The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The most interesting teams of the 2024 NFL offseason

Episode Date: February 28, 2024

The combine is open, which means that we have really, truly turned the page to the offseason and, soon enough, the 2024 league year. This offseason brings questions for all 32 teams, but nine stand out above the rest. Robert Mays and Nate Tice identify the most interesting teams of the offseason on this episode of The Athletic Football Show.Follow Robert on Twitter: @robertmaysFollow Nate on Twitter: @Nate_TiceSubscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic football show. The athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays, joining me today. It's my good friend Nate Tyson. How you doing, buddy? I'm doing very well. We're getting all the time zones this month. We're getting them all.

When am I going to Chicago next? That we get the central time zone? Are we going to Denver? Are we get the mountain time zone? No, I'm doing very well. In Indianapolis. Trying to figure out the weather back in that great Midwest, 67 a day.

dropped to 30 over in a couple hours and rain and everything. But no, it's a little different than Las Vegas right now, but I love being here in Indy, and I love getting to do this. And even if not everyone's working out, still like to talk about it and I still having fun. It's always good to be back here. I had a bit of whiplash. I completely misjudged how I had to travel back from Mexico. So I came back on Sunday, and then we had meetings here on Monday morning.

So I woke up in Oaxaca on Sunday, flew to Mexico City. Okay. My flight was delayed to Mexico City, so we made that flight home by seven minutes. Oh, that's good. Yeah, international flights, what you want. Completely exhausted running through the airport. Get on the plane, fly home four and a half hours, land, go through customs, go home, switch out four things in my suitcase, grab my suitcase, put it back in the car, drove to Indianapolis.

So that's how I'm feeling. I had a great week, though. It was fun to be in Mexico. I had a great time. We were in Mexico City for four days. We were in Wohaka for five days. It was a fantastic trip. We had so much fun.

But when I saw an NFL head coach in the elevator on Monday morning at 7 a.m., I was like, nope, not ready. Just not ready. That book's not opening up. But we did okay. I've snapped back in. I'm ready to go. We're going to do something today that we did in a slightly different form last year. We're going to talk about what we consider the most interesting teams of this offseason.

And this list is going to look a little different than I think a lot of other people's lists might. The Bears aren't on here. The Cardinals aren't on here. because we're going to spend so much time talking about them. And really, with the Cardinals, we already talked about them last week. So these are teams that I think just have intriguing pads this off season based on the way last season went, based on kind of how they're positioned within their conference. So that's what we're going to spend today talking about.

The one thing I wanted to do before we kick this off, I just wanted to talk about Peter King for a minute. Peter announced his retirement on Monday. I just wanted to say something very quickly about Peter just because he's been such a fixture in NFL media for so long. I, in 2015, Grant went folded. It was October 30th. I was young. I was in my 20s. I didn't know what I was going to do next.

And I got a call, I think it was on a Thursday or a Friday. And that Monday, I got a call from Peter. And Peter asked me if I wanted to come work for him at the MMQB for the rest of the season. And it was a really tough time in my life. And I really needed something like that. And I just appreciated that invite and that opportunity so much. and I went to work for Peter for those four, five, six months. It was only supposed to be until like the Super Bowl.

And then it went all the way through the draft. It was such a cool experience. And when you are somebody like Peter who has been at the top of this field for so, so long, it's so incredibly difficult to do that. And it's always interesting to me to find out how people can accomplish that. And I work for some people that have been really, really successful in this business. And working with Peter, I got to do so many cool stories. And a lot of it was driven by his own enthusiasm and curiosity.

There were things that he wanted to chase. He made me go to the Silver Dome, like the corpse of the Silver Dome in Pontiac, Michigan, and write about the Super Bowls that happened there as like pre-Super Bowl coverage. And I remember I did a piece that year. It was the 2015 season, and that was the year where Carson Palmer had an amazing year, Cam Newton, the Steelers' offense was really good. And I did this story about how the best offenses in the league were really pushing the ball down the field after an era when it was a lot of dink and dunk,

a lot of two tight end stuff. And Peter was in charge of the MMQB, and he was editing that story. He had, like, ideas about things I should incorporate and things that I should do. And for somebody at his level to take that sort of care in every piece that was going out on his website, it was never a surprise to me after that moment,

like why Peter had risen to the point that he did. And so I just, I wanted to express this, how much gratitude and how much respect I have for him. The last thing that I'll say, I sat next to him at the Minneapolis Miracle in 2017. And we were standing up for the National Anthem, and I was emotional and excited in the same way that I always am when I met a football game. And I asked him, I said, does this ever get old? And he looked at me and I'll never ever forget this. And he said, not for you, it doesn't.

And I always really, really appreciated that. Just as him recognizing that I loved doing this so much and that I kind of had an enthusiasm about it that maybe he did as well. and that always meant a lot to me and the last game I ever watched with Peter was the Lions Rams game this year and I can't even describe to you how excited he was watching Pooka Nakua play in that game he was like he was swearing like over and over and over again

I don't know if you were going to say that in the press box he's just like holy shit like every time he did something he was just enamored with Pukukua you're 40 covering the NFL and he's still excited about a rookie he is we're how many years into this 44 years as a sports writer, and he was as excited as any single one of us while watching that game a month before he decided he was going to retire. So there are just some people. You cross paths with them. You get to know them. You understand their process. And it makes a lot of sense why they've risen to the point that they have.

Peter is the most generous, one of the most generous people have ever worked with this in this business. He's always willing to help out everybody else. And so I just, I really wanted to take some time to kind of take a step back and recognize who he was and what he was in this field because what he accomplished over a four-decade career was absolutely. remarkable. He's a legend. He is. I mean, him, I mean, Belichick goes out as a coach this year, and then now Peter King does. It's like, oh, crap, that's a chapter of the NFL just done. And Peter King is the media representative of that chapter. And he's a legend. I mean, I've, through my dad or myself, been with half dozen teams or around those facilities. I've seen them at each of those facilities. Talking to different levels of people. It's not like he's just talking, I've seen talked to Justin Fields when I was out of practice. Okay, that's one thing.

He's talking to some scout that he knew from 20 years ago. He's talking to the cafeteria work in Atlanta, asking what Matt Ryan orders with his day. Like you say, it's curiosity. He wants to learn. And it was every aspect. I mean, I remember the article on Money Mahook quarterback where he wrote about learning Twitter. I remember that vividly, like 12 years ago, 13 years ago. I remember that how he's teaching.

But it was kind of cool just to not have that, you know, hey, this is where stuff's going. I'm going to try it. And I'm going to see what's all about. I'm going to be still on Twitter. And those types of things, that's what he's all about. all that curiosity, all about finding something, writing 10,000 words a week, about all ranging of things, front office stuff, players stuff, scheme stuff. The discipline to do that for as long as he did. Every Sunday.

It's 4 a.m., 4.5 a.m. every single week. Every week. Absolutely. With travel. It's remarkable. It's crazy. And then all the camp stuff he does. It's commitment to your craft.

I mean, curiosity and commitment to your craft, there's got to be some saying with all the seas there. But it's, he's real with that. And so, you know, congratulations to him, an amazing career. He's been nothing but gracious to me and my fans. family every time I've met and got talked to him. He vividly remembered me from I was 12 years old when I saw him 15 years later. He's like, Nate, oh, you were a baseball player, right? And I was like, no way.

I was like, I asked my dad's, you tell him that? He's like, no. I thought that was awesome. So, yeah, I just personally and just professionally, nothing but the utmost respect. I think everyone has that. And I'm just, yeah, what a legend. All right, let's get into it. Yeah.

Let's talk about these teams, and we're going to bucket these teams a little bit. They kind of fall within some nice little descriptors. So the first one we're going to do here is the AFC, and specifically the AFC South house money teams. And both the Texans and the Colts fit under this sort of signage. Both of these teams were potentially in the playoff mix in week 18. And it was a play-in game for both of these teams to get in. Over the Jax. So the fact that both of these teams were on the brink of the playoffs,

the Texans get to the playoffs and win a playoff game, I think it says so much about where these teams are and what the potential outlook is moving forward. But this is the problem that sometimes we run into with these teams. Every single time we did one of these post-mortems for one of these house money teams in our playoff shows, like, oh, the future is so bright. Disco still. The future's so bright.

