The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The George Pickens trade and the pass-catcher landscape

Episode Date: May 8, 2025

The George Pickens trade (mostly) brought to an end a busy offseason movement period for wide receivers. Davante Adams, D.K. Metcalf, Cooper Kupp, Stefon Diggs, Deebo Samuel, and Christian Kirk all find themselves on new teams. Ja'Marr Chase, Tee Higgins, Chris Godwin and Metcalf all signed big extensions. Ten receivers, including Travis Hunter, were selected in the first 70 picks of the NFL Draft, and reliable veterans like DeAndre Hopkins, Tyler Lockett and Josh Palmer also found new homes. What's the state of the wide receiver landscape after all that movement? Which groups improved the most? Which ones have us a bit concerned? And which ones are we sneaky excited to watch this season? Robert Mays and Derrik Klassen run that full route tree on this episode of The Athletic Football Show.Host: Robert MaysCo-Host: Derrik KlassenExecutive Producer: Michael BellerProducer: Michael BellerSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...⁠⁠⁠Apple⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠Follow Robert on Bluesky: @robertmays.bsky.socialFollow Derrik on Bluesky: @qbklass.bsky.socialFollow Robert on X: @robertmaysFollow Derrik on X: @QBKlassTheme song: HauntedWritten by Dylan Slocum, Trevor Dietrich, Ruben Duarte, Kyle McAulay, and Meredith VanWoert / Performed by Spanish Love SongsCourtesy of Pure Noise / By arrangement with Bank Robber Music, LLC Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. I'm Robert Mays. Slight pivot for you guys today. I know I promised you yesterday on yesterday's show that we were going to be starting our lingering questions series today, hitting some of the questions we just didn't have time to answer during the regular season last year. I ran into some issues accessing my film today,

and we had some news to hit. So slight detour. We're going to talk about the George Pickens trade, what that means for the Steelers, what that means for the Cowboys. Chat a little bit about the Jags, moving on from Gabe Davis today, and then use those moves to just talk about

past catching groups at large in the NFL. Now that the Cowboys are improved and they've kind of filled that slot we thought they needed to, which groups are we still really worried about? Which past catching groups are now the most improved now that the dust has settled for the most part when it comes to receiver moves? What do we think are the most impactful signings

and draft picks at those past catching spots this offseason? And which are the groups that maybe we are a little bit more excited to watch this year than we had previously anticipated or thought now that we kind of get to take a step back and look at those groups overall. So I dug into all of those questions with Derek Klessen. Let's get to that conversation right now. Not often do you get anything newsworthy NFL-wise, like really newsworthy in the first week of May. Typically, this is a quieter time as we get into OTAs, but the football gods have blessed us today with a little bit of news, though, we're going and chew on. We're going to use this as a jumping off point to chat about just receivers and past

catching groups in the NFL at large. George Pickens traded to the Cowboys from the Steelers here to dig into that with me and more about wide receivers around the NFL. It is my good buddy, Derek Kasten. Derek, how you feeling, man? Doing good. I almost am shocked. Some of this stuff didn't happen sooner. Usually, you know, maybe teams were also taking their one week break after the draft and being like, all right, you know, let's everyone just settle down. We'll think about shuffling the roster after the fact, but now it's a couple weeks later, and we do have some stuff to talk about. Like I mentioned in the intro, we were going to do our first episode of our lingering questions series today. We're going to push that back a week. I had some issues accessing my film this

morning, and so we didn't want to force that in a way that felt unnecessary. But again, we were blessed with a little bit of news. Let's dig into this. This is good timing because last week we did an entire show about the biggest questions we had left after the draft. and the question that led off that show was the thumbnail and the title for the YouTube video, all of this stuff is, who is going to be catching passes for the Dallas Cowboys? Because that's one of those moments where we expected them to draft a receiver. They didn't. And then in the immediate aftermath, you get the sell and the rationalization of, well,

they traded a fourth round pick for Jonathan Mingo. Like, they just expect him to be a contributor here. And then you, that hits your brain. You think, okay, I guess that makes sense. and then you take 10 seconds to think about it, and you're like, wait a second, no. No, that's not okay. That cannot be the plan. So the Cowboys, thankfully, do make a splashy move at receiver.

They trade a third round pick in 2026, along with a late round pick swap in 2027, to go get George Pickens and his expiring deal from the Pittsburgh Steelers. Your initial reaction to this move with Dallas going to get Pickens. I mean, they had to do something, right? It's like the Mingo thing. like, okay, you think about, okay, they traded a mid-round pick for him last year, but they traded him, they acquired him from a Carolina Panthers team that continued to throw resource after resource after resource at receivers. So clearly, if they weren't happy with it, then when

they needed receivers, this was obviously a huge bet. So they needed to do something. I don't know if I love the price. I don't know if I love the timing giving his deal. They're kind of in a weird spot because I, you know, we talked about the Cowboys before in the sense that they are probably always closer than we think when you have a quarterback like that. You have like a Micah Parsons. And so I could see why they think they want to be competitive and really get after it right now. Pickens just feels like a weird player to do that because after this year, he's going to get very expensive. Assuming you want to pay him. And then if you didn't pay him, you just throw a third round pick for a rental. Like it's just a lot of it to me, it's, I'm a little

up in the air about it. It sounds like Pickens doesn't want to sign an extension right now, which I completely understand. He's coming off of a down second half of the year, especially. It's been an up and down first three years in the league. Like, if you were going to offer George Pickens an extension right now, if you were Dallas, what would that number look like? Oh, I don't even. I think you're asking the wrong guy because I'm probably lower on Pickens that a lot of people. But read the market, okay? So let's look at some contracts that have been handed out recently. I'll give you an example. Okay, so I'll give you an example. Jerry Judy, when he's, he was traded to the Browns, signed a three-year, $52.5 million deal. That's $17.5 million a year.

Is that about what you would offer pick-ins in a similar situation? I think they're in kind of comparable places. Traded in the offseason, highly drafted guys, has been a little bit uneven. You can talk yourself into the upside. Maybe he'll be better for us than he was from the team he was just playing on. 17 and a half million. I think that's fair. Like, that's probably what I would go to him with if I were the Cowboys. But if you're Pickens and you have 1,200 yards and 10 touchdowns playing with Dak Prescott, you're not making $17.5 million a year next year. You're making $24 million a year next year. So I think that's why he's not overly incentivized to get this done right now, because he's about to play with the best quarterback he's ever played with his entire career.

