The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Priorities for rebuilding teams at the midpoint of the season with Scott Pioli + distractions in the NFL locker room with Mitchell Schwartz

Episode Date: November 10, 2021

What do NFL teams in the rebuilding process prioritize at the midpoint of the season? Former NFL executive and current TV analyst Scott Pioli joins Robert Mays to explain his experiences with player evaluations, the waiver wire and retooling for the future. Then, Mitchell Schwartz and Robert talk about how the Aaron Rodgers and Odell Beckham Jr. situations impact the locker room. Finally, they discuss Wyatt Teller’s deal with the Browns and how players approach extensions and free agency.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. The Athletic Football Show is presented by State Farm, because like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Get a quote today. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. Today's Wednesday, November 10th. I'm Robert Mays. Great show for you guys today.

Mitchell Schwartz is going to be joining us a little bit later. We talked about a whole bunch of stuff. Just locker room dynamics as it relates to the Aaron Rogers News, the old El Beckham story. We talked about contract extensions, how you stack up yourself with guys at your position. Really enjoyed our conversation. Before we did that, though,

I wanted to bring on someone to talk about teams that are rebuilding. Because at this stage of the season, when you have a team that has one win, two wins, that's in the first year of a new regime, it's easy to forget about those teams, but this is a pivotal time for that. They're thinking about what changes need to happen to the roster, the status that they're at, where they need to be looking.

So I wanted to bring on someone to have kind of a deep dive conversation about what that process looks like. If you're the lions, the jaguars, the jets. And to do that, I wanted to invite on Scott Pioly, who has been a GM, multiple places in the NFL. And he has been through this several different times. Really enjoyed our chat with Scott. And I hope you guys do too. Let's get to it. All right, I'm thrilled now to welcome former Patriots executive, former chiefs,

general manager, long time front office member in the NFL and current NFL network analyst, Scott Piole. Scott, thanks for doing this. I really appreciate it. Oh, Robert, thanks so much for asking me to be here. Pleasure to be here, really. I wanted to kind of take a step back at this point in the calendar and focus on some teams that we don't normally focus on at this point in the NFL season. And that's teams that are resetting in the midst of retooling. I find that process in year one of whether it's a new coaching staff or a new front office regime, what that process is like, I've always been interested in it. And you have some decent insight on that because you've done it several times.

I want to say four times in your career, you've been the member of a front office in their first season with a new coaching staff. I think it was in Baltimore in 96, the Jets in 97, the Patriots in 2000 and the Chiefs in 2009. Is that right? Pretty good. You've done your research here on. I've done this a couple times. Yeah. So I've been really fortunate to be a part of of, again, you call it resets, but new organizations as we've come in. And we've come in at different levels in different places and different, when I say, different levels of talent, different levels of where the program was at. Obviously, there were change in all of those organizations, but depending upon the team,

depending upon the change, there's different levels of talent that has been accumulated that you, you know, marry into or that you don't marry into. So that process, and I just want to kind of go back in time. So let's go back to, let's say, New England in 2000 or the Chiefs in 2009. You said they're different, but I'm sure there's some similarities. In those situations, you're sitting there at 1 and 7, 2 and 7 at this point in a year, about halfway through the season. So when you're a member of a front office at that point, you're doing a lot of evaluating, I'm sure.

So as you're doing those evaluations, what are you prioritizing at this point in the calendar? In the middle of November, what does your day-to-day look like in those sort of situations? Well, I think it's, there's a lot of things because you're still in the process of you have implemented your new philosophy, your player acquisition philosophy, and your culture, so to speak. And you're trying to maintain, you're trying to win games while also building your team as you go on. And this is the time of year where you're still using the waiver wire because generally speaking, Not all the time. You go to a team where one part of the roster, either the top end of your roster or the bottom end of your roster, isn't very good. So what you're trying to do is make sure that you are using all of your time to acquire players in season and also plan for the off season. You've spent some of your time. You've gone through your draft in that first year. You've gone through free agency in that first year.

You've gone through what I always call the second free agency, which is when players get released at the end of training camp and trying to claim players on waivers. Do you feel like that's more important when you're early on? Do you think that that waiver period is, are you paying more attention to it or prioritizing it in a different way in an early stage? I would say that you're not, you're always paying attention to it. And I don't think that you're, and to me, I think that's part of our success at different stations was because we always made that a priority.

We always felt that was important. Having a pro personnel background and more pro personnel background than I did college scouting. I had some college scouting background. That was always a priority to me because there was always this feeling that where you are in the early stages of your build or your rebuild, there's always going to be someone that's put out on the street that is probably better than something that you have right now. And, you know, people spend so much time focusing on, you know, And it's part of also, I think it's become even more so focused on the top part of your roster and your starters and your top, what I call the top 25, which is your, you know, 11 starters on offense, 11 starts as defense, your special team starters. I think so much attention is paid to that that there's so many opportunities that are lost that roster spots from 35 to 53 are critical because that's your special teams.

That's your depth. That's when your starting guard goes down. If you were trying to find a way to upgrade your third or fourth inside offensive lineman, meaning there's always ways to upgrade your roster. And you talk about rosters. You'll never have the perfect roster, but there's always that pursuit to create and have and build a perfect roster. Is there somebody from that 35 to 53 range in one of the spots,

that you were in that sticks with you, somebody that you found as part of that process. Like, oh, this was important. I can think of a lot of guys. I mean, I go back to the Jets time. When we found Dwayne Gordon, who was a backup special teams player for the San Diego Chargers,

back when they wore the San Diego Chargers. And he was this backup linebacker who played mostly special teams. It came out of the University of New Hampshire. He was a player that we brought in. And as a backup, he continued to be a backup. And then we had injuries to Marvin Jones. I believe it was, and maybe even Brian Cox, but he had to become a starter or play more time.

One of the other ones I think about in our Patriot time is a guy that we acquired, you know, once the season had started, Joanne Drewsey, who became a backup guard. And then before you know it, he's starting for us and helping us win world championships, three of them. And, you know, here was a player, again, that was acquired during a different time of the season. So I think paying attention to those things, you know, I remember there was a scout that used to say, and I don't like this saying because of the way it sounds, but there's, again, we're dealing with people and human beings, but he would say one man's trash is another man's treasure. And there's a better way to say that about people, but there are players that are discarded by other teams or that are moved to the practice squad. Sometimes, you know, a team will have a rash of injuries and paying attention to other teams and whether a team could have a rash of injuries in their secondary.

