The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Julian Edelman retires, teams “one draft away” with Lindsay Jones & the Rams’ unique draft strategy with Jourdan Rodrigue

Episode Date: April 13, 2021

Every offseason, we hear chatter like "they're just one draft away from a Super Bowl," or "All they need to do is hit on defense in the draft." But which teams are REALLY maybe only a draft away from contention? Robert Mays and Lindsay Jones each bring teams to the table, including the Dallas Cowboys, Cleveland Browns, Miami Dolphins and more. Plus they discuss Julian Edelman's Hall of Fame status as he retires during the recording session. Then, Robert welcomes Jourdan Rodrigue, Rams writer for The Athletic to share some insight on the unique approach the Rams are taking when it comes to the draft and player evaluation.Get exclusive discount access to The Athletic at theathletic.com/footballshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. Welcome to the athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays. Fun show for you guys today. Jordan Roderick covers the Rams for us. He's going to be joining us a little bit later to talk about kind of the unique take that the Rams have on their pre-draft process right now. They're handling things in a very different way.

They're kind of reconsidering a lot of, I guess, the well-founded principles of how you get ready for the draft as an NFL team. She wrote about it today. It's a great story. Excited to dig into that with her. Before we do that, though, I'm thrilled to welcome my good friend Lindsay Jones Lindsay how are you? I'm great Robert. How are you doing? I'm doing great. We have about 17 days till the draft.

It somehow feels like that's not enough and too many. The draft discourse has already made me very tired, but we're going to have to deal with it a little bit more often here over the next couple weeks. Today, though, I wanted to kind of take a step back from this year's class. So last year, when we were going into the draft, really right after they had made the move to go get Tom Brady, the bucks on paper looked like a team that really didn't need that many guys. They had a couple spots that were glaring holes. I think right tackle was obviously one of them. I think they needed a playmaker and the defensive secondary.

And they got both of those things in the first two rounds of the draft. And they really finished off their draft with two specific players that put them over the top. And that's a dangerous way to approach any draft. For the most part, rookies aren't going to contribute as much as you want them to. But every once in a while, there are instances. where teams really crush a draft and it changes their fortunes, both for that year and for years to come. Barnwell and I talked about that 2017 Saints draft on Friday show.

I think that's another good example. So I wanted to take a step back and look at some teams that typically aren't going to get a lot of attention coming up to the draft because they're not either not drafting very high or they're not the teams that really control the draft. And that's those teams we think might be one draft away. with one great run here in late April, early May, they could put themselves in a position to go from the middle of the pack to contender status in the same way that the bucks did last year.

Yeah, and I think there's a couple of these. I mean, it can be such a crapshoot. I mean, I think that's the word that I hear all the time when you're talking to agents and front office people about the draft is that as much as people want to predict exactly what's going to happen, nobody really knows. But there's a lot of teams, I think you're right, that have put themselves in a position now

with the way that they've drafted and built over the last couple of years. And then certainly with what has happened in free agency leading up to this point where you can really identify just a couple places where they can get better. I think you're going to see some trends when we go through our list right here. I think we've got five teams that we've identified as teams that really could make some significant progress. I think you're going to see some trends, ways that these teams are similar. And I do think it's important that there's a couple of teams that we're not going to talk about here because we think they're already contenders.

I was thinking the Buffalo Bills, who else are we not going to address right now in this group? Because we think they're already kind of on that level. For me, it was teams that were hanging around the top 10 in DVOA last year. I mean, obviously the Bills and the Packers were in the NFC and AFC championship games last year. The couple bounces go their way. They could have won the Super Bowl last season. I think the Saints, even with Drew Brees not being there,

they were number one last year in a lot of advanced metrics. they still have one of the best rosters in the league. Other teams like the Ravens, the Seahawks, teams up there in the top eight to ten teams in the league, those aren't the ones we're talking about. If you look at the chiefs fans, we're sorry. We're not going to be talking about you guys today. The chiefs are not one draft away from anything. If you look at the 2019 bucks, they finished 14th in DVOA and a plus nine point differential,

despite going seven and nine. So right there in the meat of the league. And those are the teams that I wanted to talk about. I will say, though, the first team on my list is kind of cheating because they went 11 and 5 last year, but they were 18th of DVOA. They actually got outscored by their opponents, but by a lot of other measures, they were closer to an 8 and 8 team. And that to me is the Cleveland Browns. Were they one of the teams that you were thinking when you were starting to do this exercise? They were.

I mean, and they were obviously, they were a team that, you know, won a playoff game were really competitive for a lot of actually their second playoff game when they were there in Kansas City. that game that Patrick Mahomes got hurt. So they were a little borderline for me where they're kind of already in that group that we talk about as contenders. But I've just been really interested to watch the way that Andrew Barry is approaching this. So this is your first team. So I'll give you the floor to kind of get into what you think that they can do, what the spots are, that if they really hit in this draft, they could make that leap, not just to an entertaining

team, kind of an up-and-coming team, but to a team that can really compete. And I think that's the distinction that you're making. And I think that's an important one. Even if they went 11 and 5 and won a playoff game, their record was better than they were last year. I don't think they were one of the true contending teams in the league over the course of the entire season. In the back half of the year,

I think they looked like a much different team, especially on offense. They were eighth, I believe, an EPA per play on offense in the second half of the season. But their defense has a lot of work to do. So if you look at the moves they made in free agency, no real changes on offense because they're set there. That's where they've spent a large majority of their resources.

The only real change that's happening there is they're getting O'Dell Beckham back. I mean, their good stretch on offense came without him in the lineup. And some people are going to say that's causal. I think that's silly. I think they were just playing a little bit better in the second half of the season and he didn't happen to be there. So you drop O'Dell Beckham back onto that offense, which Arvus Landry, everything else, Baker Mayfield playing a little bit better. That's a pretty complete unit when you consider all the money they spent their last off season.

It's really just on defense. So you look at the free agent moves they made. John Johnson, Troy Hill, right? They spent for those guys to be starters immediately on defense. Anthony Walker is a plug-and-play starter at linebacker. They brought in Malik Jackson and Tack McKinley as rotational rushers. So they really use free agency to get a couple starters, but also to kind of create the connective tissue on the defensive side of that roster.

Because we said this a million times. It really was kind of a blank slate for them on that side of the ball. And now it's how do you finish it off? they've been talking to Jedevi and Clowny. I thought that was a move they could make heading into free agency. Again, just adding talent to that defense in the way they've wanted to. So now, what are the final couple moves? And the spots that I would point out are still edge rusher,

even if they assign Clowny to a one-year deal. Because you still want a presence opposite Miles Garrett. I know they've been watching those guys where they're picking in this draft. You think one of those top three or four edge guys might be on the board. And the other spots are interior of the defensive line. You know, Shelton Richardson is still there. They have Jackson, but again, long-term solutions there and cornerback. Is there a chance that they can have somebody come in where Greedy Williams then becomes a bonus rather than somebody they're banking on?

I still think defense is going to be their number one focus, even if maybe in the third round or so, they have an extra third-round pick, which trading back is always good. Like you're looking there and you're sitting there looking at the order. It's like, where did they get another third-round pick from? It's just random from the Saints. it was to move down 14 spots last year. You do that every single time, and then you just have random third round picks added to your pick total, which is great.

So I think if they try to get a couple difference makers on defense in the first two rounds, and then maybe they add another pass catcher in the third round, something like that. Somebody that could take over for Jarvis Landry in the slot if he moves on next year, whatever it may be. But that to me is the mix. If they hit on those guys in succession, it could really take them from a team that's surprised that 11

to a team that might have the same record, but belongs in an entirely different class of team in the NFL. Well, and I think when you consider the Browns, too, is that we're still pretty young in what the, what the Andrew Barry front office plan is going to be. We have a pretty small sample size about how they're going to operate. But what we have seen so far, I really like it. I think we've talked a lot on this podcast over the last, you know, nine months or so about just the feeling that there are smart grownups in charge, which when we're talking about

Andrew Barry is kind of funny because he's the youngest GM in the league. He's significantly younger than I am. He's probably a little bit closer to your age, Robert. But it's just kind of wild. It just feels like they're building in the right way. And there was a lot to like about his first draft. You know, I think Juddrick Wills was, you know, a home run pick with their first round pick. Obviously, Grant Delpit, you know, unfortunate injury situation where he didn't get to have a rookie year. So he's almost going to be like a bonus draft. Totally. Coming to the 2021 class. So there are a group where. they're in a position where you don't have to necessarily hit a home run with every

position, you know, every draft pick this year because they're built pretty well right now. So they're in a position where you fill in some key contributors. You get a couple guys who are going to be really good depth on defense. You're going to get some good special teams players there. And you can probably take that next step into an AFC North that is definitely going to be winnable, I think. To me, it's about adding the versatility and the depth at corner and along the defensive line that you've added at safety.

