hand my team over to Bill Belichick at this stage of his career. I'm going to be honest with you. I got some questions. I got some questions about how the quarterback was developed there. I got some questions about who is offensive coordinator is going to be. I've got some questions about his roster values and how that roster was built in New England over the last couple years. So if that really was the case where, and we don't know the answer to this, but if that was the dynamic where Bill Belichick is the one

that's asking Arthur Blank about the franchise in order to vet him, I think that's the first misstep in this because I would have some very real questions if I was going to hand my team, which even if it's not complete, still has some young pieces, still has some room to grow, still has some decent offensive weapons. And I think realistically, with the right quarterback, would have some aspirations to win the NFC South next year. I absolutely would have some real questions for Belichick as to what his plan was for how he was going to get me to that place, no matter what the 25-year history of his time with the Patriots looks like. that's interesting i mean i can see it both ways uh but when you're the best and the greatest head coach of all time like he's going to get the all time win record he'll go down as the number one best head coach of all time i don't know first of all i don't know if belichick would first okay let's just rewind i've heard a lot of people out there say that oh do you think belichick takes a gap year no do you think that belichick uh people are like pelichick's not coached next year he's done are you kidding me

he's 15 wins away from the all-time win record. The dude is coaching. He's too old to take a gap here. Well, Sean Peyton, Sean Peyton's like 10 or 15 years younger than it. So let's just dismay all of that. And secondly, I just don't know.

I just don't know. I think Sean Peyton enjoys himself a little bit more than Bill Belichick, period. I'm not sure Bill Belichick's can be able to fill a free year of time away from football in the way that Sean Peyton, I think was pretty apt to do. Yeah, no, he won't know to do with himself. And look, I just think, yeah, I would just love. I would love to be a fly on the

wall in that meeting. Because, because, look, I'm sure Arthur got his questions in, but I'm sure they were not even remotely as in depth as you would other. And I guarantee you, like at these coaching interviews, or at least what I've heard, there's a lot of people in the room. Obviously, you have your time with the owner, but all different aspects of the organization are in and they're just peppering you with questions. That ain't, I, Arthur might have asked what you said. But it was not in that situation and it was a very relaxed, like, let's be honest, if you didn't like, if the Atlanta Falcons were talking about the Atlanta Falcons, if the Atlanta Falcons didn't like what Bill Belichick said, they would still hire him.

They would still hire him. He's the best guy. That's so it doesn't. Like they would. They would. And if that ever leaked, which I'm sure it would from a Falcons source, if Bill Belichick turned, they would not hear the end of it. They've been a disaster of a franchise the past few years.

years after Matt Ryan. It's been ridiculous. Like no no hard feelings Arthur Smith. My guy Dave Ragon was OC there. I love that guy. But if you got a chance to land the biggest fish of all, you just say, come on over. Here's a blank check. Turn our franchise around for two years. Go retire. And then we're going to give it to somebody else. Like that to me, I just, I still don't. I get, I don't understand the Falcons. I don't understand the Falcons. I, that would not surprise me if that was the dynamic. I think there are drawbacks to that dynamic though. And, Beyond the questions that I just asked and what's going to happen offensively and where they're going to find the quarterback, what that process is going to look like. And I honestly think that if Bill Belichick does come, to me, and I might be reading the T leaves wrong here, it seems like that they would indicate that they would probably try to go a veteran quarterback route rather than developing a quarterback.

You have to. Yes. And honestly, I think that that might be better. I mean, Kirk Cousins is potentially available. There are a bunch of different guys who theoretically could be on the market. Justin Fields. Well, that's, Justin Fields is even closer to the young quarterback plan where I would have a little bit of question about the development based on what happened with Mac Jones. Even if we throw that out, even if we ignore some of the finer details there, what I wanted to ask you is that if you were a player in that building and you are somebody who's been there for a couple years, you're a five, six year veteran.

Arthur Smith moves on. And for everything that Arthur Smith failed to do as head coach of the Falcons, I think that the relationship he had with his players was pretty darn strong. And I think that the players liked playing for Arthur Smith. It wasn't a situation where he had lost the locker room, anything like that. I think that Atlanta, again, a level of urgency where they really wanted to go take a swing at this. If you were one of those guys that had a pretty good time playing for the Atlanta Falcons for the last couple years, and you heard that they were going to hire Bill Belichick, what would your reaction be? I hate it.

Oh, I hate it. I hate it. If I have six-year vet, oh, because I've, dude, I've been a part of the Patriot way. and Matt Patricia and I've heard there were some differing, but everyone like, we need to give Bill Belichick's flowers because he's going to be, like, he will go down as the best coach of all time. However, there's a lot of shit that went on in that building between Tom Brady, between, and I'm dying to watch. I don't know, it's a documentary on the dynasty of the New England Patriots,

and they released the trailer. It's on Apple a couple weeks ago. And the most telling quote to me, I got to get this right, was from Danny Amandola, who I played with, with Matt Patricia in Detroit. And Danny Amandola said,

we worked for Bill, we played for Brady. Like, if that's not a more telling situation of, yeah, we put it up because we were constantly, we put up with his crap and the organization's crap,

not necessarily bills, but everything about the Patriot way, and just like, we're going to scare you into playing a way, don't play free play nice like that's a telling quote i wouldn't like it i i've been a part of the patriot way i think the patriot way is overrated i think that the only coaches from the patriot way to succeed uh from the patriot way was rabel and he just got fired and not for what he wasn't on the staff there he wasn't on the staff in new england i've actually heard i've actually heard

that they, in Vrabel, the people that was there, he took like 20% of what Bill did and then did his own culture. So that even, but you look at the, it just doesn't work out. Like, do you have, I mean, you probably are prepared, but off the top of my head, I can't think of any Patriot Way coach that has come from the organization of Bill Belichick that has had any success, sustained success anywhere. Do you know of it?