So they, you know, instead of, again, back, instead of putting people on injured reserve, they would try to keep as many people on the 53 man roster and add players so they would have to cut a player. Well, we can sacrifice our third tight end this week. So let's cut them. but then you could pounce on that tight end because that third tight end with team X might be better than your second tight. So there you've upgraded your football team. And that's that was, that's one of the things I loved about personally that you were always trying to find players that were better than what you had. But the key was to find the players that were better than what you had, but also had the right makeup, the attitude and the team first mentality that we were always looking for. for how did you go about those evaluations i'm sure there's a process but how did you have a sense

that that third tight end on team x was better than the second tight end that you had well it's a couple things you have this reservoir of information and experience from when the player comes out in the draft you have all that information you save that information you keep it not only in your database but you keep it in your memory bank and you remember things about players and then that's what preseason is about you know preseason isn't just about a value your team. It's about evaluating players from other teams. You know, I go back to our time, you know, I spent, I don't know, my years in Cleveland and then my year in Baltimore and my three years being, you know, being a pro director for about four or five years. And your job as a

pro director is to know the rosters and the players of every single team. During the preseason, you're looking at all of those players, not just their starters, but again, special teams and paying attention to special teams. So you're watching them in the preseason. You're seeing what their role is. You see how they fit based on what you think your system is. And, you know, I go back to that 2001 season when there had never been a team that was built through free agency. And people always said that it was a bad thing. And I agree with that 100%, especially when you're signing high-end free agents and overspending for free agents. But what we did that off-season, because based on our understanding of the rest of the league and pro personnel,

the offseason after our first season in New England, we signed 23 free agent players. But that included Antoine Smith, who was allegedly washed up. That included Mike Compton, who was allegedly washed up. You know, Roman Fyfer, Anthony Pleasant, Larry Izzo, Mike Vrable, Matt Stevens, all these guys who came. to us, and again, it was 23 players that Mark Edwards, who was our starting fullback, who came in, but they were, I would say that more than David Patton, most of them were

players that were not starters full-time. They were part-time players, but we knew how, because we studied pro personnel, because I had this background in pro personnel and this understanding of who our head coach was and the demands that our head coached, we knew who they were based on the time that they had come out from the draft, who they were, but also knew, again, they were a schematic fit, but more importantly, or just as importantly, they were going to fit with Bill Belichick. All of those guys that I just mentioned, you know, Bill had three rules, be on time, pay attention, work hard. All of those guys were those kind of guys. So it was the right fit and paying attention to how Mike Brable played in his part-time role with the Pittsburgh Steelers,

but then seeing him on all the special teams, you could see how he could fit and how he could compliment Willie McGinnis and Roman Fyfer and Teddy Bruske within our linebacker group. I'm curious. This may seem like a strange question, but Bill has always seemed like someone who appreciates the idiosyncrasies of players around the league. Like he genuinely is interested in what makes players who they are. Do you think that gives somebody an advantage in the way they see pro personnel, just someone who genuinely enjoys what makes players unique? You know, I think I'm not sure, because again, you still, I think I understand what you're asking, but you also still have to have players that are willing and wanting to be a part of it.

Because, you know, again, you look at the Patriots right now and over the last decade. everyone wants to be a part of the Patriots, right, to get some of that gold dust on them. But our first 10 years there, no one really wanted to be a part of us because we hadn't, we hadn't done anything yet. Sure. We hadn't established, and Bill wasn't a genius yet. He was on his way there. So it's not just a matter of Bill seeing those things because there were, again, a number of players

that Bill got to know when they got there. He didn't necessarily know them before. got there, he had some knowledge of them, but he didn't know them. Again, he had come from being the defensive coordinator at the New York Jet, so he knew the personnel to a degree, but maybe not the personalities of the players. But that was an important part of us understanding, you know, our culture, our way wasn't for everyone. You know what I mean? And rather than be critical of the people that weren't going to be a fit, we weren't right for everyone

and everyone wasn't right for us. Once we were okay with understanding that, that there were certain players in makeup that weren't going to thrive in our culture, we became better at player acquisition. I'm curious in-house evaluation when you're looking at the players that were on the roster maybe before you got there

that you didn't bring in. At what point during that first season, are you confident in whether somebody is going to be a building block for the future. Well, in the case of the Patriots, Robert, if that's what you're referring to in the Patriots, you know, it was, remember, that staff that we went to the Patriots with in 2000, Bill had spent one season with that team in, that's right. Yeah, 96 as a defense coordinator, but Charlie Weiss had been there.

Romeo Cornell had been there. Al, you know, well, Al wasn't with it. But, you know, there were a bunch of people that knew, we kept Dante Scarnikyu, who was our offensive line coach. We kept Brad Sealy, who was our special teams coach. I had this vision and view of the players, too, because I had spent the previous three seasons at the New York Jets, and they were within the division. As the director of pro personnel, I had to know our division inside and out. So I knew, again, at the time, as the Jets pro personnel director, had a really good feel and understanding of the evaluations of the players that we were marrying into, but also of the

Buffalo Bills, the Indianapolis Colts, who were still part of the AFC East at the time. And of course, we knew the Jets. So having worked within the division, as a pro director, as a pro scout, you generally should have a, if you do your job the right way, you should have a really clear understanding of the teams in your division. How about in Kansas City? I mean, obviously, I don't think there was as much institutional knowledge there. So when you're thinking about, all right, how am I going to decide whether this person that I may have not been as familiar with is going to be a part of this moving forward. How does that process look like and how does it typically unfold?

Yeah, and it was different. It was similar to when we went to the Jets. But in Kansas City, there were players that, again, you know on tape, you know a little bit about from when they had come out as college players. But once you get there, that's one of the most important things that you need to do. Because I have always been a firm believer that one of the most important. parts of free agency is resigning and extending your own players. You never get credit for it publicly, right? No one ever talks about, oh, wow, they re-signed Tom Bahaliy. That's a great free agent acquisition.

They don't say that, but in truth it is. So when we got to Kansas City, we knew, I really knew that Carl Peterson had done a nice job of drafting a couple of a number of really good players. And there were a number of players that were still under their rookie contracts that we had to evaluate pretty quickly and they hadn't been all pro players yet or they hadn't been so you get there and you again have to understand the culture that you've got you have to understand the schemes that you're running so when we got there there was a pretty you know there was a priority in resigning and extending Jamal Charles before he became a free agent in extending Tomah Ali before he became a free agent I'm trying to think they were, you know, Brandon Flowers, Branding Carr, you know, these were all players, branding car, we didn't get done because we got to that point where we had two corners that were going to be hitting the free agent market and we really couldn't afford all them, but getting Derek Johnson under contract.

All of those players I just mentioned, we felt and saw that they were good players, even though they predated us and I didn't draft them or we didn't draft them. We felt that they were good players. an important part of free agency was getting them secured. And we were fortunate. None of those players became pro bowlers until after we extended them. So we made some right decisions. Then we had to make a decision on Dwayne Bo. And I chose not to make a decision on Dwayne Boe.

And he became a free agent and went to Cleveland, I believe it was after that. So that whole process becomes really important. But part of that process is understanding your leadership group. and who's going to fit not only from a talent standpoint, but from a cultural standpoint. Can you remember somebody that snuck up on you in that process, somebody that maybe you had an opinion of before you got, whether it's to Kansas City or somewhere else,

and just being around them and having some proximity to it. It's like, oh, man, maybe I was wrong about this person. Maybe this person is a part of what we want to do here. Wow. You know, I think one of the players, I'm trying to do this on my feet now. I think one of the players that I didn't know well enough was when we got to the Jets.

