The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Seth Meyers talks Pittsburgh Steelers fandom, Sheil Kapadia analyzes teams with high picks in the NFL Draft, and Kat Terrell joins for a New Orleans Saints Team Visit

Episode Date: December 23, 2020

First up, Robert welcomes the host of Late Night with Seth Meyers, and avid Pittsburgh Steelers fan, Seth Meyers to the show to discuss the emotional arc of this Steelers season, his expectations for where the team actually ends up this year, the three acts of Ben Roethlisberger, the best and worst moments of the last decade of Steelers football, how COVID-19 has changed the creative process for Late Night, and more.Next, The Athletic’s Sheil Kapadia helps Robert map out future plans for some of the teams with high picks in next year’s NFL Draft, including the Jacksonville Jaguars, New York Jets, Carolina Panthers, and Philadelphia Eagles.To close things out, The Athletic’s Katherine Terrell stops by for a New Orleans Saints Team Visit to discuss the mood around the team, if the offense can live up to expectations and lift the team back into Super Bowl contention, why the Saints could be more dangerous in the playoffs than some people would expect, what they’ll look like next season if they end up falling short this year, and more.And, from now through December 31, you can get an annual subscription to The Athletic and give one free when you visit 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. Really fun show for you guys today. A little bit later on, Shil Kapati is going to be joining us to talk about some of the shifting ground in the top 10 of the NFL draft. The Jets, the Jags, a lot of teams in that area in the news. Then Kat Terrell is going to be joining us,

our Saints writer to talk about the New Orleans Saints with our team visit of the week. Before we do any of that, I am thrilled to be joined by the host of Late Night with Seth Myers. and more importantly, for our purposes here, a diehard Pittsburgh Steelers fan. Mr. Seth Myers, how you doing, man? You know, look, I'm at peace.

I feel like people are worried about me, but I'm feeling okay despite the fact that we're talking the day after the Steelers lost to a two-win Bengal team, which is not something the Steelers fans are used to. While watching that game, pardon me, was like, uh-oh. Is he going to even want to do this?

Does this make it more interesting? So I had some vacillations in my emotions last night in the same way that Steelers fans probably have here over the last month. So I wanted to ask you, I want to just kind of go through the emotional arc that this Pittsburgh Steelers season has been. So when they were, first of all, last night, what was it like to watch that? Was it one of those things where it's like, I'm kind of relieved. We know what this team is. Was it demoralizing? Like, where were you in your headspace as you watched that game last night?

I was fully demoralized about halfway through the second quarter. And then I do this bargaining thing of I turn off the TV, but then peek at my phone while I'm pretending to read a book and then get re-engaged when we pull within 10. And then I'm not, you know, and then it's, I'm, the reason they're coming back is I'm not watching, but now I kind of want to watch.

It's a mess. And I should note that I'm on the eve of, I'm pretty close to turning 47 years old, and I haven't gotten any better at dealing with any of this. So I should also note real quickly for your listeners, one of my favorite things about the athletic podcast is you can drop down and see what each section is. So feel free, for those of you don't want to hear a celebrity talk about how his teams lost three straight, just to skip ahead to, I'm sure there's a lot more incisive football commentary coming up on this podcast. That is not true at all.

This is going to be in very decisive football commentary because that's why I appreciate you, because you are not just a token celebrity fan of this team. You are somebody who lives and dies and goes by this team and reads everything and listens to everything. If you weren't, I wouldn't have even wanted to do this, but you are. And that's why I think it's a really good moment to talk to somebody who cares about the Steelers as much as you do. So looking at where this season has been and where it is now, when they were 11 and 0, it felt like there were two camps of people that were looking at the Steelers. There was the you are what your record says you are camp,

or this is not real, this is a facade, there are cracks in the foundation. Which bucket of those did you fall into? Well, it was definitely more, look, it was cracks in the foundation, but also the great gift of being a football fan is having a week to read about your team after they win. So to be 11 and 0 during a very fraught fall

where there were a lot of things to be stressful about, I would not trade that for anything, right? Of course. They gave me, it was an incredible gift, and I'm not going to now turn around and say that it was fools gold, even though it was fools gold. Any gold, fools or other eye, was a nice thing to have this fall.

So there were cracks in the foundation, and then there was that weird thing that you could sort of write it off as the weird bumpy schedule stuff that happened to the Steelers, which, again, as a man who has never had, had to get ready for any sort of athletic endeavor, you start thinking yourself, yeah, it'd be weird. If I thought I was playing football on Sunday and then it was Wednesday, I can see how that would make football harder. But I don't know if there's any, you know, none of us knew if there was any

truth to that. But I think now we see that based on the last three days, last games, sorry, that the schedule was probably inflated as a reason for this team tail spinning right now. Well, it's the sports fan bargaining process, right? Where when you lose to Washington, you think, the schedule was, even the poor performance against Baltimore. It's, ah, you know, the schedule is weird and whatever. You lose to Washington. That's a good defense. They've given a lot of teams problems this year.

So that's how you explain that away. You lose to Buffalo. Buffalo is a good team. I mean, Buffalo could be pretty much anybody right now. But that's why last night is illuminating, because then you see the offense play like that. And now you settle into this acceptance mode where it's like, no, this is just what the offense is now.

And I assume that is a little bit harder to come to terms with. Yeah. I would say that because after Washington as well, well, we're not going to have nine drops the next game. Yes. And then the next game, you have seven drops, but it's a better team. And then I think it was even just the first three and out last night was a real,

oh dear. And I should say that, you know, it's always what happens when you follow a bunch of Steelers writers, which I do on Twitter. All of a sudden today, everyone is, Twitter is saying Ben's a $41 million cap hit next year. Like there's no one is giving him any room to save this thing now. I think that's ultimately what the general consensus is as of Tuesday afternoon.

So now that you sit here and now that they're 11 and 3 and different sorts of playoff implications are being brought up, like let's say they lose to the Colts this week. Yeah. Then week 17 becomes an AFC Norc championship game with the Browns, which seemed completely impossible. And the playoff picture has changed. So now what are your expectations? Is this just over for you? Or do you think that somehow they can salvage this enough over the next couple weeks and the defense still has enough talent and everything else that they could get right enough for the playoffs to be somewhat formidable? There's so many caveats in that sense.

Well, no, but even today, I'm like, well, you know, if we didn't turn it over three times, I guess we could have beat the two-win Bengals by seven. So, you know, but then, you know, look, we're going to play two of the teams that are likely, I guess one of the, two of the three possibilities we'd have in the first round of the playoffs, right? Cold and Browns. So you have a better sense in two weeks. But now the ceiling for me is that you win one playoff game and then get killed by the chiefs and sort of say, you know, after the last few years, that's not the worst outcome to the season.

But that's the ceiling now. And that changes the outlook on a lot of things because that being the ceiling now affects what next offseason and what next season and all of those things are like. Because if you thought you were a Super Bowl caliber team and you went into playoffs like that and you happened to fall short whatever, it's like, oh, well, this was their best chance. It didn't happen. Now the resignation leads into this offseason where there are all these questions beyond the $41 million cap hit. You have offensive linemen that are free agents, Juju's a free agent, their contracts have to be signed, they're already over the cap. So now how does that change your thinking? Because it seems like this really important offseason is now here.

And I have no idea what this team is or wants to be after this season. Yeah, well, also, you know, again, not being a capologist, I, I don't know how much flexibility they have to decide what kind of team they need to be other than the team that they are set up to be. It's interesting, the other sort of narrative that I think lived in the first half of the season is how are they going to keep this team together? Exactly. And now all of a sudden, you sort of look at and you say, I don't think many people in Pittsburgh

would be upset that we would be looking at a season without James Connor, without Juju Smith-Schuster. All of a sudden, you know, I think people, you wouldn't believe in the beginning of the season, that David DeCastro would be a cap cut, but maybe he's going to be because that offensive line is not lived up to their high standard. So it looks like maybe you build it around the defense, but, you know, the big question for the whole offseason is going to be, you know, what happens with Ben, especially if the Ben we saw last night is the one that, you know, we see for the next three games. So what would you want to happen? If it was up to you,

do you think that it would be easier for everybody if they moved on? Are you ready to kind of put a period at the end of the Rathesberger era as a fan? First of all, so you are a Bears fan. You know this. I'm not giving you bad news that you don't know. But this does, right, like this is now, you realize what football is without a Ben Rotherzberger is kind of like Bears' life.

Like that's what I felt like last night. It's life for the rest of us. Oh, this is like what it's like to be a Bears fan, which is you go, we have a really good defense. and if we can just, you know, but then you fall behind. I love it this somehow has come back around on me. It inevitably does every single time, but I just love that you made it happen this quickly. Well, like last year, you know, and again, Mason Rudolph, you realize, oh, that's just sort of what the middle class is, right?

You know, when, and you forget that, you know, as critical as Steelish fans have been during the sort of three acts of Ben's career as a guy who took too many sacks. And then a guy who, you know, threw into double coverage too much. and now the guy is now. Like all those things had an upside that was worth the sort of petty complaining that fans did because of course. You know, this era's coming to a close and it's, you know, I'm hoping.

I still have this, you know, the gunslinger, you want him to have, you know, a few more bullets left in the chamber. And, but the reality is, you know, an unforgiven, you know, when, you know, Clint East was really sick and then you think he's going to die and then he gets better and then he comes back and he kills everybody.

More often than not, I think of the old West that cowboy just dies. Is Andy Reed Gene Hackman in this situation? Like how far do you want to take this? I think you are right. Yeah. But I mean, that is the really fascinating thing

is realizing that you have an immobile quarterback who also doesn't have arm strength like that, you know, or accuracy. And that's a lot of boxes that are unticked. It's been amazing to watch the jenga, tower just one block after the other get pulled out. It's like, all right, he can't move now. He can't throw now. He's inaccurate now. The decision making is bad now. It just feels like every

week we've been pulling one more of those Jenga blocks out. It's, but again, because of the 11-0 start, it's like when my two-year-old comes over and just kicks the whole Jenga thing at once. It wasn't like the last piece. It was so sudden, you know, that because even in the, you know, Dallas game, which for all intense purposes, we should have lost. Like, you know, we brought the team back. There was, you know, the flourishes in those games made you think, okay, you know, this is just, there's some weird rust thing of a year off. And, and again, like, I don't want to, you know, pile on the end of this incredible run as a fan.

