The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The rise of the Brandon Staley defense and how NFL offenses should respond with Jourdan Rodrigue + Examining Week 1 with Mitchell Schwartz

Episode Date: September 15, 2021

Robert Mays sits down with The Athletic’s Jourdan Rodrigue for an in-depth conversation on the rise of the Brandon Staley defense. Jourdan discusses her research and how NFL offenses are looking to respond. Plus, All-Pro OT Mitchell Schwartz is back to discuss the QB situation in Chicago, the Chiefs’ performance against the Browns, the Ravens’ issues at tackle and much more.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. The presenting sponsor for today's episode of the Athletic Football Show is Visa, a network working forever. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. Today is Wednesday, September 15th. I'm Robert Mays. Great show for you guys today. Mitchell Schwartz is going to be joining us a little bit later for his Wednesday segment. We're going to be doing this every single Wednesday throughout the season.

Very excited to dig into all things week one with him. him really looking forward to it. Before we do that, though, I am thrilled to welcome the athletic zone, Jordan Roderick. Jordan, how you doing? Doing well, man. We made it through. We got here. I know. I know. How was your like 10 screen football watching experience for week one? It was overwhelming. Yeah. But it was still really nice. It was nice to use the at home setup because for a lot of times, in week one, especially when there's no buys and everything's going on, I would have to leave the house in order to see everything I wanted to. Now I've decided that as long as I can watch five games at once plus Red Zone,

I feel comfortable enough. And that's where we're at with the new house, which is very nice. That's all, only five, you know, five at one time in Red Zone. I like try to take on a little more, Robert G's, you know. Listen, there are, there were moments on Sunday where I was like, man, I can't see the Vikings Bengals game and I'm getting antsy about it because it was local, so I couldn't put it on the Red Zone. Like, I couldn't put it on Sunday ticket.

These are the things you have to deal with. I will get settled in. I will get comfortable with the setup and with everything else over the course of the season. It feels like it sneaks up on me every single year. The season snuck up on me this year. We wanted to do this before the season started. Unfortunately, we did not have the bandwidth or the time or the space to do it. But you and I both worked on, I'd say stories that are connected in the lead up to the season.

Just to let people behind the curtain a little bit. We were at a Starbucks in Irvine, California. We were having a conversation about what we were both working on. Didn't even know we were in the same Starbucks, by the way. Did not know we were in the same Starbucks. And then we started talking about some stuff like, oh, what are you doing? And I knew I was going to see you a practice later that day. But I said, oh, what are you working on? And I started talking about something I was working on. And your eyes just kind of got really, really wide. And you're like, I'm working on something really, really similar to that. And what that topic is is the proliferation, the development, the emergence of. kind of the Brandon Staley style of defense, but also why that came about and how Sean McVeigh's offense kind of spurred it on and what that kind of crucible of creation was with the Rams. And I was talking to a lot of coaches about how they were going to deal with the rise of that defense on offense, you know, various offenses and how you'd have to approach it, how the Packers did it. So we put those stories out on back-to-back days last week and we figure, why not talk about them? Why not dig into this even further, a storyline and just the topic overall that I think both of us believe was a huge piece of this NFL season and some of the decisions that teams are going to make? So I wanted to ask you just right off the bat here, why did you want to start working on that story?

What was the genesis for that idea and why did you want to start digging into it? Yeah. And I loved running into that day because you had asked me, you know, what did you find out at the quarterback collective? Like when you were, you know, back months and months and months ago. And I remember calling my editor Ken from a hotel lobby way back in April. And I was like, I'm digging in something and, you know, him putting it on the budget and us just like hoping for it and hoping for it and hoping for it. And all those many months later, finally getting ready to maybe put something out there. And so it was cool that all of a sudden running into you in Irvine and then all of a sudden finding like that, you know, there was a similar train of thought running through that thread.

as well. So back a, about a year ago, I guess over a year ago at this point, I was at Rams training camp and everything was compounded. That incredibly truncated training camp was obviously, you know, there was a lot of rules to follow. And that was when teams were back in the buildings for the first time after COVID-19 had shuttered everything throughout the spring. And so that was also the Rams introducing Brandon Staley as their defensive coordinator. for the first time. And understanding that there was also going to be quite an overhaul in terms of the concepts that they were going to be utilizing and introducing to this locker room. And so after a completely virtual install through the spring, they basically came out on the field. And the first time

I saw the defense go against the offense, a lot of it was the first time these players were running it live. First time offense was seeing it off of a screen. First time the defense was was doing it off of a screen. And so that part in itself, you know, you don't know what to expect, but not only did they look so light years beyond what I expected in terms of their ability and what they were doing in terms of dictating to an offense that I knew and understood was used to quite the opposite being true. But also the way that they were rotating, the way that they were coming in and out of their sub-packaged, I stood behind the secondary that entire first week. noted that they were calling a nearly live camp. So they were calling it nearly as live as they could,

similarly to a game as they could, except for, you know, within the confines of lead structures and protocols and things like that, obviously you can't tackle or anything. But calling it as live as they could, at first, the intent was to put a ton of pressure onto the compounded situation, get as much work done as they could within that compounded space before, you know, no preseason and nothing. So that was it. That's all the time they got. So in standing behind that secondary the entire week, listening to the terminology they were using, listening to the way that Brandon Saly was communicating with the back end in particular, listening to the way that these guys were buying into the concepts and everything, it was something there that, like, latched on to me

and, like, would not let go through the entire year. And I do want to say, like, in the, in culminating this story, you know, I worked on the story for a year. And I think that this, is something that's, I'm not too arrogant to admit that, that I didn't know what I was seeing at first. And I laugh now and we'll get into it. I know because the reason why I didn't know what I was watching at first, I knew it was special and I knew it was different than what conceptually I had seen and, you know, four or five years prior at NFL practices. And the reason why I wasn't fully recognizing it at first is because so much of that back end stuff is conceptually from collegiate elements. And as a NFL,

NFL beatwriter, you're embedded through a weekend. You're like, you don't watch any college football. Like, you don't have time. You can't. And so for me, I had a couple coaches laugh at me through this reporting process. You didn't talk to, you know, three dozen people for this piece. Like some of them laughed and were like, yeah, I guess that would make sense that, you know, you're like some of the stuff that they were doing in the secondary. And so through, you know, a year's worth of work and then, you know, really sort of starting to metabolize after those, those weekends spent at the quarterback collective sessions. It just was such a learning process.