By bringing in John Johnson and now having Johnson Harrison and Delpit is that three-man rotation back there, you can do a lot of different things. They still are heavily influenced by that Pete Carroll cover three approach to things, but they want to dress it up in a bunch of different ways. And they have that capability at safety. Now can you add one more layer of that at corner and one more body to give yourself some juice along the defensive line? They're not that far away.

I'm kind of cheating and putting them in here, but they do fit the criteria when you think about just according to the metrics being in the middle of the pack. And I created this exercise so I can do whatever I want. All right. Well, so with my first pick, I'm going to pick a team that was actually a dumpster fire last year. I'm not going to cheat like you did, Robert. That's fine. So my first team that I think can make, you know, can make a pretty significant jump if they nail this draft is the Dallas Cowboys. And I've got a couple of them. Sucked in right away. What's the date? April 12th.

I already getting sucked into Cowboys hype. I love it. I'm already there too. They were on my list as well. I'm not going to put the side of you solely. So I have a couple reasons for this. One is that I think the NFC East is still going to be extremely winnable and you don't have to be a 12-win team or 11-win team even to win the NFC East.

So the jump to be competitive within their own division might not have to be that significant. The other part is that the biggest thing that's going to leave. to their improvement this year has nothing to do with the draft. That's Doc Prescott getting healthy. And the fact that they've got a pretty stacked offensive roster. And there is a very large sample size throughout NFL history and especially recent NFL history that you can win and go pretty far in the playoffs if you have a really good offense, even if your defense is mediocre to even kind of bad.

Dan Quinn, the new defensive coordinator, Atlanta took a team to the Super Bowl by having a really good highly efficient offense and a pretty terrible defense. So we've seen him actually be a part of this. So when I'm looking at the Cowboys, they have 10 draft picks this year. And I think if you're Jerry Jones and you're Stephen Jones, the plan has to be pretty clear. You need an offensive lineman.

I think you're going to need to get some depth, probably one quality starter on the offensive line because they've gone through some really massive changes there. But then you just got to get some quality defensive starters there. They need help every level of. of their defense. And if you, you know, look, what I just said about, you know, quality of defense and if you're just kind of a middle of the road defense, I'm not looking, you know, you don't

need a 15 sack guy. But if you can get a guy that can get consistent pressure, you know, maybe five to eight sacks, you're a significantly better defense than you were last year. So, you know, I think they're a team just looking at with the number of picks that they have, where they have them. They have 10 picks, four of them in the top 100. if you get quality players with each of those picks, you can win the NFC East. And I think you could probably win the NFC East fairly easily, assuming that all goes well

on the offensive side of the ball. And there's not kind of the worst case disaster scenario that they had happened last year. It's actually an interesting comparison to those Falcons teams, because if you look at their spending, the Cowboys are second in the NFL in offensive spending after the Browns, which is funny that both of those teams are right at the top for us. So they need their offense to be really good. And I do believe that it can be really good. You know, last year, some of the numbers, we've talked about this a little bit,

some of the raw numbers were a little bit misleading. You know, they were, I think, 17th in EPA per play on offense, passing the ball when Dak Prescott was even healthy. A lot of that was volume, the reason they were putting up those numbers. I think there's still some things to figure out on the offensive side of the ball in terms of really letting everything click. But I do believe in the talent on that side. And if they can get some playmakers on defense,

I don't know how good a Dan Quinn-led defense is going to be in 2021, but like you said, let's say they can find a corner at 10. They draft Patrick Susshan Jr. They try to find an interior defensive lineman or an edge guy in the second round. They stumble into a safety in the third round or something to give them some depth there. They brought into Monte Casey and Keanu Neal. Again, just flexibility on defensive. Neil's going to play a little linebacker. Casey has played with Quinn before.

I mean, if they can be the 15th best defense in the league, the 18th best defense in the league. And the offense is in the top five. That's a potential playoff team. And that is not that hard to imagine. I mean, you really are putting a huge burden on them offensively. But with the way they've spent and with the way this team is constructed,

you would hope that's going to be the outcome in year two with Dak getting back. Yeah, I mean, they seem fine with that philosophy. I mean, it seems like they've done that by design that let's put all of this on the offense. And obviously the risk with that is what happens when you draft CD Lam's seven. 17th overall when you already have two starting wide receivers. You are clearly showing your priorities there with a move like that. Yeah. I mean, and the risk, obviously, is what happens when you lose the centerpiece of your offense,

that everything else crumbles. And there really isn't much way that you can recover. And that's really what happened to the 2020 Cowboys. But I think that's by design. And I think they can get better. And absolutely the way that you laid this out. So I'm fully ready for whether it's you or me, one of us is going to be writing this in July, you know, get ready for the.

Cowboys and the NFC Championship game. April 12. I picked it to win a lot of games last year. Yes, I recall. This is me just trying to check myself about those expectations. And, you know, on offense, I can understand the moves that they made. Bringing in Tynaseki to be their swing tackle, they're protecting themselves against what happened last year.

You can't protect yourself from a quarterback injury. I would argue they did about as well as you could by bringing in Andy Dalton to be your backup. Andy Dalton is a great starting quarterback, which great news for me. But if he's your backup quarterback, then that's okay. But if you get your quarterback hurt along with your entire offensive line, then things start to fall apart. Having a capable veteran swing tackle to step in in case Smith or Collins get hurt again is smart. I think what you said about interior offensive line depth makes sense. Connor McGovern has never come on for them in the way they probably wanted to,

which is why Tyler Biotis is another starting center. but if they can add one more body for depth there along with some defensive playmakers, then yeah, they're set up to, I think, be successful in a way they weren't last year. All right, let's get to my next team that's also sort of cheating. The Miami Dolphins, who were 10 and 6 last year. But again, there were 12th in DVA. They're outside the top 10. They had a plus 66 point differential, which is good, but not nearly in the same range as some of those contenders.

You look at the offseason moves that they made. They brought in Will Fuller to, you know, one year, stop. Top Gap starter, wide receiver, Matt Scura at center to take over for Ted Karras, who went back to New England. They traded for Bernard R. McKinney, and they brought in Justin Coleman to be their nickel corner. And you can frame this in a couple different ways, because when I was thinking about this exercise, the way it started was which teams need to fill a couple big holes.

With the dolphins, there aren't a lot of glaring holes, but there also aren't a lot of spots where they have players on the roster that would prevent you from adding someone else, right? So even if you sign Will Fuller, and the Dolphins are number one in wide receiver spending in 2021, by the way, which is kind of crazy to think about. Really? Really? Yes. Number one in the league in wide receiver spending to the cap in 2021 because they have Fuller and Donate Parker playing on big veteran contracts. So you have those two guys. I was just going to say how smart that front office has been lately, but. Well, I mean, Fuller's not a one-year deal. But if you spend, you know, if you have rookie contracts else on your roster, that's fine.

Fuller's on a one-year deal, which is what I was saying. They can draft the receiver in the first round if they want to. It's not as if... They probably should draft a receiver in the first round. So that's, they're totally open to them. Offensive line spending, they're 26 in offensive line spending with one first round pick among that group. If they want to add a tackle, they can. Nothing is preventing them.

