The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The 10 mistakes teams make in free agency; Plus, breaking Geno Smith news!

Episode Date: March 7, 2023

Being tempted by the win-with QBs. Trying to fit square pegs into round holes. Falling in love with one-year wonders. Those are just three mistakes that teams routinely make in free agency. Robert Mays and Nate Tice dive into those and seven more as we kick off free agency preview week on The Athletic Football Show. Plus, the guys jump back on the mics right after wrapping up the show to tackle the breaking Geno Smith news.Follow Robert on Twitter: @robertmaysFollow Nate on Twitter: @Nate_TiceSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTubeToday's show is brought to you by...Atlassian: For projects impossible alone, visit www.atlassian.comPhilo: Sign up today at philo.tv and use promo code MAYS to get 50% off your first month2:00 Geno Smith, Seahawks agree to three-year deal15:26 Don't be tempted by 'win-with' QBs24:41 Square pegs/round holes35:07 Avoid the top of the cornerback market40:59 If a near-30 player just had his worst season, believe him43:44 Think smaller at tight end48:15 Remember, you're buying snaps55:42 Injured players stay injured62:25 You aren't special...that big deal for an off-ball LB isn't going to work for you, either65:40 Beware the name brands68:15 Beware the one-year wonder Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. Welcome to the athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays, joining me today. It's my good friend Nate Tyson. How you doing, buddy? Doing very well. Another feeling of deja vu, but I love this. And yeah, no, I'm doing very, very well.

How are you doing today, Robert? I'm doing fine. We already recorded this intro because we already did an entire show. But as we were wrapping up, as I was pressing stop on my recorder, Gino Smith signed an extension with the Seahawk. So a little bit later, the 10 mistakes we want to see teams avoid is kind of the kickoff of our free agent coverage this week. But we got to talk about Gino. It just happens.

So let's dig into it. Okay. Gino signs a three-year, $105 million deal with seems like $52 million in the first year, apparently the first calendar year, according to Jordan Schultz. I assume that means guarantees they'll go over the first two years. We'll see. But at first glance, it seems like this is similar. an overall value to the one that Derek Karside, which was three years, $100 million, was $60 million guaranteed.

What do you think about this for the Seahawks? I like it. That's kind of what I pictured as far as length. I'm curious what kind of like the off-ramps are after one year, after two year. I do like that language, though, in the tweet in the first calendar year. So that's very interesting about what that exactly entails. I like this though. Gino deserved to get paid.

This isn't like, and we're going to talk about our show, oh, one year wonders and all that, but I do think that his stuff and what he did is sustainable and made sense to me with the Cioxx. They nailed a lot of draft picks. They have a really fun collection of receivers. I like their tight ends. The defense is rebuilding,

but that's not Gino's fault. And I just, I understood why not wanting to kind of shake that up. And also gives them avenues. They got plenty of draft capital. They have to maybe want to tab another QB of the future. I don't know if they want to do that, but gives them options. And now they have, I think, a plus quarterback and above average quarterback that that's kind of going to be the market rate for that type of guy.

I'm interested when they can get out of it. How much of the guarantees are into year two? Is it a one-year deal? Is it a two-year deal? Because my biggest question with them, we talked about it last week with Michael Sean Dugar when he was on the show, how real is a quarterback at five? Yeah. Like, how real is it because would they want to go to that guy in year two?

Would they let Anthony Richardson sit for a year? If this is a deal where you're really going to have to play him for two years and he's going to be on the team for two years, it cuts off some of those conversations and some of those avenues, which they might be fine with that based on the way that Gino played. But, God, it's just amazing that we're in this place after where we thought the Seahawks quarterback situation was a year ago where Gino can get $35 million a year. It's like, that kind of makes sense. Right. Not even blinking. Oh, yeah. No, that's the rate.

That's the rate for him right there. He deserves it. I know a year ago, people were, the Seahs were getting rumored, I was maybe taking like Malik Willis in the first round. I was like their quarterback of the future. Like groom him and everything. So this is a far way away from that from,

but he deserved every penny of this. He played very well last year. And having another quarterback is not, or drafting another quarterback is not out of the realm of possibilities. It still isn't. They have two first rounders. They got a lot of other draft capital as well. But that's,

that's the thing. It's like a guy like Anthony Richardson, who I do think needs reps. This is kind of cut that off. So it's all about the off ramps, like we said. We both have said it now. But it's like that's where they can get out of this and where they can transition out of this. But also they can do this is because they nailed a draft class.

When you have a whole bunch of rookie starters on rookie starting contracts, it's fantastic and gives you a lot of money to work with under a sour cap. What are you looking up? I'm just looking up where their cap is this year. It kind of middle. Depends out. Depends on what he's going to get. They have $23 million.

Yeah. Basically currently stands. I'm sure they can free up some more. and, you know, with a couple little tweaks here and there. You know, Shelby Harris has only $3 million in dead money left on his deal. And there are plenty of ways that they could potentially do it, I would assume. But what type of team are you if Gino Smith is making $35 million a year for you a quarterback? You're in that.

This is I'm genuinely asking. Based on what they show last year, I think it's really they need the improvement on the defense. And I think that's a team if they get some uptech in their front seven. and some health benefits too, or uptick into health as well. In the NFC right now, that's a 10 and 7, 11 and 6 team maybe. I think that's where they're at, but I think they're a valid playoff team. I really do with Gino, a quarterback, and where their team situation is right now,

and the influx of talent they might get in this draft. I just don't know if I love it. Oh, wow. As like an overall team building choice, I just don't know if I love it, especially when you have that top five pick that you could use on a quarterback. Maybe they don't love the guys. Maybe I feel like enough of them are going to be gone, where they'd have to maneuver for one. But this just feels like a win now Pete Carroll type of move where it's like, oh, man, we saw what we could be with Gino.

If we signed him to this deal, like, we know what we can be with Gino. I just feel like even if he played well last year, a quarterback at this price in the tier that Gino's in, which even if we're being generous about what his season was last year, what is he? he's the 10th best quarterback The 12th best quarterback in the league. Yep, that's exactly what I was about to say. So 12th-ish. But like, do you feel better about Seahawks paying him

or the Saints paying Derek in a car? Like that's... I feel different about it because I think that the Saints had to do it. This is the only avenue for the Saints. You don't have a way to go get another quarterback. You're saying the Seahawks are committing themselves to a path. The Seahawks are at the beginning of something.

Yeah. The Saints are at the end of something. So the Saints, you're just trying to get any meat you can off the bone with this roster that you've kicked the can down the road on so many different times. With the Seahawks, you're in year two of this new regime with all these young players and with some of this access draft capital that you've created. So now if you're locked into Gino for the next three years, let's just say, or even the next two years, if he's going to be your guy at this price tag, now you're three years into that deal for Charles Cross. You're 75% of the way done with the deals for Tariq Wohen and for Abe Blucus. So the excess value you've created with those guys, you've pumped into your quarterback position to get the 12th best quarterback in the league.

So I understand their mindset, and we talked about this last week with Michael Sean. This is how they do it. Always compete. Always compete. Always compete. This is our chance to be a good team right now. I just wonder, are you putting a ceiling on yourself by doing it this way? No, I think you absolutely are.

I'm not going to argue differently than that. You can't spell compete without Pete Carroll. But I do think that it's, but I actually understand it. I think, I think this team made the playoffs and they were a fine team last year and they had a lot of holes in it. And I know in our discussion that we're going to have on the show is like not chasing last year's team and all that, but they're not chasing anything, I don't think. I think they have so much room for improvement even with Gino.

