The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Midseason Awards with Steven Ruiz and a New England Patriots Team Visit with Jeff Howe

Episode Date: November 4, 2020

First, Robert is joined by Steven Ruiz, the lead NFL writer at For The Win, to step back, take stock, and hand out some midseason awards, including league MVP, Coach of the Year, Unexpected Player Crush, Worst Preseason Take, and many more.Then, to close things out, The Athletic’s Jeff Howe stops by for a New England Patriots Team Visit to discuss how different things feel around the Patriots this year, during their first potential losing season in recent memory, bedrocks heading into 2021, what the offseason might look like if they miss the playoffs, Jimmy G, Stephon Gilmore, and more.Subscribe to The Athletic now for just $1 a week when you visit http://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. Great show for you guys today. A little bit later, Jeff Howe from The Athletic, is going to be joining us to talk about maybe the end of an era for the New England Patriots. I feel like they're the most worthy team in the league to be talking about this week. Before we do that, though, we've essentially hit the halfway mark in the NFL.

It's hard to pinpoint the halfway mark in football because 17 is not an even number. But I usually go with week eight. It's one of the majority of the teams in the league have played half of their games. I think it's a great time to step back, take stock. And to do that with me today to hand out some midseason awards, some midseason superlatives for the first eight weeks of the season, is my buddy, Stephen Rueis, from for the win. Stephen, how you doing, man?

I'm doing good. See, this is how I decide the midpoint of the season. It's the week that I don't have any ideas to write things, so I could just do an awards. I love awards. It's a great content machine. I've always appreciated that Barnwell leans into awards. I know if Barnwell's doing it, that means it's an idea worth doing. So I don't feel as if it's a gimmick that I'm going to too often.

Steven, I talk about you on the show all the time. Me and Nate both do. You do incredible work. I cite it consistently. You're one of my favorite football writers. I learned stuff from you all the time. So it almost feels like a waste of your perspective to have you on to talk about awards. But I know you would have some very ardent takes here.

So that's what I really appreciate. See, now I have to live up to that. Now I have to live up to it. I'm concerned. So one of my favorite things about you is I learn stuff from the things you write. I'm consistently finding just little observations and little nuggets to help me understand football better. But at the same time, you're not too good for the bits. You will consistently go back to them.

So the balance is something that we appreciate here on the athletic football show. Some might say I'm only good for the bits, but I'll take that. No, false. False. Some of my favorite ones, though, people that don't follow. Steve on Twitter absolutely should. The one where he has the Kyle Shanahan with the microscope is definitely my favorite, which is a, you know, if you can keep going back to it, it keeps working. You have to.

It's a rule. So we're just going to run through these. Some of these are real awards. Some of them are not. I think that it was a good chance to make some up to give us some more well-rounded kind of understanding of the season it's been so far. And let's start by playing the hits here. So eight games into the season, who is your MVP of the NFL?

I have a feeling we're going to have the same answer. I'm going to go with chalk pick, Russell Wilson, but I'm going to throw something at you. I think that this is like a Steph Curry situation. I know everyone tries to like find the step curry of the NFL, but I think the way he throws the deep ball, the moon balls, I think is what people have been calling them, might change the way that quarterbacks, younger quarterbacks throw the deep ball. I really think it's the best way to throw a deep ball. And like they're so hard to throw and like accuracy percentages are so low. But Russ is he's just consistently good at it. he's the only one that's consistently good at it.

People need to study how he throws the default. Do you think it's replicable, though, or do you think it's just a skill that is going to be hard for other quarterbacks to try to steal from? I think it'd be easy to say everyone should be doing this, but everyone should be playing like Russell Wilson is a lot easier said than done. Right, especially Russell Wilson,

because he makes no sense as a quarterback. Like, everything he does. It works, though. But I feel like if you have armed talent, it's replicable. You just throw the ball high. I know, I mean, there's obviously more. to it than that, but I really think that's the best way to give your receiver a chance because we know receivers are so much better at tracking beat balls and cornerbacks. That's why they're

receivers and that's why they're cornerbacks. And I think that's the best way to give your receiver a chance to catch the ball. I think it's a great point. And like you said, the Steph Curry comparison is a good one because how deep guys are shooting the ball in the NBA. It's not something that we thought we'd see. I remember Danny Chowell, a really good piece about it was actually in connection to the ball brothers. It was one of the first pieces that ever ran for the ringer about how Steph and those guys were changing the way that we were thinking about range and everything else. And it could be the same thing.

If more guys try to do it, I'm sure enough guys are talented enough that it could happen. So it's really interesting. I think if you look at all the other kind of pillars of the Russell Wilson conversation, he's one of the guys that passes the eye test, the tape test, and the stats test. I mean, you look at everything he's doing. He's on pace to throw almost 60 touchdown passes, which is probably not going to happen. but that would obviously break records. His completion percentage over expectation is 10.3 percentage points.

He's playing a different sport. It's exactly the way to frame it. We laid some of these out when we had Jay Keeps on last week, but it should be impossible for him to be putting up these sorts of advanced numbers with the style of offense they have. So he's averaging 8.7 air yards per attempt, which is up near the top of the NFL, and he's completing 74.7% of his passes.

Those two things are not, they don't not, compute. They should not exist in the same world, but somehow he's made it happen. He's, I believe, still second in the NFL and EPA per play among quarterbacks after Patrick Mahomes. So no matter how you spin this, and even if you did it on a narrative basis, he hasn't won it. He's a guy that it's a new choice. People love that when it comes to the MVP. So on a narrative level, a tape level, a stats level, he's the guy. And I think you can make an argument for other people, but I absolutely think he has the strongest one. yeah like i think mohomes is the closest one at this point and we're just so numb to every exactly like the ridiculous things he does and it goes back to last year we were already numb to it like he made like five ridiculous plays in that texans playoff game and like no one even made a big deal about it it was just like typical mahons and yesterday he did the same thing and no one no one made a fuss about it and on top of that like you said russell wilson does his style of play defies all logic. Like, I'm not going to name any names, but there have been people that study his film and they see it and like, they don't see him going through the process correctly. And for some, and they interpret that as him not being, I don't know how you want to phrase it, but not like not being a real quarterback or a typical quarterback. A cerebral quarterback. Yeah. Right. And like those points, there's some validity to them. Do you think there's still validity to them though or do you think that's become less of an issue now than it was maybe three years ago? Oh yeah, for sure.

he's gotten better at those things that were his weaknesses. I mean, they're still kind of there. There's sometimes when he, like, bales from a clean pocket or whatever, but he makes it work. He's the only quarterback that I've ever seen that consistently makes it work. And it's been, what, eight years now? So, like, at some point, you can't be like,

oh, yeah, he's just getting lucky. He's going to come back to bite him. No, he's a great quarterback, and he looks nothing like any other quarterback we've ever seen. And I think this is the year you have to give him the MVP award. Stylistically, just aesthetically, Do you like watching him or Mahomes play the position more? Oh, well, I like Mahomes better, like just watching.

But I'm also a guy that likes to watch Philip Rivers play. So that's kind of like... Yeah, I mean, that's a fan club that involves you and me, my friend. I think you know that. Number one, I'm driving the Phillip Rivers bus. So I tend to agree with you. And I think it's because, and this is just getting really down into the details, I just like the arm angle stuff that Mahomes does.

I think it's just cooler on an aesthetic basis. The throw he had against Denver, the one where he threw it, I think it was to Hardman on the left sideline that was just back across his body, like right when he was stepping out of bounds. It's like, that's just a throw that if anyone else made it, we'd be going nuts about it for 20 minutes. And for him, it's just second down. And I just think that's a little bit different.

Wilson has the moonball stuff. There's some throws, we talked about it last week with Jake, where he's popping balls over guys in the short area that other people just don't do. But for some reason, the Mahomes kind of bending the ball around people. I just like watching more. I just think it's a cooler aesthetic experience. And Lamar Jackson kind of has acted that to his game

over the last year and a half where he's like he made a play yesterday that was like so damn cool. I don't know when it happened, but he like alluded to Russia. He stepped up in the pocket and threw a sidearm pass down the field. And like I know people are going to complain about Lamar Jackson, how he plays quarterback and it's the same old criticism. But he's such a fun quarterback to watch.

I would throw him in my top five quarterbacks to watch. Oh, absolutely. I still think he is. I think you've written about this, and I tend to believe it too. I think they're just figuring it out. I think they're in a little bit of a mid-period growing pains phase where it's their second act as an offense and they're just trying to understand exactly what they're supposed to be.

The fact that they continue to win games and should have beaten the Steelers yesterday is all you need to know. If they're a diminished version of themselves and they're still one of the best teams in the NFL, it's usually a pretty good side. All right, let's get to Coach of the Year. I think there are a lot of quality candidates here. Who are you going with? I wanted to pick Mike Tomlin,

just because I feel like he deserved more love last year for that mess that Pittsburgh was. But I got to go with Brian Flores. What he's done with that defense in a year and a half is just amazing. I like the direction of the dolphins in the offseason, but I didn't think they were going to be this ahead of schedule. And they're a legit defense. I don't think it's fate. I think this is going to last.

So I had those exact two names on my list, and I had both of them because I couldn't choose. So I was going to wait to see what you said. I did that too. I'm a coward just like you. Both of them, and I just did a coin flip in my head and picked Flores. So I think it's two different things, right? And I think it speaks to what this award typically is. A lot of the time, it's somebody that's outperforming expectations.

A team that wasn't supposed to be very good ends up being better than we expected. If the dolphins go 10 and 6 and make the playoffs, he's going to win the award. Oh, yeah. Tomlin, and I made this point, I think talking to Nate just about Tomlin's career and how it's underappreciated a couple weeks ago. The case for Tomlin this year is the same as the case for John Harbaal last year, where you have an entrenched coach who's been somewhere for a very long time. The impressive part about the job that Mike Tomlin is doing in Pittsburgh is not that he's outperforming expectations, even though to some degree they are. It's that he's refreshed the staff and refreshed what the Steelers are in a way that we should revere. because it's easy to get stale.