So there are so many different ways they can go with these picks and they have so many high picks. The idea that they're picking six, and then they have their own pick and the Texan second round pick, there are so many different ways that if they hit on those, this suddenly looks like one of the best rosters in the league. Obviously, the huge question with them is going to be what happens with Tua. And does he take a step forward and do the additions they make help facilitate that growth? But if you assume a step forward from him,

they absolutely can take a monstrous leap if they hit on those first three picks they have early. in this draft. And certainly it's a leap on our part to assume that that leap is going to happen. We don't, this is kind of we're going. Absolutely. We go through this exercise because that is the biggest if out there. And I think when you look at pretty much all the other teams on our list that we're talking about here, they don't have that big quarterback question. You know, when you talk about the Browns, you know, you could say what's the long term there? What are they going to do with Baker's contract? But these teams, they know who their quarterback is. We've seen them be a top eight offense. Yeah, exactly. And we don't,

And we just don't know that with Tua yet. They're going through an offensive coordinator change. They're actually going to have co-coordinators. So what exactly is that offense going to look like? Are they going to have a better designed running game, more explosion out of the passing game? Because they weren't really willing to go downfield a lot last year when Tua was playing. So exactly what is that offense going to look like? But they're an interesting team that I think they're willing to make a lot of moves.

They already have. I mean, they've already treated twice. and it's April 12th moving around this draft board. So I think they're willing to be really aggressive. They're willing to kind of move depending on how the way the board is falling. You know, they don't have to be aggressive if they don't need to, but they will be willing to if they want to. And they have so many options available to them.

So they're one of the most interesting teams, I think. What do you want them to do at six? I mean, I guess it depends on what the Bengals, the Bengals do. And you were very well versed in this. You wrote a really interesting story last week with this. debate between receiver offensive line just in terms of positional value. I mean, I just want them to take a really good skill position player. You know, and I understand what you're saying about the offensive line spending.

And I mean, I guess if the Bengals, if Penny Sewell is there, if the Bengals go ahead and take Jamar Chase, I think it would be hard to pass up a guy who will probably be a very, a long-term starter for you. But, God, I just, I would love to see them take Kyle Pitts. Is that crazy? No. I mean, there's, there's so. Here's the thing.

Keep them in Florida. Because they have those three picks in the first 36, it becomes so interesting because one pick could dictate the other, right? So let's say they take Sewell or Slater or whoever. They take a tackle at six because they're like, we need another long-term starter. We're not comfortable with the guys we drafted last year. This is why you have so many bites at the apple.

Totally fair logic. Then maybe you add a pass catcher with their second pick at 18. Like is Rashad Bateman there? somebody of that ilk. So then you have a tackle and a pass catcher. Then at 36, you can go defense. Do you want a pass rusher? Do you want somebody in the interior of the defensive line?

Or if you had a pass catcher at 6 is one of the other tackles there at 18, it was just so many different ways they can go. And that's why in a lot of ways they control this draft because of those three picks that they have in the top 36. I mean, they really can go so many different directions because of that flexibility. So it's fascinating to me. I completely understand any of the logic. If the Falcons were to take a quarterback at four

and the bangles were to take Sue at five, take Jamar Chase at six, take Kyle Pitts at six, whatever. And don't think twice about it. I mean, don't even let the clock tick down. I guess if you're deciding between chase and pits, maybe then you let it run down

because you're having those last minute debates, but you take a skill position player and you don't even think twice about it. Well, this is why they traded back up to six, right? Because they assume that there would be a handful of players on the board they'd be comfortable taking it that spot. I don't know if I agree with that thinking. I think maybe you want that first rounder next year

instead of moving from 12 to 6, but that's what they did. And I think it's because they're confident, one of those three guys or the three guys they love will be on the board and be a huge difference maker for them. And they think that's a sign to me that they think they're close and they don't need to another year of building, that the guy that they're going to take at 6

is going to help them be a playoff team in 2021. Yeah, that sounds really good until Tua doesn't play well this year and you need a quarterback next year. and you said, man, I really wish we had that extra first round pick. But it's a story for another day. Look, I live in Denver where a team went all in on a second year quarterback. And now I was debating taking a quarterback the next year because the guy didn't play well. I completely understand the very human impulse to say we are close.

I'd rather have one of the best players in this draft that we've been watching for the past two months than kicking the can further down the road again. But I just think everything is going to go wrong all the time because of the team that I root for. So it's my. my woe is me, this guy is falling thinking infiltrates how I see this kind of stuff. I'll say spoiler alert, we're not going to be talking about the Bears as a team that's one draft away. No, they definitely are because now Andy Dalton is the quarterback. So there's just a couple more holes left on the roster.

Like six more drafts and you're going to be there, I swear. So close. Like 2027, that's the year it's going to happen. My next team that I think if they nail this draft can be a playoff team, a contender in the AFC is the Los Angeles Chargers. A team that... Did you just like, you've taken over my body here. Like, you've just, I somehow have, that's what's going on.

You picked the Cowboys and the Chargers in this group. Look, I'm looking for teams when I'm thinking about teams that are just a move or two away, a key starter here and there, a really good breakout rookie. I think you have to have, look at teams that already kind of have your quarterback in place. The Chargers have that. That have good talent throughout the rest of your roster. The Chargers have that have kind of some exciting new coaching talent.

the Chargers have that. And I think they're in a pretty good position where now you know exactly who your quarterback is and what you're going to be around him. And you can really kind of focus on what do you want? And the Chargers, it seems so clear that they have to take a tackle, right, an offensive tackle at 13. And it seems like they're going to be in a pretty good position to do that. I mean, this is a good draft for a team that needs an offensive lineman.

And I think you'll be able to get fairly decent value there at 13. it wouldn't necessarily be a reach. But you've got good receiver talent. You've got good running back talent. You obviously have your quarterback. You have really good defensive coaching. You've got good defensive back. So you're able to fill in here and there.

Oh, and you've got Joey Boza also really good. So they're just the team now that has me excited again about the potential of the Chargers. And I'm sure this is all going to blow up. And you're going to be playing this back for me on, you know, September 28th. just like you're with the Dallas one, but I think they're in a good position. My only concern here is the Chargers, even if they hit on a couple of these guys,

depth is still a concern. They really would need to thread the needle. And a big part of the reason the Bucks won the Super Bowl last year was Health Look. They were the healthiest team in the league. We see every single year how important that is. But the Chargers, based on the talent they have on their roster, would absolutely need to stay healthy,

even if they hit on these guys, which those are the famous last words for every single Chargers season if they stay healthy. So that's the problem. But if you look at it, they sign Corey Lindley, they sign Matt Feiler,

so they have two starters locked down on the offensive line. They are very excited about Odeiabushi, the guy that they signed on that one-year deal from the Lions to be their right guard. They think his best football was ahead of him, and I tend to agree. He played really well last year.

If they land the tackle in the first two rounds, then you have an offensive line that at least on paper looks to be a complete unit and significantly improved on the group that they had last year. Obviously, they signed Jared Cook to replace Hunter Henry. I think that's a nice low-cost way to handle that transition. They have receiving talent, whether it's Mike Williams, Keenan Allen, some of the faster young guys they had last year.

On defense, you mentioned some of the names. The other spot I would say, if they don't go tackle at 13, If they trust the depth of this class and they think they can get a starting tackle at 47, do they go corner with the 13th pick? Because if they have another starting corner with Michael Davis and Chris Harris, and you have Derwin James Adderly, those linebackers, and you have Bosa. I think they liked Cairo Fackerel as a value signing as another edge player they can rotate in.

Now things get interesting. I think it's the tackle and another piece on defense. and then in the third round, just a little sprinkle of something in those offensive playmakers. You have Williams, you have Allen. Do you go get somebody that can be a slot option for you in three receiver sets where Keenan Allen kicks outside? Just one more guy that can really make something happen. If that's kind of the trio of guys and they do stay healthy, I think it can get really

interesting. And like you said, you have to factor in how much better their defense can be just by virtue of Brandon Staley putting those guys in good spots. Well, so I think there's going to be some really good. wide receiver value in this draft where a team like the Chargers who doesn't have a pressing need for a number one or even a number two wide receiver is going to be able to get significantly better there by drafting in the third or fourth round. I just think the way that this draft is set up and just how good receivers are. I know you and Nate talked about this on the show last week.

Dane has been really, really big on talking just about how wide receiver talent overall is changing and it's kind of shifting the way that we value wide receivers now because these kids are so much better because they're growing up catching 5,000 balls a year playing seven on seven. I am super curious to see what Brandon Staley values in a defensive player in his first draft as a head coach. And if they go with a corner at 13, who is a Brandon Staley corner when you're looking at this draft and what is he looking at in terms of, you know, kind of the versatility? Does he want a guy that's going to be most like Jalen Ramsey?