And I think that's what, you know, I was so excited about when you asked me about what I was working on at the, at that coffee shop and why my eyes lit up the way they did because I was starting to finally put things together in a story that I thought was so important. And then realizing that you were also asking people about what happens next, you know, what comes after that. I think it was such an exciting thing and such a, such an interesting process to go through not just as a writer, but as someone who's like just learning every single day. And it's cool because, you know, last year, I think that Nate and I early on in the season, him more than me, because he just knows more than me. But he was watching that defense and his

antenna went up a little bit. It's like, they're doing some stuff here. Like, they're doing some stuff with the fronts that's different. And they're just approaching this in a way that you don't typically see like you mentioned from NFL coaches. And then later in the season, I got a chance to talk to Brandon Staley about, all right, like, what is the philosophy behind this stuff and got to write about it? And I thought that was so illuminating. And then that story ran. And then, obviously, he gets hired to be a head coach. And then the conversation shifts a little bit in the offseason because you have the time and the space to step back and really consider it, right?

Beyond the nuts and bolts, it's like, where is this going? What does this mean for the direction of the league? How is this going to affect other teams' decision making the way they want to build their defense, all of that? which is such a cool process to be able to go through. So I want to take a step back and take that kind of bird's eye view or for people who read your story, a hawk's eye view, a falcons eye view, at what this defense is and some of his influences and how we got here. So if you were trying to describe kind of the lineage of that Brandon Staley approach on defense, where would you start?

Well, he would probably start at John Carroll, but where I would probably start is just, some of the concepts that he has pulled and sort of blended in with the Vic Fangio sensibilities. And a lot of that, I know you've covered extensively, a lot of that coverage dictates the front, the two high shells that rotate, the way that if you have a player who can play the star, you utilize some of those things conceptually into your scheme, some of the lighter boxes that are presented at a higher rate than any other team, the gap and a half sensibilities that you have to play with against the run. all of these types of things in a vacuum, I think that one of the sentiments that kept getting

expressed to me through the course of reporting this piece is like, not all of this is brand new. Some of it just blending it together in the way that it was able to be organized and then facilitated was kind of what helped make it special and some of the ways that they prey on offensive tendencies and some of the ways that they prey on sort of like the impatience by nature of offensive coordinators who want to attack, attack, attack. This defense doesn't really let you do that in the way that maybe you're familiar with traditionally. And it bets that you will make a mistake in that lack of patience before the players on the field do or before, you know, the tendencies that you have sort of binders and binders full of are recognized. And I think that that's,

that's the interesting thing about this defense because, you know, defenses traditionally, they have adjusted to what offenses present. And I think that this defense, the success of it, it had been successful prior, but once it came across the Sean McBay system, the Kyle Shanahan system, particularly in the way that Sean McBay and Matliflor had kind of evolved it, particularly the way that it exposed the certain quarterbacks that were maybe in it, that, you know, now we've seen the ripple effect from that happened with the Rams. It's so juxtapose. it so perfectly that it became this, this thing that Sean McVeigh wanted in his own building. And, and, you know, I won't go off on the tangent there. But defensively, you know, it, it dictates,

I think, maybe more than people think. When you look at it and you see, oh, you know, they're going to, they're going to let you take off the tiny plays one at a time down the field and they're going to bet that you over-commit. Betting that someone over-commit still is a dictation, in my opinion. It still is forcing somebody to do something that they wouldn't necessarily otherwise call or want to plan for. And I think that was the sense that I kept picking up throughout the course of the season as the Rams executed this defense. You know, definitely helps to have Aaron Donald, definitely helps to have Jalen Ramsey. But schematically, just very, very smart plan and the way that some of those things that we now know and, you know, had recognized in Fangio, I'd recognize when Belichick ran it against Sean McVeigh in the Super Bowl, some of those cover seven things.

and some of the things that they do with the secondary. And then also some of the, you know, too high shell, post-snap rotation things that make life basically hell for a quarterback, particularly if they aren't as quick to process post-snap and do some things that sort of flip certain built advantages such as play action, completely turn them into a disadvantage and, in fact, an advantage for the defense. I think that all of those things combined make it a defense that does dictate. And I think that's one of the things that you recognize often in Vic Fangio defenses, and you certainly recognize it in sort of this evolution of what Brandon Staley is doing with his current system, probably what people will try to do when they pull from it as well. And I think sometimes we can struggle to describe things when it comes to the lineage of certain offenses or defenses, right? Like the Shanahan Kubiak offense is not the same everywhere.

Just because the DNA of it is similar, the versions of it, look different all over the place. So I've come to kind of call this approach, the Fangio Staley approach to defense, but they don't run the same things. Every single element of it is going to be a little bit different. You add your own spin. I remember talking to Joe Barry, the Packers defensive coordinator, and he was very clear about this.

He was the linebacker's coach with the Rams last year. He's now the coordinator in Green Bay, and he said, we were running Brandon Staley's defense, but that's true everywhere. Even if you run the Shanahan Kubiak system, you're running your version of it. So I think a lot of the general ideas that inform what Brandon Staley did last year come from Vic Fangio in the sense of we're going to make it harder to predict. Like if you play out of that too high shell, you can do anything. And that's one of the benefits of it. It's not as if when you play it with the single high safety, you can only do a certain amount of things.

There's a limited number of coverages you can call there. By playing a too high shell, you can do anything out of it. You can play cover three if you want to. You can play quarters. You can play anything, and it makes it so much harder to dictate, or it makes it so much harder for the quarterback to understand before the play happens, what's going to happen. And that may sound simple.