It's just going to keep on getting better. Look at all the resources that they have. And these off-season are pivotal in making sure that things continue heading in that direction. So let's start with the Texans specifically. Texans have $64 million in cap space. they've got some guys hitting free agency that were some of those one-year dice rules that they had.

Sheldon Rankins, Jolten Shultz, George Fant. So how they end up and how they end up deciding the way they're going to reshape this roster and say, okay, this is our follow-up act to what year one looked like is pivotal for what the next stage

of the Houston, Texas franchise is going to be. So as you're looking at this Texans team, what are the kind of looming questions that you have that you want to see address in either free agency or the draftish? And number one thing, and even as we got excited about the Texans, this always was in the back of my mind, that they faced better opponents, was the spine of the defense. Linebackers, safety, even some defense-aligned kind of rotational guys.

Because, like you said, they're losing some guys. Jonathan Grenard is an interesting, you know, so really defensive whole is what I think is the number one question for me. Because if I look at the offense, I think there is, you know, I think the past catchers are pretty good, seeing what they go with Dalton Schultz. You know, find a running back maybe offense-aligned depth, especially on the interior or a guy that can maybe start I won the guard spots or something like that, a transition plan from Shaq Mason when he moves on, all those types of things.

But I just keep coming back to safety's linebackers, safety's linebackers. Because when I watch that team, they give up all those explosive plays, week after week. They try to sign Jimmy Ward, and I love that, but he was banged up throughout the year.

They kind of had a lot of samey type guys. That safety slash slot guy that's better down in the box, but maybe not back. And I think they just have to figure that out. And again, like you said, it's house money. They weren't meant to have a fully loaded defense like this. And I think they just have identified maybe some of those holes. I think there's some

answers that they can maybe find a free agency through that. And, you know, maybe not the draft with the linebackers and safeties, but maybe free agency. So that to me is what stands out to me is shoring up that defense. So not every game's a shootout that they have to get into, especially when they played better opponents. Their offensive line was a mess last year, health-wise. Injuries. So hopefully Titus Howard getting back. There's a chance they bring back five starters. Kenny Green was hurt all of last season. So Juke- Scruggs had to play out of position. He slides back to center. There's a chance that they have their starting offensive line already under contract for next season if they get healthy.

The biggest questions for me outside of who's going to play tight end and running back, which are big, right? Do they get aggressive at tight end? Is another stopgap option? Do they take a swing at running back? Are they the team that goes after a Saquan Barkley or a Josh Jacobs as those guys are seemingly going to hit free agency over the next few weeks here? Do they feel like they need one more pass catcher? So Robert Woods was one of those guys that when they came in last year

fit the same flavor that we were talking about where it's like we just need adults. We just need capable players around our rookie quarterback and Robert Woods was almost the epitome of that. So now that we feel like, okay, it's not about a floor. It's about how far can we take this thing. Do they go seek out another outside receiver to put next to Nico Collins

with Tank Dell being that third option? Because if you can get one more dynamic pass catcher involved there, whether it's a tight end or a receiver, combined with the offensive line getting healthier and what we saw from C.J. Strave, the offense gets really interesting in a hurry. Like you say, it's the ceiling. Nico Collins looks like, shoot,

a top 12 receiver right now, and they have a dude. That guy is lock him up. He, I got to study him a little bit recently, and I was just, yeah, he's legit. This is not fake. This is not the offense. It's like, 6'4 moving like that is not real. He's hit. It's awesome to watch him to develop. John Metchy to me as like the dirty work

guy. Yeah. That's the thing. As people are going, oh, he'll ascend. It's like, I know he got drafted in Day 2 and everything. I know he had the leukemia stuff, but it's like now he's the dirty work guy. He's the Robert Wood's successor. And Noah Brown.

Noah Brown's a free agent too. A couple of those guys that were the dirty work pieces within that offense. Yeah, so Metchie can do that. And all the other guys, too. I think Tank Dell actually, he can win from the outside even with his smaller size and everything. So, yeah, like you say, a tight end or a guy that can operate over the middle and just balance the rest of the guys out, I do think that could be a nice little piece to drop in

and give him a different little flavor just to get that type of pass catcher because I look at backs that running backs wise I think they're set up to maybe take one guy on day two and there's a guy I really like for them it's the adjugestime from noradame because I like him in a zone offense and I've seen the clips he can roll I've seen the clips how big is he he's six one two twenty six okay I thought he was even bigger than that when I was I was watching you and darrell class and going back and forth with some of the stuff that he was doing and I thought he was like even bigger than that oh no it's 230 yeah but he looks like a big boy he can roll and he's built and everything.

And Dana I've talked about it's like, you start studying the running backs and it's like, yeah, there's not the Bijan or the Jemir Gibbs, but it's like, there's some good talent on day two. Plenty of kind of guys there. Maybe, you know, Braylon Allen from Wisconsin, Audrey Gastamade, those guys can maybe be your, you know, innings eater, 12, 15 carries every single week.

But there's guys that's like, I love this guy as part of a rotation or committee or they're the 40% guy with the 60% guy, you know, in the backfield. But they're kind of set for a nice little spot there. And I think if we're talking about the offensive line too, I think there's some guards in free agency that could fit for them too. So to me, it's like they have some answers for some of these spots,

which is more, which is better than some of these other teams we might talk about. But it's like, they're actually set up okay because it's like, I'm not reaching for a tackle. I'm not reaching for an ace receiver. I'm not reaching for a corner. I'm not reaching for an edge. I'm not reaching for a quarterback. We're not reaching at any of the premium spots.

That's a good spot to be in. And even though they traded their first round pick to Arizona last year, the Wenderson deal, they get a first round pick back from the Browns. So it's not like they're hurting for draft capital. well, they're still well positioned to try to add pieces through the draft. I guess the question for me, as it relates to Houston and then a lot of all the other teams are going to talk about on this list, how aggressive do you want to get? Right.

So they have that $65 million in caps-based. You're looking at positions, corners another position of need. Yes. Is this a team like if Logerius Sneed hits the market? Are you going to want a big splash or two? And there's two competing philosophies happening here. Because what we've seen from Nick Aserio for the most part before the Will Anderson trade is a lot of patience. It's a lot of moderate swings.

It's not even singles. It's like sacrifice flies. And understandable, and when they were at that stage. When they were at that stage. They're turning, just spinning, just chilling. But even if you look at where Casario comes from and just the way that New England operated when they were humming, there still weren't a lot of free agent splashes. That wasn't the way they often built the roster. You look at San Francisco, though, and what they've done over the last couple years, they've been one of the most aggressive teams in the league.

We know about the trades. We know about Trent Williams, Christian McCaffrey, but the Niners have had a big. swing in free agency consistently almost every single year. They signed Javon Hargrave last year. They signed Javarrius Ward the year before that. So they have not been afraid. So I think what the Texans end up doing and what their plan looks like, the shape of it, is going to tell us a lot about organizational philosophy and organizational mindset

when you have two guys at the center of it who kind of come from somewhat competing places. Yeah. I mean, Patriots are, Patriot guys are in Casario is like one of the most Patriot guys that you could ever have. Yeah, they are all about the nickel and diming roster building, which is something I believe in, and something like that. That's why it's like, oh, do they just sign a garden free agency? And they're like, that's it.

We're good there. They do the trade for Shaq Mason for nothing. That is how they do things. But it was great. It was a phenomenal move, but that's exactly right. I know. So I'm curious. I think that's what will win out.