That's a good point from his perspective. Like, going from whatever you want to call the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback situation the last three years to go. going to Dak Prescott, who one, is significantly better than a lot of the guys that he's played with. But also, what we've said about Dak for years is that there are very few quarterbacks who are willing to just throw at a guy the way that Dak Prescott is. And George Pickens, that's kind of all he does, right? He runs like three routes. He's decent with the ball in his hands. But his whole thing is like, if you throw him in the ball, especially near the sideline, he's going to go up and get it.

And they haven't had a presence like that since, I mean, probably Des Bryant. And obviously Des Bryant was a better and more dynamic player. but a guy that they could just throw the ball to on the outside. It does add something to the offense. I still am, again, hesitant that he's going to be like the Pro Bowl caliber potential player, but yeah, I do think this is good for him. I think the price is probably more than they wanted to pay. Initial reports are that they tried to offer a fourth round pick.

The Steelers weren't taking it. They held out for a third, which is a good job from the Steelers getting a little bit more out of this. They just traded a day two pick for their receiver. So you kind of need it back. And we'll see. they may need some ammo to try to go get a receiver of their own that they would rather have on this team in 2025 than George Pickens. So for the Cowboys, I do think it's probably the smoothest path to the most talents they could have

added at their receiver room at this point in the calendar. Would you say that's fair? I would say so, yeah. I don't know who else was going to be on the docket of this quality. And so even if I'm a little bit lower on Pickens and have some questions about like, how are they going to manage some of his, you know, some of his, the way that he likes to operate on the field with, you know, throwing punches and jazz like that.

But it seems like the Cowboys are typically okay with those guys. So maybe for them it's actually not a big deal. I think that's fair. They've been willing to take chances on guys for a long time. The one thing I will say, we've seen this happen recently over the last three, four, or five years where a guy that's been maybe a little bit of a behavioral issue in the Steelers locker room in ways we hear about. And then sometimes in ways we don't moves on to.

another team and then we realize very quickly how much of a problem they are and how much they need to be managed. So going from Mike Tomlin, who has been doing this for a very long time, is the longest tenured head coach in the NFL and has done this with a lot of different players at this position specifically to Brian Schottenheimer, who has never been a head coach in the NFL is an interesting bet. We'll see how much they can rein him in just personality management-wise, beyond whatever football impact they're hoping to get out of this. Yeah, you have that dynamic with the head coach where you're going from, again, Tomlin, the fact that Tomlin at certain points, like healthy scratched, Pickens basically, is kind of crazy.

But then also from Pickens' perspective, even though you're obviously playing with a much better quarterback now, you're going from kind of being the guy in Pittsburgh the last two years to you are very obviously not the guy in Dallas. And you just never know how some guys are going to handle something like that. Might be a good thing. It could be. It could be a good thing. That's a good point. Like it very well could be.

It's just one of the things that like until we, you know, seven weeks into the season, see how some of that stuff unfolds and how the targets are distributing and stuff like that. You just don't know how everyone is going to be, how happy everyone's going to be with the way the offense is functioning. From a skill set perspective, I think that it's a good bet for the Dallas offense. They needed somebody like this on the outside. And because of what CD Lamb is, a skill set like this fits in very well for you.

Just imagine what that offense felt like when Michael Gallup was playing well. And now you have like a big bodied ex-receiver that you can just throw the ball up to. And we know that DAC is willing to do that. So this sort of skill set within the offense, I think, was absolutely necessary. Even if they paid a little bit of a high price in order to do it. And honestly, I'm just encouraged to see them doing something, right? Like, so for the last couple of years, the Cowboys have just been to like, come on, do something

meme where we're poking them with a stick. So even if it's a little bit over aggressive, something like this, giving up a third round pick, it's better than not doing anything at the position, just being like, we'll roll with Jonathan Mingo and Jalen Tolbert and we'll feel okay about it. It's a nice change of pattern. That's a good point. Like there are sometimes where I need to accept that even if I didn't love the execution of whatever the idea is, the idea is good, which the idea is go get the best receiver that

we can on the market and actually be aggressive in a way that they haven't in, I mean, Lord knows how long really. And so they, yeah, sometimes I just need to accept that like this could work out better than I think, and I love the idea of it. So that's already a good sign for them. It is pretty telling, though, that the Steelers, who don't really have another option in their receiver room, even if there is redundancy with D.K. Metcalf and George Pickens, we're willing to move on from him for a third round pick.

I don't know what the Steelers do now. You look at it at this moment. You have D.K. Metcalf, you have Robert Woods. You have Calvin Austin, who they like more than I think the outside perception would tell you. And they have Roman Wilson, who was hurt last year. year. We'll see what he can be in year two. But I still think there's going to be something else coming here. I don't know what that's going to look like. A couple names I would throw out. Is this an Amari Cooper team? Does that make sense with a DK McAf? Potentially. Obviously, he had a big fall off at the end of last year. But if you just want to take a chance on a guy a little bit later in free agency. And the other name I would throw out, even though he's done a good amount of work outside of the numbers. And I still think he might work with Metcalf and he could be available at the right price just based on their current situation. be called Green Bay, see if they'll take like a fourth or fifth round pick for Romeo Dobbs, see if they would be interested in that.

That'd be the one guy, I think, could be available based on when his contract expires and what the rest of that room looks like where he is. Honestly, that's a fascinating question. I don't know who is actually the available receiver in Green Bay. You could tell me that maybe it's Dobbs. It might be Dante V and Wicks with some of the frustrations. I think they've had with him recently. Dobbs is a free agent.