The idea that making it harder for the quarterback is a benefit for the defense, but some teams don't believe in that. Some teams want to be, I have everyone in the exact right position all the time. They would have every gap accounted for. And there's just a discomfort. Exactly. Yeah, they want to play with landmarks instead of visually.

Yeah. And now you have this idea of, all right, we're going to start like this with too high and you're not going to be able to see it. And even if we are playing cover three on a certain play, the way that Staley and McVeigh would say it, it doesn't express itself unless you play against it a certain way. So one of my favorite things about the way they talk about this defense is the verbs they use. Like express. There's a couple other ones.

I'm sure you can think of some as well where it's like the actual words they use to talk about how the defense exists. It makes it seem like a living, breathing thing. And I think that when you see it in practice, that absolutely is how it feels. It feels like a living, breathing thing. The action verbs they use to talk about it express themselves on the field, which is always, it's very cool to watch it that way. Yeah, I think too, it empowers players to talk about it that way. Sure.

Especially when you are, like we talked about, you're playing visually. You're not just setting landmarks on a field and say, get here, make play here. You are, and there is no better word for it. And I remember when I profiled Brandon Staley early September of last year, still not quite knowing quite exactly what the scheme would be in terms of this sort of football guy terminology that we sometimes fall into instead of like focusing on the beautiful things about it, like the language that it commands. And I think what your point, to your point, like it is such a beautiful language that they use

within the scheme in terms of, you know, a player will communicate where he needs to be instead of saying, you know, green dot moves or like X on sheet moves to Y on sheet. You know what I mean? Like it's it's players and having that empowerment of, you know, and I keep, I'm just going to keep saying it because that's the word that they use is expressing yourself from position to position. And I think when I was first describing it and learning more about it, I would describe it often as as these like sort of unique solar systems, the two solar systems that exist within the defense. And one of them revolves around Aaron Donald, with Aaron Donald being the sun. And the other revolves around Jalen Ramsey, with Jalen Ramsey being the sun. And obviously the

front revolves around Jalen, or excuse me, around Aaron Donald, while the back revolves around Jalen Ramsey. And then the intersection of those two solar system ellipses, which we know orbit in ovals and not full, you know, concentric circles, that intersection point is where John Johnson lives and he commands everything around. And then the spots where the ovals don't quite hit, that's where the quarterback's trying to throw the ball. And it's up to all of these little flare-outs, all these players who are orbiting, making their orbits around these players, and sometimes the players themselves to get themselves to those points and to make the plays. And I think that's why you saw in this defense, the players who are role players and not necessarily household names last

year, they rose to the top and they were making plays and contributing in all the ways that were necessary. And I think that's two parts. I think part of that is when scheme and ability meets at the apex, but I also think that's that empowerment and that command of understanding where you're going to go, having so much information given to you because you can process it and not be not be intimidated by it. And then, you know, understanding so much about not just what you have to do, but what the quarterback will do. And I think that was something that did kind of scare the bejesus out of people at times last year was knowing and you're, you know, your defensive back that you're trying to look off. Like he, he knows where you're going with the

ball because he studied not just what your tendencies are, but where they aren't. And he studied kind of what you do in order to get inside your head and to play visual. And these guys playing from depth obviously helps with that. But it's just, it's so fascinating the language and the command of it that these players started to use because now, you know, that's the only way you'll hear people talk in that building. And it's trickled up into the offense. It's trickled over into how Sean McVe describes working with Matthew Stafford. And that's not something that he used.

That's not a word he used to use. That's not language he used to communicate with. But I think that it was such an important moment. And the story focuses really on those two specifically working against each other and competing against each other because I think it built something important in terms of the way that we see things pollinate off of each other. and we use biological terminology to describe this defense too because it is it is a living thing it continues to change and grow and I think it's built to meet predators at their apex and then

grow off of that and I think one to one coach I was talking to over the summer about this idea I was like it just reminds me of like Pacific Rim or something like yeah and it's so cool and it's just like it's the coolest thing and or like I brought this one I brought this up to you, like aspen trees, the way aspen trees grow and communicate with each other. And the way the coniferous tree comes and tries to smother the aspen, but then it communicates to grow in another spot. And it's so, yeah, you brought the California writer on, sorry, but, you know, it's just like, it's just like, it's just the way that this evolves and then pollinates. And nothing will be the same exact copy of what this is. But it's fascinating to see how people will

try and sort of plant their various cuttings of it in their own soil. So let's talk about that in a second. I want to talk a little bit more about just muddying the picture for the quarterback and how it's hard because obviously you think about it structurally. You don't know if it's cover three, cover four, whatever based on the way the defense presents itself. Even deep into a play, you cannot understand that. But you mentioned the play action aspect of it and how when a quarterback turns his

back, we know play action is a cheat code in the NFL. Like it has become just an understood. element of the NFL game that play action is more effective and that more teams are adopting. You look at the play action percentages from week one. It's crazy. I mean, you got four or five teams up over 40 percent. And there's a reason for that. Teams are going to that more and more. This defense makes play action less effective in some ways. Explain that a little bit more. Because I think that's a huge point that I have not seen very many other places. Yeah, I was kind of stoked on that one. You know, like when you're reporting a story and you

find that like golden nugget and you're like, oh my God, I have to tell you. someone about this, but no, I can't tell anyone about this. So, yeah, that was, that was a fun one to report, because it also translates directly back into some of the giant ripple effects that you saw that John McVeigh make personnel-wise at quarterback. So basically what this does, and it's not just the rotation post-snap out of too high. It's not just that. It's also players who are playing visually enough that they know, they know then and matching routes and whatnot and know then where the ball will go out of the play action. But what it does really effectively is make so many plays look exactly the same

when the quarterback is specifically under center about to take the action play. And then, you know, he takes the snap and he moves backward and flips around. And then he like rolls or flips back around. And the picture is completely different because it's when his back is turned. These safeties and these defensive backs are taught that that is when you rotate into what the actual coverage actually is. And even then, the quarterback is second-guessing himself because now not only are guys in different positions than maybe what he thought they would be in last year, there were no tendencies from these guys to study. You're seeing it, you're seeing them muddy the

picture over and over again for basically the first time. So the quarterback can't even guess half the time because there are no previous tendencies to base that sort of data evaluation on. So you're seeing these guys shift as the quarterback flips back around. If you don't have a great post-snap processor, you're in some deep trouble because either the checkdown is going to be available and that's the one they want you to take, obviously. And that's going to be the one that you probably go to, you know, eight times out of 10 because you don't know if the other options are actually available to you, even if they look like maybe they might be. You're still not totally sure. And you saw that several times, not just the way that they rotated post-net, but also the way that they match different routes.