Even if Gino takes a half quarter step back, I really do. I just think that this is the, I actually think they're just playing with House's money a little bit here. Like really, literally money. And I really do think. I actually don't hate it maybe as much as you do or don't dislike it as much as you do because I understand the situation is. But we got to see what year they can get out of it. If it's all, if it's after three years, I wouldn't like it as much. If it's after two years, okay.

I'm okay with it. And you maybe can, you're grooming a guy this year or maybe they look at quarterbacks next year. But if you say they did take a guy at five, two years, not. with, no, he was not playing on that rookie deal, but maybe by that year three, there's that little window, kind of like a secondary window with this. And you know what I mean? Like there, I think that maybe it's kind of like they're trying to kind of have their cake and eat it too a little bit with this. But I don't mind it. I think they have room for growth and I think they have all that you can get an influx of talent on that defense, what I think could be a legit top 10 offense. I think they were for stretches of the last year. So I kind of understand the reasoning behind it. I get the reasoning behind it. I just, I don't know if this is the path I would have chosen. Oh, yeah. I don't know. I think this is fine. I think this is the path I would have chosen. It depends on what they do with number five, though.

The pick, the fifth pick is going to be very, very interesting. They can get a really good defensive player at number five, really good, because we're the quarterbacks, I think, are going to go. Let's say you give Gino the non-exclusive franchise tech. Okay. And he's making third. So it's three years, one or five. Okay. So the non-exclusive tag is $32 million.

Okay. A couple million over. I just, I would, I, again, To me, it's about the avenues you cut off by making this decision. And I just would have been more comfortable if it was a shorter term investment. That's where I'm at with that. Because I understand wanting him to be your quarterback this year and competing this season. You see an opening in the NFC.

And you maybe can see that opening over the next three years. But now this is your team if you're committed to Gino for three years. It does. And I just, because you had other avenues, I'm just a little bit worried about that. I get how they landed in this place because if you look at the NFC, we can do this. We can do this. It's wide open. We can do this.

So I get talking yourself into that. But again, now you have chosen a path. Look at their division right now. Rams are looking like they're on a fire sale. And they're doing what they're doing. The Cardinals are full blown rebuild mode. And then the 49ers are figuring out, yes, they have a talented team. They have a lot of questions to answer as well, especially at the most important

position of quarterback. So I think that's what the Saints and the Seahawks did today. It was like, we're paying for competence because this is wide open. I think that's their mindset as far as like going into this year. But again, like you're saying, it's all about the years after that and going it after that and the path that you're going on with that. But I understand the line of reasoning more for the Seahawks than the Saints because, but again, the Saints are in their own world as well. Even your what you just said where, yeah, okay, you know, if we get better on defense and if we do this and we do that, this sort of quarterback, you have to thread needles in order to get yourself over the top. I get it, but they were pretty bad at defense.

That's what I mean. There absolutely is improvement on the horizon. Yes. But we're going to talk about this a little bit later. This is the first thing we talked about in the lessons. Yeah, I know. The middle class quarterback, that win with quarterback, the margins become slimmer. And I think that they have made some slimmer margins for themselves.

That being said, good for Gino, man. Absolutely. To be very happy to do this based on where he was, I was looking at old free agent signings and going through it. And when he signed with the Giants or whatever for like one year and $4 million. Now you get three years, one of four million. for a guy that played really well last year. I just wonder if it is the most prudent path forward if you're the Seahawks, but I guess we're going to find out.

Yeah, this is the discussion. It's going to be fun. We have better discussions coming up. Yeah, you like that segue? All right, let's stick into it. Just to let people behind the curtain a little bit, I'm planning out how we're going to do the spring or the off season. In my mind, it's like, oh, we have to do all this free agency preview content.

Because in years past, and for whatever reason, that Grant won years stick with me. me more than the ringer years in terms of how we talked about free agency. And it felt like there was so much time to preview the class and the guys who were going to be free agents and what were we doing by position. And it feels like me and Barnwell had so many knocked down, drag out fights about like the value of ex-free agent that the Jaguars were going to sign. And when you actually look at the calendar though, when now that the season has been moved back a week, there really isn't that much time between the combine and the start of free agency. All we really have

is this week because even though the league year opens on March 15th, which is next Wednesday, the tampering period starts next Monday. So the free agency news cycle is going to ramp up immediately starting next week. We're going to have live recap shows every day next week rounding up all of the free agency news. We've done that over the last couple years. It's fun as hell. You and I are going to be doing it every day. So that's coming.

So we really only have five or so days to preview free agency. So that's what we're going to do over the rest of this week in our own sort of way. We're going to have five different, we'll say lists. They're lists. There's really no better way to frame it. We're going to have five different lists associated with not only this year's free agent class, but just bigger picture of lessons and takeaways from previous free agent classes. And we're going to start today with what you don't want to do.

Today's show is 10 mistakes that we want to see teams avoid in this year's free agency period that they have not avoided over the last few years, the typical pitfalls associated with this time of year that we want to dig into today. Yeah, it's great. We love lists on this show in some ways you before. Lists are great because it lets you just a nice little placeholders to just kind of expand on the topic as much as there's little as you want to. So it's great for a topic like this,

especially I think you and I kind of said this privately to you, so not privately, as I say on our podcast, is that like when we were breaking down position by position, when you're trying to get to dark horse running back candidates, and you start realizing, yeah, might be a better way to do this where we can still kind of keep it interesting

rather than I bring up Jalen Rashard for the third year in a row, as no team signed him as a cheapy guy for a third downback. But I think this is a great way to kind of, of expand the topics while also hitting up on maybe like you said, some narrative stuff or big picture stuff and also any way you want to shake it because that's what free agency is because every team treats it differently. The goal here is that we're going to talk about most of the big name free agents. The guys who are available, the guys who aren't available in some way, shape, and form over the next five days. And give not the Kendrick-Borne Award to somebody

as well. That's the most important, the Kendrick-Borne Award. All right. So I want to start with a couple things. I want to start with one mistake lesson, however you want to frame it. That's kind of in the news right now. And the place that I want to start is, do not be tempted by the win-with quarterback. And that's a certain subsect of NFL starters. And I think we saw one of them get signed today. We already did a recap pod with Nick Underhill about Derek Carlanding with the Saints. Now that we've gotten a little bit more clarity about the financials of that deal, I think it makes a lot of sense. It's essentially a two-year-60 million-dollar contract, and they can get out from under it with $27 million in dead money after a year two. They would

save, I think, $30 million in cash if they choose to move on after that year. Might be $20 million. I think that $10 million roster bonus they'd have to pay it in cash. So either way, you're saving. Triggers in 2024 for 2025 makes it $20-something a mill. So it's $17 million. The cap would have been like $50 something. So yeah, it's $20.