Like, the Steelers have been interesting for, you know, since, since Ben, you know, came on board. And that's a really relevant every single year. I mean, the fact that Talents never had a losing season is remarkable. Remarkable. And, you know, we've had, you know, the real bummer is just looking back and seeing that this has been sort of a lost decade. I was about to ask you about that. Yeah. You know, and there were, you know, that's, I think the part of this year that feels a little liberating now is I don't think I will feel like this team was robbed in the way.

I feel like there's been some weird. work the last you know either ben's injury or bell being out or brown missing the playoffs or you know uh jesse james lousy calling the patriots game or you know uh tusson fumbling against the broncos in a game we should have won against paid manning like there's each year has had these really brutal endings and now this year i feel like maybe the brutal ending already happened and we're sort of aware of it going into the playoffs when you look back on let's call this like the three Bs era then after the last Super Bowl. Is that how you're going to think about it?

It's just these sliding doors missed moments where it could have been so much more than it was, or do you think that with some distance, you'll look back on it more finely than you do now? I mean, again, it was the worst part wasn't missing the playoffs last year. I guess it was, am I thinking, oh, yes, three years ago where we lost to Jacksonville, right? That's probably the lowest point where Blake, Portals beats us. Yeah. Tim Tebow beating us.

That was a real low point. But then, you know, the nice thing about the Steelers is that inner division rivalry with the Ravens has led to some real classics, right? Like Antonio Brown stretching over the goal line, I feel like maybe on Christmas Day a few years ago. Like, there's enough moments like that to think. That was Christmas Day. Yep.

Yeah. So this was a rich, a decade. and ultimately, you know, only a handful of teams won Super Bowls in the last decade. And, you know, the Steelers, I mean, I think the scariest thing about the Steelers is just you realize, oh, their best decade happened. Like, there's no chance there you're ever going to say, oh, yeah, the 70s was the Steelers' second best decade. So, and you're always, I mean, every Steelers fan, even ones like me who weren't watching

in the 70s are so aware of it that I think we're, we're, we're, constantly a little disappointed. It's so, it's weird to look back because, like you said, there's so many different moments that could be the, was this the most heartbreaking moment of this era? I think that I'd probably say it was that 2015 game against Denver, though. They had it. Because that Denver team was so beatable.

And Antonio Brown didn't play in that game because that was right after the awful Bengals game, right? Right. Now, it should be noted. We were handed that game, right? Like 20 things were right. that Bengals thing. So that is the curse of any fan

as you think about how you were robbed and forget that you were robbed it from somebody else the week before. Or, you know, the fate's hand to the Steelers that Bengals game. But yeah. I mean, there are plays from that Denver game because, again, Bell must have been out too.

Yeah, he was out and Antonio Brown didn't play that day. The guys getting touches that day were Fitzgerald Tucson had 12 carries. And a fumble. a bad fumble. Yep, he fumbled once. It was not a great game. Marcus Wheaton had five catches.

I remember Marcus Wheaton, just a footnote of Steelers history as well. Marcus Wheaton had like a 200-yard game against the Seahawks one day. And that way he ended up on the Bears. Didn't Marcus Ween have a... That was very short-lived. That was one of Ryan Pace's many free agent missteps

was the Marcus Wheaton contract. We don't like to talk about that. So this is the thing about... I remember about that Denver game was there was the corner blitz, Chris Hope, maybe, came in and Peyton Manning lied down, like basically gave himself up, and Hope came in so fast that he, like, went over him.

And they should have called him down because Peyton Manning basically, like, went to the fetal position, but Hope didn't make contact, and then Peyton Manning stood up on a third down and hit somebody, and it basically flipped the game. So, but, like, those are things. I'm just haunted by these small moments. I'm haunted by two years ago.

There was a bad PI against Joe Hayden, against the Saints, Juju Smith, Schuster fumbled late, I think maybe with two games left in the season. That was the year where we started seven and two and somehow missed the playoffs. Like, those are really good teams.

So, you know, the one upside about this year is at least I know there's going to be a playoff game. And so I'm trying to keep that as a beacon after two years without one. It just feels like all of the teams that were relevant for as long as the Steelers have been where you're every single year in the playoffs.

I guess you have to put a cutoff on it. I was going to say they've all won at least one Super Bowl. But the Ravens was in 2012. So that was also a long time ago. The Seahawks had at least one. It just felt like without these Patriots teams in the way, that group of Steelers wins at least one,

and they should have won at least one. And if they do, it changes the legacy for everybody. If Tomlin gets another one, we talk about him in a very different way. If Rathisputter gets three, we talk about him in a very different way. And it almost feels like it should have happened and didn't. You know, as much as a lot of,

I want to blame the Patriots, the dirty secret is we really always blew it in the playoffs before we got to the Patriots. In this decade, there was just that one game maybe four years ago where again, Bell was limited. It was hurt. Yeah. Yeah, but we got killed, right? Like, it wasn't a game that you even look back and say, oh, if only they had Levi on Bell. I mean, maybe, but I mean, Brady just gashed the defense. And I mean, if there's any silver lining to this year, it's knowing And I, by the way, I was, God love my New England roots, but I was so happy when the Patriots got eliminated because I just, I'm, the worst outcome was a seven-seeded Patriots upsetting a two-seeded Steelers, which I think was, especially now that you see how it just took a little scheming to stop our offense. It wasn't like Belichick wasn't going to be able to figure out how to stop this version of Ben Rathesburg. It's funny because you have this weird fractured fandom.

that I've, I've, I've, I've heard about it several times that I've come to understand it because your dad is a huge Steelers fan, but you grew up in New Hampshire. Yeah. And so there's that weird coming both ways thing. But yeah, that absolutely makes sense. How has your family been handling this? I've watching, your dad is also like a huge Steelers fan. I assume you guys have had some really good conversations or some really bad ones here over the last few weeks. It's worse than that. I just, I, I fully won't communicate with him at all. Like he's, I'll talk to him on Christmas. But we, I don't, my dad makes me even more upset. I'm more upset on his behalf than I am on mine now. Like, I hate how sad it makes my dad. And I'm at this weird crossroads moment right now because, you know, my oldest is four and a half. And I feel like this is when you start planting the seeds, right? Absolutely.

And I just, I keep sort of stepping back and looking at it from a wide angle and thinking, has this been a sum positive for my life? Like, that there's this thing. that I have no control over that has so much control over me. I feel the exact same way. I was the same way. My dad, I mean, my dad has not been with us for a while,

but in college, when I would watch games, that was when they were really, bears were really good. Like, 06 was my freshman year. And they went to the Super Bowl. And he was such a Debbie Downer all the time about it that I would never call him on Sundays. And sometimes not on Monday to talk about the game.

Because even if they had won, he had 10 million reasons that it wasn't that impressive and that I shouldn't feel good about it. So I had to give myself a 24-hour buffer between those when the game happened and when we talked about it. So I know that feeling very well. Yeah. And again, he's an incredibly spoiled sports fan. Not only did he live through the 70s and have all that, but, you know, we got to go as a family to 05, 08. We were the 10 Super Bowl as well, which obviously didn't work out. But being with my, I mean, I will say the reason, it's all worth. It was being with my dad in 2005 when we beat the Seahawks and, you know,

my mom and my brother as well, who were huge fans. And he was, I've never seen him sort of make, he made a noise I've never heard before his sense from him that was, uh, so joyous that it will be one of the things, uh, I will never forget about him. And then you'll have one of those moments with your son. It'll take 35 years. It'll be a winding road. It'll be mostly full of pain when you guys will get there eventually. So this is, I think in a lot of ways, the end of an era for the Steelers. And I think for if I'm, this is my hacky transition, it also feels like the end of an era for your show and what you guys have done.

And I was watching some of the old episodes from this season. And even like having Stacey Abrams on, I'm sure that that's just a version of your show you never imagined what exists in 2013 when you started doing this, right? Oh, yeah. Well, certainly, you know, the world changed. And I think, you know, late night shows adjusted based, on it. But it's also, you know, yeah, I mean, you know, the audience, I think is hipper to what they

want to see insofar as guests talking about different things. I believe, which is weird, because, you know, I think people would make an argument we live in an era of fake news, but I think we also live in an era of authenticity where audience members kind of don't want to see someone plug a project. They maybe don't think they like. But if you can get somebody to come on and talk passionately about things, that tends to be a better use of seven or eight minutes. And it's a tricky, you know, I think ultimately, you know, one of the things anybody with shows like artists is up against is, you know, in this era of a thriving era of podcasts, which, you know, I'm a consumer of as well, you know, a lot of times that there's someone you really like, yeah,

you're going to get more from them if you listen to him talk for an hour on a podcast that if you hear him talk for, you know, eight minutes over Zoom on a talk show. So, you know, when you're up against that, you sort of have to maybe think of like, who are guests that aren't doing podcasts, who are somebody that we can be the first person to talk to for eight minutes? And so that's, you know, an interesting challenge, but one that's made it a lot more interesting to host. I have always, just this whole year, I've been fascinated with the creative process and how people's settings have affected it. Like this spring, I talked to a bunch of musicians about how songwriting changes when you don't see anything. I never wrote about it because it was at the

end of my time at the ringer. But I was fascinated by the idea. So what stuff do you think process-wise that has changed this year for you either illuminated the way you want to do it or change the way you think about it that you think you'll take into next year and just for the rest of that time you do the show? I think the most interesting thing to see will be can we maintain what we've been doing when an audience gets back in the studio? Because it's been really fun as a creative challenge. sort of exhilarating as a performer to be able to sort of move a lot quicker, tell more jokes, and not have to worry about things falling flat.