But who knows, they're also the team that just traded a first rounder for Will Anderson to move back up. Like, you know, like last year in the draft, You don't know exactly what they're going to go down. But again, I think they've got the premium spots, and they have a little bit of wiggle room until you have to pay those guys. It's like, oh, you got kind of a nice setup right here. And I want them to definitely add, of course,

but just don't get a little too crazy. You know, just kind of finds thread that. Yeah, and I understand that you have a long runway. It's year two of this thing with Stroud. There's no reason to get overly aggressive right at the start. But I still think that there's probably, a justification or a rationalization where it's like we can compete very quickly. If we look into a couple things, if we sign the right like difference making pieces or one or two,

we can absolutely compete pretty quickly in the AFC. The only-the-Gernard thing is just huge. And so what do they end up doing? That's it. That's it. It's funny today. I tweeted out a joke about the Vikings trading Justin Jefferson. It's like when Quasi A dofemza came out and said, you know, I haven't really thought about it.

Yeah. Well, yeah. Why would you? Yeah. Because the entire point of getting multiple first round picks and $35 million in cap space is to get a Justin Jefferson. And so with Grenard, they have $65 million in cap space. It's hard to find edges. It's really difficult to find productive edges.

Double-digit sack guy. You have seen what he can do within this defense. He's gotten better pretty much every single year of his career. So would your cap space be well served signing a guy like that compared to somebody from the outside? Maybe. So I think I completely understand them wanting. to bring him back if it's possible. I know that Tomiko Ryan's talked a little bit about that today.

The lingering issue that we haven't really talked about is what the running game looks like last year. And so I think the question becomes, is that a product of rotating cast of characters on the offensive line, or can we get an upgrade who's actually running the ball? I know it's not the smartest team-building thing, and I know in a vacuum it's probably not what you'd want to do,

but it's hard for me not to imagine what this offense would look like with a healthier offensive line, and Josh Jacobs is running the ball. They're set up to potentially do it. And in a vacuum, I probably wouldn't do that. But because the offense already looked so good, I have this tendency where I want to speed it up a little bit. Rather than the day three prudent decision,

dropping an actual difference maker into that spot and be like, all right, let's go from the 30th best rushing offense in the league to 10th. And that's really start cooking here. That's tempting for me. I get it. And for me, it's the offense of line woes. Because I never had qualms with like, what are you running there or anything like that and

what Bobby Slocke comes from. That's another thing. Retaining Bobby Slocke is huge for the development of everything. But I think I saw him last night too as I was hacking up a Lugie and I was like oh God, really? As I'm walking by. I thought you got to watch yourself here. I thought I was in the street by myself walking back to my hotel and I just hack and he rounds the corner like, hi, coach. But anyways, but no, I get what you mean. I think just that's

hopefully you get the offenseal line just somewhat healthy and then we can maybe see it because how explosive this offense was, especially throwing the ball. All right, we got to lift the floor. I mean, we talk about this with other teams. The bills, what they reconfigured, their run game and everything like that. They already have a commitment to it. Even though the run game was bad, Sloak was like, nope, I'm still doing it.

This is my philosophy. This is what we're doing. I'm a Shanahan guy. So, okay, let's make it at least a quasi-strength as opposed to an outright weakness, or even average would make it so much better. Let's take in the AFC South to talk about the Colts here a little bit. They have $68 million in effective cap space. They're another team that just feels like so far.

ahead of schedule. Looking at the Colts offense specifically, because you have a group that far outpaced its expectations with the backup quarterback, the office of line played significantly better, is you're looking at the weapons specifically, and you imagine Anthony Richardson getting dropped back in this offense, which I know you do multiple times today. All the time. What do you want to see the Colts do this offseason to get the most out of Act 2 of the Shane Stike and Anthony Richardson pairing here? I love them, but upgrade at receiver. I love of him being Alec Pierce, but upgrade an outside receiver. I think that there's draft, especially where the guys sit, the type of guys Chris Bauer

likes, this is his type of receiver draft. There's a lot of big ex dudes out here that can run really well. I think that puts it over the top. I think also just obviously having Richardson back as opposed to Gardner Minchew throwing underneath will help. Having Jonathan Taylor the whole year will help. I also think that their offensive line, we've talked about this is one of the most improved units in the entire NFL.

I just think that one more dude at receiver. I really like Pittman, but he's kind of, Pittman's a bonafide possession guy. I think especially pairing with Richardson and his explosive ability to launch the ball, especially stuff over their intermediate, I really like their group of tight ends too. We've talked about that.

They've got 20 of them. And they're all like decent. They're all funny, just different types of guys. So to me, if I want to juice up this offense, get it to the next spot, I think just adding another guy with pedigree on the receiver, especially a guy that can win on the outside. Because I like downs from the slot.

So, yeah, getting an outside guy that I like Pierce, but maybe another one that's playing those 90s. 9% snaps. What would you do with Pittman? Because I don't know if I want to tag him. I know they got space and everything, but I don't know, he's not that kind of level, but again, that's more of a keep him around for a year. I think Pittman is a very, very, very high, ideally, a very, very high in number two as a low end one. So that, ideally, in a good, good offense.

So what do you want to pay that? I would keep him. Obviously, he's a good player. but it's just that, okay, I don't want to pay him top of the market rate. This is this part, this exact stretch of the wide receiver hierarchy. What those guys get paid, I'm very, very interested in how that happens. Because T. Higgins is going to be one of those guys. I think T. Higgins will be on the Bengals this year. We're going to talk about the Bengals in a little bit. They're at a different timeline.

They're a different place in the timeline than the Colts are. So if you're Michael Pittman and the tag for receivers is what? I think it's $21 million this year. 20s, yeah. So, I mean, if that, are you going to sign, and let's say with extensions, if he's a franchise, if he's a guy worth franchising and you do two tags as the guarantees, so now we're at 45-ish million, right? Like 48-ish million. Is he a guy that you'd be comfortable paying $25 million a year on an extension? I don't know. I don't either. I don't. He's a good player, but he is at the exact tier of receiver where I start to ask, is it worth just going back into the

draft and saying, we'll find another one that can play like this. Right. I think that there are some guys that that's a fool's errand. 21.8 million is the franchise tag for receivers. I think there's some guys for whom that's a fool's errand. I think that you start thinking about it with Justin Jefferson or C.D. Lamb or these true superstar difference makers, then you're going to be really sad. You're going to do the AJ Brown and Titans thing.

But with Pittman specifically in that group of guys where he's probably a top 18 receiver in the league, is it better just to say, you know what? We'll tag him, we'll trade them. and we'll use that pick to go get a guy that we think can be as good as Michael Pittman. It has more upside than that, or has a different, maybe a flavor. It's cheaper as well. Yeah, and younger, all those types of things. No, no, it's a very

important thing, too. And that's, I think, I mean, I just always remember the Christian Kirk sticker shock. Just like that, but that's the tier of guy. That's the exact tier of guy that we're talking about. Good player. Good player, but it's not, of course, he had that great line when he was talking about Justin Jefferson, and he said, you look for the blue chip guys and a blue chip

personalities. Yeah. Blue chip. Pimmons bought a green chip, you know, maybe a little like that. What's a green chip? I don't know. It's next, cover down, you know, blue, green. Blue green, I thought what was it.

I thought what was it? Blue green, yellow, red. No, blue green, yellow, orange, red. I'm just going to colorations of the grading. So, but if he's a green player, okay, I'm not going to pay blue chip money for a green player. That, that's, to me, that's how you lose money. That's the lack of surplus that we always like to use.

That's the opposite of that. That's the overpay of that. Yeah. That might not cost you this year, but, Aren't those kind of contracts biting the jags in the ass a year or two later? It gives you less flexibility. Eventually the bill comes due. That's how it always works.

So I think that's going to be their biggest question. The biggest thing they have to answer is what they're ultimately going to do with him this offseason. After that, if we move to the defensive side of the ball, it becomes how are you going to add pieces? Because they need to sneak pieces in the secondary for the most part. They have a outside corner need. Kenny Moore is hitting free agency. Justin Blackman's hitting free agencies. So how they think about that secondary and how many re-esesesies.

resources they want to spend in reshaping it, I think becomes the second biggest question outside of how are we going to give Anthony Richardson what he needs? Absolutely. Kenny were quite great in his time with the Colts and everything. And they're kind of front sevens a lot of fun to watch, especially play the run the last couple of years. It helps when Gus Bradley loads the box every single snap. But Grover Stewart was in the lineup and made a huge difference. He's also a free agent this year. That was another guy was going to bring up.