and they knew and they played, they all play from depth and, and they play down and sort of constrict around you. So not only is the picture not clear when you flip your back, back around, but then you can't, you can't actually be sure that what you thought it might turn into is actually the correct way to throw the ball. And so that to me is the most fascinating thing because as we know, especially, and I looked at this from sort of a Rams lens, Sean McVeigh especially developed that heavy, heavy play action, like league leading at times play action for Jared Goff, specifically under center, Jared Goff has only taken one non-center play action snap in the last two years prior to this season. And so his back is flipping every single time. And in

ways where that at first made it a huge advantage because it buys him more time, it allows things to develop downfield. He knows exactly where to put the ball. It allows the certain finer points of the routes to get to where they need to be so he knows where to place it. None of that exists anymore. And so to me, the fascinating part of this defense, as we talk about as a construct of an evolving, like, fire-breathing creature is that it just grows to flip your own leverage points against you. The created leverages and advantages that Sean McVeigh utilized specifically to create sort of that help for the quarterback is then the exact reason why the quarterback cannot complete passes against this defense. And so that, that plus the fact that so many things

look the same pre-snap is such a fascinating similarity that the two, the offense and the defense share. But as it pertains to the play action, like they didn't have an answer for it. And those two weeks in camp, especially that first week, did not have an answer for it. And so that to me was one of the more fascinating points is how it doesn't let you just get abused by play action, this defense, first of all, doesn't just let you get totally rag-dalled by the play action, but that it also at times, depending on the quarterback,

because as you, I'm sure, we'll note, it really depends on the quarterback in some cases. But with a quarterback who maybe can't diagnose and process as quickly post-snap, it will expose them and it will, like,

put them in hell, basically. And it's funny because Sean McVeigh, Sean McVeigh deserves a lot of credit for how he saw the chessboard with all this stuff. he wanted to go get Brandon Staley in large part because he wanted somebody from that Vic Fangio tree because in his mind that's the pain in the ass to play against what is the hardest thing to play against I want that and then he went out and got it and then he had a year of watching it up close

and then solving problems against it exactly so you have that year of having to solve it and then brand saley gets hired away and I think Sean McVeigh understood this stuff is going to be coming all around the NFL. Look at all the coaches now who've been plucked off this tree in some way. Joe Barry, like we mentioned, is in Green Bay.

Brandon Staley is running it with the Chargers. The Rams are doing the same stuff. Sean Desai is the defensive coordinator in Chicago. He coached under Vic Fangio when Fangio was there. We still have the Broncos running it. We have the Lions, who have Aaron Glenn, who was played for Fangio in Houston

and is a believer in all of this stuff. Aubrey Pleasant is their passing game coordinator. He was the cornerbacks coach for the Rams last year. You see it start. And then every other team is going to look at what worked and call Brandon Staley or somebody that knows some of this stuff and be like, all right, explain this to me. The proliferation is going to happen. And Sean McVeigh understands that.

And he went out and got a quarterback that is better suited to deal with this rise of this sort of defense than the quarterback he used to have. And part of the reason for that, like you said, if you don't have a quarterback that can adapt, you're screwed against this type of defense. Because while this is a living breathing thing, your offense needs to be a living breathing thing. It can't be something that's pre-programmed in the way that we've seen with some of these play action concepts.

So when I was talking to offensive coaches about what they need to do, one of the things that Sean McVeigh said to me and many others said to me, you can't have single purpose play calls anymore against this defense. For so long, you had guys like Sean. and Kyle Shanahan, they could just spam the shit out of those single high beaters from that Seattle system. Now you have to open things up a little bit more because you don't know what you're going to get. You don't know on any given play what it's going to be coverage-wise, what it's going to be even after the play begins because of how much uncertainty there is.

So you need a quarterback and a play call that are adaptable that can deal with whatever the defense is going to throw to you in these situations. and nobody understands that better right now than I think Sean McVeigh does, but I think other people are starting to pick up on it as well. You're going to see a lot of routes where you're reading the safety as it unfolds. If he's in a certain place, you take it vertically. If he's not, you take it underneath him. You do these middle read routes that are a little bit more adaptable, a little bit more flexible.

And I think that's so interesting to me. It's like, all right, if that's a living, breathing thing, that our offense needs to be as well. And the clash of those two things, I think is going to be. a huge storyline over the course of this season. Yeah, it's so fascinating. And like, to me, what I keep saying and have just kept saying through the course of, you know, the spring and the summer watching Matthew Stafford and Sean McFaigh,

like literally troubleshoot things in real time and just try things and build certain concepts, including that Cooper Cup touchdown, which I know you guys, like Nate Tice, I think you guys did a really good job talking about that one. But I think, like, that, Sean McVeigh went out on coached on Sunday night against the Bears. That point of irony has not been lost on me in terms of the people who like ruined him in the beginning, like made his life harder in the beginning, including sort of like, you know, Sean Desai is expected to kind of get back to the, the Fangio principles in a way that maybe

is a little bit more, you know, creative or maybe a little more expansive than what they were doing a couple years prior. But Sean McVeigh coached on Sunday night. like he had all the answers to the test ahead of time. And that's what he has coached like in camp, this entire. And I've been trying to describe it because they are problem solving in real time. And that's the less poetic way to put this sort of living, breathing evolution of this offense as well as as the defense. That's the less poetic way to put it.