It's $45. The cap is $45 and $20. $24 right now. There is a $10 million roster bonus coming to him that will likely be on the cap in 2025. And that it was $17 million without that $10 million roster bonus. So even if you make him a post-June first. cut. I think it would be like $10 million in dead money in 2025 and then $17 million in $2026. It's a two year with a maybe three year. That's basically how you shake it out. And that's

what I wanted a lot of the teams in this conversation. We were talking about, all right, let's say the Jets hypothetically signed Eric Carr, what would the deal look like? This is it. The Saints had to pump down his 2023 cap hit even lower than the Jets would have. He's making $9 million against the cap this year. Because that's the spot this. Saints are in. But these are the types of deals, the types of timelines I wanted the teams in this conversation to explore because there are downsides to committing to these is really multi-year deals, three, four-year deals because if you have this type of quarterback, you're cutting yourself off to

the most effective quarterbacks that can win you Super Bowls, the true top five guys, of which there aren't very many, or guys on a rookie contract. So as long as you're keeping your avenues open while starting to compete. the sentence of true top five guys in which there's not very many, they might be top five. Sorry to catch you off, but that just killed me. So we have, obviously, the dirt car contract is over. The dirt car contract is just, it's 40 and slept. The dirt car contract is over.

So now that we have that settled, we have a couple more guys that are going to be in this conversation, Daniel Jones being another one. We didn't really talk about Daniel Jones. in the combine recap that we did, just because we talked mostly about the prospects with Dane. But now the Giants are going to have to make this decision. Even though he's their own free agent, it's still signing a free agent contract.

So if you're the Giants, the appeal of kind of talking yourselves into, okay, if we sign a similar deal to the one that Carr just signed, where it's really $30 million a year for the next three years, what kind of team can we build around Daniel Jones to keep us competitive in that window? That bargaining that you have to do with this sort of quarterback, I think is just a scary, scary place to be when you're a team like the Giants who's operating from Square One rather than a team like the Saints who's painted themselves into a corner with their options at the position.

I don't think the Giants people or decision makers. I have no insight on this. Think this way. Think they've made it. I think they're the victims of their own success a little bit as far as fandom and other people. people that view the team that they made the playoffs. And we talked about how throughout the year, how that's great because now they get more buy-in from the brass, from, you know, hey, this worked without these guys and we could do it this way or that. And it's just, it's kind of funny.

I think they're also going like, well, we were ahead of schedule last year, but that doesn't mean we want to commit to this. Like, we want to, like, we want to make this better. We're, we're building on a shaky foundation. Yeah, like, yeah, it worked for a season. But this is not how we want to, like, really build this team. This was supposed to be a reset, kind of quasi-rebuilding. clear out the cash space, figure out what they got. And they actually made the playoffs and won a bunch of impressive games where it's like,

oh, shoot, now everybody thinks that we have to sign this guy. So I think that's what they're trying to balance as far as a team and that they don't want to go down this path because it is hard. You don't want to live in this no man's land. It's like, yes, guys can always improve. You never know that. But that's a shaky, scary bet to make if you want to be pot committed to a guy like that.

Kind of a corollary mistake that I don't want to see teams make that's associated with the quarterback one. Don't build last year's team this year. Yeah. And don't recreate the magic or whatever. And I think the Jets are in that spot. And the Jets kind of looking at the roster they had last year and saying, all right,

if we dropped Derek Carr onto the 22 Jets, what does that look like? Well, it looks pretty fucking good. But that's not how any of this works. No, so it was the 22 Jets, not the 2023 Jets.

Who knows what your defense is going to look like? Who knows if you'll catch lightning in a bottle with some of these guys? Guys, we're going to talk about it a little bit later. If guys like Quincy Williams walk in free agency, if a guy like Sheldon Rankin's walks in free agency, obviously those aren't the stars on your roster. But if you start to lose the connective tissue because you're getting a little bit more expensive, teams only exist for one year. And that's where I think the Saints are to a certain degree. I understand if you're Kai Harley and you're Jeff Ireland and you're Mickey Loomis and you're looking at all your possible outcomes and all of your alternatives and saying,

if we drop Derek Carr onto the team we had last year, we would win the NFC South. we would be a playoff team and then who the hell knows. Saints were the oldest team in the league last season. Cam Jordan's 34. DeMarro Davis is 33. And I know that they did a great job of sustaining injuries and still being really good on defense. If any defensive coach at this point deserves the benefit of the doubt for his ability to put together a really good unit year in and year out, it's Dennis Allen.

But that's not always how it works. Right. So if you're trying to do that, we're like, all right, we're dropping this quarterback onto this team. You don't build it for the team that you had the year before. that you run into a lot of problems that way and kind of tying it all back to this idea of don't get tempted by the win with quarterback, it brings me back to the ultimate example of this.

In 2017, the Vikings had this really fascinating team where they were the best defense in the NFL. A lot of those guys were young, ascending, Harrison Smith, Daniel Hunter, Eric Kendricks. They had this really good crew. Xavier Rhodes.

They had just players everywhere, Anthony Barr. And they had an offense that I think finished second in DVOA that season. Way up there. Case Keenum, Stefan Diggs, Adam Thielen, Dalvin Cook was younger. They had a workable line, and

Case Keenom was a free agent. Teddy Bridgewater was a free agent. So they had their pick of quarterbacks and they had this money that they had earmarked for Teddy Bridgewater in their kind of three-year building plan. I think we've talked about this recently. And I remember sitting there talking with Rick Spielman on the little patio at the Vikings

practice facility during training camp about the thinking behind going outside and her cousins that year when they gave them that three or $84 million fully guaranteed deal. It's like, all right, well, we have this core of players. And if we drop this quarterback into it that is unlike quarterbacks that typically hit free agency, this is the way to get us over the top. But you're building the 2018 team in 2017 when you're doing that. You're banking on the defense still being as good.

And then you have this Vikings team that for the next three, four, five years now have been chasing it where it's like we're so close. we're so, so close because I think they're trying to just push it over the top from an idea that existed those five years ago. Chasing that high. That's what they got her doing. And I just, I would be wary of that if I were some of the teams that were looking at these sorts of quarterbacks. If I'm the Jets and I'm looking at Jimmy Garapolo, if I miss out on Aaron Rogers and you start talking yourself into, all right, if I dropped Jimmy Garoppolo onto last year's Jets, it's not that simple.

It doesn't work that way. It's just not that simple. So that's it. That's my first one. What do you got for me? No, I love that, but I just want to say, too, is that every team you can't predict who breaks out, who steps into a role and does so much better than you're expecting. Finding a quarter when you're expecting a nickel is not the nickel position, but five cents is actually that's where the value comes. Like the Quincy Williams name is the one, like that's what you're saying is sometimes, yeah, this guy might be a plug-in starter and we hopefully can get some, you know, play 800 stats for us. And it's like, oh, this guy's a good starter. That's where the value comes. But then you got to pay those guys and everything just changes. You're in your. out. So first one I got is understand what you're buying and don't try to fit a square peg into a round hole. So those are kind of related. For me, the number one example in recent history is the

JC Jackson signing from the charges last year. It's taking a man coverage corner, which spoilers for something later, taking a man coverage corner and dropping them into a totally different defensive scheme. Yes, a lot of NFL defenses have a lot of carryover with one another, but what they emphasize and what they live and major in is can really change from team to team. Another example I have for this is Corey Davis getting signed by the Jets. I would, I would say Jets fans were very kind of disappointed in Corey Davis's tenure there. But when you're signing Corey Davis, he's an auxiliary player that does a lot of the dirty work, but you're paying him star money, at least relatively.

It wasn't crazy, crazy money, but it was, you know, it was a move. It was saying like, hey, we're really bullsering our clothes. He was doing just five. He was doing fine. But, you know, so it was, but that was always the disconnect I had. And I could see where Jets fans would get disappointed where I was like, he's a fine, good player. But they're like, what they're expecting is an ace, a true ace. And so it's really understanding what the guy's role is going to be, even if the dollar account doesn't, it's saying something different.