Aaron Glenn was a really good player. But again, from my understanding, he wasn't really from a size standpoint, the prototypical corner that we wanted. So in your mind, it's not prototypical. Is he really that good? but when we got there and I got to see him not only as a player, but the professional and the pro that he was,

Aaron Glenn, I can't say that he snuck up on me from a talent standpoint, because I knew he was talented. I just didn't think he could fit or I wasn't sure if he could fit what we were trying to do, but once we got there, he hit me right between the eyes in terms of, you know, Dick Haley had drafted him and he was a fan. fantastic player. And no matter what scheme we were playing, he was a good pro. He was a terrific pro football player. That's one just off the top. I know there's more that I'm missing, but I'm trying to do this on my feet. You know, I think Teddy Bruske was a player that I knew was a

versatile player. And I didn't know until we got there how really, really good Teddy Bruske was. And I think Teddy's one of those players. Everyone loved him. He was a fan favorite because of his personality. I think because he had such a dynamic, wonderful, warm, thoughtful, kind personality, people never gave him enough credit for how good of a football player he was. And I'm curious, when you have the vision that you go into a season with, right, when you're in that first year, I'm sure you, like you said, you establish a culture

and you establish a feel of what you want it to be. How often does that change over the first year? the course of that first season. And in what ways can it change? Because I'm sure you have to be flexible and nimble in your willingness to adjust that plan as you get used to the players that you have, what your strengths actually are, all of that stuff. Yeah, I think that you have to be willing to be nimble, as you say.

But I think you have to go into something with core values. And if the core values start shifting too much, then you're headed for failure. And I've been a part of failure before in Kansas City, obviously. And I think part of that is that you go and you establish a culture knowing that you don't have all the answers or you have to go into it knowing that you don't have all the answers. And that there are things that you're going to have to adjust. As you're in a program and a system, this game is always evolving. The players coming into the game, the way that they're taught, the way that they learn, the personalities are different. So you have to pay attention to how you're teaching, how you're learning, all of the employees,

teaching the scouts, teaching the coaches, everyone working together. Those things change. But you have to have, again, core values and certain tenants that are not going to change. Maybe they need to be adjusted a little bit or tweaked. And so I think that you need to be able to pay attention to those things and acknowledge and admit that you know, maybe when you came in, you don't have, or you come in, you don't have all the answers. And there are certain things, there's other dynamics that are completely out of your control, whether it's other departments that touch football, that aren't set up the way that you want.

And even though you're trying to do certain things, you may not be able to get them done. And or it takes time to get them done and you can't waste too much time. but then you also can't walk in and make changes wholesale too much because then you're just trying to train everyone at the same time. I don't know if that makes any sense. It does. I mean, I think that that's especially for somebody like you who you were in one place for so long. And I'm sure you had gotten used to one way of doing things. And there was so much success and the way that it was all streamlined going into a place where, again, it's almost like I've made this comparison in the past. It's like moving into a house that's half finished and you didn't

make any of the choices. And having to do that stuff on the fly, I'm sure is really a tough process. And Robert, our culture, you know, was uncomfortable, right? It was uncomfortable. And when you bring it and you don't have enough people around you that understand how uncomfortable it's going to be, you can lose people along the way and people that are pivotal. And so it does, become difficult at times. And that's where I think, you know, one of the lessons I learned, I needed to be a little bit more patient than I was in a place like Kansas City and understanding that it might take a little bit longer for certain people to adjust or to buy into the program. The last thing I'll ask you, kind of in that vein, if you could give advice to the people in

Jacksonville or with the Jets or in Detroit and you could go back to your time doing this. And kind of, all right, this is what I've learned. I wish I had known this when I was in your position. What would you tell those people? Wow. You know, that's a difficult question only because I think every single one of us that goes into a leadership at a different place, goes with a different personality, goes with a different set of ideas.

So what I know that I did wrong in Kansas City might be something completely different for somebody else because, You know, they're bringing their own strengths, but they're also bringing their own limitations and their own idiosyncrasies, right? Because we all leaders, everyone has idiosyncrasies and we don't always acknowledge them for ourselves because we don't, you know, as we ascend, this funny thing happens is people view us very differently. And the people who used to tell us that we were screwballs or we were screwing something up, there's this that they stop telling us. and you don't know that you're doing something wrong until, you know, until it's usually a hot mess. So what I would say is to me is make sure that you, the one piece would be surround yourself with people that are going to be truth tellers, not sycophants and not people that are afraid of you. Even if you have an intense personality, you have to have enough people around you that can, you know, and I'll say this, I know I have an intense personality.

in the workplace. I'm so passionate about it. I'm so detailed. I'm borderline OCD that when when there's mistakes or something's happening, it comes out in passion. Sometimes people will receive passion as being something they should fear. And as leaders, people look at us differently and we need to surround ourselves with people that are going to tell the emperor when he has no clothes on. it's so funny because I think that the organizations that I've gotten an understanding of and learned about that growth mindset and constant feedback, both good and bad, I think is a hallmark of those places. It really is about surrounding yourself with people that you can trust, but also people that are going to challenge you. That was part of what, you know, one of the big differences when we went to New England, because I was with Bill in Cleveland and in New England. And when we got to Cleveland, I mean to New England, Bill was adamant about tell me when you think things are off.

Yeah. Tell me things I don't want to hear. When we're doing personnel, you know, tell me what you really think. And he did a great job of empowering a group of us that were a part of the leadership group in New England that he didn't have. in Cleveland that were willing to be truth tellers. And that was, you know, Charlie Weiss. It was Bears Nigerian, who's one of the most unknown key figures in that New England dynasty that has always been a truth teller to Bill. It was Ernie Adams. It was Pepper Johnson, myself. There were a group of people there that Bill was willing to listen to, and we were all willing to tell Bill what we

truly felt without any fear of retribution. That makes perfect sense. I think that's the hallmark of any successful and forward-thinking workplace. So, Scott, thank you very much. It's really great to get your insight on this. I sincerely appreciate you taking the time, and hopefully we can chat again soon. Thank you, Robert. Pleasure of being here.

Thanks so much, really. All right. It's time now for a weekly segment. My good buddy, Mitchell Schwartz, Mitch, how you doing, man? I'm doing well. How are you doing? I'm doing great. I appreciate you doing this.

always. A lot of stuff for us to dig into today. Some stuff that's been in the news for a while. It happened after we talked last week, but I still wanted to get your take on it just because I think that the understanding of it and the viewpoint on it within a building, within a locker room is probably different than the ways that I've thought about it, the way that other people have talked about it. I want to talk to you about the Aaron Rogers situation and everything that unfolded last week. And I wanted to talk about it through the frame. of when you're in a locker room with someone and there's something going on on the outside or there's something that's not related to football that can affect the way that you see that person

or can affect the dynamics within the locker room, that's an experience I've obviously never gone through before. So the lens that you see this stuff through, when you first heard the Rogers News, when you listened to the Pat McAfee interview, anything that happened last week, how did you initially digest it? There was nothing that happened last week where I was like, this is what I'd want in my quarterback or this is what I want from him. You know, the bad enough part of him, you know, I would say lying about it. You know, I think it was a very deliberate choice to use that terminology

and then be able to kind of skirt around the fact that, you know, he can say he never said he was vaccinated and, you know, he never answered that question untruthfully. You know, it brings in the question like, there's a lot of things, I don't know, to me it's like, is he not as smart as we thought he was? Because, you know, he has access to all these medical professionals and he's going to Joe Rogan for that. Like, you know, he says that, you know, he talked to people with the league and then on today's McAfee show, McAfee asked him about that and he says, oh, well, I talked to some of my friends who dealt with COVID. And it's like, okay, so you didn't talk to any medical professionals or personnel. Like, you're one of the most powerful people in football,

which is the most powerful thing, like in America and in the world. And you use none of those resources to talk to any actual professionals. Like, that's wild to me. That makes me question, you know, just how smart you are. If you're a critical think. I would imagine you'd want to speak with the professionals and the best people in their field. You know, I always think that the athletes that are against the vaccine, I'm fine with that. You know, I think it's a little bit more prevalent in like the sports, powerlifting, like, training world where guys are so particular on, you know, what they put in their body, the supplements they take, all that stuff.