They are problem solving in real time. And both of those guys went out there on Sunday night. And they played like they had all the answers to the test in advance because they did. They solved the problems that had used to give them so many issues. And there will be new problems. And there will still be certain things, especially depending on the personnel that you have, if you run some of these concepts against the Rams offense again. And probably if you run some of these concepts against sort of these system offenses across the league,

it's not going to be, it's not solved by any means by what they were able to do for the last two years in practices. and by getting a new quarterback. It's not totally solved, but they have more crayons to color with, I think, is how I would put that. And I think one of the other, I want to get in some of the offensive responses beyond what we just talked about. Obviously, with Stafford, I think something else that came up over and over again was the ability to throw the ball outside the numbers, which he can do in a way that Jared

golf could not. If you just think about this offense, this defense in general and a lot of just quarters-based coverages, you need to be able to throw the ball outside of the numbers. So that's one thing. And then the other stuff, I want to get back into the patience a little bit because that, I think, came up over and over again in the conversations you and I both had, right? Where I remember talking when I was asking Brand Staley about them playing against the Packers and what he learned from that game, I think he said that they were patient four times in describing why the Packers were successful in that playoff game. And to me, that's one of the most interesting parts about how offenses are going to have to respond to this. Because I don't want to get two in the weeds here.

But beyond what this coaching tree is doing, even Seattle-based teams, like the Niners, the Browns, the Jets are going to be doing this, are playing a lot more quarters on early downs. So this general approach, even though some of the specifics are different with the way they match routes and just how many different coverages they play, all of that stuff changes. This idea of we're playing too high on early downs, we're not going to let you beat us with explosive plays. That is an idea that's traveling all around the league with multiple defensive coaching trees. So now that that is the prevailing wisdom with a lot of the smarter coaches around the NFL, how do offenses have to respond? And to me, this staring contest of we're going to make you run the ball and we're going to make you complete stuff underneath. We don't believe that you're patient enough to continue to do it. And that offenses responded like Green Bay did and saying, we don't think you're patient enough to let us keep doing this.

Because that's the challenge, right? It's a battle of nature where you try to. to play into the nature of an aggressive, I want to take shots, offensive coordinator and quarterback. And then the offense, with a team that's like Green Bay, that's going to be willing to bite it off in little chunks, is playing into the nature of defensive players individually saying, they're not going to want to let us complete all this stuff. Eventually, it's what Roger said to me.

He literally casted a fake fishing reel, and he's like, we're just trying to reel them in real slow, because that's what you do. Those six-yard completions and five-yard runs, they're going to be available over time against the defense like this that plays like this. And then if you get enough of them, does the defense start to become impatient? Do they start to creep down a little bit? And that's how you get that Alan Lazard touchdown

that was the backbreaker against the Rams last year. So that staring contest and that test of patience on each side, we're going to get to watch that play out in real time. And I cannot wait to see what it's like as both of these ideas and these mindsets have to start trickling around the league. Yeah, that part's so fascinating because it's not just, biological. It's like sociological too. Yeah. Because Brandon Staley

and he pulled, I know he pulled this a lot of this sort of mindset from what Vic Fangio does and his like binders full of tendencies and all this stuff that he has on people like across the league. It's like freaking, you know, his office must be crazy. But Brandon's Daly, it's like,

you know, it's basically betting that offensive coordinators by nature, the signal callers, not just the coordinators but the quarterbacks that they work most closely with can't bear it will not be able to bear it enough to where they attack maybe one play too early or two plays too early and that's where you know some of these takeaways come from and that's where some of these these big um you know unsettling moments happen for an offense is when double clutch one time and it's a sack like at the moment you don't you can't see it and

you hold on to it too long Aaron Donald is there that's all you need they just need one mistake and and I think that that is just fascinating and fabulous in the way that only this weird, not so stupid, awesome game is, is like, it's human beings, it's people. And it's betting people's minds and betting people's egos against each other. And to me, that is fascinating. Because in order to run this defense, well, you can't, I believe that. And I'm not talking about ego in the sense where, yes, I think Brandon Saley believes that

his defense will kick the shit out of you 10 days out of 10. But that's not the type of ego that I'm talking about. I'm talking about the lack of ego that it takes to. allow certain, as a person at the collective said, allow certain paper cuts to happen to you on one hand and then use the other hand. That's the one you swing with. And like, I think that that is, is so fascinating because we're not just looking at schemes and schemes being smart anymore. We are looking at, I'm going to weigh your own mind against you. I think that's what's so interesting about this. And I think that's a big and a hard lesson that Sean McVeigh had to.

to learn. But again, I saw a guy out there on Sunday coaching like he has all the answers to the test right now. Eight games from now, we'll see. But at the current moment, I think that that's, that's been what's most fascinating about this to me. You talk about language and one of the other things that comes up, Staley uses roof. That's the, that's the imagery that he uses. We're going to put a roof over you. And that's how that too high shell, that's how they describe it. Other people call it dome quarters. When I was talking to a coach taught, and they were describing the way the Niners played over the last couple years in the way that the Browns played under Joe Woods, they literally put a dome over you.