It's easy to have a lack of new ideas. When you watch 10 years of Jason Garrett teams in Dallas and you have those sorts of results after a decade, you don't have coaching staffs that are repopulating their staff in general with new ideas, with new blood, we're refreshing who we want to be. The fact that the Steelers didn't have been able to do that with the same coordinators, but they're still sprinkling in enough new stuff,

I love that. I've had a couple conversations with people on that staff. and players have even said it, there are no bad ideas when it comes to how the Steelers play football and how they plan. And for a guy who's been there for almost a decade and a half,

I think that speaks to what kind of coach Mike Tomlin is. It's the same stuff that we revere Belichick for. It's the exact same type of thing. And the one criticism in the past of Tomlin has always been that the defense hasn't really lived up or hasn't held up their end of the bargain when the offense was carrying things.

And now the reverse is true. And I still don't think like Tomlin's getting enough credit Like people were like, oh, yeah, the Steelers defense is great. But you don't really hear, like, people try to explain why it's great. Like, you wrote the T.J. Watt article, but, like, I'm talking about, like, on the broadcast. You're not hearing, like, Tomlin made these changes. And he's a defensive coach. Why isn't he getting the credit for this?

There's probably a couple of reasons for that. But, yeah, I would love to see him get that honor just once because I do think he's been underrated as coach. If, Mike, if Bill Belichick did the, TJ Watt roaming around stuff, did the let's play Mika Fitzpatrick as the cover as the robber and cover one rather than having a linebacker do it. Just those little tiny tweaks. Announcers would be losing their minds. We would hear 10 minutes about how much of a genius Bill Bealecicchick is. That does not happen with Mike Tomlin.

And I don't even put that on myself. I would have written like 14 articles about Billetich doing it. I haven't really written about the Steelers defense. I think I wrote about them blitzing like in week two. But yeah, like, I don't know. Tomlin needs more love. I agree. And I think that he absolutely could win it, but I also think that Flores, when you think about the results plus the narrative stuff, it's lining up for him.

In that game plan, we'll talk a little bit about this later in the show, the game plan they had against the Rams this weekend was incredible. I mean, that's the type of stuff they're capable of doing. I think they have such a good understanding of these are the types of players we need to run our scheme. It's a really great marriage of personnel and implementation right now. And I love watching that. I love watching those two things come together in the way that they have for the dollar. They're one of the most interesting worth studying teams in the league at this point. And I just did not expect that at this point in their trajectory as a franchise.

And they were bad as a defense last year. But like when they ran certain concepts, they were really good at it. Like they actually were one of the leaders in simulated pressures last year. And like EPA, they're really good at it. So like you could already see the foundation of this scheme like coming together. They just needed the players. They got the players this off season. Yeah.

Like it all looks great. I also think that it's a defense where you need the bodies. You need different types of guys. You've written about this, and we've talked about this on the show. The Patriots, one of the reasons they've been able to, they were so effective over the last couple of seasons defensively is when they ran that cover of one stuff, they had such a deep bench of secondary players.

Having a complementary group of guys that can do different things and almost like a basketball team, you need that in order to run that defense. And I think that giving the dolphins one more year to kind of accumulate those players has been a really big deal. The amount of money they've spent on defense, some of it was a little misguided, I think, but I also think it's allowed this version of their defense to come to fruition.

Yeah, I think it's been a great marriage between Flores and Chris Greer. I mean, if I was buying stock in one franchise that was on the rise, I think that might be it. I'm thinking off the top of my head, but that might be it. And it's funny because you need the right coach to see a vision like this through, the right coach that because I've talked to people about this and people in franchises about the idea of tanking. And there are people that are very smart, analytically bent people in smart franchises that will tell you tanking is not good. I would rather not tank because I just think that the overall, the wear and tear emotionally on young players is not worth the ultimate payoff.

Just because it's hard to lose every single week. You need the right guy to shepherd you through that stage of your franchise. if you're going to tear it down. The Browns didn't have it. The dolphins did have it. And you see just how different the two plans are when the right guy is in charge. Yeah, the best sign was the second half of last year because we're seeing in New York right now. Like players will quit if they don't believe in the coach.

But the dolphins. He sure will. Like Avery Williamson was out on the sidewalk in his uniform ready to get to Pittsburgh. But the dolphins, like, they were playing hard all year long. Even when people were saying they're tanking. And there was like rumors of players wanting out. it never really came to fruition. I mean,

Mick up, Fitzpatrick got traded, but outside of him, like players bought in, and that was the best sign before us because it's not just about X's the nose when you're a head coach. You need that buy-in from the locker room

that he clearly has. So you wanted to do this one. I think it's a great category. Who is the first year coach of 2020? Who's the rookie coach that you would want for the next decade? I think this is a harder question than some people might think. So who's your answer here?

So I put the question, question in our notes and then I realized like there's only two possible answers. There are two possible answers, but the answer says a lot about you, I think. And I think that it's a worthwhile conversation. I was going back and forth. I'm going to take Stafansky. Okay. Give me your reasoning. Mostly because all of my optimism about the Panthers this year is based on Joe Brady. And I think he's one and done. Yep. That's it. That's exactly the reason. Because when I first saw the question, my initial response was, oh, it's of course it's Matt Rule. There's so much better than I thought they were going to be.

But then I took a step back and I was like, wait a second, I'm losing Joe Brady in six months here changing my answer. Because it's the exact argument for why you hire a play calling head coach. It's the exact argument because as exciting as the Panthers have been and as optimistic as you might be about them, as soon as Joe Brady leaves, they need to replace him with somebody who's going to get the most out of that offensive talent. Stefansky is staying there. And I thought he was going to be a good, it's funny because I think they're good head coach. coaches for a lot of the same reasons. They're open-minded.

I think that they're smart guys. They're going to build their staffs in the right way. I think Stefanski has a lot of the same qualities that rule has. He just happens to be a guy in charge you can't hire away. So that's why I would pick him. And this has been, I think this has been a great year for Stefanski's brand, just because there was kind of questions last year,

was that Kubiak's offense, was his offense. But this year, you see what's happening in Minnesota. You see what's happening in Cleveland. And like when Baker Mayfield, it just doesn't have to play. quarterback like step fancy he can scheme it up like he's not kall shanahan but he's not that far off

from it like schematically and speaking of carolina like i if i'm carolina i know that's not going to happen but i look at what happened in it in atlanta in 2016 and i yep i think about that that's that's all i'm saying but you should think about that that's exactly the comparison because and that's the comparison that people should throw out every time we're talking about this play calling head coach thing because it's always the thing that's looming if the guy gets hired away. If you cannot replace him, it's really hard to replicate the magic. And I thought this when Stafansky got hired. And I've talked to him several times about for different stories. And I just think that he's somebody who sees the game in a really, he's a very humble

person. And he doesn't think that he's right. He thinks that a lot of ideas that are brought to the table are probably valid if they come from the right place. And I think him coaching with all the different staffs that he coached with and the fact that he doesn't come from one tree and that he has seen a lot of different types of offense. I think that's a good thing. I think that's exactly the type of person, exactly the type of football mind you'd want in charge because no idea is off the table

because he's watched so many of them work in different situations. Right. That's all you want is an open-minded coach. He seems like a guy who's open to new ideas. And like that's how you judge a coach. If you ever hear like Kyle Shane Ann talk about the zone read when that was a thing when people were like, it's a gimmick, it's a gimmick.

And he just explains it so simply like it's not a gimmick. sound football. Like that's how Stefansky comes off to me whenever I hear him talk. All right. So let's get to assistant coach of the year, which I don't think is a real award. No, it is. It's new. It is. Okay. Two years ago, I think. I have like 17 answers, by the way.

All right. So, all right. Let's just throw out your first one, and I'm sure we'll get to the rest of them. So who do you think should win it? I think there's only one answer here. I'm going to try to guess your answer. Are you going with Todd Bowles? Yes. Or five? Okay, Todd Bowles. see i have todd bulls on my list but the only reason i'm hesitant to pick him is because he has so much talent that just fits his defense and he deserved a lot of credit because they're so well coach

like technique wise they're players like it's all great like a part of me wants to pick brian dayball the last few weeks haven't put you off that at all you they've slowed down a little bit you don't that doesn't concern you like yeah that would be a concern for the award but my other pick the one that I'm going to pick. This is my pick. I'm going with Matt Everflees. Because I don't understand how that works. He is the number two guy on my list. All right. So explain, all right. So you don't know how that works. Explain what you mean by that because I understand, but I articulate it for the people. Because you watch this defense and like DeForest Buckner is great. But you watch this defense and you're just like, these are a bunch of guys who are just like in sync and like you're playing spot

drop zone. They're doing some matching stuff. Like it's more common. complicated than that, but that's like how people usually sum it up. And it just works. Like in in order for that to work without higher level talent like we've seen in Seattle and recently in San Francisco, I just think it takes tremendous coaching and I have to give them credit. Like I thought they were going to just fall off a cliff. Like I thought they were decent. But back when they were number one in DVOA, I was like in like five weeks, they're going to be out of the top. And they're still number four. So I have to give them credit. It's a great point. And that's the argument for Ibrislu. is that type of system, especially with the talent that he has, is all about coaching points.