It's got to be strange though, right? I'm sure it was really hard to get used to at the beginning, just talking to avoid. But in the beginning, you know, it wasn't even the craziest thing. In the beginning, it was figuring out all the tech and how to,

you know, load a script onto an iPad prompter. app and figure out your lighting. And so the last thing I was sort of worried about was the audience element. But I then quickly learned mostly from, you know, online feedback, which was really helpful. I not always worded politely or kindly, but I realized, you know, people weren't wrong when they said, hey, stop pausing after your jokes. You know, like it's one thing to pause in a studio when, you know, people watching at home

understand, oh, people are laughing so we can't talk. But, you know, I think most, you know, it's like how many of us listen to podcasts at, you know, 1.5. I can't do it. I don't understand how people do it. I can't do it. It just because I think the entire point of the medium is that there's an intimacy to it, and that's why I enjoy it. And I, as somebody who's done it for, I know, 10, 11 years now, it's been a long time. I just think there's an intimacy to it that you lose when it becomes something that's transactional and about efficiency rather than sitting with the people that you're having that fate conversation with.

I should point that it's not, I should point out that I'm not like racing to get through it. I just think that I can process that conversation. It might be that I naturally talk super fast. And so I've always like, like for example, and I should note, I once told a podcaster that I listened to him at 1.5 speed and he was, I could tell he was a little taken aback

and offended because, and I understand that it's very hard for someone to hear that and not think that I'm saying they talk too slow. But the times that I have listened to that podcast now at regular speed, it is too slow. And that's not my fault. So, but, you know, but I guess that's, I think not having an audience has been, I guess, naturally allowed me to go at 1.5. And I like that element as a performer, especially being a performer who's always, you know, I like having a verbal speed to what I do. And I like now that we have sort of built in weird as sides with crew members. And it'll be interesting to see if any of that can maintain itself when you actually have an audience back in the studio. Last thing before I get you out of here, I'm going to put you

on the spot. But I am curious now that it's the end of the year. Have you watched anything that you'd put on a year-end list that you'd absolutely recommend because two years ago, I watched Detroiters because of you. And it is still something that I am eternally grateful for because it's one of my favorite TV watching experiences I've had in a long time. Yeah. It's the best. Detroiters still maintains the best.

And timeless, Detroiters is not one of those shows. I feel like we live in an era now where you feel like if you missed a show when it comes out, it's too late. The good news is nobody was talking about Detroiters when it came out. So it's not like Game of Thrones where, oh, yeah. Exactly. Everybody talked about it two years ago. I'm sure you've watched Ted Lazo.

I have. I did. We had Brendan Hunt on this podcast. Great. Brendan and I did a show about soccer in Edinburgh, the Edinburgh Fringe Fest in 2000. Is that right? That's right,

because you did the boom stuff. That's right. And Jason, yeah. That, what an incredible execution those guys did. I made a story. It was a great show. I just watched, there's a Taiwanese movie on Netflix

called A Sun, S-U-N. That was great. That's what I'm looking for. That's exactly the vein I'm looking to hit here. And I don't know if you've watched the, this is now a show that I guess has been on for at least five years, a French spy show, Le Bureau.

I highly recommend, Le Biro, the office. There you go. That is exactly why I asked that question, because those are the things I just would never have found on my own. So I sincerely appreciate it. I hope that you can enjoy the Steelers playoff game for what it is and get your son down that road early and just have them lose to show. This is what being a fan of the Pittsburgh Steelers is like.

I hope you enjoy it. Here's what I'll say. If I could pick one outcome, I really don't want it's to get knocked out by the Ravens. That's my last outcome. And I would even be okay getting knocked out by the Browns because I think Cleveland has. had a really hard time of it. And I do like to spread the wealth and they're due. And I like their team and they're fun to watch.

Not like fun, fun, but, you know. Fun enough. Fun for the Browns. When you're a Steelers fan, it's fun to watch a team that can run the ball. But let me give you, I'm going to just give my prediction here. Ready? I'm ready. We beat the Colts next week.

We lose to the Browns. The following week, we beat the Browns in the playoffs. And then we lose to. Kansas City. I think that's about as much as you could ask for at this point. If we, it would be a perfect, if we could lose to the team that everyone agrees is the best team in football, there's nothing to hang your head on. That's exactly right. Seth Myers, thank you very, very much for the time, man. Really good to talk to you and we'll catch up down the road, I'm sure. Thank you, Robert. And in case he listens, which I'm sure he does,

I also want to say thanks to Big Ben for everything. I hope none of, I hope you know I'm not casting aspersions. I'm just saying a thing everybody can see with their eyes. Thanks, buddy. I appreciate it, man. I am very pleased to welcome to the show, a good friend of mine, Mr. Shio Kepati. Shil, how are you doing, man? Good. What's happening?

Not a whole lot. We just had Seth Myers on the show, so that's very exciting. I'm sure that you'll do fine. I'm sure you won't be a letdown for me or the listeners whatsoever. He opens for me often, so this is, yeah, I feel pretty comfortable. here. This is kind of what's been happening for several years for me. So you and I were talking about we wanted to discuss in the show today. And I landed on an idea that is kind of convoluted, but let's try to distill it a little bit here.

It's been an interesting week for a lot of teams picking at the top of the draft. Obviously, we know what happened with Trevor Lawrence and the Jets and the Jags on Sunday, which we'll get to. Also, the Panthers fired their GM. So that has a job that just came open. the dolphins are also picking in the top 10s. We're throwing them in there. And you pay a lot of attention to the Eagles. If people have not checked out birds with friends,

if you're an Eagles fan, you absolutely should. And they've had a very eventful week with everything that's happened with Jaylen Hurd. So we're going to talk about the teams currently slated to pick in the top 10 of the draft and how the ground has shifted a little bit for a lot of those teams over the last several days. So let's start at the top. Obviously, the Jets win and the Trevor Lawrence situation has been rooted in and looked at through a Jets lens for the most part. It's them losing Trevor Lawrence.

But the beneficiaries of the Jets winning that game are the Jacksonville Jaguars. And I think a lot of the things people were attributing to the Jets and why they could turn their situation around pretty quickly are also true for the Jex. They also have extra first round picks that they've got from trading away a really good defensive player. They also have a lot of cap space. So when you're looking at this, do you feel like the Jags are maybe even in a better situation than the Jets would have been to make the most out of Trevor Lawrence if they do end up getting him? I think so.

I mean, just preparing for this podcast and looking at sort of the draft capital they have. I mean, it's not, you know, they've got two in the first round, but they've got four in the top 50. They'll probably have five in the top 65. Like, you know, if you do some maneuvering, you can really add a lot of talent here. I think that is obviously the key with that Jaguar's job. I'm sure the conversation about like which GM job is the best, you know, that always surfaces around this time of year or as more guys get let go. But this to me would be a very attractive job, not only because right now you're slated

to get the Trevor Lawrence, obviously, not only because of that draft capital, but I feel like the bar for success there, even for Trevor Lawrence or whoever's the GM is so low. I mean, they have been such a disaster. Like I didn't, I don't think I fully. realized it until doing like preview stuff before this season. This will be the ninth time in 10 seasons. Seasons they've won six games or fewer. Like that's hard to do in modern day NFL. It's set up so that that doesn't happen. And so for those reasons, yeah, and they have, I'm sure, you know, you probably like some of their young talent as I do. But yeah, I think it is a very attractive job

for prospective GMs. So let's talk about that because it's a great point. And not only is the bar low, but the leash is long. You think about all of the failures that they've had there, Dave Caldwell was there for eight years. And obviously, they brought Tom Coughwin in, and that was just one of those power dynamic situations that's occasionally hard to understand. But the fact that Dave Caldwell was employed there

for the last eight seasons when they hadn't been successful, this is a place where you're given time. For the most part, they have given their guys space and the chance to succeed. And so if you took this job as both a head coach and a GM. You have resources, you have flexibility,

you have Trevor Lawrence potentially, and you have a much, it's not nearly as bright of a spotlight as it would be with the Jets, and you're probably given more time to see this thing through. I'm not sure there's a better GM or head coaching opportunity

on this entire landscape, and that includes a job where you get to build around and coach Deshawn Watson. Yeah, and I guess the one thing I forgot to mention, most cap space project, in the NFL. So like you don't, I mean, obviously you want to build through the draft and you want to

get, but you have so much flexibility with this job. Where do you want to go aside from Trevor Lawrence? Do you want to trade down? Do you want to get future draft capital? Do you want to get more picks in this draft? Do you want to add a wide receiver? You know, you can really, this is, I think, as close to starting from scratch a job as there might be for a GM. Like, I don't know. I would have to go back and look at like the last five years or so. But can you remember, like, I can't remember another job where really, you know, you're coming off a terrible season. The franchise hasn't won. You've got the top pick.

You've got caps based. Like, it's all there for you. Don't screw it up, I guess, is the other part of it. Because this is like, you know, you've got all those resources available to you. Well, I'll take it one step further. I feel like the Jets are more of a blank slate than this because the Jets have fewer guys that you'd want to build around. If you look at the Jags roster right now, their offensive line is coming back next year

for the most part. That's a nice group of players. The interior of their line, Joanne Taylor, I think he's at an uneven second season, but he's somebody that's young, was a high pick. We'll see what happens there. Cam Robinson is set to be a free agent, but everyone else on the line is coming back.

The Jets really only have Mackay Beckton, and then Denzel Mims, because we'll get to them, but they really only have the guys locked in that Joe Douglas picked. The Jags have DJ Chark, Leviska-Chanal, James Robinson, a couple guys on the offensive line. The defense for them is much more of a blame.

Slate than the offense is. That's the area where it's just the young guys you picked and pretty much Miles Jack. So I think that's part of why it's easy to get excited about this, because if you dropped Trevor Lawrence into an offense that had Chanel, Shark, James Robinson, a few viable starters on the offensive line, you got the right coach there, you added one, two more weapons, you'll get a tight end. It's not out of the question for this Jags team with the right coach to look like a pretty solid offense in 2021. And I think that road is a little bit more difficult for the Jets. Definitely.