That's, that's getting free agency. That was, that's the thought there. I guess that makes sense that if they don't want to pay him and it's already going to come up, that would make sense. And I don't think you draft Matthew Golden if you want to pay, Dante, if you want to pay Romeo Dops. Probably not. That's a really good point. But then also speaking of the draft, they drafted Savion Williams and they signed McColl Hardman, which are two guys that would do a lot of the same things that they ask Jaden Reed to do. So, like, is he more available than we think? Like, I just honestly finding out like which Packers guys actually on the block. is very fascinating to me. Yeah, the Dobbs thing is just, again,

just kind of reading the T-Lives with where his contract is, but I wouldn't be surprised if the Steelers did one more thing, a receiver, along with whatever their quarterback situation is going to look like. But good on Dallas. It's a decent amount to give up at this stage of the calendar, but I'm much more interested in watching that receiver group than I was yesterday. And I think that's when you're sitting in our position, that's really what matters.

The other big bit of receiver news today, Gabe Davis cut by the Jacksonville Jaguars. This isn't necessarily surprising given what they've done this offseason. They draft Travis Hunter second overall after a trade-up. They go get Diami Brown and free agency. What is surprising is they wanted to get rid of Gabe Davis so badly that he was going to count, I think, for $6 million against the cap, if I'm reading it correctly. And now, because he had an option bonus that they turned into a signing bonus, I believe,

so it prorated. So he only had his base salary, signing bonus proration, and the option bonus pro-ration against the cap this year. And so it was only going to be like $6 million. And they cut him. And now they've incurred a $20 million dead cap hit by cutting him. Maybe that'll change. Maybe they make him a June 1st stuff we don't know right now.

But as it currently sits, that's my understanding of the situation. So them giving him $24 million guaranteed, including, I think, like $14 million guaranteed in 2025 when he wasn't going to be in their long-term plans. He probably could have seen this outcome on the horizon. even when they sign this deal. This seemed like a Jaguar special where it was a contract that was signed for him only to be released.

This was definitely on the horizon. What I will say, I think what we're learning about James Gladstone is that he is very intent on making it clear that this is his show now. This is not the old roster. He is, if you are not a very obviously useful player from the previous regime,

take your shit and go. And Gabe Davis was one of those guys that like you could absolutely talk yourself into why he would still be a functional player on this team, even if he's only going to be your wide receiver four or whatever. Maybe you like the size, maybe you like some of the blocking, whatever. But I think Gladstone was like, if this is not clearly part of the offense, and maybe Cohen as well, if this is clearly not going to be a useful part of the offense,

let's just move on from as many guys from the last regime as we can. And I probably would have done the same thing, so I don't blame him at all. It's just, it's funny how between this and the hunter trade, how intent he is on being like, this is a very different era of Jacksonville football. just playing the Rams hits. The Rams have never been afraid of that money. They'll move on from guys even if they had to eat a decent amount of it. They'll throw picks around.

Is there a team you think makes sense for Gabe Davis? Like looking at wide receiver depth charts around the league right now, the Jets is the team that I would throw out, but it's like we already have a Gabe Davis at home. Like they have Josh Reynolds and Alan Lazard already. So I'm just not sure how much that necessarily makes sense. You know, a couple more teams that we'll talk about that have holes at receiver.

Is there anyone that jumps out to you initially as you think about potential Gabe Davis landing spots. I mean, like if Cleveland just wants bodies, I don't really think that that's a bad idea. I mean, Washington truthfully still needs some bodies. That's the exact team I was thinking about, just to kind of insulate yourself a little bit. And they don't have big receivers to begin with.

Like even disregarding like, you know, maybe do you need depth? Is Debo going to get hurt, blah, blah, blah. Debo is kind of your biggest guy. And he's, well, Noel Brown's a big guy. No, Brown is like they're dirty work. I guess that's a good point. I guess I conceive of him a little bit differently than I do Davis,

where in my mind, Brown is a little bit more over the middle of dirty work, whereas Davis is a little bit more vertical as a size threat. But no, that's a good point. But still, either way, you can see the role for him, right, for Gabe Davis. You can see why he would be useful to a team like that. Yeah, Washington is one that definitely jumps out because even your depth right now, right, is Noah Brown and Luke McCaffrey. And so you don't really have depth outside.

and getting one more guy just, let's say Debo gets hurt. Let's say McCorn gets hurt. I mean, we'll talk about this in a second. Things get dicey in a hurry if you're Washington. So I think that's, those are two teams I would throw out. And then the last one, again, and I wonder if they wouldn't want to do this

just because you don't want to block some of the young guys from potentially getting opportunities. But I look at Tennessee and like the makeup of their receiver room with Van Jefferson and Lockett other than Ridley. And just, again, kind of similar to the way we conceived of the Jags when they were going to try to bring back Calvin Ridley. It was like Gabe Davis can be your ex-receiver so you can move Ridley around a little bit. So I think that's another team just as you think about the roles where it might fit.

But I wonder if they just wouldn't want to add somebody else to the mix there because they drafted two guys in the fourth round. And that's a good point because they are not in a position where they need to really win now anyway. So it doesn't matter if you think Gabe Davis is going to help you today where I think a team that obviously does need to win now. Do you think he kind of makes a little bit of sense in Detroit? Right. Like they are a team where right now they're kind of betting on the outside that Tim Patrick is going to be healthy. Obviously, they traded up a lot for Isaac Tesla. But is he really going to be able to play 40 snaps a game out of the gate? Like this is just the guy where it feels like if you want to give the younger guys a runway, have a little bit more depth. Davis actually does kind of make sense for them. I think that's a good one to throw out. And the last one that I would potentially mention just had it and I lost it. Oh, the Raiders. Yeah. Right. You got Jacoby Myers and Joe.

Jack Bess, and you really don't have, like, a big body outside the numbers receiver that you could throw into the mix. He'll do a little bit of blocking for you if you want to be a run-heavy team. So Gabe Davis, I think, with the Raiders is another team that I think is still a little bit wide receiver needy. So those are probably the best options if I were throwing them out there. Davis would absolutely tell us that Chip does want to run the ball 400 times this year. All right. Let's take this conversation a little bit wider. We're going to use some of the wide receiver movement today in the Pickens Trades,

specifically to just talk about past catching groups around the NFL as a way to reset a little bit because I think the Cowboys were a group that we were pretty worried about before making this move. Now you're a little bit less worried. But I want to use this to kind of talk about some teams that maybe aren't as settled or maybe in a tough spot and some teams that have improved over the course of this offseason. So we're going to take this a couple different directions. Now that George Pickens is in Dallas with CD-LAM, who is the wide receiver or past catching room that you find yourself most worried about right now? I had a few.