It's all about defense in general is all about making sure everybody's moving in the same direction. But with that type of defense, when you don't have truly elite players, that's even more true. And that's what you see when you watch them. I mean, I said that from the first time I really started studying their defense because guys like Julian Blackman and Buckner, when he first got, when he first got there, we're jumping off the tape. And I was like, man, I really got to go back and watch them, I guess. And you really see that. How much, I think Xavier Rhodes is the best example. The fact that they're getting so much out of Xavier Rhodes,

a year after he was unplayable in Minnesota, that says so much about what their defensive staff has been able to do and how they've been able to put into practice the things they want to do. And I think a sign of good coaching are those that are able to take a middling player at a premium position and be able to survive with that. Like, cornerback, you need cornerbacks to survive. in today's NFL. They don't have, you know, big-name quarterbacks, and they're playing well. So that's the reason for my pick. And I have another pick that's like a Dach Prescott MVP-style pick,

and that's D.N. Peas, like the Titans losing D.N. P.'s. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because they've just fallen off a clip. And I've always thought DMP was kind of underrated. Like Ravens fans, I used to live in, like, around Baltimore, and they used to hate DMPs. And I never got it. But that Titans defense, especially on third down. And that's really where Dean P's shine. it's just been a mess. Nate Tice, number one, Dean Pee, president of the Dean P's fan club.

So he'll be happy to hear that. I totally agree. What do you think about the Desmond King trade? That has happened, just a full disclosure to people. We're recording this at 3.30 central time on Monday. By the time you hear this on Wednesday, the world may be vastly different.

So it just adds up. But the Desmond King trade went down a few hours ago. I'm curious, how do you think that helps them? Do you think that we'll see a market difference with him in the lineup for Tennessee? like the rational part of my brain says no. Like they needed a Logan Ryan replacement, but I don't know if like stylistically he's the same as Logan Ryan.

I don't know. But like I thought Logan Ryan was a big loss that no one was really making a big deal about because he was a big person in their pressures and their simulated pressures. And like they have no pass rush now. So they could use a guy like Logan Ryan right now. But Kay has some experiences of Blitzer. He's been able to do some of that stuff. I think that's the nice part is that when you have versatile,

defensive players that have played a bunch of different positions, you can graph them onto whatever type of defense you want to play. And I think that's the encouraging part is that he's that type of player. He's done so many different things that they could deploy him in a few different ways because they need somebody that can play several roles right now because they're missing several different players. They're missing a defensive coordinator too. Yeah, yeah, exactly. All right. Let's get to executive of the year. Again, I think this is a one horse race, but I'm curious about your thoughts. I was looking through the teams and I was like, like, who had the best off season and I only could pick out one guy. And that's Chris Greer, Dolphins. That's my only

pick. Oh, really? Who would you, maybe I'm forgetting someone, but I was just looking through the list of teams and I was like, I'm going to go with the team that coax the greatest quarterback of all time to their franchise and also hit massive home runs in the first two rounds of the draft. And that's the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. A part of me just, I just couldn't, I don't know, I just couldn't give Jason Lick that credit because of like all the prior years. Like, you get, five years to spend all this money in free agency and have all these drafts and you finally hit on one off season. So yeah, it's probably him.

It's definitely going to be him. But I would still go through it. What was your favorite move of the Chris Gurre? I think that the Chris Guror offseason was fine. But I also think that they paid a premium for a lot of guys. I'm not sure they extracted much value this offseason, even if you want to commend the job they did sticking to the vision that they put into place a year and a half ago.

that's a good point. Yeah, that's probably what I'm doing. I'm probably conflating the last off season with this one when they accumulated all these. Which you should do, by the way. I mean, I think that that's a smart way to think about team building overall. But with this, that's why this award is tricky. It's like Ryan Pace one of the couple of years ago. Yeah, exactly.

So I tend to think that you're right, giving it to Chris Greer awards that executive who has done the best job building their team that includes this offseason. but I do think this off season alone that Jason Light probably deserves it. I mean, the Brady thing, so let's have got it this way. What would you say was the best move of the off season?

I don't think it's by any of these teams. I would actually go with, I want to pick Philip Rivers to the Colts. Like I low-key want to give Chris Ballard executive of the year because I think he did some pretty good work this off-season. And like people were starting to fall out of love with him earlier in the office. And he traded for Buckner,

which we're told we're not supposed to be trade first-round picks for defensive players. But I thought what he did with that contract after trading for him was really smart. He basically front-loaded it and he has all this cap space to leverage and I thought that was a smart move by him. And then I thought he restocked the defense

without making any major moves. And then Philip Rivers, I really thought he was the, I thought he was the best quarterback on the free agent market. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm just cleaning on to my priors that Brady looked a little washed last year, but I still think it,

I think getting a top 10 quarterback for that type of money, so that's a big move. So now I have to rethink what I was going to go with here because you're totally right. And all the things you said are typically things that would be very important to me. As someone who loves Phillip Rivers, an irrational amount, I loved the move when they did it. I completely understood why it was happening,

why they thought it needed to happen. The locker room dynamics part of it made sense to me if you're going to bring a guy in like that, he was the exact right type of guy to bring in. And the Buckner trade, the contract, I think, is totally reasonable when you consider the cap space they had and the fact that this is a cash business.

Their owner has not been willing to spend cash consistently. They were willing to spend it this off season. You have to go do it. Why do it for a free agent that is on the market for a reason instead of a guy that you can actually go get that's going to be an A plus player for your team? And Chris Ballard believes this.

You can't get worse by adding good players to your team. I understand it takes a first round pick, but if you have the space and you have the cash for one of the first times in years, that's the way you use it. And I wouldn't look at it as they traded a first round pick for DeForest Buckner. I would look at it as think of what the going rate is

for elite defensive players on the market right now. It's not one first round pick. It's two. They got DeForest Buckner for half of what the Rams got Jaywin Ramsey for, the Bears got Khalil Mack for, and the Seahawks got Jamal Adams for. That is a good deal.

If you're looking at it with actual price for players of that caliber, I think they did pretty damn well. And DeForest Buckner, in my opinion, has been the second most impactful move any team made this offseason with number one, which for whatever reason you just refuse to believe. Tom Brady going to Tampa Bay is the most impactful move of the off season. It is the best one.

Of course. I'm not denying that. But I think if you put Philip Rivers in that offense, I think it's just as good. That's fair. That's fair. I can understand that. But yeah, I think that Brady is the best move.

And then when you consider Worfson and Antoine Woodfield, Jr., both of whom have mattered. It's not as if they're promising players. They've been key parts of the championship equation for Tampa Bay. And to get guys like that that are immediate contributors in the draft is hard anyway. And to do it when you're really pushing to be a contender, I think is amazing. They've threaded the needle here.

And even the price for Brady isn't that high for the level he's playing at right now. Everything about what they've done is impressive, even with Jason Light's track record. I'm just hesitant to, I just don't want to repeat the Ryan Pace mistake. That's all right. So I'm totally fine with that. I also think that Ryan Pace

leveraged the franchise's future to make some of these moves. The Bucks were out of cap space. So the only guy they could sign is Tom Brady. At least the other two dudes are on rookie contracts. They're not going to put you in a bad spot moving forward like several of those Bears moves did.

I still have nightmares about the Trey Burton contract. So speaking of the first of, Ryan Pace. What do you think was the worst move of this offseason if we're handing out awards halfway through? Like there's some that are so bad that I don't even think we're count. We're not counting DeAndre Hawkins straight. That's no. That's okay. That's fair. Let's take that off the table. And I think trading for Nick Foles when I thought teams would have, or the Jaguars would have to give up a draft pick to trade Nick Foles and they ended up trading the draft pick to Jacksonville. Like that's a bad move. But I'm saying re-signing Kirk Cousins. That's a really good one.

The Vikings going for it again. Like they, they, They re-signed Kirk Cousins, their reworked deal so they could free up the cap space this off-season. But they didn't need to do it. They could have let them just play out this final year and then assess the situation. I think it showed that they were naive about their chances. Did they think they were close to winning a Super Bowl? That's the only reason you would re-sign Kirk Cousin, I think.

And I don't know if you've seen the quote going around from Bill Belichick talking about how they didn't have any cap-faces this off-season. They kind of knew that they were going all in in the prior years. people are kind of killing Belichick for that but I think that's what the Vikings, that's the same approach the Vikings should have taken. And the Patriots are in good shape next year because they did take this approach.

They weren't naive about their roster. They saw the Chiefs and they were like, we don't got a chance of beating that. Let's just take this year off, build up our cap space. And I think they have like the most cap space next year. So I think they're in a great spot and the Vikings should have done what they did, but they decided to double down the curb.

That's a great idea. I mean, it's a great point. I think that's a really good answer actually because I thought, when I was looking at those moves, I'm happy to admit that I was wrong. I thought they were trying to balance the president in the future.

It's like, okay, we're trying to rebuild a little bit on the fly. We'll trade digs. We'll get that first round pick. We'll try to kind of replenish some of the stuff, cut some more expensive veterans, and play it halfway on both ends. That's difficult to do.

They fail to kind of pull off that high wire act and we're seeing what the results are now. So I can understand the thinking behind it, but I do think it was misguided. I think you're right. That being said, the Nick Foles trade is the worst move of the offseason.

It is. And people taking victory laps over the last two weeks, I've loved the fact that people were coming at me when Andy Dalton had that rough game and Cam Newton looks terrible. Let's really think about this, okay? The Bears gave up a fourth round pick and gave $20 million guaranteed to Nick Foles. If it works out, fine. What they're paying him over the next two seasons is totally tolerable

if he is a slightly below average quarterback. you gave up a fourth round pick for a guy who has been a bottom five quarterback in the NFL this year. So even if Cam Newton hasn't been great and Andy Dalton has been a slightly worse than Nick Foles has, you wouldn't have had to give up anything to get either of those guys. So I understand Andy Dalton wasn't playing great before the concussion and that it's been a wild ride with Cam Newton who has nothing around him in New England. But if you look at the price tags for those three players, the Nick Foles deal is absolutely. the worst move of those three. It is the worst assessment of the quarterback market

and the worst final decision that any team made on that market this off season and it's not particularly close. I think what makes it a little bit worse is that you got fleeced by the Jaguar. Yes. That's the worst part. That makes it even worse.