They don't want anything to throw off, you know, what their body does. I get that. On the flip side, like, we trust the medical professionals for so many other things. that go into our day-to-day lives. Like, I've never seen a guy ask a doctor like, hey, what's in this particular pill and what's in this drug? And why do you guys like it? And have you guys done longitudinal studies?

And what are the effects? Like, all right, the doctor says I need dichlofenac once a day, I take it. Or the doctor says I need this. And now maybe some guys are like, all right, I don't want strong stuff. Give me something weaker or whatever. But it's not like you're petitioning the league to like get different, you know, pain meds or whatever else after surgery. Like, you know, he had surgery on his collarbone that he, you know, ask the anesthesiologist all these questions and really press him and ask why he needed

to be put under for that. Like there's all these weird things that go along with that specific decision. Like, I'm vaccinated. I believe people should be because that's what the scientific community believes. But, you know, I get why people don't want to be vaccinated. Like I understand it. I don't think it's the right thing. And so getting back to the question, like, it does make you think a little bit differently about the guy. At the end of the day, winning tends to cure all. And when you're one of the best two or three quarterbacks in the world, kind of gets swept under the rug just as the whole offseason of drama and making it about himself and all that. You know, it was swept under the rug after they started out five and one, six and one, and there were tops in the NFC. So winning kind of cures all that for my particular thing. Like if I was

in that locker room, I would for sure talk to him about it. Like I'd want to know why. So you would. You would just go up to him and just be like, what is what's going on here? Well, so apparently he's been following all the protocols inside the building. So the guys know he's not vaccinated because theoretically, I mean, I don't believe anything he says about this anymore, but theoretically, he's doing the right things in the building, which means you have to wear a mask where you have to take a different plane or you have to do these other protocols. You have to test every day. So there's no way the other guys didn't know his vaccination status. Like the way the NFL set it up is that people know that you're not vaccinated and potentially you get shamed or you have to do these other things that make you, you know, get the vaccine. So I would imagine guys knew about that. I would, you know, just talk to him about it and ask him, like whatever guy. have different beliefs. You know, that's kind of the cool thing with football is we come from all different backgrounds. You know, there's different races, there's different religions, but there's also a lot of different ideology. And, you know, people are definitely trending more diverse in terms of looks these days, but I think trending more towards what they prefer and what they like

in terms of ideology and there's less kind of mixed, you know, thought processes or ideas. And so being in an locker room, you're, you know, open to all that stuff. So you can have those conversations you know, again, he is a critical thinker. I would imagine he's someone that likes to have these conversations and go down rabbit holes and talk about random things. So I probably would have had a conversation or two with him, especially kind of quarterback offense, Lyman Bond, you know, that they can sit down and talk to you about stuff.

And I would have just kind of gone down the rabbit hole and asked, you know, why he didn't do it and all these things and talked about it. And, you know, I wouldn't have necessarily tried to force him to get it or anything. But I would definitely be curious about kind of giving all the counterpoints and seeing what the answers would be. That's kind of the mature way to do it. Some guys maybe they don't know and they found out in the news and they're kind of put off by it. The flip side is, you know, there's a lot of stuff in the last year that's been in the news regarding him that's a little bit off-putting.

So I wonder if it's, you know, guys saw that and maybe it's just another little eye roll. And no, that's Aaron. Yeah, not too surprising. And yeah, he made it about him. And, you know, he kind of thought he was above it all. So I can see both sides of it. I think at the end of the day, once he gets back in the building, it'll kind of be fine. they'll go back to winning games.

I don't think there's like long-term ramifications from it. I don't think guys like lost trust in him or necessarily treat him differently as a person. You kind of have those lingering doubts in the back of your head now when he says some other stuff maybe, but I don't think it's permanent and I don't think it's something that really caused long-term strife. Have you ever come across a situation or an example of where a difference in ideology has actually come between players in a meaningful way? Or do you feel like that's kind of an open forum? There is a lot of acceptance and understanding. And at a certain point, you all get back to the common ground of football and that's what matters.

I think at times it can. I don't have any specific examples. But typically coaches tell you like don't talk politics, don't talk, you know, like women, don't talk money. And don't talk religion. Those are kind of like the four things that typically are the strongest, you know, things that can kind of bring. guys apart and I didn't really listen to that. I mean, you talked to teammates about everything. Do people follow that rule? No, but I mean, like, you know, the past five years it's been very different in the locker

room in terms of politics. You know, the first four years, no one's really talking about who the president is, what's going on. That stuff didn't really matter. And then all of a sudden, the last five years, there's people who are very strong for or against and there's been a lot of social justice things and a lot of, you know, things that are important to the country that have come about. And so you do have to have those conversations. You have to kind of understand both vantage points. And where does that happen? Like, what's the forum for those conversations within a building?

So in certain situations when big events would happen, I mean, you'd have team meetings or they would bring people in and there would be resources to talk through. And then you could also have players-only meetings and just, I mean, we had to talk about the anthem. We had to talk about how we were handing it as a team, you know, so that's a situation where, you know, a player's committee can meet. you can make a decision that way and they can say, hey, this is what we're thinking. We'd love to have 100% buy-in.

If not, we understand. You can do your own thing. We'll be with you. Some teams, I'm sure, talked about it in full. Some teams, you know, the quarterback chose. Some teams the owner chose what to do. So it varies team to team. But at some point, I'd imagine every team had that discussion on the anthem.

And, you know, I think guys kind of know where other people lean politically and what their viewpoints are. Some teammates definitely make it their mission to, you know, impress their vantage point on others. You know, there's someone who wore a Trump hat the day after he won and 16 or whatever it was. And it's like, that's a bold move. You know, again, you can vote for whoever you want, but, you know, you have to understand

kind of the repercussions of doing something like that and how you're seen, you know, by teammates. And again, those are topics that can tend to lead to more strife and more, you know, difficult conversation. So, you know, I know that stuff. Is there, are there people, I mean, even under their breath or behind closed doors, they're just like, fuck that guy? Oh, for sure. There's part of that.

That seems to present a problem. Yeah. And so that does present a problem. I mean, typically, it's probably not the guy you're friends with anyway. I mean, let's be real. Sure. So it's a different position. That stuff doesn't sneak up on you that much.