So this is like really inside baseball. But the quarters used to be like an aggressive coverage where you'd have four guys lined up in a row. This is the way Aaroners described it to me. That now it's more of a passive coverage where you have the safety is a little bit deeper and the corner's playing a little bit down. So you have literally a dome if you think about it structurally. So now the question becomes, how do you survive in the dome? If they're going to put that roof over you, what do you do within that space?

that you're given. Can you create plays within that area if you can't beat teams over the top? And that's going to be the question. I have not watched the all 22 yet of what Washington did against the charges this week. They had nothing down the field. There were no, there were no shots down the field. All we expect at all offseason with Ryan Fitzpatrick and Diami Brown and Curtis Say, I don't know Curtis Samuel didn't play, but and Terry McCorn was bombs away Washington offense. there was none of that. And I assume it's because none of that was available. So when teams take that away, what do you do? And I think that question is going to come up over and over and over again this year. And it goes all the way back when we, again, we talk about language. And I know that I don't always

have the right words in terms of what people are saying when they look at cutups or what you guys so very smartly say and talk about on this podcast all the time when you break things down. But it goes back to me of the metaphor that I brought up to you at that coffee shop in Irvine, California, before we're about to go sweat our butts off on the field was it's the Aspen, the battle of the Aspen Grove versus the coniferous tree. Coniferous tree grows tall enough to cover the aspen and to smother it. And that's your, that's your roof that you're talking about. The Aspen tree, though, because it's a tree that can communicate out of a single root

ball, it communicates to grow outside. wider instead of growing taller or forcing itself to grow taller, it finds other spaces where the sunlight hits. And that to me is, this is just, it's just biology, man. And watching it play out in that biodome is one of these stories of the season to me. And I think a lot of coaches feel that way. And that's one of the coolest parts is when you're reporting a story like this. And I'm sure you felt that way.

Sometimes it's like, is this interesting? Like, I'll literally ask some people that sometimes. Like, is this, is this dumb? Like, does this make any sense like what I'm trying to do here? And the response I got from, in my opinion, some of the smartest football people in the world being like, yes. Like, this is, these are the conversations that we're having and these are the things that we're having to battle. That always feels good. And that's why I was excited when you were working on it.

I was not surprised that you were because you tend to see these things in a way that I appreciate. And I was excited to have this conversation about it because I truly do believe that these ideas and how offenses respond to these ideas. is will dictate how the 2021 season goes. And that's why I wanted to do this. And that's why I'm so glad that we got a chance to. Jordan, thank you very, very much for the time. It's always so good to chat with you. If people have not checked out your story, they absolutely should.

Please go read it on the athletic. I'm telling you, Jordan wrote this in a way that no one else in America could. And you will learn so, so much if you go check it out. So please do that. Well, thanks for saying that I would urge you guys, if, you know, while you're at it, to go, Robert wrote a really good compliment to it. And I don't even know if compliments the right word because it's almost like, again, it was kind of like some of the answers to the test, really, and what we're going to be

seeing. And so I think that the two stories like really balanced each other out. And it's sort of, you know, if I was the, if I was the wind up pitch, then Robert sort of had the, had the hit. So I think that it was a really interesting way, the way that that ended up working out. Just a fascinating process. I'm glad it's over with because it took my. months and months and months. But it was, I think, one of the coolest and most rewarding learning

experiences because it was something new every day, someone new to talk to every day and someone new to teach you something and to help you see things in the way that you knew in your gut was the right way and something important, something that matters. And then for us to sort of execute it this way before opening week was a very cool thing. I think so too. I totally agree. All right, we will definitely be chatting with you down the road. It's always good to catch up. We'll talk to you soon. All right, it's time now to welcome all pro-offensive linemen, my buddy, Mitchell Schwartz.

Mitchell, how you doing, buddy? I'm doing well, exciting first week of football. How are you doing? I'm doing okay. We got to figure out something to call this. Wednesdays with Mitch. I don't know. I'm terrible at naming things, but we got to come up with a good name for this

segment because you were going to be here every single Wednesday during the season, which is very exciting for people who have not heard or did not know that. It is. We got to figure out. some sort of like alliteration thing, like a midweek Mitch and Mays or, I don't know. See, that's already better than anything else that I could come up with. You're going to have to do this. You got a cooking show now.

Like, you're a media star. I need you to help with the branding because you're clearly better at it than I am. All right. You know, most of those stars are like dying in the atmosphere, right? So that's not really quite the compliment you think. All right. Here we go. We are going to dig into a bunch of different stuff today.

during this segment each week, we're going to talk about just stuff that peaked your interest. Some of it's going to be offensive line base. Some it's going to be locker room dynamics. Some of it's going to be guys you played against in the past. There's no real set way that we're going to approach this. I want to start, though, with the quarterback situation in Chicago. Are you surprised that the fact that we're going this way this early?

So there's been a lot of talk about whether Justin Fields should be playing. and the elements that go into that decision. And something that I've been curious about is how players respond or what other players in the locker room are thinking when they know that this super talented guy is just sitting there. And they know that the guy in front of him maybe isn't as good or as dynamic of a quarterback as the one that's sitting on the bench.

And the reason I wanted to ask you about this is because the situation and the blueprint that Matt Nagy seems to be following here, is one that you watched up close with Patrick Mahomes and Alex Smith in 2017 when Pat was a rookie. Obviously, there are some key differences. But I'm curious when you were there in the locker room and saw how talented Pat was in practice and just understood what he could eventually be. What is it like to be a guy on that team knowing that this guy who may be a superstar one day is just sitting there waiting to play?

That wasn't really a consideration, believe it or not, because Alex was like still the guy. He still had amazing control of the offense. He went on to have, I think, the number one passer rating and efficiency and downfield passes that year. So it's not like he was replacing this like lower tier quarterback. Yeah. I'm not saying Dalton is that.

But I think, you know, Alex Smith. You're not wrong in saying that. Well, you said it. But I think, you know, Alex in 2017 was still, you know, probably a top 12, top 10 quarterback. He had, you know, taken the chiefs into the playoffs, one playoff games. And so it's a little bit different starting point from there. And the other thing is the guys see splash plays and you go, oh, wow, he's talented. But we're also around those guys day to day.

And so we don't know, you know, what Nagy's saying in terms of, oh, well, there's still a lot of stuff like Justin needs to learn, command of the huddle, command of the offense, making the reads on time. I mean, the one preseasoned game I watched him the most, he almost got himself decapitated because he didn't know a pretty simple bi-man pressure and the blitz was coming free. So it's stuff like that that we don't have a grasp on as outsiders. The guys on the bears know that, and they can tell if Justin can run that thing day to day, if he has complete control of the offense. That's just the thing we'll never understand. You know, that's San Francisco, Kyle sticking with Jimmy over Trey. You know, it's not because of talent.