He's 30. He's barely missed time. He only missed time last year because of PED his suspension, which is also he's 30. so okay. That might be related, but that's a guy, I would be like, hey, if I can get this guy back one or two years, especially at the nose, I think those guys age better than a lot of other positions because it's not quick twitch.

That helps because him, DeForest Buckner, the guys they have a linebacker, that's an identity of their defense. Yeah, I think they, for sure, need an outside corner. I like Juju Brants. It's just, what you're looking at all the other. It was like, undrafted free agent, seventh-round or six-drague. They're just, they would literally just try to throw guys out there

and seeing what stuck last year. And that was the state of their office. It was a reset year. It was. That was the entire point. That was the entire point. With Carter Mitchie quarterback for most of the year. They, but again, they're set up in this draft to take a guy, a corner where they're at in the draft.

Like that's right where the run of corners is going to be in that kind of late teens range. It might kind of just doing some mocks and kind of figuring where these guys stack up. So it actually set pretty well to take a guy with pedigree, like I said, because there's really good talent at the corner position. So I think that's like the easiest answer. I think outside corner for sure is the guy that they have to invest in. I'll be curious how they spend some of that money. They have not been very aggressive in free agency in terms of those big splashy signings. I don't anticipate that to change now, even again, if based on the success last year,

there's a little bit more urgency. So we'll see how that ultimately goes. I want to see what they think of their offense. That's my biggest question about the Coltis off season. How they address certain positions, how they spend resources on that side of the ball, and what it tells us about how they feel their team looks and what they need moving forward. for Richardson. I think we're going to find out a lot about their vision

for who they want to be on that side of the ball this year because they've had an entire season to figure it out. I mean, they prove me wrong right away. I was like, really, you're not going to help out your offensive line last year? And then look what happened. So like, you never, the lions are another example going like, really, you're not going to, oh, wow, okay, these guys grow. So again, like you're saying,

it's a self-assessment, self-scouting, and we don't know until we see their moves. All right, let's get to the other side. The NFC House Money teams that we're going to talk about here, both the Packers and the Rams. Both of these teams did make the playoffs last year, despite, I think, finishing 32nd and 31st in cash spending in the NFL. That's hilarious. And the Rams had the second most dead cap.

Second most dead cap. Again, it's hard to have more reset heavy years than those two teams did. And as we're trying to figure out, okay, why would a team that overachieved continue to be successful? Why are these teams going to be different than the 2022 Giants? And I think there are multiple reasons. One, the quarterbacks of these teams are better. and I think that you're betting on those guys specifically and just them being a stabilizing force more than anything else.

But I think looking at a team like the Packers, looking at a team like the Rams, and just understanding the lack of ambition they had in building the roster last year and how that's going to change, that to me is a sign of like, okay, that's why this could get even better as we continue moving forward here.

My question for both of them, I'm kind of similar to the Texans and the Colts is, how aggressive do they get? Yeah. Like, is this a, do they get? they see this year as an important kind of crucial year to compete. And I think the most important factor with that is that Jordan Love is 24, 25. Matthew Stafford is in his mid-30s.

The Rams last year, despite all the youth on defense, had the seventh oldest offense in the NFL by Snapweighted age. Oh, because Cooper. Cooper, havingstein is getting up there. So even with Nakuwa, they have a lot of guys who are on the wrong side of 30. kind of getting a little bit older in their careers. So does the Stafford aspect of this and Darren Donald and the aging core aspect of this cause the Rams to maybe be a little bit more aggressive than a team like the Packers Colts or Texans might be

just because they're in slightly different stages? And the Rams too is that we've seen both philosophies the last couple of years. Yeah, we're pushing everything. We're trading everything. And then now, like you said, they did a hard reset. I don't know. I want to know what they think of having a first round pick. First time in a long time, man.

I don't know how this fits. I don't know if I ever like this. You know, so I don't know how they're going to weaponize that and use that. Again, they're another team that I think with the weaknesses they have on the roster, DB being one. Again, they played greater than the sum of their parts. Like, this was a team. This was a, they were so well coached. I know we've talked about them, but gushed about them.

This is why Reem Moore's got the freaking head coach job in Atlanta. But I think where they're sitting in this draft, especially with that first rounder, they actually are set pretty well to maybe go interior offense line or corner. And again, those are. spots that, again, this is where that area of the draft that makes sense, trading back and getting more draft capital and figuring out getting more youth. I mean, they're nailing, they

nailed last year's draft. And again, you can't always bank that we're going to nail every draft, but it's like, hey, let's see if this heat check keeps going. Let's get some more draft capital. So we'll see if they kind of lean different than how they've done in the past. But I'm just curious, I have no idea how this Rams team is going to think. I don't know what the mindset is. I don't either. Because we knew what the mindset was for years,

and then they correctly took a step back and throttled it down. last year and said, okay, everybody take a breath. Yes. Let's figure out what, exactly, who do we want to be, how do we want to build this for the future, it worked out as well as it possibly could have. That version of it of, let's take a step back, let's calm down. My favorite offense in the league.

Led to complete reinnovation of what the offense was, but also led to them restocking the cupboard with cheap talent through the draft. So now that that one reset year, that one take a breath year went so well, are they going to get back in, like let's fucking put the pedal on the floor mode. I have no idea. I have no idea. But that question of like how aggressive they want to be because of how well Stafford played last year and what your window actually looks like compared to some of these other

younger ascending teams, I think that becomes kind of the existential question that Sean McVeigh and less need have to answer this off season. And also what you started this off like saying like, oh, Aaron Donald's getting up there, Stafford's getting up there, do they want to, you know, win one for the Gipper kind of thing? like, hey, win one for these old guys and push for them. They don't want to go into this quasi-rebuild, revamp, or anything. Not that they are. They already brought back to Marcus Robinson, which I thought was interesting.

He did. They had chemistry in the offense. It worked. I would say something. I like DeMarcus Robinson. And even a couple years ago, when he was the number one receiver on the Raiders. And there was no one to throw the ball to. Every time DeMarcus Robinson's been in a game, like, when he was on the Raiders,

when there was no one else. And I was watching DeMarcus Robinson. I was like, DeMarcus Robinson's fine. He is? I don't understand why we just don't think. Marcus Robinson is a useful, useful NFL player. If you think Michael Gallup is useful, all right, then to Marcus Robinson easily. But obviously they did.

I mean, they love 2-2-at-well. And as soon as they got Robinson out there, they're like, hey, some size out there? This is great. Yeah. Also, I didn't realize this was Shelton Coleman's a free agent. Their center who had a really nice year. They already cut Brian Allen. Yes.