You know, obviously a corner that he had tremendous. his success coaching last year with the Rams. Is it a different style? I'm just so I'm really curious to see kind of how Brandon Staley puts his mark on this draft with, you know, Tom Telesco, who is putting together a pretty long track record of making pretty smart decisions. I mean, I think last year, a lot of us were real hard on him for the Justin and Herbert pick.

And now it's like, oh, Tom Telesco knows what he's doing, saw something that the rest of us maybe didn't. So they're going to be really fun to watch and just waiting to find out how we'll end up hurting us later. That's inevitable, but we'll see what happens. And I think that the corners that they might like, it might not look like the corners everyone else would like. I don't know if they're going to need a true press man corner

the way that other defenses might value that. I think he wants secondary reaction skills, guys that can play off, guys that can play man, guys that have just a little, a good sense of the position, even if they're not the best cover corners man to man. And I think that's going to be the question they have to answer. And I don't know if these guys fit that bill. I haven't watched these corners enough to have an opinion either way.

But I do think it's a position where they could get better because I do know that they're going to want more depth than the secondary. Just having as many bodies as possible to do a bunch of different stuff is definitely something they're going to value. And the way that the roster looks right now, they don't have that. I think that's why they were in on a guy like Kyle Fuller because he could give them that. And I don't think Kyle Fuller is going to be available in this draft. but if they can get a corner at 13, there's a chance that guy can be a difference maker from the start. All right.

My last one here is Atlanta. And, you know, we've, it's a fascinating case because who knows what they're going to do in the top five. If they pick a quarterback, it becomes a little bit different. You know, they're having one eye on the future. But this is a team that finished 17th in DVOA last year. They had a point differential of about an 8 and 18. You know, they were not that far off from,

what the Browns were and the Browns went 11 and 5. So this team with a couple different breaks, I think could be okay. Obviously not a lot of additions this offseason because they didn't have any money. They signed Mike Davis and made a couple small additions in the secondary.

But if they believe their offense is pretty much set and they go out maybe and draft Kyle Pitts fourth overall and you have an offensive line with a lot of high-end investments in it, obviously some questions about how those guys are going to step up, whether it's Caleb McGarry or Hennessy at center, you know, guys that are younger, but if they can ascend, and then you have Julio, Calvin Ridley, Russell Gage, Kyle Pitts,

Hayden Hurst, Mike Davis, Matt Ryan, playing in that offense with Arthur Smith calling the shots. If you can go out and get a couple guys on defense in the second or third round that can be playmakers for you, and like we talked about with other teams, if you can be the 18th best defense in the league and that offense can be really good from the start, I think they could be closer than other people do. And I think that's one of the arguments and one of the conversations they're probably having in the building about whether they should go quarterback or not, because they're probably sitting there looking at the roster and thinking, we can be pretty damn good with Matt Ryan right now. And I think that's why they're so intriguing as to which

direction they're going to end up going. So here's my question about the Falcons that I would like you answer, I guess. And I'm not sure if you'll know the answer to this. So when we get to May 1st and we're looking back at what happened in this draft and we're doing our, you know, the exercise that all of us that are NFL reporters and NFL writers that we all do, I hate doing it, but we all do it where we have to grade the drafts and who won the draft and all this stuff. What will be a good Falcons draft? What would that look like where we would be able to look at and say, yes, they nailed it. They're going to be a better team now in 2021. I think it would involve. Kyle Pitts it for.

Okay. Because they would get the best player in the draft that's not Trevor Lawrence. But is that a better long-term decision for like who the Falcons are going to be in three years? Probably not. That's why grading the draft immediately is kind of silly. It's the worst. I hate it. But I'm going to do it anyways.

It depends on what they think of the quarterback, right? You know, I think Peter King wrote about it today. They don't feel like they have to take anybody. If they love one of the guys that's there, let's say hypothetically, the Falcons love Justin Fields. They think Justin Fields is a star, potential star at quarterback. And let's say the first three quarterbacks off the board are Trevor Lawrence, Zach Wilson and Mack Jones, and Justin Fields is sitting there. If they think Justin Fields is going to be really good, they should take Justin Fields. If the Niners take Justin Fields and they don't love Lancer Jones and those are the two guys

there, I wouldn't take one just because you're sitting there and there are quarterbacks available. If you believe that that guy is a long-term starter and he's going to fit what you want to do all of that, then I think you take them. I don't think taking quarterback just because you're picking in the top five is something they should do. That's a cop-out answer, but that's what I'm going to say. And I think that's fair. And, you know, our exercise that we're doing here on Monday evening, April 12th is one

dropped away from being a better team and being competitive in 2021. So I think in that, within that exercise, you have to take the guy who's going to be on the field who's going to win you games. And I can totally see the Kyle Pitts argument there where, you know, he may be the best player in this draft, right? Just like complete player regardless of position. So that totally makes sense to me. Is there anything on defense that you would really like to see them address in order to, you know, quote unquote nail this draft? Oh, I think anything.

I mean, I legitimately think it's a blank slate. Any warm body. I mean, it's there is not a spot, I think, where they're set by any stretch. I mean, I think that's, we knew that going in. You know, they have a couple building. blocks when it comes to Jarrett and Dion Jones. You know, they drafted AJ Terrell in the first round. But other than that, I think you just want talent.

You know, it's kind of the same way I think about the Browns. The Browns have a better baseline of players on their defense. But I just think you want the best, like the highest amount of good defensive players you can possibly acquire in the next month. I think that's what the Falcons should be thinking about. I'm with you. I mean, they're interesting. And I think that division is going to be really interesting too.

I mean, there's a clear number one when we're talking about the NFC South. with the Bucks who nailed this exercise a year ago and then won the Super Bowl. And then retained all of their players, which is wild. And then they added G.O. Bernard today. So, you know, they're getting there. They're not going to be signing Julian Edelman. So everybody can pump the brakes on the Julian Edelman to Tampa Bay stuff. While we're recording, he announced that he is retiring.

Well, that's in week eight they're going to sign Juliannellum. I don't think they're going to sign before the season starts. He could retire to Florida. But yeah, he's not going to be signing with the bucks right now. So, but I mean, I just, I think that division, I don't think it's necessarily winnable because I think the bucks are significantly better than everybody else in the division. But it is more winnable than it was last year when you had both the bucks and then the Drew Bree's saints where there weren't as many questions about who the saints were going to be. So they're going to be fun to watch. And also, you know, what makes them kind of a wild card is new general manager, new head coach.

Totally. And a ton of flexibility. I know what I want. I know I want them to draft Kyle Pitts because I, I want to watch that offense. I want to watch all those guys in the field at the same time. But if I were a Falcons fan and Fields was there and they liked him, that's what I would want them to do.

But I'm not. So I can just root for the most exciting thing possible. So Julian Adamen retires today. I was thinking about this. We can go after this. And the reason I was going to say to you, because I remember several of them came in Denver, at least a couple of them. I was kind of thinking back, I was like, man, it feels like I have watched so many Julian

Edelman playoff moments. And then I was going back through it. It's because I attended either a conference championship or Super Bowl that he played in in five of the eight years that I've covered the NFL. Like, it's just ridiculous how many times we've watched that group of Patriots play in high leverage moments. I forget until I actually think about how many of them actually got stacked up over that amount of time. And that's why you're already seeing, you know, you're going to be listening to this podcast on Tuesday morning. your Twitter timeline has already been full of debates of is Julian Edelman a Hall of Famer? It's because he was, yeah, he's absolutely not, objectively not a Hall of Famer.

End of discussion. This is not a debate on this podcast. But people are debating it on the internet. And that's because we have watched him over and over and over again in these really important big games. So his profile has gotten elevated based on who he played for. But when you go back and actually look at his like the overall stats, but people like him. I mean, he was a part of some really big moments. He was incredible in the playoffs.

Yeah. And his helmet catch in the Super Bowl and the comeback against the Falcons, who just, you know, we've talked a lot about the Falcons and Dan Quinn and stuff tonight. I mean, that catch that he made in that game was, I mean, one of the most insane plays I've ever seen and they don't win the game without him. He was a Super Bowl MVP also. I mean, those things are important. And, you know, the connection that he had with Brady, obviously, but he is not a Hallfamer.