And we know that that's the clearest path to sustain success, right? Build that efficient offense. Build that efficient passing game. And you're right. It shouldn't take that long. I mean, I was bullish on the Bengals going into last season just because I like Joe Burrough so much. And that was even knowing that their offensive line was going to pretty much be a disaster.

And so here you're not even in that space. I mean, can you imagine if they add like a Chris Godwin, a Corey Davis, and now you've got him and Chark and Chanel, and you know, you could probably add a pretty good offensive lineman if Cam Robinson goes. And so you're right. The pieces are in place. I mean, we see it this year that this isn't like 20 years ago where the rookie quarterback comes in and you know he's going to, you know, the offense is going to be really bad right away

and there's going to be growing pains. Like, I mean, we watch Justin Herbert. Even you can look at the dolphins. I know they're not lighting it up, but it's not a disaster. You know, you're going to go through those growing pains, but a guy like Trevor Lawrence with his experience in that situation, if you get the right play caller, so either you hire the offensive coach, right?

It's the head coach or it's a different type of head coach, but he gets the really good play caller, sort of like a Matt Rule, Joe Brady type situation. You really are positioned for a nice, pretty quick turnaround, I think, there where you could be certainly competing for a wild card spot for that division. It's not like there's a dominant team in that division. So it could get pretty interesting for them pretty quick. I think. It's kind of unfortunate for guys like Dave Caldwell and the people that orchestrated

this rebuild that they won't get to see it through in any way because it was really well done. This was something that happened quickly. I mean, that 2017 team, when they were a couple of game away from the Super Bowl, a couple of plays away from the Super Bowl, you had a very expensive roster, they tore this thing down fast. And I feel like the way that it's broken for them is kind of similar it's what we've seen from teams like Miami, like the Browns who, you know, Sashi Brown died for the roster that the Browns have right now.

These tear downs, when you do them completely, can set you up like this, even if they don't get Trevor Lawrence. Even if the Jets do win, lose that game, the Jets go win 16, the Jags have the second overall pick. I still think a lot of the things that we're saying are true.

And it just seems like over the last couple years, we've had so many examples of the benefits that this, this extreme approach to getting back on track can give you. And the Jaguars are a very clear example of that. Yeah, it's tough with those star players, like a guy like Jalen Ramsey. You know, I remember thinking at the time, are they going about this the right way? Are they really going to get maximize the return for him?

And it ended up working out great for them. I mean, two first round picks. It's, you know, we're talking about the Jets too. It's like the Jets and Jamal Adams, you know. In those situations, I'm always like the first, the most, the most, What I would want to do is keep the talented young player with like a Hall of Fame ceiling. You know, if you're going to be a winning franchise, but if you're not going to do that and if you're in rebuilding mode and the player doesn't want to be there, then how do you maximize

value? I mean, that really is the key. And they were able to do that with Ramsey in Gakway. It's tough. You know, I wonder if they would have made that move at another time. Maybe they get a little bit more, but it's not like they got fleeced or anything. You know, they get a second rounder, I think, and a fifth rounder there. So, yeah, they were able to turn around those players and get draft capital for the future.

It also, the fact that they're starting over completely and that it's a blank slate at every level of the organization. When you look at the Jets, we'll get to them. But Joe Douglas is there. No matter what you think of Joe Douglas as a head coach, you're still walking into a situation that you didn't help create. And if you look at some of the other arrangements around the league that I think work and are smart. San Francisco had it right, in my opinion. Where you go in, you say, you guys are linked at the hip. The GM, the head coach, this is a partnership.

You live and die together. Best of luck. That's the situation that the Jags are in. So whether they choose to have a head coach that's a figurehead in the way that Kyle Shanahan was when they hired him and he got some power and they allow that person to be a decision maker in a really pronounced way, they have the ability to do that because they are starting over. So this has been a very jet-centric conversation

with the Trevor Lawrence stuff over the last few days. But if this works out for the Jags, I think they are extremely well positioned to succeed fast based on everything that they've done over the last calendar year. So let's get to the Jets then. I was looking at it and just thinking about it. And it's just one of those things of, man, what a week.

And it's the 30-Rect thing. It's Wednesday. What a week. It's only been like five days. They still have to play this week. we talked about it a lot on our Sunday show, just how demoralizing this must be. But I think it's more demoralizing for fans than it is for the organization. Because for fans, it's all about this process and this terrible season being worth it.

What is waiting for you at the end of the tunnel? Is going 0 and 16 okay if you get Trevor Lawrence? I think a lot of them would say yes. but enduring everything they have with the Adam Gase era and ending up without a clear-cut plan is frustrating. And I can understand why it would be difficult. So now the question is, what does the plan look like? So in your mind, and I think this is the big question, now that Lawrence could be off the table, do you think it would be at all smart to consider keeping someone?

Sam Darnold and building around him if you were the Jets and selling off that pick for a King's Ransom in the same way that the Colts did when they sold it to the Jets when they picked Sam Donald. I think if you hired a coach who, you know, I don't think you make your decision on this, but let's say you find your guy, he's your coach, you love him. And as part of the interview process or even maybe after he's hired, he says, I love Sam Darnold, please, I see the talent in this guy. I have a plan for him. I'm telling you, we can get more out of him. We can surround him better. And let's go, then I think you consider it,

because you know, you're not going to get, you're not getting like multiple first round picks for Sam Darnold, right? I know you've written about this and talked about this, but it's not like you're getting this crazy amount of draft capital for Darnold. So you're almost comparing Darnold to the other quarterbacks in this class. But even further than that, you're, you're just, you're You know, with the Trevor Lawrence thing, I was kind of thinking, I feel like we fall in this trap, and I'm going off topic a little bit here, but I feel like we fall in this trap sort of every year with being overconfident that we know Trevor Lawrence is going to be so much better than everybody else. And I was thinking about this as preparing for this podcast, like even last year, like right now, let's say you pulled all 32 GMs and you said which quarterback from last year's draft class would you want. This is not off topic at all, by the way. This is all in my notes.

We're getting there. Oh, okay. Sorry. All right. Should I save that? No, no, no, no. Go with your thought. Go with your thought.

I just love that you're on the same page here. Yeah. So, you know, I would say at least half would say Herbert, right? Yep. I think most should say Herbert. I think if you're picking out of those guys right now, he clearly has the most talent and he's playing the position at a fairly high level. And I think that is a great point to bring up because this isn't a zero-sum game.

If you don't get Trevor Lawrence, it's not like you don't get anything. There are other guys available. And we've seen it so often where you have this guy at the top and he ends up not being the best quarterback in that class. Josh Allen is a perfect example of that where Baker Mayfield was the number one pick. He's not the best quarterback of that group. You can make an argument that Lawrence is in a different sort of class where he is in that Andrew Luck tier of prospects. And even if you were happy to get Robert Griffin in that 2012 draft, you knew he wasn't as good as Andrew Luck. But even if we consider that, that, I still think that there are guys in this group that have traits that you could get excited

about. Zach Wilson is not a low-ceiling quarterback. Traylance is not a low-ceiling quarterback in the way that even a guy like Joe Burrow or Tua to a degree are. Those guys don't have the traits that some of the quarterbacks in this class have coming out. There are guys you could pick at number two if you wanted to go that route where you could be very excited about what they could eventually become.

And I think if you're the Jets, that's something to consider. Because even if you don't get Lawrence, there are guys here that could become stars based on the talent that they have. And it's important not to forget that as tough as this week has been. Exactly. Yeah, even in the luck year, you know, Russell Wilson's going 75th that year. And so I know it's a little bit different. It's not the number two pick. You know, 2014, Bordles is going ahead of guys like Teddy Bridgewater and Derek Carr.

You know, even 2016, golf and Wens go first and second. Dak Prescott goes 135th. So I'm just saying, like, we shouldn't be so confident that we've scouted out and 100% Trevor Lawrence is going to be the guy and there's no one in his class. And this is a huge disaster. I mean, the Jets will do their homework. I think if there's a quarterback you like there at two, that's obviously going to be something you're going to really consider.

And then I guess there's a door number three, you know. And door number three would be the unorthodox move of saying, we're going to keep Sam Darnold and we're going to draft a quarterback at. number two. And we're going to give ourselves optionality because we know none of this is 100%. We know we thought Donald was going to be the guy and he wasn't the guy, or at least to this point. We know that

teams make mistakes. We know that you only hit on a certain percentage. I don't know. You know, that's sort of an out of the box. I'm sure there will be analytics writers who come March will be writing that that's what the Jets should do, that they should give themselves multiple options, let them battle it out in training camp, see who performs

well during the season, and then figure it out from there. It's not the craziest thought. It's crazy. It's not the craziest thought, but I think that we've seen a little bit. I think you are, you have some closest to a situation where we don't think about the optics of what drafting a quarterback does when you're supposed to have a quarterback. That would be the downside of that to me, is that if you're going to draft guy number two, it's important to empower that person. It's important to show everyone in the building, this is our guy. And those optics do matter. And that's why even if giving yourself multiple dice rolls might be smart in a vacuum.

I think you have to consider the human element of this. And too often we don't do that. But if we're taking that option off the table for a second and you're looking at either keeping Darnold and trading the pick or picking a quarterback, I think there are two things you have to consider. It's the opportunity cost of keeping Darnold and not having all those extra picks. I think you could probably get at least an extra first in 2022 plus whatever else you're going to get.

For a rebuilding team, it's somebody to consider. But if you do that and if you keep Darnold, you're giving up cheap years. That's the other concession that you're making because Donald is going to have a $25 million fifth year option in 2022. If you draft a guy, let's say it's Justin Fields, Zach Wilson, whoever, second overall, that guy is cheap for four years. So that's the question you have to ask is the, even if you don't think that this guy is definitely better than Sam Darnold, the certainty of the price tag is the question you have to ask.