I still think the Steelers are in there. They should be. Yeah, now that they are, because, so obviously them getting D.K. Metcalfe, even if we're just doing the one for one with Pickens thing, I do think he's a slight upgrade over Pickens. The problem is the rest of the room is still not filled out at all. Like, they're kind of banking that Roman Wilson, who was injured last year, for a lot of last year, at least, is going to suddenly kind of become a very useful player for them.

And I liked Roman Wilson coming out of college, but given that we saw almost nothing from him last year, that's a little bit of a scary proposition. And then obviously I think the jets are in there. I think those are probably two of the clearest ones. And then I think you get to some other interesting teams. Like, I think the one for me that in terms of it scares me the most relative to their expectations is actually still the Chargers pass catchers.

Like I, it's a very fragile unit is the way I would say. Like if everyone's healthy and playing well, okay. I don't know how long we're going to get that. Yeah, you're very close to having to rely a lot on Trey Harris. Like the moment that Mike Williams gets hurt, Trey Harris kind of becomes a load-bearing pillar in your offense. And that could work. I think he's an interesting player.

I like what kind of skill set he brings specifically to that offense. Like, is a big vertical body. But second round receivers, it's a crapshoot. Like, it could work. It could not. There's really no telling how good he's going to be and how quickly. So yeah, they're pretty close to having to rely on a guy they drafted in the second round as like a pivotal part of their offense. Because their leading tight end is still Will Disley, which last year when they made the signing, it was like, okay, this is a good, let's just get an adult here.

We're going to check this box. It's going to be fine. And then I think we all assumed, okay, next year they'll do something interesting. They'll sign another guy. They'll try to draft someone. And it was a great tight end class. And they kind of just passed it by. And it's just so a lot of questions still on this past catcher unit.

I think those are a couple of good teams to throw out. The Jets, right? The Jets outside of Garrett Wilson, we've made jokes about it. It might not matter based on how they're going to approach their offense. But I still think that it's a room other than Garrett Wilson that probably needs some additions. That's probably coming next year, but they still need some reinforcements. The Browns. Like that Jerry Judy is now your number one pass catching option in that offense.

Cedric Tillman had some nice moments last year. But the fact that they didn't add any. receivers to that room. They go get Harold Fanon, and I assume they're going to be a 12 personnel team and a heavy personnel team, so they're going to have to rely on that. But it's still a receiver room specifically that I'd be worried about. We touched on Washington. Like right now, let's say Debo gets hurt, okay?

And he has been banged up. Let's say he gets hurt and you lose him for six weeks at some point in the middle of the season. What are we doing now? Now it's Terry McCorn and Noah Brown and Jalen Lane, and we'll see if Luke McAfrey can come along for you in a year two, but that's a fragile group. You talk about fragile receiving rooms. So that's one I would throw out. And then another one, these guys are literally fragile. Depending on when Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed are back, the Saints could be in a pretty rough spot early in this season. The only reason I coped myself out of putting the Saints was

yourself, Alvin Camara, who like technically is not a receiver or a tight end, but you can throw him the ball a shit ton, which again, it's a different calculus. It almost is more like a run play, but that was the only reason. But that is a good one. Like, you just never know how much you're going to get out of those two. And like they're trying to sign Brandon Cook's to like at this stage is Brandon Cook's going to give you a whole lot. So they were another one.

I did have two more in this category that I was a little bit scared of when I look at what they are. Tennessee, I still have some questions about. Like Calvin Ridley is fine and I like some of the stuff they did. And they're not in a position where they need to be good right now because, you know, young quarterback, you're trying to rebuild. I think it's fine that they're at where they're at. And the more I look at the Seahawks, outside of Jackson Smith and Jigba, I'm like not really buying it.

I can see where the puzzle pieces fit, but I'm not buying the quality of it. I think they can get by for this year. We'll see what they can potentially get out of Torrey Horton. And the Cooper Cup is still a useful player. And I think he got paid a lot of money when you look at the AIV, but they're not committed to him really beyond this season. I am surprised they didn't attack the position a little bit earlier in the draft. but I'm also not because I get how they spent their early draft capital, right? Like everything they did made sense.

I just think that any time you're going to move on from a guy like D.K. Maccalf and you have other holes on the roster, there is a chance that you come out of the entire offseason without a proper replacement. It's just a very different feeling group than it has been over the last couple years. You have MVS as your big vertical body there and he fills that role for the, you know, we know what he is. He is what he is. We don't have to dress it up.

You've paid, you're getting what you pay for with that, where he's making five, six million bucks a year. You know what he is. But other than that, like essentially swapping out like Tyler MBS for DK.K. McGaff and Tyler Lockett for Cooper Cup, it's just a very different sort of room that it has been over the last couple of years. I mean, before they got JSN, it was really Lockett and Metcalf, and they were using all that 12 and 13 personnel in 203,

I think mostly in 2023 when they were a little bit better. up. I mean, those are like the two, that was the most vertical receiver room probably in the NFL with those two guys. And now you just have a very different sort of group and a very different sort of offense. And so I think that there's probably a little bit there where we're having a hard time processing it because it's such a shift. I think there's, that's a really good point. I think there's some of that. And then I think there's also, I'm doing a little bit like the Chargers thing where it's not a bad room, but because you actually have soft. aspirations of being like a pretty competent and functional team that maybe I'm changing the bar

a little bit compared to some of the other teams that might not be so sexy right now. I'm also, I have a lot of JSN shares and like keep her fantasy league. Well, he's the bright spot. So I'm probably talking myself into like the 150 target JSN season as part of all of this. I mean, that might be where we end up with that group. Let's go to the other side of the spectrum here. I want to talk about the teams that you think are most improved from a past getter perspective. You know, we're going to touch on this in some ways as we go through all of the off

seasons. But I want to dig a little bit deeper on this position group specifically, again, kind of in the wake of the pickings move. There are a couple teams that jump out to you as you look at what those patch catching groups look like now compared to what they looked like two months ago where you think they've made real strides. Yeah, I've got two, one going from like horrific to hopefully functional and then one going from good to hopefully great. The bad to functional is probably the Patriots, right? Like you signed Stefan dig. And if he's, you know, if he's, again, only 70% of what he used to be, that's fine. That's better than a lot of what you were playing last year.