Yeah. I mean, it's not surprising. It's most of the guys that you would expect to kind of act that way and to be outlandish about it. But I'd say money is probably more divisive. anything, especially if guys, you know, like to gamble or like to bet on stuff. And, you know, I've heard stories where car keys get exchanged and, you know, stuff like that happens. So it's like, all right, I mean, you're shelling out a $75,000 car to a teammate. Like, that's pretty big. You know, it's not necessarily his fault that he beat you, but imagine not feeling, you know, been out of

shape about losing a pot like that. So, you know, I think those types of things happen. I think for the most part, you kind of get over it. It's, again, like, if you're winning, you're winning. You these things tend to get swept under the rug. If you're losing, they tend to get magnified. You know, you've never really seen a losing team that's got great chemistry and everything's so happy and it's flowing. And I mean, listen, I hear about how good the collaboration is and how much everyone loves each other in the Bears building every single week after a loss. So you speak for yourself over there. Yeah, but you don't buy it.

Like, that's not, that's what they tell you, but that's not like what's actually happening. Honestly, the Lions probably after four games were the closest thing we had to it. and then two games later the head coach is saying that the quarterback needs to play better. So it goes pretty quickly, you know. So if you're winning, you know, chemistry is great. Everyone's getting along. You know, you can have disagreements. People are having fun with it.

You start losing. People are pressing. Guys are dissatisfied. You know, the little things magnify. But in terms of, you know, how you view a player, you know, I think for normal people, it would be similar to, you know, you meet a couple buddies or you meet some people in your life and you start to become friends with them. You know, it's kind of weird for like middle-aged people to meet people and start

being friends with them. But some people get introduced in your life. You meet them. You're like, oh, these people are cool. You hang out for half a year or whatever. And then you go on a vacation with them and you have to stay with them in a house for four days. And all of a sudden you see all these little things and it starts bugging you about them.

And, you know, maybe you start thinking differently about the guy or the wife. And that makes, you know, all of a sudden you don't like the wife. And then you're like, dude, why are you with her or why she with you? or this makes me think differently about you and then, you know, small things start to change. With football, I mean, you're forced together for six months at a time, but it's not like more than that and you have a common goal anyway. So it's different than that situation, but that's, you know, an example of how kind of these little things that get brought up in life could all of a sudden get magnified with a Roger

situation where all of a sudden he kind of goes off the rails for a week. He's lying about a bunch of things. You realize he's being deceptive and deceitful. And, you know, maybe if you're a guy who won. disagrees with him and then two doesn't like the way he's going about it you know you kind of think differently of him and then you know he comes back and throws a game when he touchdown and you know you run over to him and give him a high five so at the end of the day it'll be fine because he's so good that's kind of the thing in football um you know if you're good you get away with a lot and you know

the second you stop being good or if you're not good to begin with and you you know try to do other stuff uh typically it doesn't work too well and then kind of the last thing is i'm sure there are some people who like what Rogers did and kind of the counterculture like to go against the grain. Like, yeah, he didn't like that rule. So he didn't follow it and good for him. And it's his right to do that and all these things. So I think weirdly there's probably like a subsect that I wouldn't say proud, but it's like happy he has been doing that and, you know, trying to get one over on the league. It's most players side with players, let's be real. So, you know, whatever happens, it's kind of like, all right, well, you guys can do whatever to him. but, you know, he's in charge of his body.

He's in charge of his decisions. And we kind of appreciate that, you know, he was trying to stick one to the team. Was there a team or a year that you particularly remember where you guys would just go down those rabbit holes in ways that interested you? Not necessarily in a bad way, but just a group that you feel like, oh, we always kind of got on these tangents. And it is part of the fun of being in a locker. Well, I mean, my Cleveland group with Joe Thomas, Alex, Mac, John Grecker. That's kind of what I was thinking. Pretty much every day.

I mean, that was our existence. and what's like the weirdest topic i mean we'll keep it within reason here what's like the strangest topic you guys have like an extended conversation about that you can remember so we the one year we were big on learning new words and expanding our vocabulary so we started a word of the day thing and we our offensive line coach liked to give us extra practice before practice so we always had to be out there like 20 minutes early and you know it's just the all line and you know we'd warm up as a unit And so we started this word of the day thing and everyone had to bring a word, you know, each new day. And we'd be warming up and you'd give your word, the spelling, the part of speech, where it's from, the definition, use it in a sentence.

And we would write it on the whiteboard in the meeting room and, you know, that would be our word of the day. And that got, I mean, a little bit crazy, the fact that we were basically doing that every single day. And that was how we would start. You guys are freaking nerds. Yeah, exactly. That's how we would start NFL practices is learning a new word. you know, grilling a guy on how he came by it. And then Joe was like, oh, well, I read, I read these four words in his book.

So I read them down. Like, he would get excited about finding words that he didn't know. And that was a cool one. But in terms of, like, individuals, in Cleveland, we had Josh McCown. So I'm Jewish. You know, he's not. And he's a religious person. And we would sit on the plane next to each other.

And, you know, I would ask him a lot of questions about religion. We talk about different stuff and, you know, learning different vantage points and understanding, you know, his beliefs. and, you know, he was someone who studies a lot in terms of the Bible and religion. And, you know, he was very knowledgeable. So I could ask a lot of questions and, you know, even some difficult questions or, you know, press them on certain topics or I don't understand this or tell me more about that. And, you know, we'd be sitting there for two hours and the flight would all of a sudden be over.

And, you know, we talked about all these, you know, kind of deeper issues. And but that's someone that like, again, I considered him like not an expert in the field per se, but like he's knowledgeable. He's done the studying. He understands it. you know, I went to him for those questions and to get some answers. And so that was a guy that, you know, I definitely appreciated sitting on the plane with. And then, you know, there have been some other guys who were, you know, kind of fun to have around. All right. The next thing, I guess

it's sort of related. But it was the other big news item of last week. And that news has become relevant again as you hit free agency today and is going to be on the market for anyone to sign. And that's O'Dell Beckham. And I wanted to talk about that kind of through the lens of discussing distractions at large within an NFL locker room. Obviously, we know what happened. His dad posted a video that someone else made of all of the moments where Odell was open and Baker was missing him and kind of saying, I'm finally going to talk about this. And then that was the news in Cleveland for the next few days.

He was excused from practice. He was eventually released. We discussed this stuff under the umbrella of general distractions. You move on from someone like that because it's a distraction. How real is that? If you were in that building and that had happened, do you think that would have an adverse effect if he stayed around and that was just kind of allowed to fester? I think so. And I think the distraction thing can be real.

You know, typically, I think when guys say, oh, it's a distraction, it's when you get asked about it by the media. And so, you know, the media has open availability. Yeah. So, like, I mean, back in the day, the media was actually able to be there and, you know, get to know people. and it's a little bit different landscape these days. But, you know, for the most part, it was open locker room on Wednesday, on Thursday, on Friday, open locker room after the game on Sunday. You know, there would be other little scheduled times if they needed to grab you throughout the week.

And if your interview, you know, someone, say it's Denver week, or this is a good week, so the Chiefs are playing in Vegas, right? And, you know, as an offensive tackle, I'm going against Max Crosby, who's having an awesome year. and it's Wednesday I'm about to put on pads and go out there and practice and the reporter walks up to me and says, hey, you know, your wide receiver posted this thing on the internet. What do you think about it? You know, that's what we consider a distraction. It's when you bring stuff to us that isn't about what our job should be.