They interior the offensive line. And again, where they're at in the draft, there's Graham Barton from Duke, who I actually think they would really like, especially as versatility. Jackson Powers Johnson from Oregon. I've watched him, kind of come down a little bit on him, a little bit. He's a freak, but his hand usage is a little raw. Yeah, and Dane, when you guys were talking on the show last week, Dane was talking about how it's, he's not a technician by any stretch,

but the overwhelming physicality is something that's easy to fall in love with. He's a rare size athlete combo at the center, any interior spot. So that's what you're betting on. He's young, he doesn't have a lot of time. It's just one of those. All right, like we just talked about, are the Rams going for a guy like Grand Barton, who's more ready-made, or are they building? to the future and added the strength there. Again, I'm just making up my own timeline here,

but that's, again, it's curious what they want to go through. I'm curious what they go on day three, because now I'm like, who do the Rams like on day three? Because it's, because they've been nailing these guys. Shoot, even at DB, they had Jordan Fuller. It's like, all right, when he came back healthy this year, I'm like, oh, yeah, you're pretty good. It's another day three guy. So what they go in, who they angle? I'll be, I'll be curious, as long as Lesney and Sean McVey there, who these guys take out day two and day three, because they've nailed a lot of guys. And I, so you're looking at the, draft, I'm looking at free agency because I want to see how aggressive they're going to be at the

positions of need. They need a corner. They need another outside corner. They absolutely do. That was again, another position group, just completely thrown together last year. And they need another edge rusher. I mean, those are their two biggest positions of need. God bless Michael Hoyt and everything that he did for them. But they need another starting edge rusher on the other side of Byron. So you look at this free agent class and there are some big ticket items available at those positions. We'll see what happens with the franchise tag obviously, but how aggressive the Rams are, to me again, is a signal of what they think of them and their window

similar to those AFC teams. Transition to the other team as part of this conversation with Green Bay and where the Packers are, they're another team where it's like, okay, you have a guy at court. The biggest question for them, obviously, is what the Jordan Love contract is going to look like. And it feels to me like it's just going to be a market-level extension.

Okay? So I completely understand that. The way that he played, I think it's the going rate of quarterback, and he showed enough where I would feel good about that. I'm sure they're thrilled that they get to pay. It is a great problem to have. But so after that, so now he's at, I think, $12 million this year. Even on an extension, you'll be able to keep that number fairly low in the first couple years.

So he's not going to get, he's not going to be an anvil to the team building process very quickly. That they're still going to have enough financial flexibility over the next couple years. So this year and even going into next year, what do they think of their window? Because unlike the Rams, this is one of the youngest teams in the league. So do you still feel that level of urgency to spend a little bit this year if you can create some financial wiggle room because you think you're close? Or do you continue to slow play this thing and say, eh, we've got to figure out the Bokhtiari money. Kenny Clark's making $27 million against the cap. We'll have more flexibility in 2025.

That's the year where we'll push our chips into. the middle. So after the love thing, that to me becomes the biggest question is how much urgency do you have to kind of push yourself into that next tier of teams in the NFC? They have so many young players. I know you just talked about the roster, but even just looking at it, looking at the R-Lads and you see all these other teams and it's orange, orange, orange, orange, everywhere, meaning

they're a free agent and everything. You look at theirs and it's just like locked, locked, free, drafted 2022, 2023, those types of things. But the... The only free agents, the only free agents that were starters last year for them. John Runyon, yep. Josiah DeGuara, Rudy Ford, Darnell Savage, Kishan Nixon, guys, you probably want it to replace anyway.

Correct. So those are the five UDFA's on the first line of the depth chart. Other guys, Josh Nyman, AJ, AJ Dillon, etc. But this is the type of player and the tier of player within this roster that we're talking about. And it's the Packers. They march at their own speed. They do everything at their own pace, which makes me think that they're just going

slow and steady, keep going to that philosophy. That one good coon's year where he really opened the checkbook, that first year. I can't get that out of my mind as I think about That might be next year So maybe it's next year But that's me because of the question And they They could absolutely free up some more space

They could save $20 million if they cut Bakhtiari And then there are some other things that they could potentially do Kenny Clark I mentioned as a $27 million cap hit Is there an extension there to get that number down 27 million? Well they had to move some stuff around And he's also much younger than you remember him being Because he was so young coming in

So if they can free up, let's say let's say it's $35 million in cap space if they move on from Bakhtiari. Do they try to go get a couple pieces and say we can be competitive right now, or do they hit the brakes a little bit and understand that it's a multi-year thing that they should consider? There's one spot that I keep looking at. I think they need DB help more than anything. I think how their philosophy of the offensive line is like, hey, we got guys in day two, day three, we're going to grow them, develop them, be versatile, all that.

But it's like I ask our listeners right now, name me a Packer's, under contract right now. They don't have one. None. So they need to find one. And if you're or two. And I think there are some safeties available in free agency. Yes.

And I also, there is one, again, because of my mind's on the draft, is there is one guy I love for the Green Bay Packers because of his versatility on the back end. That's Cooper DeGine from Iowa. What position is he best at? Packers just go wherever we need them. Start him at safety. And then as soon as, if we have to move on from Jay Alexander in a couple of years, okay, now he's an outside corner. or if we don't return Nixon, we don't know who's in slot. Okay, now he's our slot guy.

So he's kind of a guy that his versatility is such an asset because they might have holes at so many potential spots. That to me is like, oh, I love that because I think the offensive line will solve itself and how their philosophy is with it. So safety, safety, safety for them, which I actually think they have some decent answers. And this is a good year.

A lot of years are good years to need creation safeties. There's always a safety available and free. You can find a scheme fit one. There's always money in the banana stand. Always. There is always money in the safety stand every single year. Here are the guys that we're talking about this year. And these are all like actual quality starters in the NFL. Well, Buda Baker is at the top of this list. But we have

CJ Gardner Johnson, Jordan Whitehead, Chuck Clark, who was hurt last year. Salt player. Mike Edwards, who played well for the Chiefs last season. Kyle Dugger, Xavier McKinney, Antoine Winfield is a potential free agent. Gino Stone is a free agent. Cameron Curl. So if you're looking at it, let's say we draft one and we pay one $8 to $10 million a year in free agency. That is more than achievable for them at that position specifically. And then the question becomes, if you move on from Bactiari, who plays left tackle, but Rashid Walker is still under contract.

And he was capable by the end of last year. So there's a world where they can move on from an all-pro left tackle, have some financial flexibility, and don't really have to touch their offensive line whatsoever. Which is crazy. And can have depth. What do you think about the past catchers? Like, do you feel like if you're looking at this group right now, do they need to need to do anything in your mind or will you just roll

with the same group again? I think they're going to roll the same group because I know they really like Christian Watson and so they think he can be the Nico Collins developed guy, that guy that like, hey we really grow him. So I think that Jane Reed, I think is very good and I think a lot of us think that he can be a Z or Slot. Tavian Wix can play. Wix

is a development, so that's four. We just named right there and that's before Romeo Dobbs, the original one that everyone was hyped up about, who still actually had some better moments in the second half of the year. Tight end wise, I love those two guys, so I don't think they're set there with Musgra and craft. Craft, holy crap, in the second half of the year,

became like a good starter as a rookie at tight end, blocking freaking like Montez's sweat one-on-one, which is just insane. But so, you know, my short answer to this is like, I actually think they're okay to keep developing these guys. I don't think they need to make a big splash to bring in that ace guy. If they like a guy on day two,

it's a deep class. If you want to draft another guy in round three, hey, we might find another one. It has to be 195 pounds. I can tell you that. That was my favorite one. They drafted Reed. And I was like, oh, they drafted this.

The guy 190, you nine pounds. I got, no, no, actually, they said it when he came in for a visit, he was 196. The visit, and then the other side of it that, I think, allowed them to feel as good as they did about him was the return stuff. The fact that he had returnability, I think, allowed them to fudge some of their original rules based on how I understood it. It makes a lot of sense. And me and Dane were both so high on Reed, and it was like, he played exactly how he played admission state. This guy is useful, and he's good. He just checks a lot of them.

He's explosive, man. Every time the ball seems to be in his hands, good things happen. That's not a little wicks, too. Yeah, oh, Wix is like, I mean, they didn't develop him at all, Virginia in the last couple of years. But it's with Reed, it's like they're using them on JetSuite Stop. I didn't picture him as a gadget guy like that. He's good at it. So there might be more to even tap into. All right, let's change the tone of this conversation a little bit.

Because those four teams, it's all optimism all the time. We're in the season of hope. The question of those four teams is, how are they going to try to get better? How quickly are they going to get great? That's the tone of that conversation. two teams, and you could throw other teams into this conversation as well that we're about to have. We talked about the bills a little bit last week. I think other teams that are like the Cowboys could be mentioned here.