So those are the questions that the Jets are going to have to ask themselves over the next few months here. I tend to be of the opinion that going with the model you are going to go with for Lawrence would be better for everyone. You start over, you have this infrastructure you're going to build around the number one pick if you got it. Do the same thing with someone else because it just gives you a chance to hit the reset button and not try to talk yourself into Darnold just because he's in the building. I think that's right. I think that's the cleaner option. know, if you do your scouting and you look at whichever one of these guys, you like Justin Field, Zach Wilson, whoever it's going to be there. And you say there's X percent chance that

it's going to be pretty close between him and Sam Darnold in terms of performance in the next four years. Then I think, you know, it should be a pretty easy decision. I mean, because then you're getting the guy on the rookie contract and not having to pay a guy because we're seeing a lot of these teams are, you know, the middle tier of quarterback now, I feel like is so big. And a lot of these teams paying those guys, $25, $30 million, those are the teams you're looking at right now going, you know, all right, well, is that the right move? Could they get a guy cheaper when you're seeing rookies come in and playing well right away? So I do think that's where you get into trouble. So I would agree with you. I think the only exception I would make is if I just had a coach who just came in

and said, like, was just really convincing that the guy, you know, the guy just loved Sam Darnold. Then I think you could think about that option. But if that's not the case, then I think the cleaner option is to just, hey, scalp the quarterbacks, figure out who your number two guy is, and go from there. So you mentioned the coach, and I think that's an interesting thing to bring up, because a lot of people had said over the last few days, this potentially changes the coach you can get. And I don't really buy that. Because even if you don't get Trevor Lawrence, even if that guy isn't coming in to coach Trevor

Lawrence, Cliff Kingsbury didn't take that job thinking they were going to pick Kyler Murray. They didn't think they were going to pick Kyle or Murray when he took that job. There are only 32 of these gigs. And outside of the downgrade from Trevor Lawrence to whoever they're going to pick number two, if that's what they end up doing, everything about what made this job attractive a week ago is still true. You still have a ton of draft capital. You still have a ton of cap space. You still have building blocks with Bechtin and Mims being the first class that Joe Douglas brought in.

By all accounts, I asked several people about this in the last 24 hours, including a GM I really respect. is Joe Douglas the type of person who would turn off any coaching candidate to come take that job? Because like we mentioned, it's a little bit different than the Jags job. You're walking in where someone else is in charge. And people that I respect have told me he is the guy that's going to drew this the right way. He is somebody that people would want to work with. So if you take all of those things together, this is still a really attractive job, even if Trevor Lawrence isn't there.

Yeah, I agree with that. I think everything I know and have heard about Douglas is that that is sort of a you that. Yeah, you know, that's his reputation is just sort of a low ego, like, good to work. You know, I feel like he has a, like, I don't know if he's going to be the greatest GM in the league. I think he has a high floor of competence if that, you know, I don't think he's going to do a, I don't think he's going to do a bunch of stupid stuff. You know, I think they're going to build on the offensive and defensive line. They're going to try to find a quarterback and they're going to kind of go from there. So yeah, I think, you know, as long as you think, if you like the, if you're

okay with the ownership, I feel like you're going to have some time there. I mean, No one looks at that. I think it's different than the Jaguars. I mean, I wouldn't look at that roster and think that that's going to be a very competitive team next year. But they also have a bunch of cap space. They've also got the Seahawks, what, third round pick. So they're going to have five or six picks in the top 100. And, you know, they added a guy like Beckton last year. That's looking like it's going to work out well. Like you mentioned, Quinn and Williams really came on this year. So they do have some pieces. I mean, I think their move should be to kind of really invest in the quarterback. the offense because they have so much work to do, I feel like, on that side of the ball. And I feel like whoever is the head coach there, they need to knock, you know, the defensive coordinator higher. They need to, like, hit a home run with that, whether it's Wade Phillips. Like, you need someone who can do more with less, basically, because other than Quinn and Williams, I don't see like a ton of talent on that side of the ball.

Marcus May is a free agent. And so I really feel like you need to hit with whoever is scheming up that defense, who can kind of keep you afloat until you're able to add more talent on that side of the ball. We'll see what they do with Marcus May. He's a really useful player. And I think that that's the type of guy you'd want to keep around. But again, drafted by a different regime, who knows. You have Williams. They've got some guys up front that I think are really interesting. Like Foley-Wattucusi, their nose tackle is just like a guy who can play. They have Quinn and Williams. Henry Anderson is there. The interior of their defensive front plays with

the right attitude. It's a good group of players. Then Marcus May, then Denzel Mims, then Mackay Beckton, that's all. That's all we're dealing with here. It's not like the Jags where you have some guys that you've given second contracts to and then you expect to be part of this quick rebuild. With the Jets, it really is a blank slate. And the amount of space they have aligns with needs for this team. Interior of the offensive line, they tried to remake it on the fly last year, but they're all short-term deals. And for the most part, I think that group is something they can remake if they want to. Guys like Joe Thuny are potential free agents. and Shurf is a free agent.

Edge rusher is another spot. If they wanted a guy like Yonik and Gacquay, they've been thinking about an edge rusher and needing one since John Abraham left that team. And then the other spot that I think is really interesting is receiver. Because we'll get to another team that I think needs receiving help, but I think they need different types of receivers

than the Jets would want. If Prashad Perriman's gone, which I assume he would be, you have an outside spot where you can go get a Kenny Gala day or an Alan Robinson potentially. they have such a blank slate and so much flexibility that I think a lot of the available players are going to line up with the ways you'd want to spend money in free agency. Yeah, they've got a lot of resources.

I mean, the big picture thought for them is like, give whoever the quarterback is a chance, right? You cannot have a repeat of the Sam Darnold situation where it's, where this many years in and you're still going, well, I look, you know, I kind of like that throw. You can kind of see the talent, you know, if he played for somebody else. And it's not crazy. I do the same thing. I mean, really, let's say, like if Sam Darnold were quarterbacking the Rams this year, I don't know, that might look pretty good, right?

So that's why I am of the opinion that they should just cut it off clean. Because that process is exhausting. As someone who has gone through that process for literally my entire 33 years on this planet, it is an exhausting process. And I would rather just distance myself from it entirely if I were Joe Douglas and the person running the Jets. All right, let's get to a team that I feel like has had a very strange year,

and that is the Carolina Panthers, who right now is slated to pick fourth in this year's draft. The Panthers are a team that had a really nice start. I think they were three and two, and it's one of those things where you're watching me, like, oh, the Panthers are kind of fun. You know, like, I don't mind watching the Panthers. And then they lose a bunch of games.

It's almost like a cosmetic tank where no one thinks that Panthers are a joke, but they're losing enough games to do this, the right way. And they just fired their GM. So now their biggest question here with the fourth overall pick is, who is the GM going to be and what is the direction that that team is going to take? And they're kind of the inverse of the Jets, where Joe Douglas is in place in New York and you're bringing in a coach to be with him. The Panthers have Matt Ruhle as the CEO type of that team, and now the GM has to align with Matt Ruhl's vision for the organization. So it's a different

consideration and I think a much less attractive job than the other ones in part because of that arranged marriage element to it. I think that's right. I mean, you know Matt and Matt Rule is, you know, when he, what did he sign a six year contract? I mean, he's running the show. You're not going to Jacksonville or somewhere else. So on that note, it is not as attractive. On the other hand, this team could be really good next year. Like, they could be in the playoffs, I think, next year. You know, you look at it, they're 10th in offensive DVOA. They're the only team in the top 10 in offensive DVOA that's not going to the playoffs.

And so, like, they've got some pieces there. And that's, I wouldn't say they've gotten great quarterback play. You know, they've got good wide receivers. Christian McCaffrey comes back healthy. If Joe Brady is still there next year. So I think it would have to be a, you know, you're not going to get like the highest profile. LGM, it's kind of like what you talked about with Kyle Shanahan, right? I mean, that's sort of this situation where the coach needs to find somebody he can trust who he wants to work with, who he

hands stuff over to, but ultimately it's going to be Matt Rule kind of calling the shots there. Do you have a hard time figuring out what this team is or wants to be? Because I do. Because with all these other teams we're talking about in this range, outside of the Bengals, that's a whole different situation with Burrough. But the Jags, the Jets, they tore it down. The Panthers didn't really tear it down, in part because they couldn't. You hand Christian McCaffrey that contract. Matt Paradis came in last year as a free agent. They can potentially move on from him, but he has a $10 million cap hit.

They just paid Jack Thompson. K1 Short is on the books for $21 million next year. So I don't know which direction they're going to go. They only have $12 million in cap space that they're slated to right now based on $176 million cap. Both of their starting tackles are free agents. So it's much more difficult to imagine the timeline and the trajectory of this team than it is for some of the other teams in the top five. And I think the biggest question associated with that is, do you pick a quarterback at four if there's a guy you like? And I think the answer should be yes.

Yeah, I think this is one of the most interesting quarterback situations because it goes to what I was saying earlier. Like I think right now, if I were an NFL team, you're always looking for like the Patrick Mahomes Russell Wilson, right? If you can find the guy who is just basically guaranteeing you a playoff spot and lifting everyone else around him every year, that's ideal. Pay him whatever he wants. It doesn't matter. He's worth it. He's probably being underpaid. But I feel like in the last three, four, five years, you don't have to throw your hands and give up if you don't have that guy.

I mean, look around the league. Jimmy Garoppolo was in the Super Bowl last year. Jared Goff was in the Super Bowl. two years ago. Ryan Tannahill is leading the NFL's most efficient offense right now. I'm not saying any of those guys suck or anything, but no one would consider those guys in the top three, four, five quarterbacks, right? They're not in that Mahomes Wilson class. And so I almost feel like if you have a chance to take a swing, like if you say Justin feels this guy's upside is unbelievable, Zach Wilson, this guy's upside is unbelievable. I agree. You have to take them at

four because it's the rookie contract thing we talked about earlier. But also, I think this team has gotten a lot of bad luck this year. Like, I think they've got sick. Are you going to be this bad again? Yes. When are you going to be picking number four again? I mean, every game has ended in a Joey Sly, 65-yard field goal this year, and they've lost six-one-score games.