It's not about facing Max Crosby, although I'd get asked the same question every single time. Tell me why he's so good. But it's like you don't want to talk about your teammate's dad posting something online. aka your teammate posting something online. Like you don't want to talk about these other issues. You don't want to put that stuff in your headspace. Again, I just went through three hours of meetings and a walkthrough. I got to process all that information.

I'm about to go take the field. I've got to have a good practice. You know, in this particular week, the chiefs are five and four. You're kind of pressing a little bit and you need to find their identity on offense. It's like, I don't want to talk about my teammate who's dissatisfied because he's not getting the ball enough or because he wants to be in a different situation. So that stuff is real. That's what we would consider a distraction. Now there are much worse actual distractions.

I mean, geez, talking about the Raiders, like having to deal with a teammate who gets a DUI and kills someone. Like, that's a life distraction. You know, that's,

you know, someone they formed a bond with or they didn't over the past year and a half. Now of a sudden that guy's off the team. He's in jail. He killed somebody. You have to reconcile how you feel about that. You know, his life's going to be altered differently.

Obviously, someone's life has taken. That's a different distraction. That's not what we know. normally talk about in terms of distractions. That's something that actually occupies, you know, kind of your headspace away from football as well. But the typical distraction we like to, you know, talk about is when you just get asked by the media about stuff over and over, and it doesn't have to pertain to what you do, you know, what your normal week is like. And, you know,

I kind of blame the media on it too because it's like, all right, don't cover it so much. Like, don't cover O'Dell and all of a sudden people won't be talking about O'Dell. Or like, you know, we talk about Tebow can't be on a team because he's a, distraction. He's a distraction because all you do is ask the players and coaches about Tebow every every single day. You stop doing that and you stop writing every single article about Tebow. He's no longer a distraction because he's not talked about. So it's stuff like that that is a bit driven by the media and then they don't like when we say it's a distraction even though kind of they're the ones causing it. And again, I don't like doing the media perpetuates the cycle thing. But like in

this case, that usually is the answer. If you don't want to see a story go away, don't write the story. Don't cover the story. Like that's the easiest way to do it. So, yeah, distractions are real. You know, guys will not go in the locker room those couple days. Like, if you can avoid it, hey, I'm taking a long lunch or I'm getting taped or whatever. Like, yeah, I'm supposed to be in the locker room, but all of a sudden you don't want to show up. And because you don't want to talk about what is dad posted online. Like, it's a real thing.

And now that 40 minutes that I normally can chill in my locker, be on my computer, eat my food. Now I can't do that. My routine's a little bit different. You know, whether that has a noticeable impact on how I practice, how I play that week, who knows, but it's like, I've altered my routine to avoid the media because I don't want to have to give an answer on my teammates' dad posting a thing about my teammate being dissatisfied. So it is real.

It does happen. It kind of sucks in those situations. I think it would have festered in Cleveland, although the weird thing is everyone says in the building Odell's been awesome, so I don't really understand how those two things can get reconciled that, you know, he's great every day and super happy and a great teammate. But inside, he's like seething and, you know, burning and hates his course. quarterback and doesn't like being part of the team. That's a bit of a weird thing. But yeah, I mean, we see teams kind of clear guys who they've determined don't really fit the culture, aren't fitting in,

don't want to be there. I mean, earlier, I guess last week, Tomlin said, you know, we don't want hostages. You know, you don't want guys who are dissatisfied that can have a negative impact. You know, there have been some chiefs that, you know, haven't had the right attitude and, you know, have kind of put that attitude into younger guys or other people and that can kind of spread and that's not a good situation. You know, we moved on from a few of those guys and, you know, all of a sudden the team got a lot better and you're saying, okay, well, they're productive players and why aren't they around?

It's like sometimes there's more to it and, you know, a guy who is satisfied. Do you think there can be addition by subtraction when you move on from somebody like that that you feel like is just a malcontent of some kind? I'm not saying that Odell was, but I'm sure that there are plenty of examples where that happens. Even if the guy is talented, you can say, all right, maybe our average talent level decreases with this person out of the building. But there is, we're better off. Like, is that real or is that just bullshit that we make up?

No, it's real. It depends on what the situation is. Again, is it the media kind of creating that storyline and saying he's a distraction? In this particular case, if you believe some of the reports and you say he's been good in the building, you know, theoretically that's not a guy you cut because he's, you know, a cancer. risk in the locker room. In this particular case, again, like all the data shows that they're better off on the field without him anyway. So it's not like you're cutting a productive guy who's a benefit to your offense. You're getting rid of an unhappy player who's been a negative to your offense. So it seems like a win-win from the Brown's perspective. But in the sense of, all right, this guy seems like he's a good

player on the field, but he's doing so much damage behind the scenes. And, you know, he's got a crappy attitude. He's bringing that to practice every day. The young guys are taking notice. The young guys are following now all of a sudden they're not playing as hard they're not practicing as hard they're questioning the coaches every step of the way that's the guy you want to get rid of and that absolutely can be addition by subtraction all right the last thing i wanted to hit today was the white teller extension the news came out today the brown signed him to a four-year 56 and a half million dollar deal with 28 million dollars in guarantees good lord the brown's offensive line is getting expensive by the way i mean it's like the eagles man it's it's

Wild. I mean, and obviously, when you have guys like that, you want to retain them. It's the best offensive line in the league. I feel like in a lot of ways, you could probably make a couple arguments for other units, but they've been excellent. He's been arguably the best guard in the league over the last couple years. So on that level, it makes sense. But I wanted to talk about it from a player's perspective and from a peer perspective.

Because you were talking about this on Twitter, and you and I have had these discussions before about certain contracts and about the ways that players view themselves in relation to their contracts. His deal did not match the Joe Tunney extension that would make him the richest guard in the NFL. It was closer to the Brandon Brooks extension. So when you see these deals handed out, when you got your own, when you're talking about that, is that the terms that players see contracts in is how they relate to players

at their position? Essentially, yeah, because that's how, you value yourself. There's so little ability to say, like, I'm this good or teams value me this way or the league sees me as X type of player. It's really your contract. Obviously, these days, pro football focus is, you know, the other outlet that people, you know, put a value on you. Typically these days, contracts also kind of coincide with your pro football focus grade, especially as an offense alignment. But, yeah, I mean, there's so few abilities to say, like, I'm this good, especially as an offense alignment with no stats.

You know, your contract kind of proves your worth and your value. So, you know, for the most part, the guy who signs the next deal who's in that kind of that top three, top five category gets a bump over the next guy at his position. So Tuney signs a $16 million deal. You know, you kind of expect Teller to surpass that. It's a little bit surprising he didn't, which makes you wonder why. I mean, I'm someone who's much more tied into contracts in the market and, you know, understanding kind of the nuances there than most other people are. And so for me, it was like, well, why didn't he surpassed Tune? Tune, you know, does the team not think, you know, he's as good as Tune or do they think there's a

deficiency? You know, I know the PFF numbers and some people would say, well, he's maybe not quite as good of a pass blocker. You know, he's a dominant run blocker in a run-heavy scheme, so he fits what they do well. But theoretically, if he hits the open market, you know, he's a little bit more scheme-specific, and that's why he doesn't warrant that deal. But it's very few people who think that way. I'm definitely, you know, in the kind of smaller group of guys who care about that kind of stuff. But for the most part, the way we think about it is, all right, I'm a receiver. This guy makes 18 million. I want to make 19. Or, you know, in my case when I was a free agent, like Lane Johnson's contract was the aberration, but the market was, you know, six and a half to

seven million, Bulaga made seven. And like, I wanted to go into free agency. I thought I was worth, you know, closer to Lane than Bulaga. And it turns out I failed at both and ended up at a little bit short of, you know, Bulaga's total value. So we didn't do a good job there. But, but, you know, but it's like that disappointed me. Like it's a crap ton of money and I'll never have to work again. Like I understood those implications, but like, Hey, you're working right now, man. That is true.