You sign Kyle Williams, who we like. Matt Collins, again, it's like MVS. He is what he is, but he serves a role and he's going to do something for your offense. And then even in the backfield, Trayvion Henderson is a pretty good pass catcher and gives you a little bit of something there. So they've raised the floor a lot, I think, for them. The other one I would throw out is the Rams, obviously. One, you sign Devante Adams. And so even though they lose Cooper Cup, I still think Adams is,

one, a better player right now than Cooper Cup, but also gives them a little bit more outside, you know, usefulness than I think Cup was at this stage. And then I love Terrence Ferguson as a tied in. And I think he gives you a little bit more juice, a little bit more fluidity over the middle of the field than a guy like Higby did. So I really liked a lot of what they added. If it's from what the 2024 group was as a whole, I think it's definitely the Patriots, like adding Stefan Diggs. I'm excited about Kyle Williams. They have Travian Henderson now. I think the overall competency of that group is just going to be in a different tier. If it's from where the receiver group was at the end of last season,

I think you kind of have to throw the Texans in there, right? But at the end of last year, it was Nico Collins and Hutchinson and just not much else. And now you have Nico Collins, no matter what happens with Tanktell, you have Nico Collins, you have Christian Kirk there now, and then you drafted both of the Iowa State guys. There is a chance they have a glut of receiving options on the Texans this year, even if the receivers, you know, come along, even if the rookies come along at a rookie pace. So I think based on where they were in those playoff games and where they are now,

it is potentially a very different feeling group in Houston. I like that framing a lot because I didn't really think of it that way. I was trying to think of, you know, what was in my mind the ideal version of whoever this team's offense was last year versus what we're getting now, whatever, I think the ideal version is supposed to be in 2025. But that's a great point because I think when I was looking at the Texas, I was like, oh well they technically had digs in dell last year and obviously it fell apart for them but i wasn't conceiving of it that way but given again what this team was in week 18 or 19 if you want to call it

for the playoffs compared to what they are now got a lot more options and i think a lot more uh players to work with for sure are there any and there are any other options even like any other options even as i like look at all the depth charts is anybody were leaving out or anybody that's on the line for you i think those were kind of the obvious answers for me those to me were the obvious answers for me. Those to me were the obvious. And then I think the other one, at a certain point, you're kind of just betting on rookies, right? Like, you could say Carolina if you want and just betting on McMillan. So let's save that because we're going to talk about the most impactful picks from this group. So let's save that. I think this is, you know, to kind of tie a bow on this

point, which teams are most improved, you know, we'll get to the most impactful signings and picks here in a second. It wasn't a huge offseason for receiver movement. And so I think that's worth acknowledging too. I mean, the prize of free agency was Devante Adams who didn't even really hit free agency, right? He signed before free agency started because he had been cut. Other than that, I mean, the biggest free agent contracts at receiver to be handed out this offseason were to like Josh Palmer. There weren't that many guys available. And even in the draft, there was Hunter, McMillan, and then you went a little bit deeper into the draft before you even got another receiver. So it was a decent receiver class, but not a very good one. So I don't know.

think there were a ton of investments at that position. So it shouldn't necessarily be surprising that there aren't a lot of groups that feel a lot better now than they did at the start of free agency. Yeah, this was not a very seismically shifting pass catching off season. A lot of the, a lot of the rooms you feel the best are about are just like young guy is going to take another step or he was incredible last year. Like you look at the Jaguars and it's like, okay, they added Hunter, but you're excited about them because we already saw Brian Thomas Jr. be incredible. So like it's just not a whole lot movement. All right.

We're going to take a quick break and they're going to come back with what we think are some of the most impactful moves at receiver that have happened this off season. You allude to this a little bit. I wonder if you have any others. Who do you think is the most impactful signing or pick at receiver that has happened over the last couple months? To me, it's Devante Adams. And it's the easy one, right?

He was the best available veteran that you were going to get because a lot of the other guys, you know, the T. Higgins, Chris Godwins, they all went off the board. And Adams, again, it's not just that he is a. better quality player than Cooper Cup was. And I do think that that's true. It's that Cooper Cup was still, even though he can play outside a little bit, he's not really going to be that much of a vertical presence for you. He's not going to be a speed threat from the outside. Adams can be a legitimate run your backside dig route type of player. You can just throw him the ball on any type of fade, any type of vertical thing. He is going to be a true, I can win and separate one-on-one guy,

which they haven't had in a while. Like they were betting on two-two at well to be that guy for a while for them. And if anything, like, you know, saw some flashes on some of the dig routes, but that was kind of it. And even for as good as Pooka and Akua is, he is not a separator. He's a bully. He backs you down in the paint. Like, that's the style of player he is, which it works. Obviously, he's a all pro level player. But Adams brings something that's so different

that they've been missing since the O'Dell Beckham run. And I think I'm not going to do that, you know, that because they're running it back like that, they're going to go make the Super Bowl again. But I do think it makes the offense more dynamic in a way that they were definitely missing. that's absolutely the headline grabbing one right like and i think everyone is excited about that move it makes sense like the moment that it happened it was kind of like of course like we probably should have made that connection uh much earlier based on what they need and what he's bringing to the table anybody that's like one or two lines down for you that you think is within at least spitting distance of what that adams move was for the ramps in terms of i mean like again josh palmer i do think gives something to the bill that is probably going to be useful. That's the one I was going to say. It's, I mean, again, because not that many guys signed.