Like if it was Belichick doing it, like fleecing you, then fine like it happens. But by the way, we need to reassess that Jimmy Garoppola trade. Like two years ago, we were like, I can't believe Belichick gave him up for a second. Now I'm starting to think I can't believe Belichick out of second form. But yeah, if you get pleased by the Jaguars, I don't know.

It's amazing. The Bears are going to go eight and eight. We're going to trot this nonsense back next year and I'm going to jump out a window. All right. So let's get into some of our more made-up categories here. I think this is just a fun way to talk about the league and, you know, guys we've liked, guys we haven't over the, guys we like for the most part. Just more nitty-gritty,

nuts and bolts, just nerd out stuff. So I knew you would like this one. Who would you say your unexpected player crush of the year? Is a guy that's jumped out to you that you just did not expect to watch, not expect to enjoy watching as much as you have through eight games? It is definitely Justin Herbert. But I feel like he's, that's him. That's everybody's pick.

I was actually going to cheat on this one. And I was going to say, I was going to just pick a whole team and say the Rams defense and Brandon Staley and everything he's doing. Like that's legit one of my favorite defenses to watch every week on tape. because of what they're doing and they're like the modern defense. Setholina at PFF just wrote about this. And like you could see it from the first game. And they're,

I really love how they play defense. And that has been, I was not expecting to want to watch the Rams this year. And it's been one of my favorite teams to watch. So just explain that a little bit more. What about them do you think has jumped out from that modern approach feel? Because Nate said the same thing on the podcast yesterday. I should have pressed them about it.

But what about them has really specifically kind of aligned with a more modern approach for the current NFL? So I was going to get into this a little bit later when we're talking about the schematic quirks that we've kind of seen this year. But I can do it right now. Like just one big thing. And I'm remembering you had Cody Alexander on your podcast at your past stop. And he talked about the B gaps being really important when you're trying to stop the spread. And I think that's been the big thing this year.

Like defense is trying to take back the B gaps and having two players in there. So we're seeing a lot of bare fronts. And the Rams are a team that they were actually playing like the mint and tight stuff that you see. in college against a couple of teams. And then they're playing a lot of pattern matching concepts, a lot of quarters coverage. Just a bunch of stuff you see in the Big 12, you see now in the SEC,

you're seeing with the Rams, and they plucked a coach from, who was a defensive coordinator in college like three years ago. He coached under Big Fangio, who I think is one of the more innovative coaches on the defensive side, which is kind of weird because he's an older dude, but that's kind of how it happens.

for defenses for defensive coaches. And yeah, they do a lot of like interesting things to take away crossers. And I think that's been like the big thing for defenses in the last two years is trying to figure out how to take away crossers. The Patriots have been one of the better teams at doing it. And I think the Rams have really joined them. And I just love how he's using their different pieces. He's moved Jaylon Ramsey around like he's playing in the slot a couple weeks ago.

So I just like defenses when you could watch them and you can tell what they're trying to take away. Belichick is like that for me. Shanahan on the off-insome side is like that for me, and like Staley is becoming one of those guys. Do you feel like more teams are using safeties to kind of do that cutting the crosser stuff as opposed to the Belichick stuff where it was a lot of traditional cover one when you had that rat linebacker? A lot of teams, it just feels like the bears are doing this a decent amount with Eddie Jackson.

I've seen a lot of teams like Antoine Winfield has done it a couple times where they just have him in that spot, make if Fitzpatrick does it for the Steelers. Do you think more teams are just having that safety in that role to just make sure you're cutting off all those crossing routes. That's something that's jumped out to me over the last, for the first eight games for sure. Yeah, and I think like, yeah, the Patriots, they used to do it with a linebacker,

but I think they really started the trend. Me, it started in that Super Bowl against the Rams. When they were playing that, they were playing that six one front and they were playing kind of like a funky zone defense where they had three levels to it. And they had Jonathan Jones playing safety and he was that guy that was cutting off. That's right. The intermediate crosser, which is like,

that's how the Rams killed defenses that year. And ever since then, you're seeing it all over the league. I think Belichick started, but you never know what you think. That's a good point. I didn't think about it that way. I'm just thinking about traditional cover one stuff that the Patriots do. But yeah, that version of it, we did see in the Super Bowl. It's a really good point.

I do think that's new, though. I think that's a new Patriots thing. I only think they've been doing it for like three years now. Which with defense, it's funny that we're so much slower to recognize the innovations just because fewer people understand what's going out, including me. I have no idea what I'm watching on that side anyway. I have to have people tell me. So it's funny that you said, Brandon Staley, because one of my guys is

Jordan for. I just, I love watching him when he was healthy. I thought that he's a six-round pick and it really just speaks to the level of coaching like you said on that side of the ball. There's secondary players overall, all of them play in this cohesive way that's really fun to watch. So he's a guy that jumped out to me kind of in the same vein. I had them next to each other on the same line is Julian Blackman. Just rookie safeties who, Blackman just plays downhill. He's really authoritative. I've said this before. They think he's going to be one of the better defensive backs in the league in the next couple years. And I think you see those flashes.

Antoine Winfield Jr. is the same kind of deal. Oh, yeah. It's just, it's really, he's already an elite safety. I know. Within like two games, I was ready to say it.

He's so good. One of my favorite parts, one of my favorite things that happens is when you watch a player in college, I don't watch a lot of college football. I come to the process pretty late. I'm more than willing to admit that. But when you watch a guy,

and I started watching him, and then the exact play, player you envision that guy as shows up on the field on Sundays in the NFL. That's what's happening with Winfield. You just saw him play. It's like, he's just a shitsster. That's all he is. He's just a chaos creator that you drop into the middle of something. And that's what he's doing. He's done great work as a blitzer. He makes plays in the open field. He's around the ball. Everything you expected him to be, that's what he is for that defense. So he's in there for me. Wyatt Teller has been hurt, but I loved watching him over the first month of the season.

I mean, just the type of weapon in the run game, you very rarely see an offensive lineman deployed as. They were using him as a puller in a way that really only Quentin Nelson gets thrown around. And I just loved watching that. But like you said with Herbert, I think that's a great point. Because Herbert is on my list. And two other guys that I'm going to lump in with Herbert are Mackay Beckton and Chase Claypool.

I was going to say Beckton was my pick because I did not expect it to happen this soon, where he's already doing the stuff he did at Louisville to NFL defenders. He tossed Frank Clark yesterday, and I don't know how you are that strong of a person. So I think that the reason I'm lumping all those guys together and the speed at which it's happening is the perfect point. And the same goes with Herbert. It's been a really interesting year for teams betting on traits in the draft. And I think you can say the same thing about Metcalf. I know that was two years ago, but it's the same kind of deal where you're like, all right, this dude is different.

I don't care what it looked like in college. I will figure this out. And those are the types of guys that have exploded early on. AJ Brown's the same kind of deal where it's like, I don't know, but I'm going to bet on the traits and figure it out later. That's exactly what Herbert's been. It's exactly what Beckton's been. And it's exactly what Claypool has been.

It's like this dude is just a better athlete than everyone else. He has more physical gifts to play the position. I don't know how long it's going to take, but I'm going to take a chance on it. And for those three guys, it's happened very fast. And another thing with Herbert that I think a lot of people missed, including myself, was that Oregon offense made it impossible to evaluate him properly. Like, he was just so robotic, and you could tell it was coaching, and it was just like an extreme college offense where he wasn't doing NFL quarterback things ever. And like when he was inaccurate, that was the only thing he could really evaluate. I think that's why a lot of people fell out of love with him.

Like when I first saw him play at Oregon, and this was like his freshman year, I think they were playing. Stanford and he was just throwing dimes all over the field. I was like, when this guy comes out in the draft, I'm probably going to love him because it's how he's playing. But I didn't see it on film, but I'm, I'm willing to admit, I take my hell and admit I was wrong. I was way wrong about him. The nice part is you'll always be less wrong about it than Seth Galena was. So at a certain point, you can always just hide behind him and let him take the heat when it comes to Herbert. It's always good when someone else was more just committed to a take than you were and that take is extremely wrong. All right.

So you alluded to it a little bit earlier, but I wanted to do the most valuable schematic quirk that you've seen this year. Is there anything else outside of the Rams defense that you had on your list? That you just think it has had a huge impact on the league so far. I'm sorry it makes you shoot your shot there a little bit early if you don't have another one. No, I think you put the most valuable scheme. And I think it has to be what's happening in Tennessee, where they're turning Ryan Tannahill into an elite quarterback.

I mean, he's a good, I always thought he was underrated in Miami. and we're kind of seeing those good traits that he had in Miami, but you can still see the weaknesses every now and then. But Arthur Smith has done such a good job of masking those weaknesses, just getting the best out of Tama Hill. And it's becoming the league of, like, the quarterbacks that thrive in that type of offense and then, like, the other creative quarterbacks. Like, you can put Cuck cousins in there, you can put Jim Cee in there,

you put Baker Mayfield this year in there. And I think that's been the most bad team. It's the best type of offense. It is. I believe this for like 10 years. It's the best type of offense. I will not hear any other answer. It is the best way to get the most out of a limited quarterback.