So that's fan expectation, but that's also team expectation. That's also role expectation for coaches and scheme. I will, some coaches and some organizations are very good at working with the personnel department and going like, hey, these are guys that we would prefer for what we do. and there's some organizations that the personnel guys go, we like this player without understanding at all what their offensive defense does. And the guy this year who's going to break the bank just because of the market is Jacobi Myers, who I'm a fan of Jacobi Myers' game. You are as well. A lot of us are. He's an analytics darling. He's a useful player on third and fourth down. He plays over half of his snaps in the slot. And even though he's a bigger size guy or a decent size guy, you know, that is something that that's where he makes a living is a majority of his snaps are in the slot. So don't sign him and go, okay, went on the outside 80% of the time.

He can do it, but it's not like his real, real what he majors in. So just understanding what guys excel in is especially for teams explaining it to fans, but also just teams and personnel with their coaching staff as well. That is something that I think understanding what you're buying and understanding what the role of that player is going to be is so, so important. Yeah, it's just amazing how some teams look at guys. It's like, oh, yeah, he'll figure it out. Like that's not what he's ever done before, but he'll figure it.

out. And that's one of the benefits of pro personnel compared to college is that you actually know what he could look like in the NFL. Proof of concept. You don't have to worry about projecting him into this role that he's never filled before. Outside corners going inside and vice versa, outside receivers going inside and vice versa, I think is a really good example of it. Having past rushers that are in one type of scheme and you project them into a different type of scheme, I think there are a lot of different examples of how this can work out well and how it can work out poorly. And it's just amazing the teams continue to make that mistake over and over again. And the other one, too, is offensive line, too, when you got a guy that's maybe a pass-first, you know, past protector better than a run blocker or vice versa, a guy that's really good at run-blocking.

All of a sudden goes into an offense that passes it 40 plus times. Orlando Brown ended up working out, but that's one right there. They traded for him, but it's just a guy like that. The bills isn't going to break the bank for him, but Roger Saffold going to the bills, he's signed just a one-year, you know, kind of more or less a vet-men deal. But that's the same thing. He's a run-first, run-blocking guy, and they're dropping him to the bills pass happy. attack. It worked out okay. Yes, he got named a Pro Bowl, but that's name recognition.

But it's one of those where it's like understanding what they excel at. The guy that always comes up, and this is a personal example. This is when I was with the Jaguars. No, I was with the Jaguars. Jesus. My dad was with the Jaguars and they had an offensive line named Tony Paschos. And he is a road grading old school right tackle. And meanwhile

for a stretch that that team started throwing a ball 30 something times. And it was, why do you sign Tony Paschos? It's not to throw to ball 35 times a game. It's to run the ball 35 times. the game. But you just have to understand what these guys, what they are better in and what, what they are, what unlocks them and like to use them. It sounds so simple, but you'd be shocking what teams do to each other and self-savitage themselves just because they want to go and break

the bank for a name guy. The guy I think about in this year's class, what teams are going to do with Caleb and Gary where that he's somebody that was not asked to drop back very often. That's Tony Peschos. That's right there. A very specific type of offense. And when you're looking at all the guys available at that position of which there are several. You have McGarry, John Wain Taylor, Mike McGlenshy, how are you going to sort through those guys? And if you ask Caleb McGarry to do something that he's not very good at, you may be a little bit disappointed in the end. It seems like it's everybody's favorite talking point about the improvement of Caleb McGarry. I don't know where that came from. But it's, it was a early season talking point

on this show. But it seems to be, I'm pat myself on the back right now. But it seems to be one of those where you have to understand what he is. He's a run first guy and they protected him. They gave him chip help. A lot of movement stuff with tight ends of running backs, a lot of play action, a lot of nakeds. It wasn't him past protecting 12 straight times, you know, straight dropping back and pass protection. So yeah, understanding the role, that's a, that's a perfect one right there. All right. So what do you make of Christian Kirk? Because Christian Kirk is a guy that was signed for a lot of money. Money that is kind of top of the market receiver money or close to it, who we consider really a slot only guy. And if you look at his snaps about 75%

of them, 754 of 1100 total essentially, were in the slot last year for Jacksonville. But that offense, I think, really benefited from Christian Kirk being there. So sometimes I think it's about where are you at in your team building process? What do you really need? We slammed that signing last year. And I think there's a chance that it looks, you're looking at the limited resources this year. And if they stagnate a little bit and they really still needed to go out and get Calvin Ridley, there's so many different considerations, but I also think that in the short term,

sometimes those deals can look pretty good, even if in a vacuum, it seems like a lot for Christian Kirk. And last year where we did this show, we were talking about the receivers. And Christian Kirk was one of my, I thought he would be a good kind of upper middle class signing for already good offense. You pop him into really trying to truly unlock something. I think I mentioned him with the Chiefs as one of the teams I really would like to look at him.

And that's why I maybe was disappointed. It was the Jaguars. It's like, man, I think you build outside in with receivers. Like, that's how I picture a receiving room getting built. You built the guy, you want the guys outside that can win. And then you find the slot guy or you move guys around. So that is, like he had a very successful year. Also, underrated Doug Peterson and his ability to understand his personnel.

Evan Ingram is another example I know we'll talk about, but that's another guy that using him way better than any coaching staff had before and unlocking his gifts. He understands his guys really well. So that's something I underrated a bit, but that's still something. Snaps played is valuable, but limitations is also something you have to consider. If you're always going, man, we still need this. It's like, wow, but you're paying money for a guy usually that should be able to do that. So it's a luxury kind of player.

And what I mean by luxury is it's usually those types of players are the ones that you already have the other guys that do the hard stuff as opposed to a guy that has to be in one specific role. One of the biggest compliments I can ever give a guy, and I've said before, is a scheme-proof player. which is to your first point and really to my last point. And that's what Christian Kirk is. If he's slot only, that's why I ding him a little bit, even if he is a plus player. So while talking about both sides of my mouth there, but I think that's really what that signing is. There are some positives of it, but you have to understand the opportunity cost of what else you can do at that position. It's interesting because, I mean, his cap at this year is only $11 million.

The way that they structured it. It goes a big time in 2024, about $24 million. in. In 2024, they have some financial flexibility. They have guys hitting free agency. You know, Josh Allen, Calvin Ridley will see what ends up happening with that. Evan Ingram after he plays on the tag this year. So they might have to lose. The Calvin Ridley trade might be one of the most inspired moves in this past year if that hits. Like if he comes back to what he was, that's a true number one that went on the outside. That's like, holy crap. For the circumstances I understand, but it's like, man, geez,

that this is worth an interesting. This is worth mentioning to me, though, is that they go out and sign Christian Kirk to a deal paying him $18 million a year, and they still feel like they need to go get Calvin Ridley. The number one need was receiver at this office. And again, that doesn't make the Christian Kirk signing a bad one. I think it's just sometimes we have to distinguish between what on-field value a player provides based on what sort of surplus value you create with the contract that you give them. And with Christian Kirk, it's going to be hard for him to provide surplus value on that deal, but they undeniably are better on offense because they went out and signed Christian Kirk. And I think Jocobie Myers is going to be a similar conversation.