I mean, there's no, there's no one. Because most physical. is telling. His offensive coordinators were Charlie Weiss, who went and coached in college after he was done with New England, and then Josh McDaniels. Those are the two offensive coordinators that they've had. Josh McDaniels failed twice as a head coach. On the defensive side, the defensive coordinators that they've had mostly have just been assistance other places. Like Dean Pease went to Baltimore at one point, and then Dean Peas went to Tennessee later on and then to go to Atlanta, oddly enough. I mean, for the most part, they've been in New England for almost the entirety of his run. So we haven't seen. seen that many guys get hired away and the ones that did failed yeah i think that it's such an interesting situation for me and bill bellichick and the new england dynasty like i almost wish from uh uh like my perspective that bill bellichick would have lasted maybe one or two more years in new england got the win thing and then just retired and rode off into the sunset because In reality, if Bill Belichick goes to Atlanta or L.A. or wherever he ends up, he's going to end up somewhere.

I just imagine all the effort, all the time, all the stuff he's going to need from within to really change the culture of an organization. It's not going to happen overnight. It's a hard reset because anywhere that he goes, these head coach openings are completely, completely different than the Patriot. way. And so that to me is like, man, it's going to be, if Bill Belichick goes, it's going to be a two or three year deal to where people are really going to have to buy in. And I think, I hate to say it, but we're finally going to get to understand, was it Brady or was it Belichick? Because if he goes to a new place and he doesn't have success over two or three year period and he gets the win record and I think you're going to say it's Brady. I think it's a combination of both. Right.

now. That's a huge topic of debate, but man, it's players not plays. But over 20 years, if you look at the stages of the Patriots dynasty, you look at what happened in the first five years of it. I think we all have to admit that Tom Brady was not Tom Brady for the first, I don't know, let's say three or four years of who the Patriots were. Maybe there's a shift between like 04 and 05 that happens where he becomes a star level quarterback. But their defense did a lot of the heavy lifting in those early years with those first couple Super Bowls. And then they didn't win a Super Bowl for a very long time. And so I think that it's a combination. And I think we talked about this. I can't remember. I think it was a Chad Graff yesterday when we were

discussing the Patriots. But I think that that idea of we coached, we played for Bill or we worked for Bill, we played for Tom, is an interesting look at how the culture was set there. Because early on, I think that Bill Belcher probably did set the culture for the first decade or so of who they were. But after that, I think you'd probably make an argument that Tom Brady was the one that carried a lot of that culture. So I don't think it wasn't Brady or wasn't Belichick for the 25 years of the Patriots dynasty. I think it was a little bit of both for a long time. And I think as we've come into a new era of the NFL, it's fair to wonder if Bill Belichick is made for this era of the NFL. And that's the biggest question that I have. And Gerard Mayo today, during his

introductory press conference, said some interesting things. Two things that jumped out to me. One, He talked about how you need to meet players where they are with this era and this, with players that are of this age. And I'm not saying that was a shot at Bill Belichick, but I think that is a declarative statement about what kind of environment I want to create within the building. I don't think you ever would have said or heard from Bill Belichick, yeah, you really need to get to know your guys and you need to form relationships with them and you need to really

understand who they are on their level. It's all fear base there. So I think, and again, in 2007 even 15 years ago maybe that sort of mindset where you create this kind of machiavellian feel over your entire organization maybe that's okay but now i don't think that's nearly as workable with this generation of players so that's why i don't think it's a bellichick or brady thing i think there's over time things change and as things have changed i wonder if we've gotten further and further away from a type of play

player and a type of atmosphere within an NFL building where Bill Belichick can have that sort of control. Well, I think as things, that's a great point, as things change and his times have changed, which they have changed even from when I was in, in 2009 to 20, 23, whatever, like he had Brady. So he didn't have to change. Okay. So like he was 219 and 64 with Brady, 78% of the time they won games. The four years post-Bradie, where he hasn't changed, he has.

hasn't gotten a quarterback to fill the role, their defense, their personnel and offense hasn't been good. He's 29 and 38, one playoff appearance, zero AFC East titles. So I do think that this times have changed. He hasn't been able to change with it. Now, it is a personnel issue. It is a quarterback issue. It is a offensive receiver perspective and stuff like that. But I do think that there's going to be some change needed. And there's going to be a need to hire a younger innovative offensive coordinator, a younger innovative defensive coordinator. Bill's always going to have his hand on the defense. But I do think there has to be some type of change for it to work. Bill can be the CEO type guy and lead with vision,

but I think you've got to be able to trust and to hire. You can't go into a new team and hire this Bill O'Brien guy or this Josh Daniels guy. It's not going to work. And in fact, that would be the worst thing that could happen. You've got to hire when Belichick is you got to hire an innovative head head, or innovative OC and DC in my opinion. I think that is where if you're trying to flip this to the other side and say, how could this work? That's where it begins. You have a conversation with Terry Fontno with who's the GM in Atlanta right now with leadership and say, okay, let's make sure we're going outside of where you would typically look for it got to fill this role on the offense. And then on the personnel side, if he's tired, if he's paired with just a normal,

GM and a normal front office that's picking the players, does that put him in a position where he's able to succeed in a way he couldn't in New England because he was picking bad players? If he's just allowed to coach with an offensive coordinator that maybe comes from a different place and can bring some modern ideas, how does that look? And I think you could spin it in your mind to say it was the players were the problem in New England. He picked them. So it ultimately comes down to him, but the talent level was the problem in New England. If you put him in a more traditional setting, can he still be successful? And if you're the Falcons,

I think that's the story you have to tell yourself. Yeah. And you just answered my question when I asked when we started the show, why the Atlanta Falcons? And you said Terry Fontno. And I was with Terry Fontno and Mickey Loomis in New Orleans.