And I think that they're doing other cool stuff with it. The way they use their screen game, the way they create yak opportunities for receivers. I just think it's the right combination of stuff. To me, he's a no-brainer head coach hire. He doesn't have a very public persona. I've never seen him do an interview. I've never met him before. But I still think that if you just watch the results,

on the field. He's definitely deserving of a bunch of looks. I don't think I could pick, like, pick him out of the line. I know what he looks like, but I don't know what he looks like. And there's like a certain point when you're developing a quarterback where you, a team probably realizes like, uh, we got to go with the Puviac offense. And they realize like the quarterback isn't the guy. Like I think the Browns are probably coming to that realization this year with Baker Mayfield.

Like he's never going to be like, I don't want to say Mahomes because he's just the gold standard. But even a Matt Ryan, a guy that you could just ask to play quarterback and your offense is going to be in good hands. And this is the perfect way to hide your quarterback. I don't know why more teams don't do it. And I don't know why teams that have this offense like the 49ers invested so much money in the quarterback position. I really don't get it. It's really funny that the 49ers don't understand what their offense does for players.

The Kyle Shanahan is just hell bent on paying running backs, even though it doesn't matter what running back he puts in there. It's always been a disconnect that I think is interesting. And I do think it's the worthwhile conversation about why more teams don't use some of the pillars that those teams use. And I think the answer is that you can't do it halfway. You cannot just do it on a part-time basis. You have to commit full all the way to this type of offense. It has to be the bedrock of what you are because it doesn't work if you don't do it. Everything has to be married together.

You can't just, and I've been guilty of this in the past. you can't just say, well, they should just run more play action passes. If that's not the structure of your offense, if your runs and your passes aren't tied together, it doesn't matter. I did this when I wrote about Tanna Hill a couple weeks ago. I put a play action throw from the last season they had in Miami and a play action throw that they had in Tennessee this year, right next to each other, the tape. And if you look at it, it's a play fake. The route is designed to attack the exact same area of the field. The linebackers in the Miami tape don't step up because the offensive line isn't moving in a way that makes you think it's a run play fake.

With Tennessee, it's so natural and so tied together that as soon as they start moving in that outside zone action, you're moving with it. It looks real. The fake has credence in a way it's not going to with other types of offense. And I think that's why you don't see more teams just try to do a little bit more of it because you can't do a little bit more of it. And one of those offenses, I think this year that kind of has that problem is New England. Like, their run game and their play action game is not tied together at all. Like they don't really have any fakes off of the Cam Newton read option looks at all. And I think that's one of the biggest reasons they're struggling to get big plays outside of,

obviously, they have limited personnel at the receiver position. My answer here, you and I've talked a little bit about this. I'm actually writing about it for the athletic a little bit later this week, is the team's use of jet motion in the passing. game. It's not the most valuable thing because not that many teams do it, but it's the thing that's jumped out most to me. If you look at what the jet motion was in like 2017 when the Rams and the chiefs were doing it, it was straight stolen from college, pit and that Canada stuff where you're using it to get guys on the edge and just create, because it was really

difficult to do that with modern NFL offenses and displaced linebackers in the run game. The same way they did at Wisconsin with Melvin Gordon like six years ago. That's what you were doing. Its value and its utility was in the run game. Now, I think that more teams are understanding what that jet motion can be for you in the passing game. One of my favorite plays in the entire season was the Robert Woods touchdown against Washington, where he comes in jet motion from right to left, and they snap it when he was the number two receiver on the left side. So he was still a little bit further inside, but he ended up being the number one guy running a vertical down the left side. So on the same play, you accomplished two things.

You go from a three by one set to a two by two set as the ball is getting snapped, which that does a tonne defensive checks. And you're playing with who's the number one and number two receiver on that side, which plays with defensive communication. And a lot of teams are doing a great job of doing that. With that guy moving at the snap, it's not just that it's a distraction. You literally are making defenses talk to one another in a half second before the snap happens. And that impact has been all over the league. You've seen it with the Packers. you've seen it with the 49ers, you've seen it with the Rams,

essentially all of the most innovative teams in the NFL. And I just think it's had such a cool impact on the way the game is being played right now. Yeah, and that's kind of like, I don't know if it actually happened like this, but it's kind of the next evolutionary step from like stack and bunches where you're playing with who's number one, who's number two,

and you're playing with those pattern matching defenses, causing confusion after the snap. But in this way, you get the best of both worlds. You get confusion before the snap. You get it after the snap. And yeah, that's a great point. I didn't even think about how it affected the passing game. And it's really cool to watch because I think that it's,

a lot of this stuff is accidental, right? You're using all of that jet motion and you almost find out by happenstance that it does this for your passing game. And that's the cool part of just watching this stuff evolve over time is that the Rams are the perfect example. I think that because they throw so much shit against the wall and just see what sticks. They eventually become like a football laboratory,

which you were talking about with their defense. And that's, I think, what they ended up figuring out. It's like we're using it all the time in the run game. Look what it's doing to defenses. Can we use this in the past game? And the answer has been clearly yes. All right.

Let's get to some less fun stuff here. I want to, what was your worst preseason take? This is an award that only matters to me. Okay. I'm, I got two. My worst one that I put out on Twitter was I picked the bears to go three and 13, but I don't think it's that bad of a take. Let me explain myself.

It's not that bad. For the purposes of that article, I use some site that'll let you go through every regular season game and pick the result to be game. Then it spits out standings at the end. So I'm not like thinking, oh, the bears are three at 13. I actually like picked them to go six and ten or something like that, seven and nine in another thing. But my actual worst take was Brady was Washington.

This wasn't going to work in Tampa Bay. They were going to have to change the offense. He wasn't going to be able to make throws. and by week two I realized I was a big idiot. That's a really bad one. I don't think it's as bad as picking the Cowboys to win the NFC, which is what I did. I'm picking them to win the NFC.

Look, I can't blame you. Actually, I can. I didn't pick them to go to Super Bowl. You believe in Mike McCarthy and Mike Nolan. That's your point. I have my Mayacopal for this. I have done it already. I have apologized to the people, to myself, to my family.

I put it out there. I'm very sorry. I cannot believe Mike McCarthy dup to me. I did not pick them to make the Super Bowl. I picked them to get the number one seat in the NFC. So that's a little bit better, but still not good. The other one kind of speaks to a conversation we had a little earlier today. I picked the Vikings to win the NFC North,

but I thought that was going to take like a 9 and 7 type of Vikings team. I did too. Which they're like 18th in DVOA coming into this week. They're an average football team that's gotten a little bit unlucky at times. So that's not that far off. I just did not think that Packers' offense would look like it does. I thought the Packers would be kind of a middling, regression-laden team in a way that they haven't been.

So it's more about me being wrong about the Packers than it is about being wrong about the Vikings. Yeah, I was ready to buy until Aaron Rogers was done, being a good quarterback. I never did that. I was ready. That was my worst take. And I wanted to bring something up. I forgot to mention his name in the assistant coach. And it's kind of related to Mike McCarthy.

Chan Galey, by the way. I thought that was a terrible offensive coordinator hire. He's been everything that Mike McCarthy promised to be. He's been a guy that's been clearly studying new offenses because they're doing a lot of cool stuff on offense. And Mike McCarthy has done any of the things he promised. But I want to give a shout out to Chan Gaylee. Chang Galey, unexpected innovator,

unlikely innovator, Chang Galey. But that's what he's been in his entire career. I mean, you just wouldn't expect a guy who was a retread head coach in a bunch of places to be somebody that's willing to be, an extreme thinker offensively. But if you think about that spread chief's team that was 10 years before anybody else,

he was running 10 personnel with the jets when they didn't have a tight end. So he did see some stuff coming before other people did. So it's kind of cool to see that come into play. All right. You get to do one. This is another one of yours.

You get to do one draft over for a team. Quickly, what is yours? I'm replacing Isaiah Simmons with C.D. Lamb. it was the pick I wanted before the draft. I wanted to see the Cardinals' offense just, like, loaded with stars, and I'm going back to it. The obvious pick is who got picked at number four and replacing him with someone else,

but I was assuming that you might go with the offense of Lyman route, so I left him to you. I did not do that. I don't think it's not fun to talk about how the Giants should have picked Mackay Beckett instead of Andrew Thomas. I'm not going to spend moments of my life worrying about that. I, on my list here was give the Cardinals anyone, so I'm glad

you went that route. I have Chase Claypool going to Green Bay. I mean, I know a lot of those guys were gone, and that's why you can't really tear down the Packers for the choice they made in the first round. If Justin Jefferson was on the board, maybe they take Justin Jefferson.

But I just think if you drop Chase Claypool out of that Packers offense, it's very fun. One, he's instantly the second best receiver on that team. Two, they run all that jet stuff. We've already seen he can do it. So he would have filled multiple roles for them in a way that I just think is really fun. Another guy just,

this is just a Bears Homer pick. I think Darnow Mooney would make a lot of teams better. Like that was just going through the draft and like figuring out which guys in certain rounds. Like Julian Blackman would make a lot of teams better. Damien Lewis would help a lot of teams on the interior of the offensive line. There are a lot of different guys, I think, late in the draft that hindsight is 2020. All right. Spinning it forward a little bit.

This is our last one here. What is the game that you are most looking forward to in the second half of the season? I'm going to go, the easy pick is Bucks Chiefs, but I'm going to go, because I think those are the two best teams for the week, but I'm going to go Ravens Steelers rematch because I thought people had some weird takeaways from that game.

Like I watched that game, and I'm not as down on the Ravens as a lot of people are, and I'm not as... I don't understand how you could be. That makes no sense to me. Why do you think the takeaway from that game is the Ravens aren't as good as we thought

when the Steelers didn't let anybody run the ball for seven weeks, and the Ravens ran the ball for 265 yards? And they should have won the game and they, like, committed a billion turnovers. Lamar Jackson just played horribly. And, like, even the steel, I'm still skeptical of that offense

and I'm skeptical of Ben Rafflesburg. I know they kind of opened things up in the second half, but I just don't see it with him. I don't see him matching Patrick Mahomes throw for throw. I don't know who can outside of Russell Wilson, but I just can't even imagine it in my head. It feels like over the second half of the year, we're just going to see teams squat on their stuff

and just say, you're going to beat us over the top or you're not going to beat us. and I don't know if this dealers can do that because we haven't seen them do it all year. I mean, they've hit a couple deep shots to Claypool, but for the most part, it's been all get the ball out, let our guys do the work.