But like you want to see yourself viewed the way you see yourself. So like I had a really good year. I thought I was the best right tackling football. You know, I had graded well on PFF, which again is important for the way people see you just in the world because it's the only like stat people have of, you know,

how good you're playing on the field theoretically. and I wanted people to take me seriously as an offensive tackle. You know, I was a guy who was slower coming out of school. I wasn't a left tackle. I was a right tackle only. And, you know, he was overdrafted. And, you know, he hasn't been that good his first few years. And so I wanted to get this big deal to, like, prove that I was that good.

And I think that's how guys see it as well. Like, this is what I'm owed. This is what's going to make people, you know, think of them the best. And again, it's different as a right tackle because it's kind of seen as a lesser position but like you know theoretically if i had signed for nine or ten million and people go oh wow like lu log is at seven lanes at 11 you know Mitch signed for nine or ten like damn he must be really good you know maybe I would have gotten one or two pro bowl nominations like maybe people would have seen me differently and thought like oh that's the guy with the big salary he must be pretty good

like that's how you're viewed like first rounders last way longer in the league than they should they get paid more than they should because oh he was the first rounder he must be good and guys who are at the top of their position in terms of money, you just assume that they're better players. So, like, that's why you want that as a player, because it gives you this kind of, like, status ahead of, honestly, where your play level is. Like, I mean, Odell, we were just talking about him. That's not maybe the greatest example. But, like, his, you know, superstardom and his contract kind of make us assume he's still the same

player he was six years ago when obviously that's not the case. No one claimed him. Like, he wasn't worth, you know, $7 million for the rest of this year. So, you know, you kind of are like your. draft status until you get a second contract and then you are what that second contract is and that's your identity in the league so that's why guys chase those big numbers and i don't know about this i can't say this any certainty but chub took a discount compared to the running back market to go back to cleveland there's a chance that teller looked at the situation bill calhans his offensive

line coach he's clearly thrived in that offense with that staff maybe he thought this is what's best for me even if I take a little bit less. Is that real? Is the allure of a certain situation? Can a place be so player-friendly that you think they could create an advantage for themselves when it comes to retaining or coaxing talent? Yeah, I mean, I didn't want to leave Cleveland. You know, I wanted to stay there.

I had three awesome friends. I met my, you know, now wife there. Like, I like going to work every day. I didn't realize that it wasn't really run too well and there were a lot better things out there. But, like, that's all I knew. so I had fun with my friends every day. Like you don't necessarily want to move to a new city.

You know, you tend to enjoy your environment. You want to stay there. So yeah, guys definitely, there's a comfortability with wanting to stay where you are and maybe, you know,

taking a deal that's slightly less. The other is just fear of injury. I mean, that's honestly what drives a lot of these deals is, yeah. You know, Teller has 10 more games to make it through to, you know,

get to free agency and it's just like, oh man, if I blow out my knee, all of a sudden this deal isn't there. And I think he was, what, he was traded. So like in that particular case, you could probably get, you know, a little bit more leverage on a guy who's never had that huge payday. So it's a little bit of all those things.

They're definitely guys who prioritize their situation, their coaches, their friends being in the right city. You know, we see that a decent amount of the time. You know, in Chubb's case, maybe he just said, all right, well, the market's not really paying running backs anymore. Like, I'm comfortable here. It's more money than I need. Like, I'm okay doing it. You know, I'm in a position that gets hurt a lot. I don't want to risk out into free agency. You know, in Teller's case, he's never been paid before. You know, you try saying no to a four-year $56.8 million contract because you're holding out for four years, you know, 60.5. You know, when it gets to that point, it's like, all right, is it worth risking 10 games of potentially getting hurt to not hit free agency?

You know, I love it here. I've got an awesome offensive line coach, a great situation. We're winning. You know, I know the Cleveland fans. They're all, you know, gung-ho about football. And, you know, if you're playing well, they absolutely love you. So, you know, he's in a great situation from that perspective. I'm sure he's really good friends with, you know, Joel and Treader and, you know,

Conklin and, you know, all those guys. So he's probably in a good room. Great coach, you know, great system for him, good city. You know, he's hit all these things on the checklist. Like, is it worth $4 million over four years to wait three months and have that injury risk? And obviously the answer was no. How much does city matter when people are thinking about free agency? Because it's funny that some of the places, like,

Buffalo to me, I think has done a really good job of being a place that people want to be. Look at how they've retained so many of their guys in-house that we're going to hit free agency. You go up there. It's not because of the city. That facility is pristine. They do a great job of making those guys comfortable. I think that they've really created a culture there. And that's something you consciously have to do when you're in Buffalo because the city is not the most attractive place to be for a 22-year-old kid.

with millions of dollars. So how much do you balance what it's like in the building and what it's like in the city when you're considering this stuff? It depends on what kind of guy you are. You know, I just need air conditioning on the internet and, you know, I'll be good wherever. So to me,

that's a little bit less important than, you know, some guys who want to go party, you know, four days a weekend, want to be in Miami or where L.A. or wherever else. I would say for the most part,

you know, free agency sounds great and it is great. I'm not saying that it's not, but like, oh, this guy's at the open market and he gets to choose where he wants to go and, you know, all these things. It's like, okay, well, you just left one team who didn't agree to pay you or didn't agree to your price. So now there's 31 teams left. It's like, how many teams need a right tackle? Okay, well, only 12 teams like truly need a right tackle. How many teams are willing to pay top of the market for free agent right tackle that they haven't been around for the last four years? Well, now you're looking at maybe five teams. And then

all of a sudden you start asking for a certain amount. And now three of those are like, Well, no, I mean, we'll give you, you know, the seven million. We're not going to eight or nine. Like, that's ridiculous. And so all of a sudden you're left with two options. And it's Buffalo and Green Bay. And it's like, you can say you want to go to Miami or New York or L.A. But if there's only two teams willing to be in the ballpark of where you're, you know, going to get paid, that's who you're going to go to.

So the idea that like the scheme matters, the city matters. What matters is the money. If the money is relatively even, then you start looking at those other factors. But, I mean, have we ever heard a guy turned down $2 million in free agency to go to a different city? Like, no. You hear, oh, I sign there, and it's a great city and he wants to be there. But guys aren't turning down, you know, top of the market deals in certain places to go to a different city for a lot less. If everything's even, then, yeah, then it comes into play.