And Sean Payton was in New Orleans forever. Sean Payton is a massive, massive Bill Parcell's Bill Belichick fan. And so I think they got enthralled and Terry Fontno, I got enthralled like, let's hire this guy. So that makes sense Terry Fontno's there. I just wanted to clarify that because that makes a lot of sense in my opinion. We'll see how it goes. And it's going to be a fascinating thing to monitor because I think that's the job that might make the most sense.

And it does seem like there's a decent amount of smoke around it. Let's stick in the NFC South very quickly. P. Carmichael out as the Saints offensive coordinator. he was there for 15 years. And obviously the setup changes after Sean Peyton leaves. He's now the play caller. It's a different sort of job as the offensive coordinator. But I wanted to talk about this because it's a situation you're very close to.

You worked with Pete for years when you were with the Saints. Talking to people around that situation here over the last couple of days, what is your read on why this was the time for Dennis Allen and for the Saints to make a move there? Yeah, I think ultimately it came down to just wanting to start fresh. Look, Pete, Pete had been there since Sean Peyton got there in 06. That's a long time to be somewhere. Okay, he was the longest tenured O.C. And it wasn't even close.

And he was the longest tenured coaches in the league, let alone office coordinators. Yes. And so I think it got a little bit just stale at the end. And not necessarily his offensive play calling, but I think for both sides, including Pete, from what I'm here, it was a welcome change. Look, it sucks anytime you get fired, right? But he's going to have a job. He's probably going to go to Denver with Sean and Joe Lombardi and ball out. And I think this was probably a way around ownership for Dennis Allen to keep his job.

Hey, we need a new guy because we're stuck with Derek Carr. So ultimately, it brings me to John Gruden. Like, I don't know how it will affect his loss. lawsuit against the NFL, but everything I'm hearing down there with DA and Derek Carr, like they still believe in Derek Carr. Derek Carr played really well down the stretch. I don't care what you say numbers wise. He got them in a chance to potentially get into the playoffs and to win an NFC South.

And if you go back and look at the times that Derek Carr played his best ball, it was a John Gruden. It was a John Gruden. And so I think this is more of like a, hey, look, we're going to probably go a different way and we're going to go swing big for the fences. And look, Pete's my guy. Like I loved Pete. Pete taught me how to prepare as an NFL quarterback. He taught me everything I knew about an NFL quarterback style with Joe Lombardi and Drew Bree. So, yeah, I wanted to talk about it because it's an unfortunate situation anytime someone gets fired.

But ultimately, I think change was good for both sides of the spectrum here. it's not surprising to see them move on. I think that the P. Carmichael thing was a way to try to tap into keeping Sean P. Let's stick with continuity. Let's see if we can try to hold on to what this model looked like for so long. P. Carmichael, by the way, that's the life I would have wanted for the last 15 years. He's hired as the offense coordinator in 2009. So you're not the play caller.

You're an offensive coordinator of a team with a play calling head coach. And you just get to be there for, what, a decade, 12 years, essentially with Sean Peyton. What do you make it as an offensive coordinator for the Saints? Oh, man. At least a million. Probably a million, right? So you're making, you're making like a million bucks a year. You live in New Orleans. He's living in the same house in Destrahan in East New Orleans forever. Has it spent any money. He's the cheapest human being of all time. You're just hanging out down there. You just put it all in the bank. No one ever mentions your

name. You never get any heat when things are going poorly because you're not the play caller. And you're making a really nice living, having a really nice life, just hanging out down there. It's a perfect way to live. And now that's over. But for about a decade, I think Pete Carmichael had it going pretty well down there. He did. And if you remember in, he was hired in 06. And then in 2000, I got to make sure this was a long time ago,

2011 when Sean Peyton broke his leg or turned his knee on the sideline of Tampa that year, Pete took over play calling. And we ended up as like the third best offense in NFL history in terms of points and yards. So he was calling the plays that entire year once Sean got hurt. So that was sort of his like, oh, man, like, yeah. And then the next year he's like, okay, here you go, Sean. You can have it back. Let me just, let me just hang out over here.

Before we get into the green thing of what comes next, I'm curious, did he ever want to be a head coach? Was that a situation where teams would ask? He just didn't really aspire to it. Because when you have a guy who's that successful with offenses that have been really good for eight to 10 years, you would have assumed he probably would have gotten more looks for a head coaching job over that time if he had wanted them. he never cared he never cared about it he loved his situation in new orleans he loved the people that he worked with when you had drew breeze like there's just some people that are in in i he's a very very highly motivated guy and um you just sometimes you find people that are like i'm good man

like i'm good like like one thing he's he's one of one of the brightest coaches in terms of xes and o's that i've been a part of finding mismatches finding like that was the secret sauce him and jo lombardy was a secret sauce in new orleans when they were there and i i think with with pete uh we call him sneaky pete i'm i'm just like flooding back memories of everything that drew and myself and and and uh pete did but i think the thing with pete was like he never really enjoyed talking to the team or a motivating type team you know some some guys are different they just want to stay in the shadows a little bit and just be xes and o's he never really enjoyed talking to the team that's like all it is nowadays as an NFL head coach so i think it suited him well to just sort of stick back and be an o'c i'll be

curious what his role will be in denver if he does end up there because obviously jollum bardi's the offensive coordinator johnny morton who was with sean for years in new orleans has been all around he's the passing game coordinator and davis webb is the quarterback's coach and zach streif is the oline coach yeah oline coach so like there's it's going to happen i can see him like senior offensive analyst. Yeah. Something like that. That would not surprise me at all.