And as smart as that might be, considering their offensive personnel, I don't know how sustainable that is against truly great offenses. Yeah, I tweeted this. It looked like the Ravens were the first defense that looked like they had watched film on the Steelers' offenses here.

Like the Titans the week before were like, they were playing off and like blitzing Ben Rathesburgh. like he's getting the ball out quickly. You're not getting home with the blitz. It just didn't make any sense. But the Ravens finally pressed the receivers and try to blitz Ben. And he looked uncomfortable in the first half. I know we turned around the second half when they spread things out.

But yeah, like you said, not sustainable. I don't think. My answer is Chiefs, Bucks, because I'm not some weird hipster with my choice here. I'm going to go with the two best teams in the NFL playing each other. Last one for you, I do want to ask you, what has your favorite Fox player illustration been this year? I'm telling you it changes every week. Like Miles Gaskin has...

It's really hard. He had a helmet on this week. I don't know why they drew with the helmet on. Like, I'm assuming the guy had no idea who Miles Gaskin was. I'm going to go with Ben Rathesberger. Yeah, it's the best one. He's built like Thanos in his picture. It's amazing.

Like, Rathesberger has never been in that great shape in his life. But he's just like, I don't know, all the quarterbacks are great. Matt Ryan's a good one, too. He looks like a contract killer. The Phil Rivers one is funny to me. too because I just think that I've always been somebody who pays a lot of attention to aesthetic quarterback choices like what guys uniforms look like the fact that Kirk cousins wears the long loose sleeves and is the only guy that does that has always been great and Rivers does

the same thing like Rivers could not look less impressive in his uniform than he looks he's a much bigger guy than you think he is when you stand next to him it makes total sense that he's never gotten hurt because he's actually massive but when you look at it's like that just is not like a basically impressive guy. And in his picture, he's just totally shredded up. And Rogers is similar though. Rogers yesterday,

I got to go back and watch it. I can't believe we didn't mention it on the show. I think he was wearing long underwear that he cut underneath his jersey, which is not surprising at all because he's worn many turtlenecks during his career. But it's really funny, some of these older quarterbacks who just don't give a shit

about any of the things that they're putting on. It's amazing. I wish they incorporated that into the drawings and actually made like realistic drawings of these people. and this is a thought. I had the same thought about Rivers when I was watching the Chargers game and like in all of their uniforms.

I was like, I'm so happy he's not on the team anymore because he would have just ruined these uniforms. Justin Herbert looks so much better. Tyraub Taylor looked so much better in those uniforms. I'm glad he didn't waste them. This is a pro Philip Rivers podcast. We have nothing but love for Philip Rivers. Stephen, thank you so much for doing this.

Always so good to talk to you. Please go read Stephen's work on For the Wind. Please go follow him on Twitter. I believe just at Stephen Ruiz, correct? Yeah. Yeah. He does some of the best work about the NFL that you'll find. You will consistently learn stuff for reading and listening to him.

So please do that. And Stephen, we'll talk to you later, bud. Yeah, thanks. Appreciate it. Well, thank you to Stephen for joining us, but I'm an idiot. And I forgot to mention defensive player of the year, which seems like a pretty important award when you're considering season-long awards that we give out. So my quick take on this, I think that Aaron Donald is the answer.

I mean, he leads the league in sacks, tie for the league with nine, leads the league in pressures as an interior alignment, even though he's playing outside a little bit more this year. He has 48 pressures on the season. No one else has more than 39. We should not be surprised by any Aaron Donald stats anymore, but that one is bonkers. You could give this award to Aaron Donald any single season. He is the best defensive player in the NFL and has been, essentially since he came into the league. Saying that Aaron Donald should be the defensive player of the year is not dissimilar to saying that Bill Belichick should be the coach of the year. These guys are the best at what they do year in

and year out. But awards are often narrative driven, as we discussed earlier. And I think that For that reason, Miles Garrett has a real chance if he keeps going on the trajectory that he is. He has nine sacks. He's tied with Donald. He leads the league in force fumbles with four. He's sitting at 37 pressures. So, excuse me, 38 pressures. So pretty much second in the league, right with Stefan T.J. Watt, Shaq Barrett.

One of the things that I've loved about Miles Garrett this year, though, is that his pressures have come equally on each side of the ball. He has 19 coming from the left side, 19 coming from the right side. So they've moved him around a lot. He's affected the game from pretty much every single alignment. And when you consider that plus the production, plus the fact that he's never won it before. And this just seems like the year where he's really taking that final step, that's the guy I would give it to if we weren't giving it to Aaron Donald. But like I said, you could give it to Aaron Donald any single season and you wouldn't be making a mistake.

Joining me now for this week's team visit, it's Jeff Howe from The Athletic who covers the Patriots. I feel like after this weekend, a lot of the conversation was on essentially what's going on with this New England team. So I definitely wanted to have you on. I appreciate you taking a time. Yeah, thanks for having me, of course. So my first question, you've covered this team for what? About a decade now, right? 12th season. It has flown by. So, I mean, you've seen a lot of stuff, but for the most part, I would say the overall tenor of the conversation around the Patriots, even if it's vastly a little bit within individual seasons, has been similar. I'm sure the feel of the locker room has been fairly similar over that 10 years.

What does it feel like there right now? I'm sure it's just a different temperature than it's been compared to any other time you've been covering this team. Yeah, I mean, it's weird because I haven't covered a losing team since I covered UMass hockey. So back for the daily collegian. So it's, and they don't even lose anymore. So it's a weird world we're in. But I think it's also tough because we're not in the locker room every day, which, you know, it's just a weird year. those Fridays, like I always used to get such a good feel for the vibe of the team on Fridays

because you could tell how loose or confident or whatever, however they were feeling going into a game. And then you can kind of assess whether or not that was trending in a certain direction over the course of a full season. And more often than not with this team, it was trending upward. Now with the WebEx calls and everything, you kind of, you measure the words, but you're not getting any, it's a press conference setting online. So you always have to, you can listen. He can watch, you can assess, but there's always some resistance, I guess, from the other end of the line.

I think the fact that the Patriots have so many strong, quality, veteran leaders, they're in a good mental state right now. They're probably all sitting there wondering what the hell they're supposed to do with the team that's two and five. But they're saying all the right things. And even a new guy like Cam Newton, he's been saying all the right things. he's been incredibly accountable throughout the whole season as well. So I think they're in a good state of mind. I just don't know how much that's necessarily going to translate toward the final two months of the season. I mean, hearing from them the last 24 hours or so, they keep mentioning how there are only a few plays away from winning a lot of these,

or at least three of these games now, which is true. It is totally accurate. But the problem there is they're making some of the same mistake. and there's a reason why they're two and five. And these Patriots teams over the last, not just the 12 seasons I've been covered them, like the entire time Bill Belichick has been here, they're always the team that makes those three or four plays that either turns a 50-50 game into a seven-point win or a somewhat close game into all of a sudden like a 24-point win.

Because, again, they just don't make those mistakes. And one stat that really sticks out that tells the story of this team more than any other one, They're 2 and 0 this season when they win the turnover differential. They're 0 and 5 when they don't. And they were on their way to winning the turnover differential in Buffalo. Cam Newton's fumble was the very first turnover of the game. They ended up with a 1-1 draw on the turnover score sheet, and they ended up losing the game as a result.

Sometimes when you watch a team that's gotten some bad breaks, you think this team is better than that. This team is better than the 2 and 5 that they've shown, and they don't deserve to have that record. When you watch the Patriots, though, even if they've gotten a couple bad breaks late in games, this looks like a bad team. I think they're 26th and overall DVOA right now. They're in the bottom third of the league in offense and defense.

So it's not as if, if we get a couple more breaks, if we're this team for the rest of the season, we can compete with some of the better teams in the AFC. If they're this team right now, they're not even close to a team like the Chiefs or the Steelers or the teams that you consider true contenders in that conference. Right, right. That's the troubling thing. like even if they were five and two right now. Like let's say everything unfolded perfectly in Seattle

and they didn't have the COVID situation and they were able to beat Denver. I mean, there's a take the COVID situation. If they didn't have the COVID situation, they might beat Kansas City. But I mean, there's been a lot of strange things going on right now, but you're right. Like bottom line is even if they were,

include the COVID's. If they beat Seattle, if they finished that touchdown drive, if they didn't, face plant against Denver, a team they should have beaten and finished that touchdown drive. If they somehow didn't lose to Buffalo and the rest of the season still played out, you know, they'd be five and two, but like you said, they'd be a very imperfect five and two. A lot of those stats in terms of the league rankings wouldn't have changed all that much over the course of a few extra yards in those final three drives.

So you would sit here saying, what is the long-term prospects of this team? What if they do? I mean, if they make a run in their 11 and 5 getting into the playoffs, Pittsburgh is still a whole lot better. Baltimore is probably still a whole lot better. And then Kansas City, I mean, yeah, you played them tough once, but what is the ceiling of this team and is as high as Kansas City? Probably not.