And if, you know, you brought up a great point a while ago when we were talking about this, if he can just do some of the stuff they thought Amari Cooper was going to do for them or did for them in like the first few weeks that he was there and then kind of tapered off, that's probably enough. And I think they expect him to do a little bit more than that, but I think that would be useful. Other than that for me, it's probably just the rookies in terms of like big time impact that I think we're going to get.

like I would probably say Tetaroa McMillan and then obviously Travis Hunter. I was going to take us to the picks next. So McMillan Hunter, obviously those guys drafted in the top 10. Any others that you're like when you see now where the guy has landed and you see the receiver room that he's in, you're like this can be, if not transformative, then make this feel like a very different sort of offense than it felt like before other than McMillan and Hunter. In terms of the guys that were picked, I mean, it probably is Kyle Williams actually,

who we've already talked about, but they don't have anybody. who is a true vertical get down the field guy. Like last year, their best bet for that was Kishon Booty. Like some of Drake Mae's best throws were just throwing go balls to Kishon Booty. And if Williams can be a better version of that, maybe have a little bit more where he can run some more posts and some more double moves, a little bit more flare to these routes. I think that could knock something different.

So he is probably the receiver pick. I feel the best about outside of the obvious guys. Yeah, he was the one. I was going to ask you what your favorite, like sneaky impactful signing your pick was. he was going to be mine for just a draft pick. That and Trey Harris. I think that Trey Harris has a chance to be, they're going to have to rely on him.

And again, it's a crapshoot when you have a guy that you drafted in the second round. But I feel like he is the sort of player that they just didn't really have last year. Like, Quentin Johnston is a big bodied fast guy, but he's not really a good vertical receiver in the way that I think Trey Harris can be for that offense. Like, it's just so easy for me when you think about the way that Trey Harris was used at Ole Miss and what Justin Herbert is to imagine Justin Herbert throwing like javelin post routes to Trey Harris within this offense, right? It's so easy to see.

Like I've seen Herbert make that throw 100 times and I've probably seen Quinn's drop it a dozen times against the box like his rookie year. And Trey Harris isn't that fast. He's not Jalen Giten fast, but like being used in a similar sort of role, it's just not hard for me to connect the dots there. But Harris is bigger. So if he can just get a half of a step and Herbert gets a, enough air on it, Harris can go up and get some of those post routes.

So Harris is a good one. He brings something to that offense that they don't really have right now. I'll be curious to see what the makeup of the receiver room is in Houston. Right? Like, I don't love Jaden Higgins as a player. I don't love him as much as I like J.O. and Noel in the draft. We've talked a lot about this. But I'm really curious because I went on a Houston, a Texans podcast during the season last year.

And it was late at night. and we had a really good conversation just about where the Texans were at. It was actually this offseason, excuse me. And one of the co-hosts was talking about how much he loved Jaden Higgins. And one of the reasons that he loved Jaden Higgins was that he felt like by going out and getting a big body guy like Jaden Higgins, they could start using Nico Collins in some different ways. And so, and I hadn't really thought of it in that way. And then when the Texans drafted Jaden Higgins, we were exchanging some messages.

And I was like, you called that. Like, it's a good way of thinking about it. And now I'm like, okay, it's a different system with McAaly. Like, it's not going to be the same offense even if it has some shared DNA. And so the ways that you're using those receivers are maybe a little bit different. So just the deployment of all of those guys in Houston and how impactful or important those rookies are going to be. That's one that I'm really curious to see how that shakes out. And you mentioned Tennessee, like, I just don't know what to make of that room and like what the roles are going to look like and how impactful or useful the rookies are going to be.

but I have to imagine they're going to get a lot of opportunities. And then the last one is just what the bears are going to be. Like what Luther Burden and DJ Moore and Roman Dunesay and Colston Loveland are all supposed and Cole Comette are all supposed to be within the same offense? I can get there. Like if Luther Burden, if you're going to have this offense that has a ton of condensed formations and it's all and, you know, the lines between slot and outside start the blur and you're going to create all these yak opportunities.

In the abstract, I do understand it, and I do understand how these pieces fit into it. It's just hard to envision the nuanced differences and how you're going to use a DJ Moore and a Luther Byrd. Maybe the right answer is they're not different at all. You're using them in the same exact way. Maybe that's the place that they're landing. You have a BS offense. Yeah, well, the guys are just supposed to be interchangeable.

Like maybe that's how you're thinking of it. but that's one where my imagination just I haven't been able to get there with it yet. But I do think the burden is talented. And like there is a chance that he is really impactful from day one if he's utilized in the right way. I'm like mildly scared that they kind of just spent a second round pick on what might be a gadget player, a lot of the ways that they were trying to use James and Williams early in his career.

But if he's good enough at it, that it's probably like. James is the 11th pick in the draft. I know. Right. Well, that was, that's a whole other thing with the Jameson Williams and how he's, how long it took him to come along and why. But if he could just be that, for a second round pick,

that's really not that bad. The last thing I want to say is going back to Houston. The Higgins thing is a really good point that it might unlock Collins in some ways. Because I think forever, we've talked about that with CD Lamb, right? Like, oh, you need another guy in there so we can use CD Lamb in all the ways that we want to.

I guess I just never conceived of Nico Collins that way because you just don't need it. Like, he's already amazing and he does all this stuff. stuff that I just didn't think of it that way. And then I also think if they want to be a little bit more of an aggressive rushing team, you kind of need bigger bodies like Higgins who can maybe throw their weight around a little bit and help blocking. Because for as good as we thought, maybe the dropback game could be last year with Dell

and Diggs, they're not moving people in the run game. And so I wondered if they just wanted some more bodies there. All right, before we move on, we're going to take a quick break. All right. So last thing here, I just wanted to ask you about the groups now that most of them are fully formed. that you are maybe more excited to watch than you thought at first glance. So who are a couple of those options for you?

So I have one like cheating one and I have one actual one. My cheating one is that so when I thought what I thought the Bucks past catching room was going to be three months ago, I thought it was going to be Mike Evans and Jalen McMillan. I thought Chris Godwin was going to be gone and I didn't know who they would add. Now it's Mike Evans. Chris Godwin is back. they still have McMillan and they drafted a Mecca,

Bucca, who I think is a very, very good player. And so even if it feels like a crowded room to me, it's a much better room than I thought, again, we were going to get three months ago. So there's that one. That was cheating, but I will take it. It is cheating. I will accept it.