The Ravens could be mentioned here. So these two teams that we're going to talk about are the what now contenders. You felt like you were a potential Super Bowl team last year. You fell short for one reason or another. Now what do you do? And that discussion in my mind starts with the Miami Dolphins. They are $37.5 million over the cap right now. That's after cutting Xavier and Howard.

That's after cutting Emmanuel Agba, which added up to $30 million in savings. They have several restructured candidates potentially, Tyree Kill, Bradley Chub, but they're going to need to do some work to even get Camp compliant. And that's before we talk about how they're going to add to this team. And you look at certain position groups within this roster. Their three starting interior offensive linemen are all free agents. Yeah. And what was their weakness last year?

Yeah, that was, I didn't know it was all three. I knew two of them were free agents, and it was all three. Yeah, offensive line help. I mean, that's it. It sinks their season every year, so what's shore this up? And you go to the other side of the ball, they're two starting interior defensive lineman, Rayquan Davis and Christian Wilkins, who's like a pro-bowl level player also are slated to hit free agents. They've already, I think about a month or two ago, they talked about Wilkins and how they even talked about it's just,

you know, we hope for the best. And it's like, oh, so this is not happening. Like, you aren't bringing him back. So it's- Even if they tried to franchise tag him. right now with it. That's hard to do, just money-wise. It would be very difficult to do that. And then he is starting outside corner. Now that they lost Howard, Howard has dropped off.

Camp Smith last year they drafted in the second round, did not play. Yeah. She didn't. But in, oh, my God, Ramsey's comments like, oh, the guy, Fangio didn't less play. I was like, well, I think he was playing that way to hide Howard a little bit. He was trying to help out. But that was the thing. We broke down the Dolphins defense and it was like, all right, how do you attack him?

Throw it to the non-Ramsey side. Or when Ramsey wasn't playing, it was thrown to the non-Haward side. Now that's permanent. Now, okay, so outside corner, interior offensive line, wow, we're already starting there. And like you said, it's not like they have a ton of money or a ton of resources, just throw out all these issues. This morning, Mike McDaniel came out, was talking about the potential two extension. They want to get it done. They're enthusiastic about it.

It's like this is something we're going to work on. So I guess this is just happening. Okay. Okay. I guess this. And that's what this is. That's interesting, me. This is where I'm out with this team is that I have so few reasons to believe that,

even with how banged up they were in the second half last year on defense, it's hard to imagine a world where the Miami Dolphins are better positioned in 2024 than they were last year, even with some of the injuries they were enduring on defense. And so there's two different versions of this conversation with these AFC teams. There's the team that has fewer resources and fewer pathways to get better, and there's a team like the Bengals where you wonder, okay, how are they going to ultimately end up doing this? But with the dolphins, I'm fairly pessimistic as I look at what this looks like right now

and why the results might be different by the end of next year. Well, and if they want to bring back Tua and make the extension with them, it's like, again, we've watched how these last, well, two seasons ago, obviously with his injuries, but like we've seen the limitations that happen when stuff gets tighter. And it's like, okay, so we know what's happened here. Are you going to change another scheme thing? And I mean, one of the best innovators and one of the best offensive minds. And it's like, okay, is he going to add a new level to it?

But again, we're now have one hand tied behind our back. Like you said, it felt like last year was kind of that push where it kind of stars aligned. And this actually kind of works in our division, too. So they're in a tough spot. That was my first note on. I go, they're in a tough spot looking at this. But I think the two questions is going to be the first one that we have to see how they answer it. Well, part of the two thing is, if you extend him, can you get that number down this year?

But that becomes a consideration. They have to save money. So committing to him long term might be a way to save money. They're 30 over right now? Yeah. Okay. So they could probably save one. like 18. Like with that? Okay, they're still over in double digits. So they're going to need to

restructure somebody. They're going to need to restructure somebody. Tyree Kill is a $20 million based salary. Bradley Chub is a $20 million based salary. So just simple restructures with both of those guys can get them to a pretty decent place. But they're not going to have a lot of additional resources to improve in some of these areas. Let's shift our focus here to the Bengals, who obviously fell short last year for very different reasons than Miami did. But again, I think if you're trying to bucket these teams together, it's the one step down, you know, borderline contender in the AFC. And that's how the Bengals feel. And part of the reason for that is that this defense just took a step back last year. So the defense just didn't feel like the same caliber of unit.

And now we've gotten to a place where what is the offense going to look like? They came out in Franchise T. Higgins immediately. Right away. And so I wonder what that means. I wonder if they're trying to get that done as quickly as possible to give them as much potential runway as they can. on trading him and getting something for him. That would surprise me, though. Because I still think this is a really important year. I still think you can justify or rationalize this idea of like, okay, if we bring him back for one year,

it's worth franchising him because we are going to be a contender in the AFC. Even last year when we were talking about the moves, they make their Orlando Brown stuff and everything, it felt like it was a two-year push. You're just looking at their contracts. It seems like everybody's going through this year. And so that's why I don't feel like it changes. Even if you just go, hey, we're tagging Higgins in the extension.

doesn't happen. Of course, that can create other problems down the road. You can time again next year or whatever. But this is all it felt like the push before we have to pay Joe, Burrow, they did that, but then the push before we have to pay Jamar Chase. And then we have, all right, our resources are dwindling, even if we have these two stars.

So to me, it feels like, okay, we're still in this. We're still pushing this year how much that is, what they want with an angle, you know, Tower Boyd is another free agency. This is a team that loves to be an 11 personnel. So I've seen some, like they draft to Charlie Jones from Purdue last year. He's a decent return and everything. He's a slot guy, so is he

the guy that comes up and steps up, or are they going to bring him back and go, no, we have the whole band back together? They literally have no tight ends. Like, that's another thing. That's just a position that's a stopgap over the last couple off seasons. I actually like the guys that they ended up playing last year, not Irv Smith, but the, sorry, Irv, but the Tanner Hudson, and Drew Sample, they actually did

okay. Yeah, I thought the Tanner Hudson actually gave them more than I expected down the back half. But it's okay, so now it's, what do they do with Joe Mixing? It's another year older. Does Chase Brown get more of a workload because they're looking for more explosiveness. Do they try to find some explosiveness at tight end? If Higgins is back and then, okay, you still need a right tackle.

So there's just so many looming questions about this team where they felt two years ago like, oh, man, straight up, man, straight up. And so now that we're like two years later, this is where, this is that reality you're potentially looking at if you're a Texans or your cults staring into your own future is what the Bengals feel like right now. Right. And for them with the draft, and I know Bengals fans are going back and forth, I've seen and they wanted Johnny Newton from Illinois for a little bit.

Now they want to tackle. Now they want a receiver. Well, they need an interior of defensive lineman because of readers hitting free agency as well. So that one makes sense to me too. And, man, but it's for me, I can understand both arguments. Oh, my God, this feels like the Penn Hesil, Jamar, discussion again, all over again. I actually understand if they did go with a high receiver in this draft, which at first I would say, no way. But then that gives you a succession playing with T. Higgins.

And he can be on the field at the same time. In this class, there's a lot of guys that can work inside and outside. Also, if you want to trade them this off season, you could. Now you have a successful play. Because now there's no way to know before free agency starts before you get to the draft. But let's say you land a guy you feel really good about, I would almost guarantee you. There would be a team that didn't get their receiver during the draft that would be open to trading for a T. Higgins and extended him. Absolutely.

T. Higgins is a very good player that a lot of people like. But they also have a brain drain losing Brian Callahan. So that's another thing, too. But they're in an interesting spot, obviously, because they're in a near. this contendorship because even if, okay, we just talked about the receiver. If they want to go tackle, like you say, maybe get a right tackle, okay, then we also have a succession plan there if he wants to bump over when Landau Brown moves on potentially or anything like that.

So do they look at just as this one-year thing? Are we looking at it as a two-year, three-year answer thing? I think with the draft, they've always been really patient in how they've looked at that. It's always been succession plans. DJ Turner last year. That's another position. Gdobie Wuse is going to be a free agent this year. So there's a lot of transition happening on this team.