So that's certainly an interesting way to look at it. And it's just the troubling issues is one of it is the run defense has been just really, really bad. I mean, the last three games, I think they've given up over 500 rushing yards. the last three games. And some of that is personnel. A lot of that is personnel related. I mean, just look at going back to the offseason, yeah, you had the opt out with Dante Hightower, Patrick Chung. You lost Jamie Collins, Kyle Van Noy, and Alandand Roberts, who was your fifth linebacker last year, but you lost those guys in free agency. And then, but the only thing that

you did up front, you know, the run defense last year was very spotty. They gave up over 100 yards in seven games. They gave up 200 something to the Titans in the playoff loss. They knew that that was an area that they had to improve. The only move that they made on the defensive line was basically letting Danny Shelton walk and then signing Bo Allen for the exact same contract. Bo Allen suffered his second practice injury last week and now won't play all season. So then you look, so where's it go from there? Lawrence Guy has been tremendous, but Lawrence Guy injured his shoulder in the second half Sunday. Who took his place? Nick Thurman, a guy that they signed off the practice squad Saturday. Who did the bills run?

run at for their third touchdown on Sunday. Nick Thurman, caved them in right off the snap. So it's things like that that are just breaking down. I mean, I looked at the 10 worst running plays in terms of the, I guess the 10 best runs from a Bill's perspective Sunday against the Patriots. It was their seven longest gains plus their three touchdowns. And I wrote down the name of the player who got blocked out of his, on all those plays. I said, okay, John Simon.

John Bentley, every one of those 10 plays. You were surprised about Simon. That was like one of your first takeaways. I wrote something like in a season preview, like John Simon will set the edge and so it will be or something. I don't know, something biblical. One of those things that was just like, I'm never going to regret writing that. But like the amount of respect John Simon has in that locker room and he's just, he had a really bad game. But those 10 runs, it was between three and five players all got blocked out of their rushing lane.

or all got blocked out of the play. It's just like, that's too many breakdowns on 10 plays. So the light personnel, look at Adrian Phillips, a lifelong safety is your second leading snap. I don't play the second most snaps as a linebacker so far this season. Like there's just, there's so many issues where teams are finally saying, we can run the ball on this team and there's no sense in even thrown. So that's, I think what you just said is so telling because

all the guys you listed off that aren't playing. Like you think about Dante Hat Tower, Patrick Chung, losing Danny Sheldon, losing Kyle Van Nuoy, it's like, you start listing off all these names. It's like, man, we probably should have seen this coming more than we did. Because even if John Simon and Lawrence Sky are both dependable players, which they have been for this team, when those are now the guys in the top tier of your front seven

versus the guys we were talking about that they lost, the expectations for this team probably should have been a little bit different. But I think the inclination so, been so far towards just saying, oh, they'll figure it out, oh, they'll figure it out. And at a certain point, you just don't have the guys. And we probably should have known that coming in. The expectations

for this defense probably should have been a little bit lower. So I guess my question is, if you're going back to that offseason when they lost all those guys, when they've made some of these moves, when they've set up that personnel for this season, do you think that they would do some things differently? Do you think we should have calibrated the expectations differently?

I guess just in a broader sense, how do you we got to this place and should we have seen this coming more than we did? Yeah, absolutely. I think the hard thing is the cap, I mean, which Belichick is kind of famously pointed at twice in the last few days now. It's a shocking. Yeah, it is. But their cap situation, like, it's a real point. And we could argue the merit behind that for a long time, whether or not, you know, that was

self-inflicted, which to an extent it was, but part of it was, you know, they weren't able to resign Brady, which accelerated a $13.5 million cap hit on dead money just on him. They've got $28 million in dead cap space this season, which I would assume I haven't checked. I would assume that's the most in the NFL and by a lot. I think Carolina actually has the most. Oh, really? I believe so. I believe so.

I can look that up while you're talking. So anyway, I'll ramble here then. I think the idea that they could have kept Kyle Van Noy and Jamie Collins. I mean, yeah, there was interest there, but Miami and Detroit, they spent a lot of money on those guys. They gave the best contract. So Patriots weren't going to be able to match that dollar for dollar. And I think the thing that really hurt them was the lack of an offseason just because they spent two early round picks on Josh Uche and Anthony Jennings. linebacker is such a tough position for Patriots rookies to learn. And like I'll put it in perspective.

Dante Hightower, he came from Alabama, Nick Saban's defense, very similar to Belichick's defense. I remember talking to Hightower during rookie camp in 2012. And he was like, I opened up this playbook and I recognized it like immediately. He's always been one of the smartest players I've ever covered, knows the defense in and out, one of the best leaders of the dynasty. And it still took him until his third season to feel comfortable in this defense. And this is a guy who went through an entire rookie offseason and so on and so forth, had great leaders. Josh Uche and Anthony Jennings, I mean, we know what COVID did to the offseason. They just haven't had the chance to get to adjust to that learning curve, which has been greatly accelerated. So when you're stuck with

Joanne Bentley is you're only one of your top five linebackers returning this year and you've got a safety playing linebacker and you've got Brandon Copeland, who you've, who you've, you've probably ideally signed for some edge depth playing inside linebacker and then tearing his peck. I mean, there's just, all of these things are kind of snowballing. And some of it, again, I'm not trying to make excuses for the sense that some of it is self-inflicted, but it's, it's well beyond that as well. So you look at it. Carolina does have the most. They have 50 million, 50. Oh, jeez. What are they doing? The Jags have 50, but I think it's an interesting contrast because both of those teams are in full tear-down mode.

It's much different having $50 million in dead space when you're saying, this is a wash we're building for the future. Let's get rid of our expensive players. The Patriots didn't do that. They have what you said, if they're 39 million or whatever it is in dead space, but they tried to play the middle ground. They tried to say, we're not rebuilding. We're trying to do it halfway on both sides.

And I think that's difficult to do. And I think this is the result. So before the end of this season, like we talked about it, if this is the version they are through the end of the year, it doesn't matter. Do you think this stuff gets righted? Because on defense, the personnel isn't changing. And on offense, a lot of the issues they're having, whether it's a lack of playmaking talent, Cam Newton struggles, it doesn't seem like there's an obvious fix there.

So do you see any of this getting cleared up? But for the most part, do you think we're going to see some version of this Patriots team during the second half of the year? You know, it's an interesting question. I think, like you said, defensively, the personnel is not going to change. If teams want to run against them, they're most. likely going to be able to run against them. And, you know, Baltimore, like, the Patriots are going to look great on Monday against the Jets

because everybody looks great against the Jets. And that's going to be like. It's a great get-right game. Yeah. I mean, that's like putting a Band-Aid on a leg that just got snapped in half. Like, that's not going to do much. And then the next week, you're going to have to pay that medical bill because Baltimore is coming to town.

And that's a team that's, like, you can't convince me that after what I've seen in the last three weeks, they're going to be able to stop Baltimore's rushing attack. So it's going to start to get even uglier again. The problem with having two games against the Jets left on the schedule is that's going to destroy your draft position. But looking at like what's it going to look like the rest of the way? I mean, one thing that keeps coming to my mind is what are you going to do, a quarterback? And like with the trade deadline in a few hours, it's crazy to think, like I'm not saying this team should be buyers. and I don't want it to be misconstrued that way.

But if you can get like a Golden Tate caliber player, somebody like that, you know, the final legs of his career, end of a contract for a late day three pick to try to help a guy like Cam Newton or even, let's say, a few weeks from now, Jared Stidham, just to see what you've got as you evaluate that position the rest of the way. I think that's something that you've got to consider doing.

Now, I'm not, in no way, shape, or form, would I give up a Thursday or a Friday pick for a wider, receiver or a tight end right now, unless that's somebody that you know is going to be in your system for a few years. Because the next year's draft class is just way too good, especially offensively. And that's going to start to solve some of your issues. But you've got to evaluate the quarterback position. And whether it's Cam Newton or Stidham or somebody in the draft or another free agent or whatever, I mean, the only thing you can control right now is, is Cam Newton going to be in the mix next off season? If he's not, is it going to be Stidham? And if neither of those guys are or

or whether they are. I mean, again, how much can you really evaluate when Jacoby Myers is your top receiver and Gunnar Olshevsky and Demir Bird and Isaiah Zuber keeps getting called up from the practice school? Like, how? I still don't believe that Isaiah Zuber is a real person. I still do not believe that that's a real guy. All the other guys, at least I've heard of. I know that Gunner-Rol-Shefsky is a real dude.

I still don't believe Isaiah Zuber exists. You know what's crazy about him was he was, they gave him the most guaranteed money out of any of the receivers. that they signed as UDFAs after the draft. And they had Jeff Thomas, who was like this heralded character concern from Miami. And they had, shoot, I don't know, two other guys, like some pretty decent players. They had that kid from Auburn that was, you know, friends and close with Jarrett Stidham. They had like four, they might even have five UDFAs.

And Zuber was the one that they gave the most money to. Every time he's got the ball in his hands, the guy looks like he's as fast as lightning. But again, he's a practice squad call-up. I think the Golden Tate-esque player point is a really good one because they need to understand what they want to do at quarterback next year. And you need to get as much information as you can to evaluate Cam Newton. Let's say can we get him for $15 million next season? Do we think he's a real option? That's an important question to answer.

But outside of that, what do you think the trade deadline looks like on the other side of the ball? Do you think it's a possibility that we see Stefan Gilmore go? Because I think that leads to the question of what does this roster? look like next year and how do they try to retool in the off season? Could that start with Gilmore here in the next few hours? You'll be listening to this podcast after the trade deadline ends. But before it happens, do you think that's something that we could see? Yeah, let's just record two answers to make me sound really smart.

I think so the problem going into the trade deadline is, yeah, I think he's available. And the price hasn't been met. And he has to be like, you're not just going to give away, Stefan. Gilmore for the sake of giving him away. I mean, this is a guy that comparable to past play and other trades, Jalen Ramsey, you know, Jamal Adams, guys like that, defensive backs, he should net you a first round pick. If all of a sudden, let's say some lousy team for whatever reason is going to be drafting

in the top of the second round and they need a cornerback, I don't know. Can you settle for a second? You know, maybe, maybe you can stomach it. But again, if I were trading Gilmore. or I wouldn't do it for any less than a first rounder. And the times that his name has come up in trades in the past, that just hasn't ever come close to materializing. Joe Tooney is another one.