It's because of command of the offense. It's because of knowing what Kyle wants. And so I think that gets lost a little bit. you know, as a player who's going through it, there was no point I thought, oh, man, we should be starting Pat over Alex. You know, to that point, Alex was the best quarterback I'd ever played with. I didn't, I mean, I knew there was better, but like, that was a pretty huge step up for me. So I was pretty excited to be playing with him. And you saw the stuff Packadoo, you saw it in the preseason. And to me personally, you just don't quite know how that translates into games.

You know, you also see him with the second group. You know, he didn't take any reps with the ones. once the season starts and that guy's running scout team, to me it just doesn't matter because there's literally no repercussions. You almost want your defense to intercept every pass. You want to throw these risky passes. You want to push the boundaries because anytime they can get an interception, that's going to make them feel good and confident going into the next week. So we never really had that situation where I don't think the team was like,

oh, man, we've got to be playing pad. He's clearly better. We knew what we had waiting. We knew the excitement. We knew the talent. You could tell those first OTAs. the ball just came out of his hand different and he could do different things. But I think this is a different situation.

It seems like, you know, Dalton's not quite as good as Alex was. Fields might be a little bit better, like, from the get-go in terms of complete command of the offense because he had a bit more. I mean, the stuff Pat ran in college, you know, it pretty much they had, what, one or two protections. They had, like, two run plays and like four or five different, you know, route concepts. So, yeah, it's just a totally different situation. All right.

Let's play the hypothetical out then a little bit. Let's say, just for sake of argument, Fields looks ready enough. Like in practice and his command of the offense is such that, I mean, they're putting him out there situationally, right? It's not as if they're putting him on ice like Jordan Love last year or something like that. Let's say he's ready to play. And they're just worried about keeping him on the bench for whatever reason. If he's ready and he's clearly more talented, if you're a player in that locker room,

would it upset you that they were not giving you the best chance to win every single week? Would that be something that kind of got under your skin at all? Yeah, for sure. I think it seems like wasn't that kind of thing with Trubisky was it last year, maybe two years ago, where you're basically saving your quarterback at risk of losing the team or you're keeping the team at risk of losing the quarterback. This isn't quite as striking. It's not just one guy that you're making the decision about.

But yeah, that stuff reverberates if it's a trust thing. That's the basis between good coaches and bad coaches. Good coaches never lose stress in their players. And their players always believe that the coach is making the right decision. And if you got a guy who's like clearly better in practice and you're not getting the right answers from the head coach as to why that guy's not playing, you're just going to be like, all right, well, he's making a mistake and the biggest decision for our franchise. How can I trust him in anything else he's telling me you day to day? And so that can definitely turn sour and turn south really quickly.

That's why I wanted to ask. Because in my mind, my first thought, watching that offensive line and watching Jason Peters go out after like a quarter and a half and a fifth round rookie is now you're starting left tackle against the defensive line that has Aaron Donald. I know they don't play against each other. But you know what I'm saying. When you watch that happen, my first thought is let's not break the guy. Let's not throw him out there into a situation that's not conducive to his success.

there's no downside to keeping him on the bench for four or five weeks as we figure out this offensive line situation. But if there is a downside when it comes to how other guys in the locker room will respond, if they know you're going to keep trotting out the wrong guy every single week, then I think it becomes a little bit of a murkier situation. Right. And so we talked about this, you know, last time we were together when I was talking about Denver and why I thought Denver was going to get a boost from just like average quarterback

play because now they have a quarter of a make they can trust to stay on the field. You know, in this situation, Chicago's strength is their defense. Well, if the defense is frustrated by that second, I know, I know. But if the defense is like, all right, well, it's the middle of the first quarter. Our offense just had two straight three and outs. You know, we know nothing's going to happen there. I mean, screw it. Fields is back here. He just threw a touchdown. He ran for a touchdown. He's better than Dalton. They're not putting him in. You know, that's one of those mental things that matters. It really just does. It's as simple as that. It's as that and yeah, it's a risk. And, you know, it's going to be interesting to see. I mean,

I know you have a certain feeling about their defense and what the strength of their team is. I think we kind of know the weakness of the team, as you mentioned, up front with the O-line. You know, I don't know that our O-line isn't good enough, so I can't play the quarterback is a valid excuse. The thing you don't want with fields is to develop bad habits. I mean, we see young guys and especially running quarterbacks. They get into the habit of running and bailing and just trying to make things happen only with their feet. And you want a solid O-line. You want that guy to be comfortable in the pocket

and learn how to be an NFL quarterback who runs, not be a runner who can throw the ball. So that's a risk is stunting his long-term development. And if that is the case, I mean, the coach can't come out and say, hey, guys, our O-line's just really not good. We did a poor job. We let a left tackle go that is a solid player. He's not great.

He's not bad, but better than what we have. We drafted a guy with the back injury. He's at for the year. We just didn't put the resources that we did in there because we're paying a 36-year-old Tidan who hasn't produced in seven years. He can't say that, right? So that's the kind of thing where, like, the head coach can't really be honest about it. And I don't think if that is the reason, he can't tell the team that. So that is a disconnect, and he has to be able to kind of tell the team in a different way.

That's exactly how I see this. And I don't think it's about him getting hurt behind that offensive line, by the way. I think it is bad habits. I think stunting his development is the consideration you have to take into account. And you're right. You can't just say, well, you guys suck, so that's why we can't play the quarterback. It's a really difficult spot. And I think that it's not as simple as what fields should just be playing.

And I think these are all the considerations that have to go into it. And that was, well, that was real quick. That was the thing that I tweeted about Nagy that Chicago blew up about. Like, it's not that he's saying stuff that's incorrect per se. It's just he's saying the wrong things. And he's in control of whatever he, puts out there to the media. So like, don't say, oh, we need to see Dalton the regular season.

Well, that means that you can't evaluate for a whole training camp. That's not the right thing to say. Like, there are correct things to say. They're just not being said. Just don't say anything. Don't say anything about who's going to play quarterback. It's a much, much easier way to handle this. Yeah.