So let's get to the Gruden part of this because I do think that if you're trying to connect the dots, it does make a lot of sense because of how much Derrick Rars succeeded under him. The question for the Saints is how comfortable are the saints taking on a guy who was fired for the reasons that John Gruden was fired? I mean, we think that that's going to come up again if he ends up getting the job there, all those emails that came out, the things that he said in those messages to Bruce Allen, the reasons that he got fired to be the Raiders head coach, those things haven't gone away. So that becomes a question of how comfortable the Saints are in hiring a guy with that background

and how comfortable they should be and how comfortable we should be with that hiring. I think that from the Saints perspective, this is just me talking about it and thinking about it. When you do something like Groome did and there have been people that have done things before that have sort of gotten forgiven, right, wrong, or indifferent. And they always get this second, sometimes third chances, right? I can name a lot of players or coaches in the past who have gotten second chances. Now, is it long enough from as for like after that? I don't know.

I mean, I think the saints are going to have to deal with it. I think the saints are probably, if they want to go this way, they're probably in lockstep with the NFL and what needs to happen. Right. And they're probably going to get a PR plan around it. And I think at the end of the day, there's definitely going to be some backlash if it happens. And I think eventually it'll just go away. Like everything else in our culture seems to just go away. Right, wrong, or indifferent, that's how it probably is going to go.

And with Gruden, I think outside of everything that has happened with him, outside of football, I think it's a great hire. And I think the reason it's a great hire is you not only get an OC who's, been in the league called amazing like his vision as an offensive coordinator should not be ever doubted like he is i really liked watching those raiders offenses over the last couple years i really liked watching them so you get that and then you get a certified head coach in the building you get another head coach for dennis allen to lean on when things aren't aren't going right and when things are maybe being questioned from DA, it's just how much,

how is that going to work, right? DA and Gruden are tight. I don't know. And it just, it makes too much sense. Now, I don't know if they're going to go that route,

but if they were, this is Gruden's best chance, in my opinion, to get back into the league. And it sounds like the only other interview that they've set up so far, the one that I've seen, is that they're looking to interview Dan Pitcher,

who is the quarterback's coach, they are interviewing Dan Pitcher, who is the quarterback's coach for the Bengals. And Dan has gotten a couple looks over the last couple years. He is very well regarded in Cincinnati. I'm surprised he hasn't been a candidate for more open offensive coordinator jobs, including the one in Chicago, frankly. So not surprising at all to see his name potentially connected to this as well. Well, somebody else that you've got to keep in mind is Joe Brady.

I think that's an interesting name for me. He spent a ton of time in New Orleans when DA was there as a secondary coach, learning that style offense. It's gotten a lot. He was in LSU. Like connect the dots there. If Joe Brady wants to get back, I'm sure Joe Brady's going to get a chance to be full-time OC in Buffalo.

But if not, if not if something crazy happens, like that's a name to watch in my opinion because I think he's, I think he's really done a good job with the Buffalo bill since he's taken over for Ken Dorsey. If he is naming the full-time coordinator, I'm thinking I'm staying in Buffalo. If I have a choice between, going to New Orleans, be the offensive coordinator, or being Josh Allen's offensive coordinator,

I think my quickest path to a head coach, if that's what Joe Brady wants, probably goes through my time with Josh Allen. Just my two cents about the situation. All right, let's turn back to the playoffs here, like we're talking about at the beginning, because even though there weren't that many competitive games this weekend, I think a lot of the games that we saw were eye-opening. Watching C.J. Stroud and Jordan Love absolutely tear it up against very good defenses in their playoff debuts. I wanted to zoom out and just consider these guys, not only for what they did last weekend,

but what they've been over the course of the year. Nate and I talked a little bit about this over the last week or so, just what you can really pick up on and learn from what C.J. Stroud and Jordan Love have done. And I wanted to ask you that question, because you've taken a look at the position in a way you really never have before, now being in your first year in the media. You've gotten to look at the landscape of what quarterback play around the league looks like.

What have you learned that we can apply moving forward from the seasons that C.J. Stroud and Jordan Love have had? Well, I mean, there's a lot. There's a lot to learn. My first, my first thought when we talked about this was evaluating quarterbacks is such a crap shoot, man. Like, it really is. It is so difficult.

Like, you can think, you know, what quarterbacks are you going to spend all this time in the offseason scouting, interviewing, putting them through. test, this S2 test at C.J. All this, it doesn't matter. It matters what happens between the white lines. Bottom line. Like, that's it. And even that doesn't always matter that much when you're evaluating these guys because there is no more, there's no position where context matters more. None. And there are so many layers to the context, even in the NFL, where it's hard to evaluate how good guys are, let alone applying those layers of context to college where there's even more complicating factors to the process. Yeah, I think the biggest thing between CJ Stroud and Jordan Love is how they

got to where they are today. The biggest thing with Jordan Love is that he sat for two or three years behind Aaron Rogers and learned, I don't know how many years you can look it up, but learned so many different things, three years and learned so many different things about quarterbacking in general. He probably learned a ton from Aaron Rogers. He, he, he, he, he, he, he, looks identical to Aaron Rogers on the football field. The way he throws, his footwork, he's jump throwing stuff left and right. And I think with, I think with that becomes, then you become like, hey, all right, my time is here. The organization picked me 26 or whatever it was in the draft. And man, look at how I was able to sit. There was no pressure on me whatsoever.

just sit back and learn. Then the onus becomes on the player. Okay, look, we know you want to play. We don't think you're ready to play right away. We see a potential future for you as a starting quarterback in this league, but there's steps to it. And Jordan Love finally got a shot, and it didn't start very well, but the last eight games of the year have been insane. And his growth has been exponential. And I think the main reason for somebody's growth like that is that you were willing to be able to trust Jordan Love. Like Matt LaFleure had a vision for what this offense could look like under Jordan Love, and you're starting to see both of them shine.