So, like, I don't think you're going to be in the top five next year. You certainly don't want to be in the top five next year. So if you have a chance to draft a quarterback that you really like, you go ahead and do it because I think Teddy Bridgewater, I think his contract kind of ties him there next year. But after that, you can get out of a quarterback. it in 2022. And man, if you hit on one of these quarterbacks, like I would say Bridgewater has pretty much been like the mediocre line, right, of quarterbacking in the NFL.

I mean, right around there. He's literally a bridge quarterback. His name is Bridgewater and he is your bridge quarterback. Teddy Bridgewater and the contract they gave him, it would be like if the guy they picked in the top five was named like Joey franchise quarterback. Like, that's the only way that it could be more appropriate than what Teddy Bridgewater is for this team. And I think you're exactly right.

because it's almost like what I was saying about the cosmetic tank. They've lost just enough games to get in this position while having no one call them a joke and potentially been just bad enough for Joe Brady not to get hired away as a head coach and be the guy that oversees this offense next year. So I'm curious about what it'll look like. Here's what I'll say. I had similar questions about the way they were spending their money when Marty Herney was the GM coming into this year. I assume that rule rubber stamped a lot of these moves.

the fact that he signed Temple product Robbie Anderson is probably indicative that he was. But I wasn't sure why they were spending their money in this way because like, don't you want to be bad? Why would you bring in Teddy Bridgewater? But it's worked out okay. So I'll just be curious how much clarity we have about the vision after we see what they did this offseason. But I think with Joe Brady, with some of the weapons they have, everything else, it's definitely a situation to monitor. And I'll be curious to see who ends up there as the GM. So really quickly before we get to the Eagles.

I wanted to throw them in here because I think they're a team we talked about a ton early in the season. And now it's just kind of the narrative about them has changed. And that's the dolphins. Because they were the story of the season, I think, through five or six games. They were winning. They looked like a playoff team. Now it feels like they might be on the out side looking in of the playoff picture. But none of the reasons that we were excited about the dolphins moving forward have changed.

Everything about what they can be is still there. just this is a pretty broad but I think important question. If you were looking at how you would tweak this Dolphins roster, the things you think they need to go from a fun, exciting, interesting team to a potential contender in 2021, what are you doing both with that Texans pick in the top 10 and with some of the financial resources that they have? What positions do you think they need? I am pouring all of my resources into the offense and saying let us sort of set this up so that if Tua is a good quarterback, he's going to have everything at his disposal to succeed.

So I think obviously, offensive line, I mean, they've invested resources in that already with guys like Austin Jackson and Robert Hunt. But if you look at it overall, I think they're 29th in that pass block win rate met. So there, obviously you can upgrade on the offensive line there. So I think that's one. Outside of Jackson, there's nobody that's a deal breaker for we can't move on from you. you're a building block. I think that's important. And even if you spent resources, you're not locked into any version of it,

besides Jackson likely being your left tackle. Yeah. So I would do offensive line and then load up on pass catchers. I mean, Devante Parker's been good. Gisickey's been good. You can never have enough of those guys. I would just load up on those two areas, pass catchers and offensive line.

Because I look at the defense and it's like, you give me those cornerbacks and like Brian Flores, I'm feeling pretty good. Not that you don't need to ignore it completely. like, but I wouldn't be spending, if I was like on the fence, you know, if you had an offensive player and a defensive player sort of in the same tier with one of those first. I would definitely be leaning towards the offensive side of the ball because I think if you can

get to be like a top 10 offense next year, given how good the coaching is, how good you are at cornerback. I mean, legitimately one of the best past defenses in the NFL, we know defense can be volatile. It doesn't mean it's going to carry over to next year. So certainly pass rush you could address. But I would just feel like let's pour our. resources into the offense. We've got the coach who can figure things out on the other side of the ball if we don't add a lot of talent there. I totally agree. And I think that this is a long way off,

but I think this is a team that could potentially be a trade partner for somebody who wants to move up for a quarterback. Because if you're sitting at six and you don't love any one guy, there's not one spot there that you think is a premium position that you want to go get, there are going to be people that want that fourth quarterback. And you could add even more. pieces. The one guy I think that makes total sense for them in free agency, if he does hit it, based on what Tua does well and what they need, this is a Godwin place for me. Because while the Jets, I think, makes a lot of sense to go get a vertical outside threat with the guys they have if Crowder and Mims are there, when I think about conceptually what the Dolphins offense is and what Tua does

well, I want quick winners, middle of the field guys. Godwin, Parker, Gisicki, at a lineman, now we're cooking. think that's the type of player I would look at. Even a guy like Curtis Samuel makes sense to me for them, who's also hitting free agency. Space player, somebody that work in intermediate areas of the field, can do stuff for you because I don't think two is ever going to be that cannon armed outside the numbers type player.

I want guys who can make plays in space, yak, things like that. I think those are the types of guys that would make a lot of sense for that. It's so funny with Godwin, like, as I went through this exercise, every team, I'm like, ooh, Godwin would look good there. He would work anywhere. But I agree with you. Short and intermediate part of the field, middle of the field. I mean, that, if you're thinking of like the best version of Tua,

that's where he's going to be throwing the ball, offense, slants, RPO's, all those different types of things. He would be great for them and they, I think, will have, you know, money to spend on a player like that. The guy that I, the place that I think makes a ton of sense for him and just fit wise. And Nate has said this is Baltimore too. Baltimore needs a type of guy like that.

And everyone needs a Chris Godwin, but there are just some offenses when you, watch them, it's like, they need a quick winner in man, everything else. So the Ravens and the dolphins, I think both are applicable there. So yeah, let's get to the Eagles. And I don't want to belabor this, because I'm sure you're kind of hurts out to a certain point. But I want to talk about how the J-1 Hertz situation and the way it's unfolded not only affects his future, but everyone else there. So two weeks ago, before Hertz got the starting job when we were dealing with all this whence nonsense. In your mind, was it a foregone conclusion that Doug Peterson would be gone after

this season? Foregone conclusion might be, I guess, a little bit strong, but yes, I thought that the most likely scenario was that Doug Peterson was not going to be the coach in 2021. How do you feel now? Well, yeah, now I'm a little bit certainly more on the fence. And it's funny because I was just watching the Hertz film before I came on and like, it's not like they've come up with great offensive answers. I mean, if you really look at this and you look at what Hertz did even last week against Arizona, it's isolation routes on the outside. It's a screen. It's a second reaction play. Like, you know, some people were saying to me after the first game, oh, why didn't they scheme stuff up like this for Carson Wentz? And I'm like, the scheme is not what's winning here.

I mean, Jalen Hertz is better than Carson Wentz. Carson Wentz was a disaster. And he's making some play. So on that end, I say, you know, that shouldn't really, change your opinion. Now, on that note, you know, Doug Peterson has gotten his teams to play hard every year. He hasn't lost the locker room. I think they're like 11 in three or 11 and four when Carson Wentz hasn't been the quarterback. So if you wanted to talk yourself into, let's keep Peterson and let's figure out what we're doing at quarterback. I don't think Peterson and Wents can come back, basically. That to me is like a non-starter. That would make no sense. You've tried that. You've tried adjusting his staff, telling him to make changes. That didn't work.

was a disaster. But if you decide as an organization, we're really going to be aggressive and try to move on from whence. And I'm sure we'll talk about what their other quarterback options are. I don't think it's crazy then to say, let's give Peterson another shot in 2021. Because I certainly don't think all the issues have been on him. He's been part of the problem like everybody else. But he also has built up a lot of goodwill with the organization. And it seems like they're rallying at least a little bit here in December once again this year. So, yeah, I'm definitely not as sure that Peterson will be gone as maybe I was two weeks ago. I think that you could make an argument based on what he's done over the last couple weeks that he should come back.

My biggest question about just the Eagles before we get to Carson Wentz or Jalen Hertz is what the rest of the roster looks like. I mean, the finances of this, it's no secret. It's a fucking mess. And I just don't know what the 2021 Eagles would be, even if you brought back Jalen Hertz. I mean, you have, Al-Shan Jeffrey has $10 million of dead money left on his deal. They have, I want to say, like, seven or ten guys, let's look at it right here. Wentz, Cox, Jeffrey, Graham, Johnson, Slay, Hargrae, Brooks, Malik Jackson, Zach Ertz, Deshaun Jackson, Derek Barnett. They have 11 guys making at least $10 million.

And there isn't a lot of outs. There aren't a lot of outs with those contracts. It's not easy. So that's a conversation for a different day. The Wentz part of this, it feels like if Hertz is going to be the guy and we're trending in that direction, I don't know why you'd bring Wentz back in order to avoid the problems that you had with Hertz now. But also, if you have no leverage in a trade, would it make sense to bring Wentz back? It's just such a mess. If you had to just, I'll put you on the spot, if you had to kind of predict the future and you had to say, these are the quarterbacks that will be on the roster in,

at the start of training camp. Is Wentz there, or do you think that they just say, let's give him a chance somewhere else, let's move on, let's have Jalen Hertz be the guy? I think Wentz is going to be gone and it's going to be Jailen Hertz. I understand all the financial implications and the obstacles and stuff like that. I think the one thing some don't realize is that this isn't just about 2021. So yeah, is it ugly? Are you taking the biggest dead cap hit of any player?

Yes, absolutely. But the thing with Went is you're not just keeping him for 2021. If you keep him for 2021, he gets this kicker where it's $15 million guaranteed for 2022. And so now all of a sudden, you're tying yourself to him even further down the road. So my scenario, and I don't know if they're going to do something like this, but I think it would be a mistake to just after four games of Hurt, say he's the guy, he's the quarterback of the future, let's go. I mean, the Broncos, I guess, did some version of that last year with Drew Locke,

and I was crushing them. So I think that's a mistake to make. So I wonder if you keep Jalen Hertz, you know, he's showing you that he's probably got a pretty high floor. You know, you're not going to start him and be a complete disaster. At least it doesn't look that way after two games. And then maybe you trade out of that number seven spot. Maybe you try to trade back, right? And you kind of just say, let's push it.

Let's push it back a year. We'll go into 2021 with Hertz. You know what? If Hertz plays really well, fantastic outcome. We've got a rookie, we've got a quarterback on a rookie contract. If Hertz doesn't play that well, well now we'll go. We just added some capital last year, both in a Wendt's trade and moving out of that number seven spot where 2022 you say, all right, do we need to take a big swing at a quarterback here?