For the record, April 12. 12, Lindsay and Roberts say Julian Edelman, not a Hall of Famer. He is the non-Hall of Fame player, I think, that has taken up the biggest space football-wise, probably in my life. Just again, in terms of how many high-leverage moments I've watched him participate in and how he's just been a presence if you've covered the league and been around it for the last decade. It's really kind of amazing. Again, the space he occupies, even if he's not a Hall of Fame player. And I think that's exactly why we're having this conversation about him right now and why the debate about his Hall of Fame candidacy rages on on the internet.

All right, Lindsay, thank you so much. We will chat with you next week about something else draft related. Always good to talk with you. Appreciate the time. Thank you so much. I'm really looking forward to listening to your conversation with Jordan because her story today was so smart. You should see my outline for it. It is like some Pepe-Sovia nonsense.

There's a lot of stuff going on. All right. We'll talk to you later. Thanks. see you later. I'm very excited to welcome now. In my opinion, the NFL beatwriter that I think does the best job in using her access to teach people about the processes of the NFL and the way that it actually works. And I would say that even if we didn't know each other and even if we didn't work at the same place, Jordan Roderick, thank you so much for coming on. It's always good to chat with you.

Thanks for having me, Robert. That's very kind of you to say, maybe exaggerating a little bit, but I appreciate it. I appreciate it. So many of the pieces, that you've done over the last year, I think have given people a really interesting look into how the sausage gets made, for lack of a better term. The story about Jordan Fuller last year and how the Rams found him in the draft, I thought was really, really interesting. And I think that a lot of the tenants of that piece inform the story that you wrote today.

And that story was about the changes that the Rams have made to their pre-draft process. They are not at the Senior Bowl anymore. They didn't send a contingent to the Combine before the pandemic even started last year. They are not at all of these pro days. So your piece starts with less need at the Bram's facility watching senior bowl practices. So when did you have an idea about how far they had taken this approach? When did you really want to start digging into it? Yeah.

So that's a great question because I, when I was covering that story about Jordan Fuller, I had all these little clues that started making themselves present within the reporting process. one of them was obviously the re-application of certain data points and how they're using different metrics and measurements in their evaluation process. So that was fascinating to me because I was in my first year, so I was coming over from a very different organization. And strategy everywhere you go is different. And we talked about this in Slack prior is like it's not like any, you know, there are wrong answers or right answers. But strategy everywhere is totally different. So I was fascinated by that strategic process of the entire draft calendar year, essentially.

Well, actually, I was going to write a simple story about how the Rams had adjusted their scouting process, specifically due to COVID. And I was zooming with Les Sneed, and I realized he wasn't actually at the Senior Bowl that was broadcasting live on my television. He was on his couch in Malibu, California, zooming from his home. And I was like, hey, man, so you guys aren't at the senior roll. And he just started taking me through, you know, the reason for doing that. And so that started a very long ongoing, you know, been reporting the story for several months now, if not maybe the last year because these processes have changed since that time of the massive changes that they've implemented, a major, major overhaul of reassessing

and reevaluating everything from a resource such as time on task and where, those saved hours can go to, like I said, how they match data sets and apply different measurements and different points to players as they go through and how they collect data and disseminated and all of that. So it's a hugely fascinating story to me and it gets into philosophy and sociology and all of these different things that I think are so important to team building and crucial now, as you know, Robert, because I know one of the big fascinating points to you is this wave of data that is starting to happen and how can teams find? edges when everyone's receiving sort of the same data points, the same testing numbers and sharing

all of these things, how are they finding edges and doing so within the structure of their own ecosystem, which varies from team to team. So it's interesting. I was having a conversation with a head coach recently, and we were talking about some of this stuff. And just that, that contrast between old and new, old and new thinking. And he was talking about how a scout, he was talking to a got about watching guys in person and just how that's sort of an outdated idea. Like you have all of these hours of tape on these guys and watching them play. The idea that you'd be swayed by how a guy moves in person, there's almost more of a downside to it than an upside because you have that intimacy and there's that lack of distance

between it and it kind of swayes your decision-making process. So when you were talking to them, did any of the old arguments come up about why you'd want to be at pro days. Why teams think there's value in actually being on the ground? Because the more and more I think about it, it almost seems like trying to create that distance for yourself allows you to see it with clear eyes than somebody that gets infatuated by someone because he watched him move and run in person. And it's a great question because the thing that I kept hearing over and over again is, why are we going to do this thing that's always been done and exist within this mechanism of what the league has always done traditionally? Why are we going to keep existing within that

structure if we're also at the same time trying to find new ways to push the edges of that structure to find a competitive advantage. So it's it's maybe less about the Rams thinking that they are right in doing this and more so them thinking that there's more value for them in very efficiently stripping all of those biases that can come into play when you see a person in person. And when you're talking to other scouts standing next to you who are gasping over one person who's working out in front of you versus how you're breaking down your film in your own place in the RIMS facilities alongside their data analysts and unpacking that set of biases. And so I think that it was less about like other guys do it this way because of this. And instead sort of pointing

to the fact that they felt that they were becoming too biased in an evaluation of prospects and all of these variables that happened when you attend something in person. It wasn't in the piece, but Les was talking about how even when he's sitting up in the same, stands in Mobile for the Senior Bowl. He's wasting time essentially because he can't focus on one prospect for the entire afternoon. At the same time, dozens of hopeful team personnel are approaching him, handing him their resumes and trying to engage him in conversations. Media is trying to engage him in conversation. So he's never really fully efficiently focused in on the prospect he wants to see. And he's, you know, I can't miss this other guy on the other side of the field. And what if I have to

look here, here? And that goes for every single scout that that, that, that, out there within their various assignments. And so he actually thought that they saved two weeks of work by instead receiving all of the film for the various positions and players they wanted to see, assigning them by region to their regional scouts who were already familiar with those players. So they could cross-check what the 90% of their body of film study from the college season showed them on that prospect. And then doing it all in real time.

So they're getting these film cutups of these drills at Senior Bowl, which I think those drills are very valuable. And we talked about that as well, as those drills are valuable because they, they match top talent against top talent. And it's, it sort of either corrects what you thought or reaffirms what you thought about guys in some ways. And so they're saving like a like a week of work or two weeks of work. He said they might have even saved three weeks of work when you factor in travel and sort of stand around time and all of this stuff because they're doing it all in real time and they're finishing the senior bowl part of the spring in one week doing it in real time from their. couches instead of over the span of three and then reinvesting that time elsewhere. So it's so fascinating because it's like, well, if they're the only ones doing it,

could they maybe be wrong? Right? And that's my question. I think the senior bowl is the biggest one to me. That's the one that sets off the most alarm bells because with the combine, you're just watching guys run around. All of that stuff is uniform. The times are really important.

You're going to get all of those. So you quoted J.W. Jordan, who is their director of draft management there. saying he's not any better at timing of 40 than anybody else is, which I thought was so funny because it's true. Like, who cares if you're the one with the stopwatch? But that stuff for the combine, that makes sense in pro days because that's all uniform.

It's all in a database somewhere, whatever. I still think a football guy would still be able to talk himself or herself into this idea of watching somebody up close, seeing like those drills and seeing how they look live and everything else. Because if you remove that from the equation, why would you ever need to go to a football game again? because that's like a sea change. That is a, like a tectonic shift in the way that you'd think about scouting.

I think the only argument for going to live college games would be the information that you can gather on campus from the coaching staffs. That to me I could still understand is valuable. But other than that, the actual sitting at the game part and watching guys live, it seems like they are not prioritizing that over the idea of trying to be as efficient as possible in the way. that we're dealing with all of this information, all of this tape, all of this data. Yeah, and isn't that crazy? Because it's a small example of something that does indicate such a major philosophical shift, right? Because I see in the future for them some sort of a blend where they still have their college guys out in their various stations and they're still going to games.