And I think you've got to have the pieces in place, the organizational structure. And you've seen the Packers do it three times now with Brett Farr, of Aaron Rogers, and Jordan Love, which is crazy to me. There's a stat, like, I don't even know that the Browns have had like 30 starting quarterbacks or 40 starting quarterbacks in the span that Green Bay's had three. It's insane. And so like you're always trying to find that guy. If you have this belief in the front office that you've got your guy, you've got to build

around him. You have to do everything in your power to be able to make sure he goes out and plays his very best football. And the Green Bay Packers struck gold. I mean, they really did. I don't know what it is. I don't know what the secret sauce. is that makes this model work.

And I think that's absolutely worth exploring this offseason. Because let's go back and think about the guys drafted in the first round who did not play at all as a rookie at least recently. The two guys who come to mind over the last five or six years, one is Patrick Mahomes and one is Jordan Love. Every single other quarterback drafted in the first round, if he wasn't the day one starter, he started as a rookie at some point. Okay, Kenny Pickett, Justin Herbert only because of the weird situation with Tyrod Taylor.

Kyle Murray was the day one starter. Daniel Jones started as a rookie. Baker Mayfield started immediately as a rookie. Sam Darnal. Josh Allen started as a rookie. Josh Rosen. Lamar was later in the year. But Lamar did play as a rookie, even though it was not as much as all these other guys.

Trubisky was a day one starter. Deshaun Watson played as a rookie. Jared Gough played as a rookie. Carson Wentz, as you know very well. James Winston, Marcus Mariotta. Blake Bordels, I can't remember Blake Borders. Oh my gosh. I had no idea we're going to bring up Blake Borders. Well, I'm literally going as far back as I can to find guys

that's hilarious. No, that's hilarious. I'm glad we did. Bortals did start as a rookie. Okay. Mansell played a little bit. E.J. Manuel played as a rookie. Andrew Luck plays a rookie. Robert Griffin, Ryan Tannahill, Brandon Whedon. So I think the only guy in the last like 15 years other than Jordan Love and Patrick Mahomes that did not play at all as a rookie was Jake a lot. Yeah, yeah. Wow. That's wild. And if you remember Mahomes, it was the very last game of the year against Denver. That's right. That's right. That's right. But it was one game. It was one game. It's still, it's still matters. It's one game. And Jordan Love has played before, right? Jordan Love has played one or two starts here and there. But I, I do think that that's a funny story because I'm glad you got about the one dog start with. Yeah, with Jordan Love. I mean, he balled out in Denver and they sort of were like, okay, this is what we have. Remember a couple of those plays. He played with some backups. And, and, I draw the line between love and my homes. I'm glad you brought that point up because everything I've heard out of KC was when

the chiefs leapfrog the saints to grab Mahomes. They were bullish on him, man. Everyone was, right? Like the athletic ability, everything about him. But it was also the time when Alex Smith probably had in 2016 his best year ever. Okay. And he was awesome in 2017. He was really, really good.

Yes, yes. And then he was awesome in 2017 when they drafted Mahomes. And so I know that when the chiefs drafted Mahomes and they set, they had a plan in place. And Andy reads all about plans. And you don't deviate from that plan. Like even if Alex wasn't playing, I think that Andy wanted Patrick to come in.

And it's very well versed, right? It's very well written about like everything that Alex meant that did to, and meant to Mahomes. Mahomes is super grateful for it because he, He showed him not only how to play the game a little bit, but it was more the off-field stuff. How do you get ready? How do you prepare?

How do you watch film? How do you do this? How do you do that? And I know that when the chiefs draft in Mahomes, they had their quarterback coach Mike Kafka, and they had their OC at the time, Matt Nagy, in the same meeting room. So they were running meetings with the quarterbacks.

And Mahomes would break off. And he would go with Kafka. and he would just be like, yeah, look, we're going to learn the game plan because you're the backup, but we're going to work on just you. We're going to do everything we can to just make sure your development is right. We don't want to rush it. You don't have to be rushed. We want to make sure it's done right.

And you've got to imagine that's what happened in Green Bay. I thought that was the best thing that Andy Reid had ever done with Mahomes was like, hey, take the pressure off of you. Let's figure out and practice what you do well. Then let's see if we can take it over the games. and then when the full-time starter and the games, let's go to the AFC championship game. Like, it's just, it's wild. I wonder, and again, I don't know what the secret sauce is.

And we can talk about this a little bit because I do think it's worth getting into. As we've seen these examples of guys sitting, you know, the entirety of their rookie year or most of their rookie year, and really getting some time behind the starter and getting to work on themselves, getting to work on their deficiencies, even with Rogers, right? Think about what Rogers was mechanically at Cal in that Jeff Tedford office. Jeff Tedford. rigid it was. And then he gets to sit behind far for a little bit.