I'm tempted, and whether it's right or wrong, whether it's, It's fair or unfair. To look at the offense and say, they'll figure it out. They were borderline top 10 offense last year. With Burrow playing bad for a month. Bad for a month. Then missing the back half of the season. And so they need a right tackle and we'll see what happens with Higgins.

But my temptation is if Burrow is back healthy, they'll figure out that side. I think so, too. The defense to me becomes the biggest question. This is the team that finished 23rd in defensive DioA last year and 30-second an explosive play rate allowed on defense last season. So is that just a question of the safety? getting better and progressing. Now we're in year two of Jordan Battle, year three of Dax Hill.

You know, the corners are young, but we've drafted guys there. We have Cam Taylor Britt. We have DJ Turner. Mike Hilton is back this year. So is that, okay, we're going to bank on in-house development from those guys. We're not going to need to necessarily add any splashy pieces. That's risky.

If they end up doing that, I think that comes with inherent risk based on how the defense looked last season. Because we talked, we have gushed. and praise these teams that did commit to their guys and say, hey, they are going to develop them. If you don't have a backup auxiliary plan in case things go sour, not just injuries, just development stalling, oh, shoot. We didn't address that that entire off season because we thought so-and-so was going to be a good player for us.

That happens to teams all the time. It happens. It's just how it goes. But that's the risk that you play with that. And I'm actually even glad you brought up like Joe Mixon at running back. Okay, that's a big part of this offense, even as we think of all the pass catchers and everything, Mixon's development as a pass protector helped a lot last year. I know it's weird to hear like a year five, year six running back finally developed

patch protection. But they couldn't keep him on the field on third down for years. Years. I mean, that's the entire point of Somagie P-Rine was because Joe Mixon couldn't play on third down. That's why he was P-Rine getting all those little catches and checkdowns and why I talk about him too much on the show. I understand Joe Mixon as a stabilizing force as someone heavily invested in Chase Brown

Future Fantasy stock. I'm really hoping it becomes Chase Brown time here very soon within this Bengals' office. offense. But it's funny. The explosiveness, delta, between those two when they touched the ball last year, was absolutely hilarious. It can be wildly different. But again, it's another question.

Like another, like, not just outright, like, oh, we have no answer, but it's like, is this answer good enough? And they have a lot of that throughout the roster. I understand why this can't happen. I understand that David Mulgetta is T. Higgins' his agent. He is going to ask for every single dollar. not going to budge on some of this structure stuff that the Bengals are famous for you.

Famous for is a good way to put it. Infamous for. Famous for is a good way to put it. Notorious. It still feels like there would have been a way to figure this out. It still feels like they have $112 million in 2025. You said that to me before and I was like, they do? I'm, I know I'm missing something, but I was, I was talking to Paul Diener Jr. yesterday. I was like, there's no way they can figure this out. And he's like, no, I just, I don't think that there's any way they can do it. It's like, okay. I just at a certain point, it's like, okay, I'll just accept that that's true. And I'll, I'll, I'll, under those circumstances, but this is a pivotal offseason for this team with the borough contract.

So his cap it, I think, goes from $29 million this year to $46 next year, and then they have to page Marchase. So this is a very, very important year for a team trying to squeeze everything they can out of this core as they continue to try to be competitive. Let's move on to our last bucket of teams here. We're calling these the new regime rebuilds, okay? Teams that are bringing either a new head coach or a new front office. and are really kind of taking this thing in a new direction. I want to start with the New England Patriots. I personally think that the New England Patriots are the most fascinating team of the offseason.

And it's for this reason. I like that. We didn't know what their scouting process was until this morning. When somebody asked Elliot Wolf, who is the de facto GM of the Patriots, how does your scouting system work now? What was his answer? They change it. They are no longer doing that role-specific Patriots grading system.

So it's a wolf system. They are going to a completely different. and grading system. And so that's... These are the sort of fundamental things that we... I wanted to know about the Patriots. Yeah.

At the Super Bowl, so this was three weeks ago. Yeah. I was talking to a Patriots writer than I know. This is before Elliot Wolf was announced as the guy who was going to speak at the combine today. It was before we understood what shape the front office was going to take. I was like, who's in charge?

Who's in charge? How does the scouting department work? What sort of offense are you going to run? The biggest question I had about this team was if they moved on from Belichick was it going to be a small pivot into just a different version of what they had always done?

The fact that that doesn't seem to be the answer leaves me very intrigued about what the path forward for New England ultimately ends up looking like. And I think so because that Patriots scouting that Belichick and Pioli kind of came up with Scott Pioli

in New England is it's specific. It's a very, it's unique. So here's the quote he gave about it. Perfect. Elliot Wolf had the combat today. He said, we changed the grading system. It's more similar to what we did in Green Bay. The previous Patriot system was more,

this is what this role is. And our new system is a value-based. So it makes it a lot easier for scouts to rate guys and put them in a stack of, this guy's the best, this guy's the worst, and everything falls into place. I think it accounts value better and makes it easier for the scouts.

I know why that's a whole other topic of why he's saying that, because I actually have some agreement with that, with some of this, even though this is the system I got raised in, I guess, or groomed in. No, that's interesting because, again, this is Ron Wolf's son. Elie Wolf's been around for forever, even if he's only a few years older than us. I think with him is that, what is it? It's height, weight speed, and it's the trenches, high weight speed, and the trenches. And I'm looking at the rumor of the quarterback that's going to him at pick three in Daniels.

That seems opposite to me of what maybe the philosophy is, of what he believes in the wolf's, just my assessment of it. Look what Jordan loves built like. You know, just the guys that the Packers took at that quarterback position. I think there is a threshold for that. They have thresholds at every position. We just joked about the receivers. To me, in your mind, Daniels doesn't fit the tools, the aspect that is not. Not an arm enough and not size.

Just straight up size. Because he's slight. Very slight. And I think he's maxed out. I think this is what his build is. He's like 28 years old. There's a lot of concerns with him. I'm writing about right now.

But yeah, I have a little more alarm bells going into the, after the process than I had going in. But to me, at pick three, but that's a driver seat. Maybe I don't like Daniels, but there's probably plenty of teams that like him, and maybe they want to move up, and maybe you stay in the top 10, and you get that line in a receiver and recoup there. Okay, but again, what's the threshold there?

What are you guys looking at? What do you guys identify as your weakness? Is the defense staying the same? Because Mayo is Mayo, and he's a Patriot guy. Are they going to use that the same way? And then they promoted within for their defensive coordinator job as well, coming to their defensive line coach is now the DC. So that I expect to stay fairly similar. But the fact that the scouting

process are changing, that is Notable to me. That was the biggest question I had, is even if you didn't bring in a new GM from the outside, is are you going to actually follow a different sort of process, and it does seem like they are. Here are the receivers they've drafted recently. Tyquant Thornton, he would, Elliot Wolfman drafted him because he's 180 pounds, okay? Booty, maybe. But even DiMario Douglas, who actually has some juice as a good player.

He's got to pop, if you will. Yes, he does. Yeah, that's right. But he was a day three guy, and I get that. There's some leeway there. But again, he would not be looked at traditional. additionally by the Packers system. So I'm just saying one position there,

but even if they look at offensive line, like Belichick always kind of like guys, they were always about hands, which I always thought was interesting. While the Packers system is more, hey, look how like dancing bear. It's three-cones. It's literally three-con times. They have a three-cone threshold in Green Bay, and they've had one for years.

And if you look at some of these Patriots offensive alignment over the years, yes, there's been Joe Tuny and every Coltrane, Cole Strange is a good athlete as well, but there's a lot of, there's the Shaq Mason's of the world. There's a lot of weird body-type guys. Yeah. So it's different. Again, these are just two positions we're talking about.

That's a whole overhaul of what they've done for 20-something years. I think there was limitations of how the Patriots did it. Obviously, how you see this roster is made up and everything, some of the skill guys. But I think that's what's naturally going to bring juice because Elliot Wolf has those thresholds. So they're going to move on from J.C. Jackson, I almost guarantee it. That would bring them to like $90 million in cap space. Kyle Dugler and Michael and Wenow, just not guys you'd want? When did you want on Wenoo?