But again, like, even when I was talking to Brad Holmes last year for the, for the Jordan Fuller piece, they found so much more value in just showing up to practices rather than scouting games because they were getting all of those things and showing up to practices and watching how the players practice and watching how they interact with teammates, the things that you can't necessarily see from specific film cutups of that. So it's interesting. It's not even just traveling versus not traveling, but even adjusting the way you travel. And so I think that those drills that you do at the senior bowl, they cannot be undervalued at all. Like I think you and I are an agreement on that because they put top versus top, right? And so

It's a way to eliminate noise. You're putting everything on the same level. And it's a good way for you to figure out if, you know, maybe lesser school prospects can compete with top talent. And I think it's a really good way to evaluate. But it's so interesting that they have in their hierarchy of how what they feel helps them the best. And they have put removing those sort of in person and live biases ahead of actually seeing the prospects. do things in person because they believe that their film studies should be in depth enough to show them what they need to know about the prospect when also applied with the data pile that they are assembling on each prospect, which includes personality profiles and speaking with coaches and other scouts across the league and other GMs and talking to like 100

people about every one guy, which every team does. But then just doing it all over the span of a week versus that three week period, they felt that reevaluation and re-sort of funnaling of that time, plus in combination with removing those biases that you can get from being there in person versus doing it sort of in a vacuum, they felt the combination of that outweighed going in person, which I thought was so interesting because, you know, it's like that quote that less has in the piece, he's like, you know, just because this is always the way that it's been done doesn't mean that, you know, why are we, are we only doing it because that's the way it's always been done? Or is there a way we can reverse engineer this to make it into a better

way that works for us as a, as a team? Well, it's interesting because I think that beyond football, even, the pandemic forced everyone to think about those things by interrupting the rhythms of your daily life. I know I live differently than I did before any of this started. And the pandemic had something to do with this, but they almost had a jumpstart on it because they were forced virtual when they were moving to L.A. So it's almost as if this stuff has had time to gestate for them in a way it might not have for teams that saw this pandemic shift as jarring. So what has the timeline been about how this stuff has been different for them that it might be for another team? Because this is the second kind of seismic event that they've had to deal with over the last five years.

Yeah. And you know, Robert, that came up unprompted. Like it was so, interesting because that was such a common thread that these guys were utilizing and thinking about when they were talking to me for this story without knowing what the other people had talked to me about was that move from St. Louis where they were essentially straddling the continental United States on their way to Los Angeles. I've made that drive. It's not a fun drive. But they also, like half of them didn't even know how to turn their damn computers on at the time, right? So it's like They had to learn and they had to adjust and grow. And at that point, they didn't have facilities with which to conduct their draft meetings.

So they're learning how to like use, I don't even know what it would have been Skype, I guess, at that point. Because the Zoom wave is here at this point. But, you know, and they're learning how to conduct virtual evaluations and virtual meetings and organized travel. And they pointed to a couple of players, J.W. Jordan pointed to a couple of players to me who like they didn't even meet in person. or see in person for such a long time, including Corey Littleton, who became a huge impact player for them and then factored into their compic formula that we all know that they love to utilize. And then Morgan Fox as well. You need to utilize it. When you keep trading away first round draft picks, you need as many

compics as you can get. There's that ecosystem. Yeah. There's that ecosystem. Yeah. And so, and Morgan Fox, who ended up becoming like quite a situational role player for them. Again. And athletic football show favorite, Morgan Fox. Yeah. Again, we'll turn into. a comp pick maybe. I haven't looked at the formula recently. But, but yeah. And so it's, that move was such a catalytic factor in how they decided to reframe their thinking of things. And then they hired a bunch of young people and they made their analytics department extremely robust and

nicknamed it the nerds nest and, and a lot of their, and a lot of their coaches are in there. Several times week, including Sean McVeigh. They're, they're all in there, you know, working with, the analysts and having that sort of marriage and partnership between what you're watching as football evaluators and what you're also processing in terms of data. And so I think that that's where they had that big catalyst come into play where they had to change their way of thinking because there was no other option for them at the time before they got settled in in Los Angeles. And I found the parallels to that to be extremely fascinating. Talking about the data and kind of that the mine of data they have and the bounty of data that they have.

We've talked about this, you've written about this. I think it's kind of become accepted that the 40 is no longer as important as it used to be. There are teams that aren't the Rams that have thrown it away in favor of the GPS data. And I think with game speed, that's really important. Because for years, we asked that question. Is it time speed or is it play speed? What is it? Now we have eliminated that mystery.

We know what a guy's play speed is at every level. I think a lot of teams are doing that. I wanted to ask you, though, because you made a really interesting contrast in the piece about what a speed threat receiver would be. And I think what one of them called the technical receiver like a Cooper Cup is. Did you ask them at all about the buckets of GPS data that they have? Like, obviously, it's speed for whatever, how fast you want to see a guy move. But what other conditions and qualities do they try to measure with that data? Did you get that granular with it?

Because that's really interesting to me. And it's so fascinating. And it's where, and I think like we, I only helicopter over it because I am terrified to jump into the discourse on analytics versus pure football and all that stuff. It's not fun. I'm terrified of that. So please, nobody come find me after this. But I read it and I look at it.

And I think where you can find a really good marriage between what numbers can do for you and how you can correctly apply them as well as football watching film and evaluating based purely on on film and watching a player is this example specifically because you know the Rams at the time they're looking for a slot receiver they're not interested in some of the the higher ranked receivers in the draft because they're they're looking at a guy and how he operates within the confined space within the middle of the field and then throughout the seam and all of that and so they're looking for a guy and how fast he is getting off the line of scrimmage, for example. What is average distances between him and his coverage, for example? And so in those ways,

they found that Cooper Cup's straight line speed was at the bottom of how they weighted him in their evaluations, whereas if they want someone who's going to run like 12 go routes a game for them, then that weighs differently because they want to look at how fast is he at near the apex of his of his route. What's his miles per hour near the apex of however, wherever he's supposed to be when the ball comes to him. And I think when those buckets become really important and what they do is as you get different sort of categories of it. And a good example of this was when they were looking at Van Jefferson. And Van Jefferson had the senior bowl GPS data just like Cooper Cup did. And one of the the things that people did was they sort of generalized Van Jefferson as being the quote

unquote fastest receiver at the senior bowl. Well, they were taking that speed from when he was doing gunner drills on special teams. Well, that doesn't apply to, I mean, you can move through traffic. Maybe that's a small application to what that would be to actual playing in an offense. But it doesn't actually apply super thoroughly to what Van Jefferson's job is on 60% of his actual snaps. instead that applies to maybe the next 10% that he's playing on special teams. So separating and discerning that bucket of data from, in actuality, you know, situational tracking, I think that's how you can really marry your knowledge of football and the understanding of what you need a player to do for you and the numbers of it all.

And that's something that the Rams are trying to invest more heavily into. And again, because more colleges than ever are doing the. GPS thing. It's not, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's only recently that teams have been able to, like, actually ask for this data. Um, and, and the sharing is it's like very, people are very, very tight lipped with some of this, this data. And then you could maybe find it a little bit more readily with next gen stuff and, and, you know, at the senior bowl when they're, they're actually getting these numbers because the players are wearing maybe the GPS for the first time and they're tracking spark and all of these different types of things. And so, um, it's, it's so fascinating. Because,

one thing that we'll know, you know, maybe three years from now, is were you correctly applying the data for your vision, for your player? Were you correctly pulling from the right buckets, essentially? And I think that's, you know, I'm rambling as an answer to your question, but I think that's the biggest part of this is, were you right and were you successful in pulling from these different buckets and not just pulling from them, but separating them in the first place? I think that, and I want to say, based on the research that I've done, I did a story about how the tracking data could possibly relate to quarterback evaluation last year and because there are some services that are now trying to make it a uniform thing across college football and sell it and everything else. And I think that'll be nice in terms of understanding how often the guy went to his right read and things like that, but I still believe that the chip is in the pads. So efficiency of movement is interesting to me.

Like, can we, are we going to get to a place where we know how many false steps the receiver takes, where we know how efficient of a route runner he is? I don't want all of that stuff to be quantified because I think that I want it to be more art than science still. And that's, I would want it. It's a trend in that direction. But that interests me because with Cup especially is like efficiency of movement matters. Do they track that with change direction? Do they track that with separation?

All of that stuff. I don't think we know that yet, but I'm very interested in it. So you said, and I agree, this makes total sense. this question of why are we doing it this way? And it's acting with intentionality. And they have done such a good job with that. And I think that part of the reason both you and I are interested in this franchise and have talked about it multiple times on this show is because they apply that thoughtfulness

to everything that they do. There is this, why are we doing it this way? And they try at every turn to create edges, whether it's in their scouting or the way that they apply their draft capital. So you said in the piece at the end. By the way, everyone, Robert grinned as he couldn't keep a straight face as he was saying that. Because I wanted to bring it here because it's very good. So you were taught, at the end of the piece, you said that the way they have used these resources is a fragile ecosystem, which is a perfect way to phrase it.