And you watch him play the moment that he gets in or when we start, when we see him as a starter for the first time. And mechanically, he looked nothing like he did when he was playing for Jeff Tedford at Cal. So I think that time to just be like, okay. And in Mahomes' case, it was kind of the opposite, right? He was a little bit too free and a little bit too loose when he was at Texas Tech. So you get time to just work on what is the best calibration of who I can be as an NFL

starter because the time you're drafted in May, late April, early May, and week one, that's not nearly enough time to kick those bad habits or really drill down on, okay, what do I need to tweak? What do I need to change? And maybe that's, it's that simple. Maybe it's just about being able to really break it all down and build it back up over the course of 18 months rather than having to start right away or being the day one starter at training camp.

So if those are the little secrets to this, that is kind of the secret. off this entire process, I think it would behoove teams to try to follow that. If you can, can you make sure that when you draft a guy, hopefully from a position of strength, you can have a succession plan like this, where he can sit for a year? Because if this continues to succeed, I would not be surprised to see more and more teams look for it. And I know there are teams that are trying to do it. I think in an ideal world, there are NFL franchises who would be following this.

It's just difficult to pull off and stick the landing. Well, that's the, that's the biggest thing. The level of quarterback play is just there's like three or four or five, six guys that are at the top. And it's just sort of everyone else. There's a middle level. But the quarterback play is in essence, other than those 10 or 12 guys, just not very good. And so when teams are drafting this low, they have a chance to get their franchise. They want to put them on the field right away.

And that leads me into CJ Stroud because what he is doing this year with, just being forced into play on a franchise that had won 10 games in the prior three years before his arrival. And they have now won 11 games. They have the AFC South Division title. It's mind-blowing because I'm telling you it's not easy as we just talked about to play as a rookie. This guy doesn't look like a rookie. And when you break down the film, everything that he brings on the field, is I almost can't believe it when I see it. I can't believe it. The accuracy, the amount of ownership in the offense.

That's a difficult offense to learn. There's a lot of run game checks in that Shanahan system with Bobby Sloick. He's got to get all those down. He's got to make sure he gets to the right play. The amount of trust I've seen from Bobby Sloick as the year has gone on with CJ Stroud to get in and out of the right plays, with CJ Stroud to make some of these throws. Like people are like, oh, he did this in college.

No, he didn't. I'm sorry. Guys were wide open. It was a shotgun, throw him around offense. And when people tell me that, I'm like, you don't watch film. You don't watch film. Yeah, he had success because he was Ohio State. If you look at some of the pockets at Ohio State versus some of the pockets versus

Houston, Texan team where he's no stepping and throwing like this and it's an accurate 40 to 45 yard throw down the field and a BB. Like, come on. No, he's not doing it. And so that to me is like why it's so impressive. Not because of the physical traits, but because of everything else off the freaking field that comes with the franchise quarterback, that comes with the star power,

that comes with you won 11 games in your first year that comes with, we have a new head coach that comes with, we're a franchise that just can't win. All of that pressure, it doesn't phase them. That to me is what's insane. It's everything. because I think that's totally fair.

His composure in the pocket, clearly the way that he affects the locker room. D'Amico Ryans was talking about that recently the fact that that guy just had the locker room, even at 22 years old, which is a huge part, I think, of just being a franchise quarterback in the NFL, is having that control and having that presence among all those other guys,

especially guys that are however much older than you. But to me, it's that combined with the physical skill set. He is special. There's just no way around it for me. He is a special thrower of the football. And I totally agree with you. I watched probably four games, five games of him at Ohio State last year before we talked about him pre-draft. I really liked him.

I really liked what I saw from him. Watching the Michigan game back last from last year. Watching the Georgia game back from last year. I thought that the accuracy was impressive. The ball placement was impressive. I thought he was underrated out of structure those last couple games of the year when they were playing better defenses you could see that. But even as someone who liked him, there is no way you could ever have imagined anything like this. If you could have, he would have been the number one pick in the

draft. It wouldn't have even been a conversation. He wasn't. There were questions about him coming in. And I think that there's going to be revisionist history in this where people are going to look back and be like, oh, we should have known this. Even as somebody who liked him, you never could have known that he would have been this sort of player. But he really does just look like the natural Some of the things that he's doing are just different physically and with the football than other guys are capable of, and he did it right away. So like you just alluded to, there are different ways to do this, but I think it's important when we have guys like this who are standing out as rookies, aren't just functional, aren't just running the offense, but look like stars in their first full season as starters. We should keep our ear to the ground and try to figure out what we can learn from this store and stuff. And I promise you that's what NFL teams are going to do from this.

No doubt. And that's the crazy thing is like as a rookie. You're doing this as a rookie. Like, you're overwhelmed as a rookie. You've been playing football for two straight years. You don't get a break. And he hasn't hit the rookie wall. In fact, he's breaking down the rookie wall. And that it's real. It really is real. And I do think that NFL franchises are going to be like, hey, like, what do we miss? Or Carolina, like, okay, look, they were the first two with Bryce Young and C.D. and not to say Bryce Young isn't going to have a great career because I think the situation he was put. in and Carolina was brutal from from the get-go. But when you surround the pieces and you build every single thing around this guy and you have the attitude and the awareness outside of the locker room within whoever you're dealing with and being able to be the face of the franchise, it's just super special and it's not normal. That's what we have to understand. It's not normal. Like so many people miss on first round picks, you just alluded to them. They're not half those guys aren't even in the league anymore.