But it's a little bit right, really. If you thought about what the bucks might be before, they let go Godwin, it was like, it's a different room than it is now. My actual answer is the Cleveland Browns. And this is not a unit that I think, is going to be good necessarily. I'm just kind of fascinated by how this is supposed to work out

because we've talked a little bit. Stefancy's probably trying to run the offense a little bit more like how he wanted to three, four years ago. I think that could probably be good for a guy like Cedric Tillman. And he's probably going to get a bigger role now. Quinchaud Judkins is a guy who catches a lot of passes. Last year, the Browns were had the fourth lowest percent of targets to running backs. And Judkins, I think, is crazy considering what they used to be.

I know exactly. It just feels like it was such a separation from what Stefanski was when this offense was really good. And so Judkins, I think, helps them there. And then they drafted Harold Fanon, who I think is going to help them get back into 12 personnel and kind of stretch the field that way. So this is not a unit that I'm like, oh, I'm excited. They might be like top eight pass catcher unit. It's more just like I'm truly fascinated to see how this thing is supposed to work out. That is the commentary and the thought process of a very discered.

person. I don't really deny that. I can't wait to watch the Jerry Judy Quinshaw Jenkins, David and Joku, Harold Fanon,

Dylan Gabriel Browns is the statement made by a very unwell man and I seriously appreciate that. I'll follow that up by saying I'm excited to watch the Raiders. Like whatever this is supposed to be with Brock Bowers,

Jack Besh, Jacoby Myers, and then whatever pass-catching Ashton Genti is giving you, Michael Mayer thrown in there. Like, it's just like an island of not, I say misfit toys in the sense that they're positions of strength and there are guys you're going to rely on that aren't necessarily the centerpieces of other passing games, right?

Like, that's all I'm massage this. I think that's what Bowers is for you. It's like if you created a pie chart of like where most teams funnel their resources and funnel their targets, it's like the majority of the pies towards the receivers. but with the Raiders, it's like them and the Niners who are just in a completely different world in the way that their offense is probably going to function.

And even the Niners have Ayuk and the Raiders don't have an Iuke. I like Jacoby Myers, but yes, I think that's correct. And again, we made a lot of comparisons about what this Raiders team felt like earlier this week. And I think the early Andy Reid chiefs is a place where I landed and I think that you could kind of easily see some of the comparisons there.

So that one is an answer for me. You kind of alluded to this earlier, talking about Travis Hunter. I'm very excited to watch the Jags receiver room. And I even include Diami Brown in that mix. I liked the Diami Brown signing. I get why they did it. It's just one of those moves where going back and watching,

I don't know, I probably watched all of Diami Brown's targets from last year all we were doing our free agency shows because there were only like 50 of them. It was pretty easy to do it quickly. And I watched the way that Washington was using him, especially in the screen game. And it was like, oh, I get that. Like it just as is a screen guy within that screen game that Liam Cohen is likely bringing to Jacksonville, like I get wanting somebody like that at that price in a world where we didn't know if they were going to be able to have Travis Hunter. So that group of past catchers, even without Gabe Davis now, like, I can get on board with that. Like I do think that is going to be a fun group to watch how they use Hunter, what his role looks like with Brian Thomas Jr.

And I think part of the offense is doing a lot of the lifting here because of how much fun that group was. as to watch last year. But I do think that Liam Cohen has shown us that he kind of deserves the benefit of the doubt when it comes to finding interesting ways to get the ball to his playmakers. I think that's true. And I think some of what Cohen's best stuff last year was screens. And a lot of that was receiver or running back screens. But if we can assume that Diami Brown is going to get a little bit of work in the screen game

and the jet game, I can see where his role is going to be. And he's, I think of him in the same way that we thought of Marvin Mims last year, where it's like this is in theory a guy who is a smaller vertical guy, you know, your Taylor Gabriel or something like that. And then the coaches at some point realize, well, what if we just gave him the ball immediately and see if he can do something? And it worked out in both cases. And so, um, honestly, getting Diami Brown for a one year, $10 million flyer when you just need another guy to help Brian Thomas and Travis Hunter. So it's a pretty good, pretty good signing to admit. What a fascinating pairing of guys who were signed to that contract this off season. It was Diami Brown and Tutu at

well, got the one year $10 million deal as like the third receiver role player on their respective offenses. And they, I think combined probably like way less than Vita Vaya does. Any more? Any other groups where you're just like, all right, now that the dust is settled, like I'm very excited to watch what this is going to look like. I've got a couple. I mean, I am pretty fascinated by what we're going to get out of the 49ers.

Like, because one, we just don't know what we're going to get from. CMC. Kittle, I think, is still going to be pretty good. But then Iyuk is coming off of a season where he wasn't healthy. He ended his season not very well. And then Ricky Pearsall, I think he showed some nice signs at the end of last year, but we just don't know, like, how much volume is he really going to get this year. And then they actually signed a guy I forgot to mention in my sneaky signing that is good, DeMarcus Robinson, two years, $8 million.

That's actually a pretty good, like, hey, we just need a wide receiver three to be an adult and give us some okay snaps here. And I think that was a good signing. So how they formulate that room, how they bring along a guy like Pierce-Sol. I'm pretty interested in that offense with everybody else. And then the other question for me is when does IUC come back? Because when I was looking at potential moves that the Steelers could make or a team that was wide receiver needy, Juan Jennings is going to be a free agent after this season.

But I wonder if the Niners wouldn't be willing to move on from him. One, because he's a very useful player within that offense. But two, let's say IUC isn't back until the middle of October. do you want to chip away at your receiver depth by trading away a good player just because he's hitting free agency next spring? I think based on where this team is and the fact that they still want to win games,

that would probably surprise me. Yeah, I think that's a really good point because with the IUC thing, they're probably thinking, okay, let's try to get by until maybe late October and then he can give us the push that we need to be a really serious playoff team.

But what if you trade away Joan Jennings early, IUC isn't back, and then you go like two and four and five. Well, then DeMachus Robinson becomes like your number two receiver. Right, which, which listen, DeMarcus Robinson serves a very important role. I don't know if he should be getting wide receiver two looks this late in his career. Two more that I'll throw out at teams that drafted rookies in the first round.