Yes, yes. The replacement level is so high at that position. You can find guys that are not as paid as high or middle rounds of the draft or the draft capital as high to have that role. Christian Kirk is one of the better ones at that role, but you can still find above average players at that role. And that's why I always struggle with it, even if he did have a good year. And yeah, it's just that I think you can find other ways to piecemeal it. All right. Speaking of my next one here, beware of the top of the.

the market cornerback contract. If you look at the last 10 years of free agency, there's a graveyard of these things, man. It's really brutal in some of these instances. A couple names. Tremaine Johnson, when he went from the ramps to the Jets, the Malcolm Butler contract that he signed with the Titans, J.C. Jackson last year, Trey Wayne's with the Bengals. There are a lot of instances of this.

William Jackson going from the Bengals to Washington. What's his face gone from the Raiders to the Eagles back in the day? remember that one too um when they built the dream team and he he ended up being okay but then they're like they use him the wrong scheme i'm blanking on his name right now ah sorry raiders the raiders the raider oh namdi assimoa not yes yes but that's other square peg roundhold conversation but yes sorry sorry to derail you you're i think that it's for a few different reasons here one coverage is volatile like who the best corners in the league are it goes up and down all the time very rarely do you have a 25-year-old player like Jalen Ramsey that was good for four or five straight

years was one of the best players in the league at his position that the Rams could go out and give all of that capital to whether it be draft assets or money. Those guys are just harder to find. And I think what the Patriots have done is kind of brilliant in understanding that. Stefan Gilmore is an outlier here. They signed Stefan Gilmore to a big money multi-year deal. But for the most part, the Patriots have kind of tried to squeeze what they can out of these guys on one, two-year deals when they acquire them. They traded for a keep to leap. He was there for a year and a half. He was second team all pro in his only full season with the Patriots.

They let him walk in free agency to go to Denver. They go get to Rieves. He's there for one year. He was a first team all pro and they win the Super Bowl. They let Malcolm Butler walk. They let J.C. Jackson walk. They're going to let Jonathan Jones walk. I think it's because paying up at these positions with how voluble.

cornerback play tends to be, you don't know where you're aiming with the darts that you're throwing sometimes. And I think that can lead to some real mistakes at the position. So this year, you know, James Bradbury was awesome last season. He was a second team all pro for me. It was a one year $7 million deal that he got from the Eagles. Do you want to now pay James Bradbury three years 60 if you're finding a looking for a corner and free agency? Or are you trying to find next year's, this year's James Bradbury. Bingo. The guy that's available for whatever reason that had a down year last year, you can get for a little

bit of a discount. And the other kind of model that I'm looking at with this, I've mentioned this example 20 times over the last two years. The Bengals went and gave Trey Wayne's that huge deal, three years, $42 million. When it was time to reassess the way that they were handling their secondary and free agency, instead of doing that, we were paying a ton of money for one guy, they split it up. and it's $7 million from it's $8 million for Mike Hilton. It's $7 million for Chedobiauizier.

So you're getting two potential starters for the price of what you spent on one potential starter. And in the secondary where it's a weakling system and it's about having capable players all over the place, I would be hesitant to throw huge money at any one position for guys hitting free agency on the back end, but especially corner based on the history. It really is. The cross-sport comparison for this position is really. pitchers in baseball. You just don't know. Like, yeah, there's some aces literally. That's what they're

termed in baseball, but also volatile. Like you guys get hurt. Guys come up out of nowhere. Guys fall off out of nowhere. And that's where it's kind of like you don't want to waste innings on guys that can't throw because it's damning. It's same with you don't always snaps on guys that can't cover. It's funny. The Bradbury discussion is such a perfect one. We've both been fans of his game, even if it was kind of a, it wasn't even that bad of year. It's just a little drop off he had the year before. If I had a pro scout that says, yeah, we want to pay him $20 million a year, I'd be like, why didn't we want to last year? That's another one of my lessons. So if you liked him so much and he was such a no-brainer to pay

him, why didn't you want to do it last year? I don't know about that. So that's exactly where it's like, I think this is where this is the middle market aisle. You shop in this kind of aisle. I think a guy like Byron Murphy, a guy that maybe has some stuff to still tap into has shown versatility. Those are the bets worth making as opposed to, no, we're dropping top dollar on this guy because then if he can't play or if he drops off or he gets hurt or any of those things that happens to corners. Corners age very quickly. As closer you get to 30, it's very scary if you ever look at the historical numbers. So why not pay for a guy that's in their mid-20s that you can maybe still get the best years out of them? It's just a, it's a scary position that you ever,

hard to invest in unless you truly have a Ramsey type, which is how many names have we just listed here that we would do that for? One. Really? Very, very few, right? It's very few ever. Every five years, there's usually about one or two, and that speaks to what the position is. Yeah, like Patrick Sartan will probably be that guy here over the next couple years or sauce, but it just they don't come around that often where you can just rely on them to be the best player in the league or one of the best players in the league at their position consistently.

And so this year is a good example, right? Like Bradbury is 2930. He'll be hitting free agency at the top of his market. Like he is, you're buying high if you sign James Bradbury this year. Marcus Peters is 30, right? So let's say you can get Marcus Peters at one year 10 instead of $18 million for James Bradbury, whatever it ends up being. I just think those are the sorts of bets that might be a little bit smarter and worth making

compared to guys that are going to get those massive, massive deals just because we've seen so many of those go sideways. All right, what's your next one? When a player is around 30 and coming off their worst season, believe them. Don't bet the outliers that you're all. something to tap into something and go like, we're going to stop this. We're going to stop the bleeding with this guy's career.

Numerous examples, the most recent one from last year's class for agency classes, Alan Robinson coming off his worst year with the Bears. And if you watched him play, yes, the Bears' offense was anything to write home about. But even when he was playing with Justin Fields, he wasn't getting open.

He was dropping passes. He was running sloppy routes. And for a guy that that's his game, kind of scary to also invest in him. Same with even Bobby Wagner. I know had like the high grades and everything. He was, even Bobby Wagner was coming off his worst year of his career. And Rams went and paid him.

Both Rams players, of course. Rams went and paid him to pay for old Seahawks Bobby Wagner, middle prime. That's what they were paying him to be like. And Bobby Wagner had a much better year this year, but it was a much more limited role. They hit him a little bit and what they asked him to do. So there's plenty of names for this. I mean, it's nothing. It's all sports.

Anything over 30 is scary. But believe them, don't think that you're going to tap into something. you might get something back in using the role better, using that player in a better role. But believe them. When they're coming off a down year, they played most of the games. Yeah, believe them that that's probably what they're going to be from now on, even if you get maybe a healthier year or maybe a little bit of an uptick. The example to me from last year is Chandler Jones, who he had 10 and a half sacks in 2021.

But if you look at the actual per the rate stats, the per snap numbers. It was great. He was 33rd in the NFL in past rush productivity, according to PFF. and that's only among players who played at least 50% of their team snaps. So, I mean, that's a second rusher at any team. And you're paying him a huge market rate contract. And you just don't need to do that for that guy, especially at that position. That position to me, every single year, Justin Houston's available.

Yeah. Like, there is a Justin Houston. That position ages well when you're paying the right price for it. Justin, Melvin Ingram. Like those are the guys I would keep coming back to. So if you want to sign a pass rusher who's over 30, just fine. Sign one year,

six million. Find the mercenaries. Especially because at that position, it's a rotation. Like all you need is snaps at that spot in order to kind of build that group up. So I'm totally with you. I mean, the Allen Robinson thing just breaks my heart.