If he walks in free agency, which I think is more probable than not, he's going to get you a third round compensatory pick in 2022. If somebody comes calling right now with a third rounder in 2021, then you probably have to sit there and say, you know what, it's worth taking that right now. plus, you know, it's probably going to be at least a dozen picks better than a comp pick. So, I mean, I think you're ideally hoping somebody is going to offer a second rounder for Tooney, but I don't know if that's realistic. So, yeah, I mean, selling is certainly something that is worth considering,

especially because it's not just the quarterbacks that are attractive in next year's draft class. I mean, this Patriots team needs tight ends. They need wide receivers, and that class is loaded with talent there as well. So if you can stockpile as much early round picks as possible, whether you use it as trade ammunition to get up the board for a quarterback or you have a chance to answer some of those positions of need, the skill positions of need, along with potentially quarterback, then again, give yourself the chance to do that.

It's just don't trade Stefan Gilmore for a late second round pick because I'm not sure that's really going to help you. Well, the conversation is different than it is with Tuni just because he's not an expiring deal. I know he wants a new deal, but you can still have Gilmore back next year at a reasonable price if you decided not to budge. so that's a whole different thing. The tuning thing is interesting because you can let him walk or you can trade him because that's the one area of this team that could be set next year.

And if you look at the way that Unwenu is played, how do you pronounce that? On Wenu? If you look at the way he's played this year, he's been fantastic. So you have him, Shaq Mason, you have to figure out the David Andrews situation. I don't know if that's a guy they'd want back next season, but they'd have to figure out the center. So I mean, I know they like him. He's incredibly smart. He does exactly the type of stuff they'd love to do.

So if you have Andrews, win, canon on when you and Shaq Mason, that's a starting offensive line that you can feel very good about next season. And then now the question is, what happens on the rest of the offense? The quarterback question is the biggest one. And I feel like this is a team that is really set up to succeed next year just because they're going to have resources when a lot of teams don't. I mean, they only have, I think, $130 million in liabilities on the cap next year. They have $45 million in cap space or so.

And that's before you make some moves. Let's say this is the last year, Devin McCordy is there, things like that. So they could be set up to kind of retool on the fly next year in a way they weren't this offseason. And I think that's the biggest question is, what are your bedrocks going into next season? I think it can be the offensive line and maybe some guys in the secondary, even though you might lose some people there. So what this team could look like at the start of 2021, I think is a fascinating question when

you consider some of the receivers that are on the market, some of the quarterbacks that are on the market, where they're going to be drafting, and how much overall all cap space they might have. Yeah, they're going to have a chance to to really go out and pay for a quarterback if they think that they, but the problem is like when you're in a position where you're having to go out and pay for a quarterback, the group that you have to go off of isn't always going to be ideal. I mean, if the cowboys, the cowboys could not have royally screwed up a Dak Prescott situation anymore than they have. But then again, you know, what's his ankle going to look like by the time free agency comes around? And what does that do to his price tag? Or what he was

willing to sign for. But you know, you never know. I mean, if Dak Prescott's a guy that is going to take a one year type of deal and then go out and get himself $150 million a year after that, then that might be a situation where the Patriots jump on it. What about Garapolo? So the problem, I don't, when they moved on from Garoppolo, their biggest concern with him was his health, the injury issues. I mean, he played six quarters, made himself vulnerable to an unnecessary hit and injured his shoulder and wasn't able to go out there and play. The following off season, or the 2017 off season right before he was traded, he missed like a week of practice because of a minor cap issue.

And there were some groans about that stuff. And we've seen what's happened in San Francisco with the injuries that he's taken on. So do you really want to go pay 20 plus million a year for Garopolo? They love him. They love him to death. But having a guy who's an injury risk like that is going to be concerned. So, yeah, I think he would probably be on their radar. But again, if five teams want to try to sign Garoppolo, you're not talking about 20 million a year.

You're probably starting to talk about 25 to 30 million a year. So, you know, that's an issue too. I think in terms of the bedrocks, you look at, and not just that, I'll even kind of spin that one forward a little too. Like the rebuild that they're looking at here could happen faster than anticipated if the recent draft assets materialized as quickly. as the guys did from 09, 10, and 11. You know, that 2010, after 2009, they had locker room issues. Brady had his first season after the ACL. They really had to remake the roster.

They had a lot of retirements from the core dynasty players from the early 2000s. And it looked like 2010 was going to be an ugly year. You know, Devin McCordy starts to really flourish. So does Rob Grancowski. They had some role pieces there. They had a lot of guys who, you know, Julian Edelman was more of a special team or then, but Patrick Chung was still starting to play.

So that thing started to accelerate pretty quickly. And they went 14 and 2 when Brady won the MVP, and then they got humiliated by the Jets in the divisional route. But they were competing quicker than they expected to. This year, you know, there's been a lot of groans in Boston from the fan base of Elfellichick's recent draft classes. But again, I mentioned the learning curve for Uche and Jennings. Same thing for Asiase and Dalton Keen.

I mean, tight end is a tough position for these guys to learn. Grunkowski, I made the Hightower comp earlier. Grunkowski as a rookie wasn't a full-time player until week 10. And that was still when they were going through an offseason with two days in training camps. So think about how hard it must be for guys like Keene and Asiase to kind of emerge right now. So those guys could potentially flourish. I mean, Damien Harris, every time Damien Harris was inactive last year, the tweets I got was, you know, a blown third round pick. And now every time Damien Harris gets the football,

the fan base thinks that he's, you know, the next Walter Payton. So you need patience with a lot of these guys. I mean, Isaiah Wynn lost his 2018 rookie season to injuries, is really starting to look like, aside from a couple of games when he had a cap issue earlier this season, is really starting to look like a franchise caliber left tackle. So, you know, Chase Winnevich was their best pass rusher until some of their situational packages have diminished his playing time

in the last three weeks. But the pieces are there, Kyle Dugger. J.C. Jackson will be a restricted free agent. So, like, there are a lot of attractive pieces that are young, and if they all start to hit at the same pace that they did a decade ago, then this re-assuming you can get a quarterback, this rebuild won't take as long as I think many are probably projecting it to. I totally agree with you.

And I think that having the offensive line essentially intact, having Jackson, Jones, McCordy, some of the younger defensive backs, a little bit more development from the front seven guys you talked about. And let's say hypothetically, let's say it's Garapolo, just to throw out a name for one year 20 million, just if there aren't that many takers because of the injury concerns. You're still going to have money. Let's say this offense next year has the offensive line we talked about with Andrews back,

the back field we've discussed, Edelman back for one more year, and Jimmy Garoppolo and Alan Robinson. That's something that you wouldn't be upset about. That's a team that suddenly becomes interesting when you get some of the guys. guys back on defense that you're missing right now. So I think that it kind of harkens back to the conversation as we were having before about should we have anticipated this? Should our expectations be different?

If this team was wearing any other jersey, what would we say about them? Maybe I'm falling into the same sort of thing here by saying, oh, with a couple more tweaks, we have Belichick, we have McDaniels, let's see what 21 looks like. Maybe that's a little bit too rosy, but I still think you could spin it that way if you wanted too. Yeah, I mean, because, and then, you know, the big issue with some of the cap stuff here is the Patriots middle class is just not where it usually is. And when you've got, you know, I've used this reference like three times in the last two days. But, you know, football is a 100% injury rate. And Belichick is always counting on guys to go down and who is going to step up. And usually you've got like, you know, last year, like, 10% percent. Terrence Brooks was a really valuable safety coming in for Patrick Chum. This year, I think the role is without some of those guys in the front seven, you're making some of those back-end guys a little more vulnerable.

There are, you know, let's like some of the, like a branded Lafelle or whatever. If a guy like that comes in and is able to play better because he's got better tight ends, better wide receivers around him. Whereas now you're asking, like, Demir Burge, your number one wide receiver. And that shouldn't be the case. The guy's making a million dollars this year. He could not play for the Cardinals last year. He was the guy that the Cardinals looked at and they're like, you know what?

No, thank you. That's all you need to know. He should not be the number one receiver in the NFL team, even if you think that he's an interesting kind of sprinkling down the field guy every once in a while. That's what he is. Yeah, right, right. And it's just they, so the middle class is usually some of these,

whether it's somebody who's grown up in the system like a Dane Fletcher or somebody that you brought in from the outside again like a brooks or i mean even early as you know rob nickovich early in his career or an andre carter guys like that the patriots just don't have enough of those guys right now or or many at all i mean adrian phillips again having a really nice season but he's playing out of place and teams run at him which it it reminds me of mark baron with the rams two years ago like yeah mark baron's a good player but when you play him at linebacker teams are going to run at you and you're kind of going to get what you're asking for awesome Jeff, thank you very much.

This is an incredible insight. I sincerely appreciate the time, and I'm sure we'll be talking to you down the road. Thanks, man. Yeah, thanks for having me. All right, guys, thank you so much for listening to the show today. I'm sure it's been a wild, stressful week for a lot of you.

Hopefully this gave you a chance to decompress a little bit. Thank you so much to Stephen for coming on doing our mid-season awards. Thank you to Jeff for popping on and talk about the Patriots. I will be back with Lindsay Jones on tomorrow's show to talk about all things week nine. Until then, please rate and review the podcast. leave a review on your favorite podcast platform. I would sincerely appreciate it. Thank you so much for listening to The Athletic Football Show.

We'll talk to you tomorrow. This was the Athletic Football Show.