And you had less on your podcast, love and personnel last week. It was a really good conversation. And he went into detail about that. He went into detail about the steps of the process and the thoughts that go into what. why they have traded these picks away. And I thought it was so, so interesting how convincing he was in laying this out. He sold it. He really did.

And it's because I get it. If you're picking in the 20s or later every single year, which they have every year of McVeigh's tenure, your assumption is that in that in that range of the draft, you're not going to have players that, as he said, flip the math for you, which is really let's gives you a window into how much these guys are on the same. The fact that less need sounds like Sean McVeigh, sounds like Brandon Staley, like they all talk with the same value system, I think really lets you know that they're in step on this stuff because that's how those guys talk. It's about flipping the math. You should see all of the, sorry to interrupt you, Robert, but you should see they all have the same reading glasses too, all of them. That's a good thing. Framed. Yeah, it's like they are simpatico in there. So when you're looking at it and there was a coach I was talking to recently told me that it's

around like pick 12 or 13. After you get past that, it gets real murky. And if they're, they're assuming that they're going to be drafting in that range all the time. And they're thinking, all right, how are we going to flip the math with the picks that we have? And if they think two first round picks for Jaylon Ramsey gives them a better chance to flip the math than the ways that they could use them in the first round, I think I believe

that. Like, I think that I am okay with this approach based on the ways that he laid it out. So when you guys were having that conversation last week, which again is great and everyone should go check it out, were there any details or nuances to the way that he was framing that for you that you hadn't heard from that from that side of them before or that made you think about it in a slightly different way? No, I don't think so. I don't think in terms of what he was saying. It wasn't really surprising. It sometimes strikes you, though, on a sort of philosophical standpoint that you're sitting there and you're watching this like sort of experience. experiment unfold, right? They're not doing it the way that other teams have done it. And there are

similarities in certain facets of what they do. Refusing to overvalue like late third or excuse me, late first round, like middle third of the first round pick draft picks, they're not overvaluing them in terms of drafting a pick and drafting and sort of what they call an unknown entity at a later round first round pick. Instead, they believe that there's more value in bundling those together for someone who they could have gotten in the top 10 had they lost the previous share, which they hadn't. So this is where those two things have to go hand in hand. You have to keep winning and assume that you will keep winning in order to get a good return of investment in these experimental trades that you're doing. But philosophically, it's really interesting because we don't know if they're right yet.

I mean, they're right. They're right so far, right, because they're winning sustainably. And I would argue that their roster has gotten better this year. And, you know, they've lost a couple of key players, but it's either been at or maybe a little bit better at a couple of positions and some developing younger players. It's a somewhat important position, too. Yes, kind of important. A little bit of a big deal there. But yeah, I heard there was a trade or something to have it. I don't know, whatever. So philosophically, though, it's kind of like this razor thin and like I said, in my piece, fragile ecosystem that they walk because they bet on these known quantities, known entities, a Jalen Ramsey of Matthew Stafford and have no issue bundling those later first round picks simply because they don't place a higher value on those picks than they do a player who is a proven entity who fits in their system, who also, and this is important, plays a high value position. for them. This is pass rusher. This is quarterback. This is corner. I don't see them, for example, as much as they have messed up the running back situation in the past, I don't see them ever doing this for a running back or for like a guard or anything like that. So you have that part of it. And that's in one phase of it. And then you also have to have

it's the math flipping. It's you have to think about it that way. You have to think about it in practical terms at all times as to the way it shifts the numbers for you. And it seems like they have done that. Exactly. And like we can get into this for probably hours where you have all of these two-on-ones from Aaron Donald or three-on-ones for Aaron Donald and two-on-ones. Jalen Ramsey's playing like three positions at once in that, you know, Brandon's Daley defense that they ran last year. And so then it comes into point with you also have to understand your coaching staff and your coaching staff has to know, first of all, how to utilize these players and maximize them in the system. But then there's that

middle phase where you also count on the second through, you know, maybe fourth or fifth rounds of the draft, including the compensatory picks that they are so proud of and hold so dearly, you have to identify those prospects at a better rate because you don't have the higher round capital. And you don't have the financial capital because you have invested core contracts throughout your roster and those guys aren't going anywhere. This is your Aaron Donald, or Jalen Ramsey, the tandem of Woods and Cup. You know, these are your big, the punter, like these are your big contracts on your roster, right?

And so now you have to plug in all of the holes around them, but you have to do it in a way where you are receiving a maximum investment or maximum return on an investment into a pick that is maybe a little bit harder to identify because he's a third rounder, harder to identify because he's a falling six-rounder as Jordan Fuller was, and then he ultimately was a starter for them on day one last season. And so you have to, that's part of the reason why they're trying this with their scouting and evaluation process is because they believe that they're already, you know, if your window of trying to identify these guys is already so small, and you're also receiving all the same data that the rest of the league is receiving,

you have to find an edge in the way that you maximize your time, the amount of data application that you do and how invested you get your scheme and how these players need to do maybe one or two things very well for you in order to fit inside the puzzle of their scheme. And it creates this big sort of revolving, I keep using this word, but ecosystem, but one thing could topple it.

You could have a coach who maybe he doesn't win as many games, the next year. And then your plan is in shambles, essentially. You could have a star player who gets injured and then that could topple things in a similar way. You could have these draft picks. They could not maybe turn out to be who you thought that they were when you were evaluating them. So it's betting that all of these things and multiple phases are going to be good at one time. And that's where it becomes kind of really freaking fun to follow because it's, it's like it's a ride. That part of it to me is where I would raise an eyebrow

because I don't think over time a team is going to be able to consistently hit on more third to six round draft picks than another team. I think that is often a crapshoot and it's more about giving yourself more bites at the apple. If you want to bet on cup picks, that is smart because if you're going to be getting an extra third round pick every year,

then you inherently have more chances to succeed. But if you go back and look at it, let's look at their third, fourth, even second round picks from 2018 and 20, and 2019. Your Joe Notebooms, Brian Allen's, John Franklin Myers is another team,

Taylor, Daryl, Henderson, David Long. I mean, they're not the monster home runs that a Jordan Fuller was in the sixth round. And that's not an indictment

of less need in what they do. That's just how drafting typically works. Right. But what he said that I thought is, it makes total sense to me, and I loved hearing him say this,

was that you have to understand where you are in your development. And he framed it in a couple different time frames as you build. He said in the build, when you're trying to collect a core of talent, when you break through, and I think the most important part of this is when you sustain is how he framed it. So the 2017 season is obviously the year they break through. But if you watch that formula to sustain into the next year where even when things don't go right, you're winning 10 or so games and you're a borderline playoff team, then you can gain the confidence to say, we have faith in the ecosystem. We know that our range of outcomes is probably small enough that makes a trade like the Ramsey trade worth doing.

And so far, they've been proven right in that thinking. And I am just obsessed with this idea that if it all goes to shit, you're giving away the second overall pick one year. And that is just so hard to stomach. But in their minds, and same with Justin Jefferson going two picks after they picked last year, that's hard to watch when you're giving away those picks. but their adherence to these principles and them not getting scared off by things like that, I think speaks to their knowledge and their belief that it's only going to happen in this fairly limited window of outcomes. And we have faith.

We're going to land somewhere in there. And I think that drives this. And they have to get to the Super Bowl again before Aaron Donald's contract is up. I mean, if you want to look at it in the most simple way possible, like that's really what their window is. It's not about Matthew Stafford. It's about you have the best player on the planet on your roster. How are you going to maximize everything around him?

And I'm not saying before Twitter comes for me, like they're not building their team around a, you know, superhuman defensive tackle. But that's like you're trying to get back. That's how long you're trying to sustain this model. I think, Robert, like when you're looking at them sociologically and you're looking at them is like a big experiment and a body of tries and fails and misses and corrections and pivots and things like that. You look at some of these major swings and you look at how quickly they happen. You know, that trading for Matthew Stafford doesn't happen if you don't

first do it with Jalen Ramsey, right? Sure. And, you know, this entire shift in their draft process, it doesn't happen if they don't completely knock out of the park, in my opinion, last year's draft. I mean, if you look at last year's draft, when they've got one foot in the door still of sort of this older model of doing things, and then you see how the pandemic has, in a lot of ways, forced them forward, much like how it was in St. Louis when you first started to see these major organizational changes happening after they left St. Louis. including hiring Sean McVeigh, including, you know, trading it for Jared Gough, who we could talk about on another podcast.