So that's kind of the way I would look at it. Now, you have to see what you get for Wentz. I know you've talked about this. And it's true. I mean, this is like the hardest trade market, I think, to predict of any player in the last, I don't know, however many years, you know? Could there be a team like the Colts that said Frank Reichson? I love this guy.

Philip Rivers is 39. Let's make a move. Yes. could there be a bunch of teams saying, are you nuts? We saw that guy play last year. We've got other options. We're not paying, giving up much for him at all. So it's going to be a really tricky situation.

But I guess my gut would say hurts is back, Wence is not back. I think the biggest part of this is going to be how much flexibility and wiggle room, Wence is going to give teams with renegotiating and restructuring that deal. And I feel like if I'm reading the T leaves correctly, them leaking to Schefter this week, week that he would be willing to move he wants to be a starter somewhere right i think is a test balloon to say i want to be a starter somewhere i'll do what i need to do to do that and if he's willing to make concessions it opens up an entirely new set of possibilities both for him and for the eagles because if you're going to come in and you're not going to have a whatever a 25 million dollar cap hit

that it would be i think it's 25 and 21 which is palatable for a starting quarterback right but it's still a lot for the guy that's been playing at Wents's level. So I think there would be a team that would give up a pick for the current version of his deal. I think there would be five to seven teams that would give up a pick for Wence if a lot of the guarantees and a lot of the money were no longer on the table. So I think that's going to be the biggest question is what does that contract look like? Who's willing to trade for the newer version of it if that version does end up existing?

And the other part where he has a say, or I guess you could say control, is with what I was just talking about, that kicker of $15 million guaranteed in 2022. That's supposed to kick in the third day of the league year. And so that's not a lot of time to get a trade done. But if you work with him and say, listen, we know you don't want to be here. We're ready to move on. Let's get some time before the draft here. Give us four, five, six weeks, whatever it is.

Let's move that date back. Well, then that gives you some flexibility also. So, I mean, that seems like the most likely scenario, right? I mean, obviously Wenz doesn't want to be a backup. up. There's no scenario I don't think where you can just go into next year with handing whence the job because what do you say to your locker room when you do something like that? Do you really want to go into 2022 with a quarterback competition with Hertz and Wentz knowing that you're also tying yourself to Wentz? So it is a very confusing situation. I feel like the least

messy scenario would just be to move on. You got to eat the dead money. This is not how you envisioned it. But at some point, you have to look beyond just 2021 and say, what's the best move for the next whatever three to five years. And I think, you know, as long as you can kind of get whatever you're looking for with Wence in form of a draft pick, that I feel like will end up being their move. Well, I appreciate you talking about this for the 4,000th time in the past like couple weeks that you've had to. So, Sheel, always good to talk to you, buddy. Sincerely appreciate the time. Enjoy the holidays. Enjoy the week. We'll be talking to you down the road, I'm sure. Thanks for having me. You too. All right. It's time for this week's team visit. I'm pleased to welcome

my friend Catherine Terrell to the show who covers the Saints. Cass, thank for doing this. I appreciate it. Hey, anytime. We haven't talked for a while. I think last time we talked was preseason and expectations and predictions were a lot different back then. I think you said the Bucks are going to be better than the Saints. No, I didn't say that. No, I said the Saints were going to make the Super Bowl.

Did you? I thought you said you thought the Bucks could be better. I thought they could be better. The Bucks could still win the division. You might not be wrong. Saints Chiefs was my Super Bowl pick. And I feel pretty good about that in the sense that this Saints team, the way that they were playing on defense especially, this is the team I thought they could be. It took a while to get there.

But the defense and the defensive talent ultimately shone through, they looked dominant on that side of the ball. I mean, a weird game against the Eagles, obviously, but that's a type of team that can jump on you with the hurt stuff. I thought they played great against the Chiefs. but the big question about this team obviously is whether the offense is going to be able to pick up its end of the bargain and have them be a true contending team going into the playoffs so after the loss to Kansas City after the last couple weeks after we've seen what they look like with Breeze back

what in your mind is just kind of the overall mood both in that building and just with the fan base in general about where this team sits and what chances they have in 2020 I think the fan base feels positive about how they played against the Chiefs defensively. I mean, I've actually heard a lot of fans say, oh, you know, I feel okay with that loss based on how it went. I think people are nervous about the offense, which, you know, it's not your typical saint's problem. But at this point, you don't know if Drew Breeze is going to come back and be the Drew Breeze he used to be. did he look rusty or is he just getting older and he's on the tail end of his career?

I mean, there's a lot of excuses you can make for him. They have no receivers right now. So, I mean, that's a problem. Yeah. I mean, little Jordan Humphrey scored a touchdown. So, I mean, that tells you a lot. But if it's the other issue and it's just breeze having taken a huge decline after having 11 rib fractures,

which is, you know, reasonable because most normal people can walk after that. that. Then what do they do? So fan base is a little nervous based on past years, past history, past playoff exits, but I think they do feel good about where the defense is at right now. And I think they should. And that's why I feel like they're going to have a chance in any playoff game because of how deep and how talented and how potentially dominant the defense is. But if you go back and you watch that game from the offense, I went back and watched all the breeze throws this morning, it doesn't look good. And it doesn't look good. And it doesn't look good. on several levels.

One, the Chief's defensive plan in that game was essentially, we don't think you can get open. The amount of just... Or throw deep. Yes. And the amount of sticky man coverage where you have guys with zero cushion and having no respect for their ability to beat them down the field. And honestly, guys running routes for people.

I mean, there were a couple different plays where you just had defensive backstowing exactly what was coming out of certain bunch sets and everything else. And that's why it's hard to know how much of this is on Breeze and how much of this is on the supporting cast. Because if nobody's open and you have a quarterback that has zero margin for error and he's hurt, then these things start to compound. And I'm just wondering if this is the version of the offense

that we're going to see for the rest of the year, or if Michael Thomas coming back or Breeze feels a little bit better, it's almost an unanswerable question at this point, whether or not this is exactly what we could expect or if there's a better version of this team two weeks from now. Yeah, I mean, I think you can't answer that question because some of their worst offensive performances came at the beginning of the year when they were a totally different team. I mean, they couldn't do anything against the Raiders. Now, I will say it's kind of well known in the building that Breeze does not play his best football in the first month of the season.

And I think that it's kind of reflected in the Saints record the last few years, or maybe not. just over some of the years. They have a tendency to fall into a hole to start the season, but part of that has been because of just God, awful defenses. So it's not like it's all on Drew Brees. But I don't know. I say that to say it's kind of known. Breeze likes a lot of time with his receivers to get the timing down,

to get the tempo and chemistry down, which is why it was important that he played last week. But at the same time, can he even do that if all his receivers are hurt? If Michael Thomas isn't playing until week one of the playoffs, if Marquette's Calloway is not coming back. He may come back this week. We don't know. Treyquan Smith has hurt.

So Breeze, it doesn't have the ability to establish this timing with the receivers. It's basically Emmanuel Sanders and Alvin Kamara are bust at this point. That's the problem is that it would be okay if just Breeze looked old. He's 41 years old. That's acceptable. At this point in his career, you almost assume he would. but the other guys look old. They had a play...

Jared Cook looks old. Jared Cook looks old, and that's the exact person that I was going to mention. They had a play in the second half where they had him as the single receiver on the back side of a three by one and Breeze threw a fade to him just down the field

and there's just no separation whatsoever. And that's what you see a lot. Even Emmanuel Sanders, who I've always liked as a player, is clearly in the back half of his career. And again, if there isn't going to be separation, and there is zero margin for error for what Breeze can do, I don't know if this version of him can overcome that.

And if he doesn't, and if this is a team that, again, is looking at, if it's not a first round playoff exit, let's say it's a division around playoff exit, I don't know what happens next. And I don't know if that is a reality that the Saints or their fans are quite willing to face when you consider what the last five years were supposed to be and what they ended up being. I think the fans know that, like in their heart. I think that's why they took the Eagles loss so hard, not because it was a bad loss or because they thought it was an inferior opponent. It's because they've seen this story before.

They've seen the Saints start slow, have this like resurgence in the middle, play lights out, lose to someone they shouldn't lose to, and then have a bad playoff loss. Now, Payton, Sean Payton, on Tuesday tried to say that narrative's not correct. It's lazy. They're not a one and done team in the playoffs all the time. He was pointing to the MC championship saying that was out of their control.

But the problems that presented themselves in the Vikings game last year are still there. Interior of the offensive line, pretty much exactly where it was last year, despite their best efforts to fix it. Breeze at times looks old. Wide receivers, not enough of them. Those were the problems against the. the Vikings, and here we are again a year later. So everyone's kind of bracing themselves for the worst case scenario.

And then what happens next is they have to dismantle this team to get under the salary cap. So that's why it's Super Bowl or bust. That's why everyone knows that it's got to be now because I don't think Breeze has another year in him. I think this is it. And I think he knows that. But even if he's gone, now it's that dismantling that will have to happen.

This was always going to be the best version of the Saints with this core, even before the salary cap dipped because of the pandemic. This was always going to be their best shot. Now, we're looking at an entirely different proposition. Do you have any sense if they fall short, if Breeze does move on? Who the non-negotiable pieces on this roster would be? Guys that you absolutely think would be part of the 2021 core if they have to start stripping this thing for parts.

Well, obviously, Camara and Thomas, but they signed new contracts. So that's a given. I think Ryan Ramcheck, that's a guy you have to extend. that's probably the first guy you extend. I think Trey Hendrickson probably walks. Marcus Williams probably walks. I'm just going through. Sheldon Rankin's probably walks.