And with what he's doing, it is, it is special. I'm curious what his individual workouts with teams looked like. Because that's the only place, as I've gone back and thought about this, of where he might have been able to show some of this stuff off, whether it was the off platform stuff, whether it was the arm angle type of things that we've seen. I truly wonder what some of those on-field throwing workouts were, because he just seems like the type of guy who would just shine in that.

And remember he did well at the combine. but the combine is a little different than what they're going to put you through at a pro day workout. You're just throwing to guys from the pocket for the most part. I think that is my number, oh my God, I'm about to go on a tangent. That is my number one thing that I hate. You can't show anything in on-field workouts in shorts.

You can show how strong your arm is. I hate the combine. I, sorry, I don't like the combine for reasons that people are, guys are in their underwear showing off for scouts for grown men. Okay. these team workouts where they get reported,

oh, he really dropped in status because he went 45 of 47. He missed two throws on it. Dude, it's the most ridiculous thing in the entire world. Put the game film on. What can you do between the white lines? Is this the player you want? That's how I think that scouts miss the mark on the, these quarterbacks, they get so enthralled with what they do in their underwear at the

Combine or what they do at a private workout when no one else can know, dude, there's no one coming after you. There's no pocket. I think it is a data point. That's all. I think it's a data point. It's ridiculous. The problem.

It's stupid on so many levels. Don't tell me that. I don't disagree with you. I think the problem is in a situation like Zach Wilson, right? where you have a guy who lights it up in that exact environment because he does have a really live arm, but then you watch him in college, and he never had to deal with what would look like an NFL pocket

for the entirety of his final season at BYU. So I think, again, it's just the data point. And the only reason I say that is, because at Ohio State, you didn't see him doing some of the stuff that he's doing right now. You didn't see some of the off-platform throws. You didn't see some of the changing of the arm angles. You didn't see some of the even the no-step stuff

that you're talking about where he's getting these, throws off in a crowded pocket. There wasn't as much of that. Maybe we had a couple games where you had some flashes, but in a workout, are you sending guys at him? Is he having to move? Just the little things he does in space when he's having to avoid a free rusher, things like that.

I just would have been curious to see if you could pick up on some of that when you put him in those circumstances during a workout, because those are just the things we did not see for the most part on his tape at Ohio State that you are seeing now. Yeah. I still think the combine and those workouts are dumb. Well, the combine is silly. The combine, you're just throwing a guys who are like running go routes. I'm literally watching his workout as you're talking just because I was curious.

He's doing nothing. He's literally just dropping back and throw into guys running down the field. And it's like how guys under pressure perform. Okay, first of all, you're just in front of a dome throwing to guys you've never thrown before. Of course, you're going to look like crap sometimes. And like, I don't know, I'm just, we could do a whole show on that, dude. Well, guess what? The combine's coming.

So you saved those takes. we'll be ready to go. Last thing I wanted to talk about here, again, the AFC side of the bracket is phenomenal. It's as good as you could hope for, especially with the quarterbacks, but we're also getting two rematches on that side. We've got the Texans going against the Bravens again, which was so early in the season, it might not matter, and we have the chiefs going against the bills for the second time this year. So with those two rematches in mind, when you're playing a team in the playoffs and you've seen them again in the regular season, how does the preparation change? well it depends

when were these teams when did these teams play Ravens Texans I think was week one or two so very very early in the season week one according to Beller so it almost doesn't matter whatsoever the chiefs and the bills was I think week 14 15 it was later in the year

just happened so the Ravens Texans game week one you're going to take nothing away from it they're completely different teams C.J. Stroud no one knew what they were going to do Lamar Jackson honestly the first five or six weeks of the year he didn't look very good. And there were some grown pains with Todd Munkin and that offense that was receivers

were leading the league weeks one through six because I looked it up and I was on NFL network about it and drop percentage even over the chief. So they have turned their both franchises around. So you can't really learn a lot from that. So you're going to be studying the last five to six games, especially the playoff game as of late to see what they're doing. You're still going to be ready for the unexpected. I think that the Ravens are probably a little bit worried about that offense. and C.J. Shroud and what they're doing, even though the Ravens have a really good, the best defense in the NFL, I think that it's going to be an issue to take. Now, when you go over to the other side of the spectrum and you go Chiefs Bills,

I think you can learn a ton from that game. And they're going to be, it's going to be part of the breakdown because it was week 14. And I think what you learn and what you see, the first thing is a quarterback. When we would have rematches, even divisional, forget about the playoffs, which is a whole other level. But we were in the same division. We're playing the Broncos twice. We're playing the Chiefs twice or the Raiders twice.

We would, the first film breakdown that we would do when we came in on Tuesdays was we would break down and we would look at the rematch, right? The first game of the rematch. So if we were the Chiefs playing the Bills, the first thing that Patrick Mahomes, Matt Nagy, Andy Reeder turning on on Tuesday is that first Bills game in Week 14. you're going to study that backwards and forwards. You're going to see where did they have success against us? Where were the weaknesses that we can exploit in that game? And then what you're going to do, you're going to take notes on that. You're going to go back to your notes from the week 14 game.

If I'm Patrick Mahomes and say, okay, here's my notes on third down. Does it make sense? You're going to have these notes plastered on the whiteboard the entire week. And as you go through the last four games, of the bills, okay, are they the same defense or are they not? If they're the same, then you're really going to pay attention to these 10 or 12 pages of the notes that you took week 14 of the bills in your preparation of the games and of personnel. It becomes really matchup oriented in the playoffs.

And so when you're looking at that sheet, okay, here's the third down plan. It's almost like a cheat sheet. You can almost get started a little bit quicker. It becomes ingrained in your mind a little bit quicker. You have a better feel for what they're running defensively. There's always going to be these things that they throw at. that they're going to get away with. But I think that that's a big deal.