But, you know, these things sort of signal these shifts for them. And so they don't have that draft class. And if they don't try those things in parts and pieces last off season, then they don't have this draft class. If they don't have this draft class specifically where they're saying, you're seeing the emergence of Cam Acres, Jordan Fuller's a starter, Terrell Burgess, if he's not injured, he's a starter.

A huge part of what they want to be defensively. Yeah, huge. Like a major puzzle piece for them, both Jordan Fuller and Terrell Burgess in a variety of ways. And, you know, if they don't have that draft class, then they maybe don't throw themselves full on into this new direction. And so it's so interesting the way that you're seeing them try things and then they're coming out again and swinging at the first pitch.

And I think that's really interesting. I think it has to be said they're doing this because they're allowed to do it. There are some owners that would never let this happen. They've been given the leeway to continue after mistakes, but they've also survived mistakes. There are GMs that would not have survived the Todd Gurley extension, the Brandon Cook's extension, and the Jared Gough trade and extension because those teams would have been five and 11 after all that stuff happened. That's not what happened here. so they get to continue with this big experiment because they continue to win games.

So it's almost set up as this perfect set of circumstances for them to keep trying the wildest shit imaginable and see if it works. Yeah. And it's like if you're not getting fired after explaining to Stan Cronky that you are going to move in a different direction at quarterback, 19 months after handing your other quarterback in historic extension, you're probably not getting fired. Like it's so it's I think and we talked about this in our in our conversation before this podcast. Robert is like it's so interesting to me how often you hear in league circles about GMs or personnel people who make decisions that are fear based that are based on the idea that I have to do this to maintain. I have to do this to hit status quo. I have to do this to make sure that I am not losing my job instead of having that. sort of comfort of knowing that there's going to be continuity and knowing that you are allowed to fail. And I think that that's something that doesn't get talked about a lot with the Rams

because I think they fail a lot. You know, like they have failed multiple times in massive ways financially and in times with personnel over the last few years. And I think that, I mean, we don't have to go through all you ran them down a little bit. But like, But then they've also been allowed to have an answer afterward. That's something that is not, that doesn't happen in a lot of organizations because either A, the GMs or the personnel people are not asking to take those swings. And so how do you know what the sort of retribution from ownership or from whoever will be if you're not failing in the first place?

Or there's this understanding that if you, if you F up, then, you're going to get fired. You don't have a job anymore. And so that's something in terms of the continuity that allows them to make these pivots is because they're the three people who are making these decisions, maybe four, if you count a couple of the finance guys, it's like, it's Kevin Demoff, it's Les Need, it's Sean McVeigh, and it's Tony Pastores. And they're all allowed to jump into these things together without sort of that true fear of retribution. Now, I don't think they can go in and light the building on fire and expect to keep their job. But, you know, and this.

If McVeigh could have been to arson, I think he might be able to keep his gig. I don't, I don't know. I think if the only way he's leaving that team is if he retires. Like, that's really, I mean, he could go out there and try to tackle somebody, you know, high school football coach style from, you know, from the other team and probably still keep his job. So, yeah, it's, it's so fascinating to see what happens with that continuity. and like I told you before, to me, they're this big sociological experiment because you have to look at them in like a three or four year period and an account for all of the little things and the little shifts in philosophy and all the daily things that happen. And they paint a picture of what they're trying here.

And then 10 years from now, we still won't know whether it's right or wrong because it depends on who you ask, right? And also, we haven't even talked about the fact that the coaching staff isn't made up of entirely different people than it was four years ago when he got hired. And now it's like, okay, let's say you are better with Matthew Stafford on offense than you were with Jared Gough, understandably so. You still have holes on the offensive line. Hopefully you can fill those in the second or third round. I would say that's a draft priority for them or should be. And then how much worse is your defense this year, even if you do have faith in Rahim Morris and his ability to take in, come in and kind of keep the ship going straight? you'd assume they're not going to be the best defense in the NFL by virtue of some of the talent

they lost and the fact that Brandt Day was the best defense play caller in the league. So now if you fall from one to seven on defense, can your offense make up for that? There's like there's so many different things to take into account because, again, there's so much change happening there because people are poaching their guys because they're successful. It's just, it's a fascinating organization. It's endlessly interesting to think about why they're doing this stuff. And then Robert, we think about like just because they're doing this stuff. And then Robert, we think about like just because they're doing it right for them doesn't mean that it's right for somebody else.

Like I was talking to you about covering the Carolina Panthers. Their model could not be more different from the Rams current model in terms of keeping that window and building to that window. However, it worked for them at the time. They got to the Super Bowl. At the time it worked for them. And with the Rams, it's like they're trying all of these things. And I think, you know, we can even go so far as to say they're innovating. some ways in thinking about how they, from everything to scheme to, you know, how they're building

out their analytics department to all of these different things. And you're seeing them be poached left and right every off season. And Sean McVeigh starts over with new coordinators in each phase, you know, three years in a row. And, and they're still able to win. At the same time, you wonder, you know, how much does that regression factor in? It's clear that they're betting on Matthew Stafford to mask not only make up for the offense and what it looked like last year, but also mask some of that natural regression that I think even if you're looking at it just hard data, you should expect some regression. Like it's very hard to stay as elite as they were in all of those categories year over year when you factor in loss of personnel and how

other teams have started to actually understand what you're doing. And it took up, it took many people a long time last season to even figure out what the heck they were even doing. And so I think that all of those things are so interesting when you come out to this upcoming season. But as they're getting poached, it's like, well, what are you trying to do? Are you trying to apply these principles into your organization, understanding that this is a completely different ecosystem? Or are you trying to shape pieces of what they do to your organization? Or are you just trying to say, okay, we're going to just completely pivot as a franchise to try to do it their way. And all of those things come with such inherent risk that it's been fascinating to watch because

what's working for them with their system that they've built doesn't necessarily work for five other teams that have taken their coaches this year. You need a rock at the center. You need a guy who you think is going to make you an above average offense solely by his presence every single year. That's not your quarterback because your quarterback can get hurt. And I think the other teams we've seen kind of take on this mindset and the moves that they've made are New Orleans and how aggressive they've been over the years. And what we've seen the chiefs do with draft picks.

Straighted away those picks for the Frank Clark deal because they just assumed we have these guys at the center of this equation. That is going to be enough to protect us from the worst case scenario. And getting back to what Les was talking about, that's that sustainability question. Have we reached sustainability that warrants and justifies this sort of aggressiveness? and they clearly believe they have moved into that face. So it's fascinating. I mean, I can talk about it forever, but we can't. So Jordan Roderick, thank you very, very much for coming by to chat.

It's always going to talk with you. Please go check out Jordan's story on the athletic, all about the way the Rams have changed their approach to the pre-chat process. And please go listen to that episode of 11 personnel with less need. It's an hour-long conversation. I promise you guys will get a lot out of it. Jordan, thanks a lot for coming. Appreciate it.

Thanks, Robert. All right, guys. Thank you so much to Lindsay and Jordan for stopping by. I love that conversation with Jordan. I feel like I learn a lot every time she's writing about her talking about the Rams. So that was great. We'll be back tomorrow with Brandon Thorne breaking down every aspect of this offensive line class. It is going to be a painfully nerdy podcast.

And I apologize in advance. But I do think it's a fascinating group. And not just the players, but the depth of it and what that could say about the positions development, there is nobody I would rather talk about that position with. We are going to dive headfirst into that group. In the meantime, please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. I sincerely appreciate that. Also, please subscribe to the Athletic.

Along with the piece that Jordan just wrote, there's so much stuff on the athletic right now. The piece that Sheel and Zach Berman and Bo Wolf, two of whom are coming out tomorrow's show as well, wrote about the Eagles dysfunction today is a must-read story. there's one of those every single day. If you don't have an athletic subscription yet, I don't know what you're doing.

Theathletic.com slash football show. Please check it out. We'll be back tomorrow. Thank you guys for listening. Talk to you later. This was the Athletic Football Show.