But he's another very good example. Like, obviously two of my examples are two of my favorite players like in the last 10 years. Bobby Wagner and Alan Robinson. I love Bobby Wagner and Alan Robinson, but that's the truth. Truth hurts and that's kind of where they were at in their careers.

All right, my next one here, don't be afraid to think smaller at tight end. Not like the size of the players, but in terms of the swings that you're taking. Evan Ingram, to me, is the perfect example. The Jags sign Evan Ingram on a one-year, $9 million deal. Evan Ingram was a huge part of what the Jags were on offense last season. And I think that it makes sense on a few different levels.

We've seen how long it takes tight ends to hit, how long it takes them to really have a huge impact in their career. It doesn't happen for these guys right away. And so many of these guys are drafted in the first round, like Evan Ingram, Haydenhurst, Eric E. Braun. Jared Cook was a kind of elite bloomer at that position with a lot of physical tools. They've become really useful players on second, third team, second, third contracts, because it takes a while.

So if you can find a guy coming out of that first deal and you can get him at a discount, you can really find value. And Evan Ingram is the best recent example. And another layer to it, at that spot, let's say you get an Evan Ingram. It's a great one-year deal. I think, oh, man, we only got one year out of him.

The Jags just franchise tagged Evan Ingram. So over two-year stretch, they will pay Evan Ingram if he plays in the tag this year, $20 million guaranteed. How much guaranteed money you think John O'Smith got on his extension with the Patriots got his deal? Too much. $32 million. It's crazy.

So even with having to tag Evan Ingram, the Jags are going to pay $12 million less than the Patriots had to pay to John Smith on that massive contract. And I just, those one-year deals at that position, there's value to be found. And I think that if the Browns weren't so analytically inclined, David and Joku would have been one of those players. But it's not hard to keep finding those guys. So I would much rather if I, there aren't any real big name tight ends that I think are going to warrant those

sorts of deals like the one that Austin Hooper got from Cleveland, the one that John News Smith got from the Patriots. We'll see what Dolan Shultz gets. That Hooper deal was so huge. Oh my God. I mean, there's monster contracts. Monster deal.

Yeah. And so I don't think we're going to see those. types of deals. But if I were a team that needed a tight end this year, I would look at a guy like Jordan Akins. Yeah. Jordan Aiken's 30 was an awful situation with the Texans. He's a little bit older because he came into the league late.

But if you're doing one year, four million, one year five million for Jordan Aikins, who has some past catching talent, that to me is just so much more attractive than some of these huge tight end contracts that we've seen in the past just because there's so many examples to me recently of these one year deals or these short term deals for. for not a lot of money where you're really getting a lot out of those guys at the position. And you don't even know, like, Hayden Hurst's best year was this year, I think, of his entire, of his entire career because he got used in a perfect role for him, more of a spreaded out role for him, not a road grading role.

Like he actually, the Bengals used them perfectly and their 11 personnel stuff. The situation for that position matters so much and just the role that they're asked to do. Some of these guys, it's really hard to make a living in line as a tight end, down after down after down. And some of these guys get used where they don't have to do that. Maybe in their first stop, they had to be that guy. And now they can be more of a plus role player. And that helps some of these guys unlock and actually learn the game. It's a really hard position. I broke down the tight end class this year, an article last week. It's a loaded tight end class. It really is. I personally have eight guys with first three round grades, which I think is an astounding number.

Daniel Jeremiah said he had 11 in the first three rounds. Dane Brugler has seven in the first three rounds or a top 100, I should say. And it, but speaking to that, and this way I kept bringing up in the article was that, especially at tight end, it's a position that it takes time. Even guys, the Darnell Washington from Georgia, who just blew up the combine. If you look at this guy, you're like, oh, my God, he looks like a monster. And everyone, and I've noticed this, and this is maybe because I just want to get a draft take off real quick, is that everybody's saying, oh, my God, this guy's going to be an extra

offense of liming out there. He's going to set the edge every play. if you watch him, he's still a project as a blocker. And his highlights of him blocking are all in space, which is one, it's a good thing that he's a good athlete and he could show that. But he's not going to just plop in and be Mercedes-Lewis tomorrow. Mercedes-Lews took four years to become a good blocker. I think Mercedes-Lu is a perfect example, right?

Took forever. It took so long for him to kind of change the discussion about who he was as a player. That happens at a tight end all the time. All the time. It's a hard position with a lot of body types, but my theory, and I'll repeat this all the time, is you draft the big freaks, the big athletic guys, and hope they figure it out. And that's where you're trying to find the discounts.

Maybe we get this guy at the right time in a better situation. Evan Ingram's the best one because Doug Pearson understood how to use them horizontally instead of vertically. And I think that's like the 1A example of this. All right. What's your next one? My next one is if you're paying for snaps and not luxury players. And what I mean by that, and there's a couple ways I mean by this, but really you're paying for guys that are going to be on the field and give you plus play.

And so when you look at a dollar count amount, and I think our example that we came up in the pre-show and I'll just use it right now is Orlando Brown, a ton of money at left tackle for you're paying them a premium price, top-end price, potentially. That's what it seems like the chief said today that they're not tagging them. So that looks, there's probably a market now is if you pay for that, for what I consider an above average left tackle, wouldn't you want to break that up in some way and differently amongst other players to pay,

basically say he gets $20 something million, can we find two or three guys in that $24 million range and that plays snaps. Snaps matter. Snaps and first downs are kind of the numbers I'm going to look at for a lot of players, and I think that's where Valley comes. Because if you're on the field affecting the game positively, that matters. And if you find, if he's an above average player but you're playing premium price, you're not getting a lot of value out of that.

But if you pay two or three guys who are above average, paying them decent market rate prices, that adds up. It really adds up because now you're affecting the game in two or three ways. And I think that's where finding the guys that can give you snaps, winning snaps, as opposed to just the luxury guys, just because you want to pay sticker price, that matters. If you look at teams that I think have done a good job in free agency over the last several years, I think they've been really conscious of this. It's like, let's try to break it up and let's try to.

try to sign two or three guys for the price that it would typically cost to sign a top of the market guy. I keep coming back to the Bengals, but the Bengals have done the best job. I think of any team at wielding the financial flexibility created by their quarterback contract. How many starters have the Bengals found on defense through free agency? Most of them. I mean, most of their starters. And obviously they signed some big deals. Like the DJ Reader contract is a big contract, but you know, Trey Henderson is making $15 million a year when the top of the market, past rushers is making $25 million a year. Von Bell, Mike Hilton, Judobia Woosier.

I mean, the guys that they've pieced it all together with, it's multiple starters for what it would take. The Hockinson one's perfect. It's upper middle class, but you're getting upper class production. Like that's kind of right. That's exactly it right there, that contract right there. And the bills have done a very good job of it over recent years. You know, the bill's team building model of we're going to use free agency to plug holes. You know, it's going to be DeQuan Jones and guys like John Brown.

and mid-tier offensive linemen. That's mostly what they've done. Even guys like Micah Hyde and Jordan Poir when they sign them, those are monster deals. Those are modest contracts that they use to find multiple starters in free agency. So use free agency to plug holes,

not look for the true game-changing players on your roster. The problem is, in that Bill's model, they haven't found the game-changing players through the draft. That's what you have to do if you're going to follow this model. but I do think that is the ideal way to build your team. And the Orlando Brown, I want to talk about Orlando Brown for a second. I'm surprised they're not tagging him.