And I think that's how coaches and players both look at these rematches. Okay, so let's say from that week 14 game through the game that they just played in the wildcard round, there are drastic changes in some of the things that they're doing on defense. How do you separate that being the way that they thought they had to attack a certain offense with that being actual substantive changes in who they are on defense over that five or six week period? I think that context matters. I think that the teams who they play matters. I know that when we were playing in the playoffs,

we would throw out back in the day. We would throw out Lamar Jackson film. We're like, okay, they play it completely different. We would throw out, there were some other teams that were just like so different on that side of the ball offensively and that teams would play them differently. I think the biggest thing that you take away from, if you're the chiefs,

the biggest thing you take away is where did they have success against us. Was it third down coverages? Was it, okay, on all these times they were in covered two, we just didn't do very well against it. We didn't have our cover two beaters up this game. That's the data points that these coaches look at and that's how they will because you've got to imagine if you do something

that's right, you're going to see it again plus other things. So you've got to be ready for what teams do well against you and it does come into play. And then same offensive game play. planning. If there's a couple of plays that worked against the bills, you better believe that Andy Reid's going to dial it up again. It's just going to be from a different personnel grouping. It's going to be from a different formation, all that stuff. So there's a lot that goes into rematches, especially this Chiefs, one, because it happened so soon. That's interesting.

So looking at the game since the Chiefs game, since the Bill's Chiefs game, Buffalo played the Cowboys, the Chargers, the Patriots, the Dolphins before playing the Steelers. It seems like the Cowboys would be the most applicable film to what you were doing. And even that was only one week after you played them. So I assume it's going to be pretty similar in terms of approach in terms of like their defensive identity to what they probably did against you the week before. You're not going to watch the Patriots game. You're not going to watch the Dolphins game.

You might watch the Chargers, but it was Easton Stick. They did give them some issues, though, and that's a really good offense. So I think it's the Chargers. I think it's the Cowboys game and I think it's our game. And then they might pull some stuff like third down pressures. because it seems to me that I don't know, I haven't really dug into the defensive side of film, but on first and second down,

McDermott's playing more too high shell coverage than maybe he has in the past. However, on third down, they have been more aggressive, at least in alignment with these double-a-gap mugs or these overload fronts that maybe they're not pressuring from, but they put a lot of pressure on the offensive line to block the four in different ways that they're able to go out there.

So I'd be interested to see that as well. There's a lot of different, there's so many different things that you have to look for. But I think the thing that you're going to look for most is how did they have success against us the first time? It's interesting. Looking back at just the box score before actually doing a lot of studying of the game, which we're obviously going to do over the next couple days. Pacheco did not play in this game. So you had 11 Clyde Edwards, Allaire carries.

That was really it. And other than that, they threw the ball 43 times, despite what I assume is correct. about the amount of guys that they're putting in the box where you're just seeing a lot of so looking at it right now I can do this very quickly. I love modern technology. So in week 14, the bills

use six or fewer guys in the box on 82% of their total snaps, which was the number one rate in the league that week. Just for context, the dolphins lead the league at 63% on this season. So extremely light boxes, the chiefs only

ran the ball about 15 times and they did not run ball that efficiently. So you'd have to assume. Yeah. And then playoff Pat, man, he ain't sliding. He's a threat with his feet too. And so I think that's a big deal because when you have these light boxes, when you have first and second down shell coverage, obviously you're going to have six man boxes. And I talked about this in another show I did. And I wanted to make sure that since we are sort of preview on the chief spills now, I think the biggest thing to watch is the pre-snap stuff that Patrick Mahomes does on first and second down. I think that Andy Reid's probably going to have a lot of kill plays.

What do those mean, Chase? Well, okay, they're going to have run, kill, pass, or pass kill run. That means if I have a run up, I want to make sure that I run it into a six-man box. If it's not, then I'm going to change plays, kill it to a pass. Or we have a pass play up versus too high. Oh, we don't like it. Let's kill it to a run play. So I think that is on a defense like this week.

When they don't do a lot of crazy exotic stuff, you just have to have the right play on at the right time. I would expect that that's probably what they're going to do, although I expected them in negative six degree weather last week to come out running the ball. And Mahomes was Mahomes and just threw the ball almost every single step. I don't want to get you on this rabbit hole here because that's exactly what I'm going to be spending the next 48 hours of my life. But the bills played a lot more man coverage on early downs than they typically do. It was like almost a quarter of their snaps. And then they played more cover two on third down.

So kind of flipping it on its head where you're playing a little bit more man on early downs than they typically did. So that little, you know, this is what you think we're going to do. This is what we're actually going to do. Harder to pull the wool over team's eyes when you're doing it the second time around. So that little cat and mouse game between Andy Reid and Sean McDermott is going to be fascinating. And we will have plenty of time to dig into that over the next couple days. For now, that is all we've got. As always, sincerely appreciate you guys listening.

Please check out everything else we've got on the Athletic Football Show feed this week. Dan Bruegler, mock draft 2.0, two rounds available on the athletic. Him and Nate broke that down on Prospects to Pros. I highly encourage you guys to give that a listen. We did a little coaching carousel update about the Seahawks, Patriots, and the Washington football team with our team writers for all three of those teams. So if you guys want to go listen to that, that is available in your feed. And obviously our divisional round preview will be coming your way on Friday morning.

Very excited to dig into that. For now, that's all we got. Appreciate you guys listening. We'll talk to you soon. This was the Athletic Football Show.