Like, he's a good, like you can play guardian tackle? I don't know. I feel like you have to. Like, Andy's homegrown. And Kyle Duggers is pretty nice piece. Oh, I love Dugger. But that second team all pro last year or two years ago. But the, that's why I'm curious, if Mayo and that defense philosophy doesn't change,

Dugger's amazing for this. Yeah. If I'm in a Fangio defense, Dugger is like, okay, you know, but as a tight end eraser type and does what all the versatile stuff that he does, dying backer stuff. Yeah, I love him for the Patriots. Other defenses, maybe not as much as much as I love Kyle Dugger. So beyond the, what are the Patriots going to look like?

What are their process is going to look like? They own the draft. That number three pick becomes the most important pivot point in the entire draft. Do they just say, we're getting a quarterback? We love the three quarterbacks. We're getting a quarterback. If that's the answer, it becomes less interesting because it's no longer a trade piece. It no longer becomes a pivot point.

I have not watched Daniels enough to know. I don't have fully formed opinions about the quarterbacks. I come to this later than you guys do. I'm fully willing to admit that. my thinking with the Patriots, when you look at the struggles they've had to find past catchers over the last 10 years, and when you think about where they're at in the team building process,

I would be tempted to just take Marvin Harrison, Jr., and just never think about it again. We got our dude and just whatever. We got our Calvin Johnson. Okay, we'll figure out the rest of the years later. This may be our best position with the top three pick to go get a quarterback, and maybe that's how they're thinking about it. We want to get this started sooner rather than later.

but it would be so hard as I look at what is a complete rebuild on offense. A complete rebuild on offense with a new offensive coordinator, a new offensive system, new offensive language. They're starting from square one. I think a foundational pillar-like piece with that first move is a very tempting proposition for me. And then, I know. This is the thing.

This is the gamanship of it all, too. It's like, all right, do I move back a few spots? And I get my neighbors or a duncee, or I get one. of my tackles like there. Are that or that? But that's the thing. It's like that to me is threading Neal perfect. But that's the thing.

But it's like Harrison to me is just so he's a purple chip above a blue chip. He really is. That's a real thing. And to me it's like, do I want to play this game of getting out smarting myself or do I just take the dude? I would just take the dude. I would take the dude. That's what I would do.

Don't ever think the dude. There are other teams that have been in a similar place. The comparison I would make is what Detroit was doing in the Penniesool Draft. Okay. Right? Detroit's starting from Square World. one for the most part. They've got a couple offensive linemen, but otherwise the roster is a total tear down. They stuck at seven. They picked Penteau, because at a certain point, you need

fucking players. Yes. You need blue chippers. Them having the opportunity to pick a blue chip player and say, we'll figure out the quarterback later, that right now, based on my understanding of the landscape, that is the more appealing path to me. I think that is. But I don't think that's what they're going to do. That's not my, that is not my feeling about what is probably going to happen. Again, it's February 27th, but whatever. I'll leave it. The article isn't done yet, but looking at some stats on Daniels,

and we're going to talk about these quarterbacks a million times. His stat, statistical profile, looks almost identical to a lot of things with Justin Fields coming out, and I don't mean that in a good way. Doesn't throw over the middle, scrambles way too much. And I love Fields. Why I liked Fields was he was he was 230 and ran a 4-3-8. Daniels is going to run fast, but he's 200 pounds.

And again, that's where my, that's where I'm like, is this what you want to bet on? Like maybe a skinnier, like slower, not slower, but skinnier, smaller, more susceptible to injuries fields. And it's like, we just saw what the limitations of that. So that's where I have hesitations. Like, that's our guy. Two other teams, we've talked a little bit about last week. So we can just, we don't have to hit this as hard. But the Chargers and the Titans are two of the other really intriguing teams in this offseason for me.

What the Chargers are going to do at five. I listen to a lot of prospects to pro. in the car on the way here. Dane brought up multiple different times this idea of the Bears trading up for one of the receivers, and these two spots seem like they might be spots so you could do that.

He was making me do math on the fly. I'm pretty into the idea. Because I... With these guys, and like, you look at the Bears' roster, and so those being potential trade-up spots with both the Chargers and the Titans, I've been starting to think about

how that top 10 will unfold, and these two teams, specifically, hold a lot of cards and I think are kind of question marks as to which direction they're ultimately going to go in that range. Look at the Chargers. They have Herbert. Okay, they have the thing you need.

They have the quarterback. They need a lot. Yeah. Like, they, to me, it's like get as much as you can. Day two, day, like as many picks as you can get, they to me make a ton of sense. Titans were aggressive last year to move up for Levis. And it's like, okay, are you guys doing that?

So they're just a wild card as well. I want to get that for them. So I'm not sure with them. But I know, Dane bringing that up to me, maybe start doing math. And I was like, I guess you trade a third for that to move up a couple spots. But if you're those teams, if I'm the Titans, and I know I'm going to get Joe Alt or something like that.

Okay, all right. Yeah, and you're going to take that receiver, and they may take it. Okay, yeah, sure, sure. Yeah, yeah, okay. I'll move back two spots to get that third. Rand Carthin did say, though, today that they need more team speed and Malik neighbors may be available when they're picking at seven. So that's another thing to think about.

But what the Titans end up doing in that spot, how they feel like they need to go, how the coaching staff of Bill Callahan end up shaping that. So that's, to me, a really, really important spot. And then again, what do the Chargers do? if I had to bet right now based on absolutely nothing other than feel and just looking at the chessboard, the Chargers moving back in this draft feels like a real potential thing that could happen. And I think it would be a smart thing for them, like where they're at, again. I think they just need starters.

Blue Chip starter helps, but they need a lot of pieces. And they have a weird roster of aging and, like, it's a weird spot right now. So to me, whenever you're in that spot, I'm like, what the fuck are we going to do with it? Trade back. Trade back. Just get more shots at it. in that top ten of preferably. And then the biggest question for me about the Chargers with their current roster is

who stays and who goes. So you have all these monster cap hits. Khalil Mack, Joey Bosa, Mike Williams, these are all guys with like 30-ish-million dollar cap hits. My guess right now is that two are gone. Okay. I think if I had to bet right now, I'd say they release Mike Williams. Yep, that's number one for me.

And they trade Joey Bosa. Yeah. That's kind of where I got to, too, looking at all the deals too. Yeah, that's kind of what I figured out. It's crazy that Keenan Allen out-survived Mike Williams. Can you move on from Keenan Allen after the way that he played last year? One plays right now. Yeah.

And one plays well. Yeah. One plays and one is never on the field. Yeah, I'm going to keep the one that plays, even if he's older. So what the Chargers ultimately do with keeping those guys and what they ultimately do in the top five, this is a team that can go in so many different directions now that Harbaugh is there, and it becomes, to me, one of the bigger questions of the entire offseason. So the Patriots at five, the Patriots at three, the Chargers at five,

those are the spots where I think the draft finally starts to take shape and we get a lot of information about what those new regimes think of their team what they think about their timeline. That's what this year. That's what this stretch of the calendar is. It is. We get to learn about how these teams see themselves and what they think their best path forward ultimately looks like.

And we start getting to bang the drum about guard signings. Oh, maybe they're doing an offensive shift here. We got three more days of Combine talk before we get to shift. Free agency week is a fun. week. How we did it last year. That was a lot of thoughts. We'll be doing it again.

I'm excited for this year. You be ready for it. All right, guys, that is all we've got for today. Sincerely appreciate you listening. Me and Chase will be back tomorrow with the next edition of In the Pocket. And then me and Diane are going to be coming your guys's way on Friday. Doing a little combine recap the other side of the compound, the scuttle butt side of the combine.

So be on the lookout for that. Great to be back with you guys. Excited to dig in this week. Appreciate you listening. We'll talk to you soon. This was the Athletic Football Show. Thank you.