I was too. Because $20 million for a left tackle for even one year because the offensive line tag is a combination of all the positions, $20 million for one year of a left tackle is not that much of a premium to pay. But if you're, let's say you're the Bears, okay? You have Atlanta Brown hitting free agency. Left tackles never hit free agency. It is almost impossible to find a starting caliber left tackle in free agency.

It's one of the hardest positions to find outside of quarterback. We're forgetting out about Toronto Armstead being a free agent. He has a huge injury history and it's past 30 and he still got big money. That's how hard it is. It's very, very rare. Okay. So let's say that for argument's sake, Orlando Brown gets the deal in the Trent Williams, David-Baktiari range where it's $23 million a year.

Right tackles hit free agency a lot. And it's actually a decent spot to look for players in free agency. You know, Jack Conklin is somebody that the Brown signed. It was a pretty good value on that deal of $15 million a year. And we've seen that happen in free agency before. So the right tackle market is that about $19 million, that's what Ryan Ramchek signed for. So if you get Joanne Taylor for $16 million a year,

compared to Orlando Brown for $22 million a year, and you can sign another starter with that $6 million. Isn't that what you'd rather do? That's what I would rather do. Yes. Or you get drawn Taylor and the whole tight end discussion we just had. You take a flyer on the tight end. Boom, right there.

It just opens up more avenues for you because if you're pocket committed on Orlando Brown, now you can't take those flyers even if it's a middle range type of guy. It's just tough for me to justify those top of the market deals in free agency. Because I just feel like it's a buyer beware situation. Those guys are available for a reason. And if you're spending so much on them. the opportunity cost, it becomes so clear, so fast. And the JC Jackson one is the one that's obviously burned into my mind,

but we have plenty of other examples recently. Do you think that, okay, say they do, nothing happens to Orlando Brown. And they also moved on from Frank Clark today. And that saved like over $20 million in Capspace. Do you think something's cooking in Kansas City? Like a move? What would it be? I don't know.

I think that they learned lessons last year about, about spreading it out, right? So last year is a perfect example where I think that they've done a really good job of understanding the change in their mindset they needed to happen. When Holmes is on that rookie deal, grip it and rip it. Fuck it. Pay everybody. Pay tons of money for Frank Clark and give everybody this extension. And I think they understand that that world is one they can't really live in anymore. You have to be more modest. You have to be more thoughtful about the moves that you're making what they did at their wide receiver group.

Instead of giving Tyree kill all of that money, they go out and use a second round pick. on Skymore. They go out and sign to MBS. They go get a juju. It's like, okay, let's piece this thing together.

And I think that when your quarterback is at the stage that he's in and your quarterback can lift the players around him, that is necessary. And offensive line is a little bit of a different

consideration because I think they know that you just need capable players at every single spot. And that's probably what they're thinking is I don't want to give $20 million dollars to Orlando Brown when I don't need $20 million of production from that position.

I thought that they might pay it just because there's a certainty tax associated with that decision that I think would behoove them. But if they say we can find this for cheaper than that at a discount, maybe that's what they're trying to do. Who's the next to Orlando Brown that we can find? Right. Well, yeah, right. Who's somebody that, yes, yes. They're turning over every stone to fill that position. Well, that's also, even though they threw all the big money at Joe Tuny, that one always made sense to me because, well, Tunney's a good player.

but also he could play across the line. Yeah. So as they figured out the rest of the old line, boom, okay, this guy at least is going to give us plus play. This is the same discussion we had about the bears where I was like, you got to look from the offensive line that could play multiple spots because you're trying to fill it out and find your best five. It worked out touny is just, I mean, is amazing.

And also that was just another part of that deal. So the tuning one should bring us to our next one here. What's your next one? My next one is injured plays, stay injured unless you have the 2000s Phoenix Sun's training staff. And that's you can get Grand Hill to play. 80 games a year and all that. And that's a good transition from Joe Tooney.

Because the one thing about Joe Tuny is he's playing. He is going to be on the field. I know he got dinged up a little bit last year. But he had been playing forever. Perfect example. They signed Mitchell Schwartz in Free Agency. Mitchell Schwartz was on the field every single play. Guys need to play for you to get value off of them when they signed.

I was talking to a GM last year about Toronto Armstead. I was like, why not? Like why not to run armstead is cannot trust him to stay on the field. 11 games, 12 games. People love to Ron Armstead. But when you can't trust those guys, you're given a ton of money to to stay on the field. They become mistakes very quickly. Yes.

And it's also an opportunity cost in a money way, but also then you're paying money for Armstead to be your left tackle. And then now other guys have to move around. If he misses time, then, oh, okay, we got to put this guy left side. Oh, God, he's our starting right tackle. now our right guards kicked out. Okay, who's playing center now? You have to figure out all those kind of question marks. So it's like you're creating more like mental energy to figure out what all your kind of other dominoes might be.

And the other one too is like even in they're signing their own players here, but like the Chargers with Mike Williams and Keenan Allen, both great players. But they miss a lot of time and you're paying them a lot of money and they're not on the field. It's that double whammy. So now you're giving snaps to a better. Worseer. Oh my God, Nate.

Worst players. while also like paying much of your cap, most of your cap to those types of players that should be on the field. So it's that double whammy. Other one last year was Randy Gregory. Randy Gregory has battled injury issues in college. He battle injury issues throughout his time in Dallas, amongst other things. Denver pays him and he's not on the field a lot. And yes, he's a plus player, a good player.

But there's just that opportunity cost with that is most injured guys kind of stay injured. If that's their history, that's kind of, it's called an injury history. you know, it's not an injury one-off. You know, some guys, yes, you have the freak injury, but that matters. Playing those snaps and earning the contract matters so much in so many ways, shape, and form.

I'm trying to think of a good example from this year's group. I mean, like, Judevian clown is a very good example, right? Chauvinian clown has been hurt consistently all the time, but you guys that you just talk yourself and say, well, if he stays healthy, you know, what could that look like? It's just dicey.

Garapola, right? Like, if you're the jets. Marcus Davenport. Marcus Davenport's another good example. Yeah. That's a great example where if you talk yourself into the upside of it. And I totally could. I could see why you would do it.

Because guys, that talented don't typically hit free agency. It's like, oh, man, if this hits, like what could it look like? Well, if it doesn't, you're paying $18 million a year for somebody who can't get on the field for you. Yes. You're paying. There's one thing about like, okay, yes, are they worth the contract as far as the player and what they bring? like if it was a plus player, plus plus player. That doesn't matter. They have to be on the field to make it worthwhile.

So that's why injury is a whole another consideration, people that need to take into consideration in the draft and also in free agency because that does matter. All right. My next one here, you are not special. The mega off ball linebacker contract that you're about to sign is not going to work out for you. This is the scene from arrested development over and over and over again. I mean, just the list is brutal.

I know C.J. Mosley had a nice season, but C.J. Mosley is making a lot of money this year. A lot of money. And there's a chance that Quincy Williams walks because of how much they're paying guys like C.J. Mosley. Foyah Leukon, the contract that he signed last year. I know we had a lot of tackles. But this is a team whose run defense was abominable at the end of the season with a guy making $20 million a year, $19 million a year as an offball linebacker. They teams consistently just attacked them in that area and coverage in the biggest moments of the year. Joe Schobert, again, speaking of the Jacks, the deal that Joe Schrobert signed with Jacksonville, Corey Littleton, the deal that Corey Littleton signed with the Raiders. It just doesn't work out very often.