And I just think the way that that changes the overall makeup of the room, I'm curious to see it, the Packers, just like what Matthew Golden does to that group? And can that be kind of the skeleton key that unlocks everything for you? I mean, I know it's hard to rely on rookies that way, but we've seen first-round rookie receivers make a pretty immediate impact on some of these teams. And we've hit on this a lot over the last two weeks

since they drafted him. But the skill set that he is bringing is just a skill set they haven't really had. I think people are looking at what Matthew Golden is and they're looking at the 40 time and they're just thinking of him as this like speedy, vertical receiver. And I just, that's not, he's not like, he's not like Matthew Golden.

Yeah, I just don't. I don't know. Even if he is like Brandon Cooks, Brandon Cooks is not just a speed receiver. Like Brandon Cooks was a fully formed outside receiver who was a little bit undersized. Like, Matthew Golden and Jaden Reed are very, very different players.

And so I think that conceiving of Matthew Golden is like one more guy with a similar skill set thrown into the mix of this Packers Pass Catching Corps. I've seen that, I've seen people say that a couple different times. since it happened, I think that's just a misunderstanding of like what type of player Matthew Golden is. It really is. He is not one to one for Wix, but he serves more to me like that similar role where he's supposed to be your one-on-one beat or your slasher, you're that type of deal. He is more

that kind of explosive rather than the just run straight, be good at that. Like that's what they have Christian Watson for. Yeah, exactly. And I think that's that's probably the right comparison, right? Like Watson is more of like a speed vertical player. I think that Golden is a vertical receiver. but to me it's about what he can do off some of those vertical stems. It's about some big outbreakers, dig routes, comebacks, things like that where you're having a guy that if he's one-on-one with somebody on the outside, you trust that you think he can win. They haven't really had that guy. Like that's been their problem is that they didn't have that guy last year.

So teams could just say, we're going to play a ton of man coverage against you because there's no one we think in this receiver room. when it's not schemed up for them that is going to win a one-on-one opportunity consistently. The entire point of bringing in a guy like Matthew Golden is to potentially add that skill set to your room. And I do think he brings it in a way those other guys haven't really over the last couple years.

If it works out, like in the best outcome, right? Of course. And it's fascinating to me because I just like, who gets bumped out of the rotation? Because it's not just that they already have a crowded room to begin with. It's that they also want to play a lot of 12 personnel, because they have tight ends that they really like. So it's like you might not only get bumped out of the receiver rotation,

but there just might not even be as many receiver snaps to go around for the other guys. So Golden will obviously get his fair share looks, but it'll be interesting to see who else gets kind of bumped down. The other one, again, you think about hierarchy and how it's established when you add players of a certain caliber. And that's how I think about Carolina too. It's just now when you have McMillan in the mix there, what it does for Legat, what it does even for, you know,

Jatavian Sanders and just the other players that they have in that room, I do think that the whole offense, even if I didn't love Mick Millen to the degree that some other people did, I think the whole offense makes a lot more sense now when you add somebody with his skill set into the mix to the point that I enjoyed watching the Panthers in the back half of last season with the guys that they had. Now you add him in there with Legat and Jalen Coker

and some of the other pieces that they have. I'm actually very curious to see what they look like and what they play like. I really am too. And like they have a lot of young tight ends that you just don't. Like Jadavian Sanders they drafted last year. And he flashed a little bit, honestly more than I thought we were going to get from him as a rookie. And then they draft Mitchell Evans, who's probably just going to be more of a boring, you know,

tight end two type, which is fine. But like they did add a lot to this room. They even tried to bring back Hunter Renfro, you know, from the Raiders, say what he had to year off. That's right. That's right. I'm more just like, I'm not obviously expecting him to do a whole lot for them. given that he's taking a year off, but I am curious to see, like, does he still have something?

He's not that old, so that one was one of the more interesting signings at the off season, I feel like. Yeah, and then I'll agree with you on the Bucks one, even though it's cheating. Like, just dropping a Macah, Buga into that room is just, like, so stupid. It's definitely cheating, but that is one that, like, none of us had foreseen that the Bucks were going to take a wider seefer. And again, we talked about it. And when you think about Evans' age and Godwins' injury stuff and all that, all that, it kind of makes sense why they would want to add an extra body. I just didn't think it would be the second best receiver in the draft in the first round.

It's just not how I thought they were going to solve that. I'm looking at the teams that didn't add a receiver either in free agency, like a big, like a real receiver and free agency or in the first three rounds of the draft. Okay. And which, what those teams are. Some of them are very surprising, right? The Browns are surprising. The fact that the Browns didn't really do.

anything there. They signed Deante Johnson, but like Deante Johnson's a flyer at this point. At this point. So that one's a little bit surprising. The Dolphins, Nick Westbrookina was their big splash. Not surprising based on what they've invested in the position. The Falcons, not surprising. That is a position where they've invested a lot of resources over the last couple off seasons. The Cardinals, more surprising. A little bit more surprising that the Cardinals did not add everyone. So there were like four or five teams that really didn't do much at all at the position over the course of this spring. Some of them make sense.

Some of them maybe make a little bit less sense. The Cardinals are, there's such a tough one because I do, I would have liked one more body at receiver. Maybe a guy who's a little bit more of like a slot Z. He can kind of separate one on one, something like that. I just think Jonathan Gannon would have lost his shit if they spent another like top 100 pick on a skill player when he needs so much on defense or spent any of that free agency. money. Like, I think he was like this offseason, hey, man, I need this for me. Like,

the offense is fine. You could probably make an argument at the Jets. I mean, they didn't, they added Josh Reynolds and Tyler Johnson free agency, which, you know, those are smaller, more modest signings. Then they drafted Arian Smith in the fourth round. But again, the teams that said were good and the teams that didn't, I think are, it's a, it's an intriguing group. And the fact that the Cowboys were in that group and are no longer. I don't think should surprise anybody. We all expected something to happen or we thought it should happen and it did. And thankfully, gave us a decent amount to talk about today.

We will return to the Lang Green Questions shows. We are going to start those up next week. So very excited about those. We'll hit a few of them before I go on vacation and then kind of get back with it a little bit later this summer. But for now, that is all we've got. We will have another mailbag coming your way on Monday. So please be on the lookout for that. For now, that's all we got.

Appreciate you guys. We'll talk to you very soon.