So, yeah, I mean, in a perfect world, there's guys who grow up and, you know, they're in the South and they don't like being in the cold and they prefer to stay in the South. and if one of the teams from the South wants to pay them $7 million and a team from the Northeast wants to pay them $7.2, yeah, they might choose the team from the South, but that's comparable money. If the team from the Northeast is going to pay them $9 million and the team from the South won't budge off of seven,

they're not going to end up in the South. They're going to the Northeast. So money kind of trumps all, especially in free agency. Like that's for the most part, why you get their free agency. You want to maximize your earnings. You don't have as many choices as, you know, you think you do or other people think you do.

and from there, then you find the guys who are real suitors, and you can start to whittle it down based on what's important to you. I just want to make this very clear before we get out of here. To the people of Buffalo, I enjoy Buffalo. Okay, I think upstate New York is nice. I've enjoyed my time there. This is a comment on what younger people who just got a lot of money might think about the city of Buffalo. I'm just making that clear right now.

Well, I heard Toronto's awesome, which is right across the border there. Toronto's a great city. I've enjoyed my time in Buffalo. So I find it very pleasant. I could absolutely understand the benefits of settling there, all of that stuff. Just want to make that very clear. So my only real time in Buffalo, so my last year in Cleveland, we did a joint practice with Buffalo because we had Mike Pedden who would coach with Rex Ryan, who was in Buffalo.

So they kind of set that up. It was miserable as an offensive line thinking like, oh, crap, we're going to Buffalo for joint practice. You know, Mario Williams, Kyle Williams, Jerry Hughes, Marcel Darius. And we had never done joint practices. So we only heard that they're bloodbass and it's super physical and there's fights all the time. So we were, you know, worried about it for four months after they announced it. So we go up to Buffalo. We're there for like two days.

We take the train. I still have photos on my phone of like Joe Thomas and Alex Mack, like sitting across from each other on the train, like wedged together and like both asleep. and they barely fit on the thing. But we took the train. It ends up being the two easiest practices we've ever participated in. There are two-hour training camp practices, which is unheard of. The first 30 minutes is special teams, and the O-line doesn't need to be out there. So it's really an hour and a half practice, which is even more unheard of.

That's like a Friday practice for teams and season. We're like, are you sure we don't have to be out right now? Are you sure? They're like, yeah, this is how they do it. And then their D-Lines just didn't give a crap. I don't think Kyle was practicing. Mario Williams just didn't care about practice. like Hughes didn't care.

So it was like the easiest week of practice for the offensive line. It was awesome. Conversely, apparently our defense was like wop in their offense. I don't know. There were fights over there on a different field, whatever. At the end of the second day, I guess their offense quit. I don't know the exact story, but apparently their offense quit, which is like, we're done with this.

There's too many fights. Cleveland's beating us. I don't know. Their offense stops. Well, we as geniuses are like, well, the defense didn't get all their work in. So first team offense come to the defense's field and now, you know, you're not. you're going to be like the scout team for our own defense. So we had to do more reps and more plays against our own team in Buffalo.

That was already pissed off. Yeah. And they were like fighting and stuff. It was, it was awful. But anyway, so that's my only experience in Buffalo. And like we have curfew and stuff. So there was like one or two restaurants and people are like, oh yeah, go over here. And, you know, it seemed fine.

Like I said, I only need, you know, air conditioning and internet. So for a guy like me, it would be awesome. But yeah, I've heard it, you know, there aren't too many things to do there. It's, you know, maybe one or two places and you kind of have to go there a lot. So that's all I know of the city. You know, Mitch Morris lives there. He's, you know, a good dude, but he's definitely more of, you know, simple liver. So he enjoys it there.

He has fun. But yeah, for, you know, 24-year-olds that want to go out three nights a week and, you know, want to enjoy the riches and spoils, I'm not sure it's the destination city. Have you ever had any brutal joint practices? No, that's my only joint practice. You've never, that's the only one you ever had. Only one. Oh my God.

Cleveland, that was the only one I had. It was my last year there. Kansas City, Coach Reed doesn't really like them. You know, I don't know why, but we never had to do one. So, you know, those are the only one I've ever done. It was, honestly, dude, the whole offseason, we were just like, oh, we got to go to Buffalo in two months. Like, oh, we got to go in two weeks. Oh, we got to go next week.

Oh, that's two days away. Because it's like, it's the best D-line in football at the time. You know practice is soccer. You think the tempo is going to be insane and the intensity is going to be there. And, dude, it was awesome. Like, there was barely any individual. We did, like, the one-on-ones. And, like, typically it's the one-on-one run-blocking that you really don't like.

Because, I mean, pass-blocking, whatever, it's over quickly. But, like, run-blocking is just, like, go smash your head against a wall. All they did is basically just, like, stack and shed. So they kind of just stick their arms in your chest, like, try to jerk you to the ground and then be like, all right, I made the play. Like, it wasn't physical at all. They weren't even, like, being physical. It was just, like, stack and shed. use your hands. So that was super easy, you know, one-on-one pass pros, whatever. And then, you know,

we went to practice. Again, I was right tackle. I was going against Mario Williams. He wasn't given a craft in practice. He was going really easy. And, yeah, man, it was awesome. It was the complete opposite of what we expected in the best possible way. That's so funny. Like knowing, having talked to all of you guys, all five of you at some point in my life, I could just imagine what those conversations were like in the lead up and just what the conversations were like on the train on the the way home. Oh yeah. I had my wife had gotten me snacks for training camp and it might have been golden Oreos. I feel like it was something in that vein. But I remember, oh, it might have been short break cookies

actually. But I remember I timed it out so that like I would have one every night when I got back to the dorm and it was timed out. So like I finished the sleeve or whatever like the last night in Buffalo. And I was like, this is going to be your reward for getting to the end of, you know, going to Buffalo. And I remember, you know, going home after the Buffalo practices, you know, eating my little cookie and be like, man, I saved this reward and, you know, didn't even need it. This is the easiest practice ever. So, yeah, it's just, it's funny how that worked out. And then, of course, we took the train back. And then our preseason game two was actually in Cleveland. And I proceeded to break my thumb in pregame warmups because I asked our 6-7, 365 pound third string

offensive tackle to give me a chop move and warm-ups to, you know, pretend like he was Mario Williams. And he caught me right at the tip of the thumb, and it broke. And then I didn't know it was broken. I played the whole first half and like preseason game two and got an X-ray at halftime. They were like, yep, that's a clean break. And then whatever was either the next day or the day after we had practice and it was casted up and they made me practice and I didn't get to miss any time. So that was, you know, quite the three or four-day journey there. All right. Well, we'll revisit that and much more here in the future.

As always, buddy, really appreciate that. I'm going to go get some shortbread cookies right now because that sounds really good. I think they'll go awesome with your sweater. We haven't talked about sweater season for you, but shortbread cookies, warm drink. I've said this many times. When we get to like 50 degrees, I ascend to the best version of myself. This is where I love to hang out. So we're killing it right now.

All right, bud. Good to talk to you. We'll chat with you next week. Sounds good. See you. All right, guys. Thank you very much for listening. Thank you to Scott.

Thank you to Mitch for their time. Really enjoyed this episode. Please read and review the podcast and your podcast platform of choice. I would appreciate that very much. Please subscribe to The Athletic. Theathletic.com slash football show. We'll be back tomorrow with Lindsay Jones

and Matt Schneiderman, our Packers writer, for a little check-in. It's been an interesting week for him, I'm assuming. Appreciate you guys listening. We'll talk to you soon. This was The Athletic Football Show.