Jared cooks for me a free agent. He'll be gone. Manuel Sanders, it could go either way. I'm trying to think of the goal for guys that maybe Malcolm Brown could be gone. I mean, Andres Pete just signed a new contract. So much to the fans' disappointment,

I'm sure he'll be back next year. Yeah, just all over. I mean, you build around pieces like Thomas and Camara, but there's still more pieces that they need to figure out. And they don't really have another safety waiting in the wings, even though Marcus Williams has been hit or miss. He's played well lately. Trey Hendrickson, I think you can absorb that blow, but man, that's hard to say when he's NFL sack leader right now. So a lot of people won't be in the Saints uniform in 2021. one.

And obviously the biggest part of that is Drew Brees, who they'll be paying for, whether he's on the roster or not. It's either $35 million or, I think $22 million. So you're not going to go out there and sign a free agent quarterback because you're already paying the price of a free agent quarterback. And you're paying you're not quarterback. Whatever Taysam Hill is, you're paying him $16 million. How much on a daily basis, how much time do you spend on over the cap or the spot track site? Like how many hours a day? Well, I was on it today for like 20 or 30 minutes.

I probably check it every day. So that's why I have some of them memorized. Like I know, I know Breeze and Tase him. But see, the thing about Tassum is like, I don't think that he proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he's the guy. So now what do you do? Maybe Sean thinks he's the guy. I don't know. That is the question.

There are 10 of those. Like, what do you do is essentially the story of the offseason for the Saints? because I just have no answers. I have no idea. That's why I asked. Obviously, Camara and Thomas. But outside of those guys, it's like, the people that comprise this roster right now

and the reasons we call it the best roster in the NFL or that I've called it that are guys like Trey Hendrickson and Marcus Williams. It's guys that aren't going to be the first ones that come to mind, but they're the reason that you have arguably the deepest team in the NFL. Those are already gone. now it's the guys that gave you the best starting roster in the NFL. It's just, it really is a disheartening thing I can imagine for people that root for this

team because this was the last best chance. And I just can't even imagine what it's going to look like moving forward. I'm belaboring that point. But it's just, I just can't imagine what it would be like to come to terms with this being the end when you look at the amount of talent that that roster has and what that defense looked like on Sunday and what it's capable of. And it's hard to watch some players like Cam Jordan who are not playing like they used to. And all of a sudden, Cam Jordan, who was so great last year and such a key piece of the team,

is a guy you look at and you say, is he done? Yeah. I don't think so, but I also think that it's a valid question because even though he's only 30 or 31, I want to say 30, but I might be wrong. he has been a guy that's basically never taking a game off he plays well now he plays about 70% of the snaps but he doesn't miss games and that takes its toll because you're playing through injury playing through injury playing through injury getting off-season surgery and then all of a sudden you wake up and you're not the same player he used to be you could argue he drew double teams at the beginning

of the year but i think that there's more to it than that so i mean you look at him what do you do with him You look at Tehran Armstead, who's been such a... They're two sides of the same coin to me. They're very similar on both on those sides of the ball. They almost like represent each other as a mirror image. Right. I mean, and they're not getting paid peanuts next year. They're one of, two of the biggest salary cap hits.

And what do you do if you don't have someone to replace them? And so, man, the saints are going to be shedding salaries left and right. They're going to be restructuring salaries. They're going to have to hope they, extend ram check so he's not playing on his fifth year option Marcus Lattimore huge question and then Marcus Davenport

I mean he's going to be around because he's cheap right now but he's not he hasn't played like the guy they wanted him to be when they traded up for him so God this sounds so negative for a team that has Super Bowl aspirations but it's reality and that's the thing and that's why it's so hard to come to terms with because I love the roster so much and so many of these names are guys that I would always attach myself to is like, oh, that's a guy I'd want to

build around. That's a type of, like, Trey Hendrickson is a perfect third rusher. Like, if you're building a roster, that's the guy you want as your just chaotic third rusher drop it in peace. There's so many, DeMario Davis is like that. There are just so many guys on this team. And the roster overall, I think, is the platonic ideal of how you'd want to construct the best football team possible.

And the fact that that team can fall short. again and there is left with all of these questions is just not something I envisioned before this season. So let's spin it in a more positive direction before we get out of here. If you had, and I, this defense is still capable of playing very well. The question is whether the offense can somehow find a level that can match that defense and, you know, let's see what the final product is. If you had to build a case for why the Saints are going to be more dangerous in the playoffs than we're making them out to be right now, what would you see?

say. I would say go watch the end of that Chiefs game and watch Drew Brie's run the two minute offense to perfection as he almost always does and tell me that that guy doesn't have something left in the tank doing this with receivers that if you don't live in Louisiana, you have never heard of. When you watch that, you think, hey, there's still something there. And I mean, 2015 Broncos was like dragging out the ghost of Peyton Manning, and they still did okay. So it's possible because the defense is so good, they can probably, I guess, gloss over the offense's problems,

at least for one round. Now, if you get Michael Thomas back, maybe that changes things. And so they get through a round, I mean, I assume they're playing the wild card round. I'm just, I'm going to go off that assumption that they're not getting the number one seat. I think that's a safe assumption.

It's possible. I wrote a whole story about how it's still possible, but it involves the bears beating the Packers and some other stuff. So anyway, I have now lost my train of thought, but I do think that it's possible. I don't think Michael Thomas is the be-all end-all, but I think Michael Thomas Gianthe Harris, Marquette Calloway and Treyquan Smith,

all not being injured does help. I mean, no, Drew Brees can't drag, this team to a Super Bowl, like, you would think he would have, could have, like, 10 years ago. But if he just gets something and the offensive line plays at all okay, I think they can make some noise because who else in the NFC outside the Packers are really going to come challenge them. I think that's fair. And I think it, a lot of it has to do with Michael Thomas. In your mind, if you had to guess, do you think he will be back for the playoffs? And do you think he will be at a level where he can contribute.

Is he going to be 80% of Michael Thomas if he comes back? Yes, I do think he'll be back from the playoffs. I actually thought Payton was pretty refreshingly honest about it. Sean Payton on Tuesday was saying, look, I mean, I watched Michael Thomas. I watched him have eight catches for, I think it was 80 yards the other day. He was grinding through it, but it just wasn't going to heal while he was playing. He said, if we can get him back to almost, almost, 100% by sitting him, then that's what they're going to do. So they made a choice to do that.

And I think, I kind of agree with him. It's a smart choice because what does it matter if you're the two or the three seed if you don't have your best player available? Absolutely. Or one of your best players available. I mean, also that just it's so weird that we've been talking about this considering a year ago, Michael Thomas was on top of the world. And, you know, God, I think it was exactly a year ago today. He set the catch record. But from that to where we are now, with him only having like 430 yards and just having the craziest year is so strange to me. But I think if you can get Michael Thomas back, Jared Cook reverts to pre-Tampa Bay Jared Cook. And you get one of the receiver to step up.

Maybe things are a little different. It's just so funny because it's not a disaster, right? It's not a situation like the Niners or a team where it's just completely torn. down. It's like a fun house mirror version of the Saints. Like everything is still there. It's just a little bit distorted to what I thought it would look like even a month ago. And I think that's the biggest question is can they straighten some of that stuff out before we get to the postseason? Again, unanswerable, but that is the question that will loom over this team. And if they can't answer it in the right way, it will

lead to many more questions as we head into a very uncertain 2021. Catherine, thank you for very much for the time. I really appreciate it. It's always good to catch up with you. I'm sure we'll be talking later on when the Saints inevitably make the Super Bowl after the very negative discussion we just had about them. Hey, and then you can tell me how your Super Bowl prediction was completely correct. I still think it's a good prediction, by the way. And I promise you I will. You really think so. You think that they can still make it. Yes, I do. I do think, however, if they have to go to Green Bay in the winter, and they're not 100 percent and it's going to be hard, but I think that they're

capable of it if they play at their best. I mean, they just look at what they did to Tampa Bay. Maybe they peaked too soon and that's always an issue. But I mean, they destroyed the bucks and that's not a bad team. I mean, if they play like that, which is a tall order,

they can beat anyone. I think that the defense is good enough to beat anybody. I truly do. And if you look at that game against the Chiefs, you just need to take advantage of two or three of the little openings that Kansas City gave you. And that's the best offense in the league. And if you can be 10% better than they were last Sunday against a team like Green Bay, I think they absolutely can beat them. The defense is,

it's not only the talent, it's the attitude they play with against those really good teams. That is a group that, in my opinion, kind of plays when they want to. And when they want to, they are extremely dangerous. When Marshaun Latimore is engaged, he's as good as anybody. buddy. And it's this, I think it's the same thing for a lot of the guys on that side of the ball. And if they're playing Green Bay with all the chips on the line, you will see the best version of this team. And when you, I think the best version of this team is still capable of shocking a really good team in the playoffs. I think you're absolutely spot on about Latimore. But I really think the defense played even better than those stats show against the chiefs because I agree,

everything stacked against them. Hendrickson went out, Williams went out. They had to play a cornerback at safety. They were on the field for 40 minutes and 92 plays. And also, they didn't get any luck. And if they just jumped on that ball in the end zone, maybe it would have been a different game if you had a touchdown instead of a safety there. And maybe not, but all those things. And when the game was over, I thought they can, that defense can play with anyone on their

best day. So let's put a button on this. If anyone is going to give me shit about how I just talked about the Saints, this is my final thought about it. I would love to see them play a better on offense in order to get the most out of this defense. I think it's a championship caliber defense, a slight upgrade and a slightly healthier version of the offense we saw on Sunday. They can beat anybody.

That's what I want people to take away from this conversation. Catherine, thank you very much. We'll be talking to you later. I really appreciate the time. Thanks for having me on. All right, guys, that's all we got today. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you to Seth Myers for dropping by.

Thank you to Chiaa, and thank you to Kattero. we'll be back tomorrow with our typical Thursday show, me and Lindsay, Christmas Eve. Until then, please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. Mean a lot to me. Also, please subscribe to the athletic. We're still doing our buy one, get one promo. Buy a subscription to the athletic. Get one free.

It's open until the end of the year. Sincerely suggest you guys do this. You will not regret it. The coverage you can get there is unmatched anywhere else. We'll be back tomorrow. Thank you so much for listening. Talk to you guys later. This was the Athletic Football Show.