It doesn't. The history of giving a ton of money to guys at that spot, you're just often left disappointed. And the guy this year, if he ends up hitting the market, it would be Tremaine Edmins. If you're going to give Tremade Edmins a top-of-market off-ball linebacker contract, is just a dangerous place to live. we just do not have a lot of evidence that those deals age well and they don't take that long to age poorly. I'm talking one, two years where you're already thinking, how can I get out of this? Another injury riddle position as well that where if you paid them money and also they're not on the field.

Shaq Leonard is a great example of that. I know they're signing their own guy, but still, they give him an extension, but you're giving them money. I know not a free agency, but still. But Mike Foy, that's, it's because like even him, I created a stat in true. media, and I think I've said this before, about team success tackle rate. So basically, was your tackle led to a successful play for the defense? And I created that stat because of FOIA in his last year in Atlanta, because he had all these tackles.

But I was like, none of these are positive plays for the defense, though. That's a 70-yard gain on first down. That was a first down on second and four. And, you know, that's why you're, if you're counting stats like that, literal counting stats, but looking at that and that's what you're paying, that's also scary as well. You've got to find other do-shit stats. and usually you can find those guys in the margins. Quincy Williams is like the ultimate example.

I had him on my short list for second team all pro. And that really kind of is a little like that kind of speaks the position that they got this plus plus player out of nowhere. No one was expecting him. He was supposed to be a project safety on that you got cut by the Jags the year before. And also now he's out playing the big money guy. I think that's very significant. Also our guy, David Long. I mean, these last two bullet points about the injury history and then now paying off ball linebacker.

he's both of them. And I love David Long. But that's the thing. He's always been injured in his career because he's a smaller guy. And also if you're paying top shelf price, he's got to be on the field. And that usually doesn't happen at that position. Logan's $15 million a year. So just I want to be a little bit nicer than I was.

But that's still a lot of money. He's a fine player. He's a fine player. Those deals again, they can go south very, very fast. And it's just, we're talking about mistakes. You want to see teams avoid. That's when I want to see teams avoid.

Yes, absolutely. my last one and this is kind of a tie-in from kind of like previous points we've been making on this but beware the name brands when you can whip something together from the bottom shelves like when you can find rather than paying you know the top top market price for somebody and just whipping together hey the mercenary pass rushers and finding guys or trying a guy like my guy obo or crookwu yeah I don't know that that one I don't know I think I guess got it, but from the guy with the Texans last year and the Rams before, this is my whole argument about the Millsap doctrine.

This is the guys that, um, Nuwasu, like, hey, find these guys that are in the margins that you're, okay, I'm paying them nine million and a two year, you know, two year 20 million dollar deal. You know, something where it's like, if you break out, we're betting on that. I'd much rather take a chance on those types of players that might be ascending. Byron Murphy might be a little more expensive than that. But as far as at least past treasures and other positions, the guys that might be ascending, as opposed to guys that I'm going to pay, you know, upper middle class price here that really you're not getting any value out of.

This was my argument for Kendrick Bourne a couple years ago, but the Patriots went out and gave him big money and it kind of ruined it for me. So, or decent price on it. But also just piecing together, you know, again, this is the mercenary pass rush discussion, the Justin Hussons, the Melvin Ingrams, the Fletcher Coxes of the world. Clowny is now in this type of part of his career. Arden Key. Art and Key is a good example.

Yeah, Yanukwu, like, might be in this part of his career now, just a gun for hire year after year. Like, that's shopping in this lane as opposed to just the one big star price. I'm looking at the available past rushers right now. I guess Marcus Davenport's probably the best example, right? Where he's a highly drafted guy, he's showing some flashes. If that guy's going to get 15 million, what does Charles and Menahue get? Can you get it for half? You know, I think that those are the types of bets, again, that I would just try to consistently make when we're talking about how to allocate free agent resources.

Just because a guy doesn't have name recognition doesn't mean they're still not the same type of tier of player. That's just something. It's funny. And I'm not talking to people listening to this show. This is what teams do all the time. Well, this guy was a first round pick. You know, they do this all the time. But just because the guy doesn't have the name that you remember, even for me, mispronouncing half the name.

It's just that they're still good players or give you the same level of production. It doesn't matter what the name is on his back or what his draft pedigree is. Production is production. All right. My last one here. Beware the one year wonder. Okay. And this happens in a lot of different positions.

The one that I just can't get out of my head. And this is kind of a corollary to what you mentioned earlier. It was Nelson Aguilar. Where Nelson Aguilar was available for nothing when he signed with the Raiders a few years ago. And then he has that big year with the Raiders. and he pops and the Patriots give him all that money. So much money. Just look at the last few years.

Just do it over two years. Do it over three years. What is a guy really? Season's only 16, 17 games long. That one year can lie to you. Listen to a guy when he tries to tell you what he is over a multi-year period. This is weirdly kind of what I'm coming back to with the Daniel Jones thing. Just listen to it.

Unless you have a really good reason for a while, why he's a different player than he was in the past. And maybe we do with Daniel Jones. I just don't know if we do. I just think that you run into issues and you create problems when you do it this way. And I just want to see teams avoid that. Let's do it over multiple years. Nick Foles is going to be out of the league when he goes back to Philly,

but when he was in Kansas City and he's bouncing around, the Jags signed Nick Foles to a four-year $88 million deal. with $45 million guaranteed based on like one playoff run. Oh, man. That's their guy. Hey, that's the needle mover. Just don't tell yourself a story about one season or one stretch of games or just be realistic about what guys are. And don't talk yourself into it.

Well, he could become this. I just think that that is a dangerous way to live. Do outliers hit? Yes. but I live in a city that's built on people thinking they can hit on the outlier. I literally live and every building around me was built on people betting on outliers that didn't hit. And that's why they could be built. And I think that's something that you're betting on outliers.

It's going to be a losing proposition. Do sometimes they do hit? Yes. But that's even my little tiny example is like Devondre Campbell. The Packers got off the waiver wire essentially. And then all of a sudden he plays plus football for him and then they give him a deal. Yes, they can get out of it. It's not that crazy of a deal, but they still paid them.

And that's still something they have to fix and figure out when they're paying other players now. So that is it. It's one year wonders are a very, very scary proposition unless you're really talking yourself into it. And then that's even scarier. All right. That's all we got. Those are our 10 mistakes you want teams to avoid. I'm sure no one will listen to us and we'll have another free agency period littered with bad signs.

Thank you for the content. Yeah, that's fine. We'll take it. It's great. It's great. Tomorrow we're doing the 10 biggest wild cards in this year's free agent group. Widest range of outcomes, you know, widest range of potential salaries, just the guys that we cannot really put our finger on in this year's group.

So we'll talk more about this collection of free agents specifically. We're going to have shows like this coming throughout the week for you guys. Very excited about that. Between the lines, DeShon Reed's excellent new narrative podcast series about the black experience in the NFL. Episodes 4 and 5 will be coming your guys. his way on Tuesday, so please be on the lookout for those. We will also have Prospects to Pros and Football GM your way later this week. So a lot of shows are going to be in your feed.

Just let it happen. Just let it wash over you. It's going to be great. Exciting time, a lot of stuff to dig into. If you have not listened to our Derek Carr recap that I did with Nick Underhill from New Orleans. Football a little bit earlier, that should be available in your feed if you want to go check that out.

For now, that is all we've done. Got. We'll be back tomorrow. Appreciate you guys listening. Talk to you soon. This was the Athletic Football Show.