And same with, I mean, Kyle got asked that question every single day. And he just kept saying, you guys know the answer. Like, we know the answer. So just avoid it. talk about something else, talk up whatever else you want to do. But yeah, he's totally in control of that narrative. And to me, he hasn't done the best job with that specific part. All right.

Let's talk about the Chiefs game. It seems silly to not have you give your thoughts essentially every single week about what the Chiefs did. You're going to be watching this game very up close. It's one of the best teams, if not the best team in the league. You have an intimate knowledge of what they're doing and the things that they're trying to accomplish. It would be wrong to not use you as a resource. source here. And they played a huge game against a probable AFC contender on Sunday. So what were your impressions week one with this kind of new look chiefs offense?

You know, the thing that struck me is that the offense looked pretty similar to everything we've seen the past few years. You know, it's not like the new look O line dominated and they ran the ball all day and Pat had a ton of time and all this stuff. Like it just looked as it has been. The flip side of that is the upside, right? You've got three rookies starting, the center, right guard, right tackle. You've got a new kind of. kind of old vet and tunie who's in year five who's now like the oldest guy in the room and you've got a young left tackle who's switching sides and you know people are trying to see if he can be a true love tackle and stuff but those five guys haven't played together three of the five have never

played an NFL snap they just went up against one of the most talented defensive lines in the NFL you know held their own I just think the ceiling for this chief's team is higher than people think because week one is going to be theoretically the worst performance of the year like the most inexperienced one of the best fronts, you know, not having quite as comfortable of a game plan because you just don't quite know, you know, what the Browns are going to do defensively, how they're going to use Clowny, how they're going to use, you know, Malik, a new guy, or this linebacker who can play linebacker and slot and all these things. And so I just see, like, okay, that's a pretty good game one against probably the second or third best roster and team in the AFC. They took their

best shot. You know, Cleveland looked pretty pissed about last year still. Um, seemed to be taking that personally and they succeeded and they had a good game it wasn't a great game but they've got the best player on the planet and the best tight end and the best receiver and those guys made plays and they won and they took the brown's best shot they've been psyched all you know off season to go get the chiefs again i think to the chiefs it was probably more of just all right this is game one it's a big game and you know that's all we got to do were to browns like this was the goal of the off season was to get the chiefs and they couldn't do it so I think you've got to be pretty encouraged by Kansas City and know that this theoretically

should be the floor of how good they can be. When you guys, whether it was during the Super Bowl run or during that playoff run, whatever, there were a couple games you guys were losing late. When you guys were losing with Pat, was there just kind of an understanding that this was going to work out? We have the best player on the planet.

The only team is going to beat us, is us beating ourselves, essentially. Did that reverberate throughout the rest of the of the huddle because it feels like that when you watch the chiefs play. So I don't think that's a conscious thing that we think. And I know there was stuff that like, you know, we kind of had bad fourth quarters. We don't put games away or we'd be behind and kind of just wait for Pat to do his thing. Like we never went out there like, oh, we got this. We're coasting. Like every game was we're going to be aggressive. We're going to attack. We're

going to do our thing. We're going to score 49 points. All that stuff. The difference is that when those fourth quarters happen and you're down 10 points, you're down 11 points. You just have confidence and trust in each other and there's no like, no one needs to make a big speech. No one is panicking. No one's like, oh man, we really got to do this, this drive, otherwise we lose. Like, you just trust that you're going to score the next drive and then you're going to score the next one and you're going to win the game. And it's happened almost every time, which is the wild part, but it's not like there's no part of you that's like, all right, you know, as long as we're within two scores, Pat's going to bail us out. Like that's just not the way you think.

That's not the way we're wired as players, as chiefs, you know, as competitors, which I hate saying as competitors, but I just did it. So I guess I'm, you know, immediate person now. But it's just, you just trust each other. I get back to trust. Like, there's just a confidence with each other that you're going to do the right thing. You're going to make the play and it's going to happen. You know, you see a lot of teams that once they get down two scorers, you're just like,

all right, this game's over. You know, they can't come back from that. Or they don't know the horses to do it. or the scheme is really about run and play action and they can't throw from down a couple scores. But all those things the Chiefs can do and obviously it starts with Pat. And it's just the trust that he can do it

on script and off script. And that's kind of the cool thing is whatever the situation calls for, like he does it. All right. So you talked a little bit about Orlando Brown switching positions. I want to talk about his old team here for a second. We're recording this on Tuesday. The Monday night game happened last night.

the Ravens tackles had a rough time. Lamar was pressured on 18 of his 39 dropbacks last night, according to PFF, and the Raiders blitzed twice. So a 46% pressure rate while blitzing twice. That is not a good day. Al-Han Vilaueva struggled. Ronnie Stanley, especially based on what we've seen from him in the past, had some moments where he struggled a little bit.

Just what were your overall takeaways and what were you thinking while watching them kind of deal with that Raiders front during that game? Yeah, that was not the best offensive tackle performance, I'd say. Really three out of the four offensive tackles in that game had a rough one, especially compared to what we expect of them. Starting with Stanley, I mean, the dude's coming back from a broken leg. I don't think he practiced the entire training camp.

You know, my brother had a broken leg. That first year back, he was in pain basically every game. It still felt like crap. There were some games. He basically couldn't make it past halftime. They're different injuries and all that stuff. But I understand that. He didn't look right physically.

to me, you know, I've never really seen him lean on guys. I know Yannick has that really awesome cross-ch chopping. He looked good, but like Stanley never leaned on guys. He never got caught with a, you know, with a chop move and like falling on his face and the guy gets the corner. Like I never saw that from him. If anything, the knock on him was that like he played too high and people said, oh, he plays too high and he's soft and all the stuff. So it's like he didn't have his flexibility. And then when you did get locked up, you know, that left leg is kind of the leg that he's putting a lot of pressure into to stop bull rushes and he just didn't have confidence in it or strength. I don't know which one, but definitely not the confidence. And so I just felt bad. It just, you know, you could tell that he wasn't physically or

mentally kind of all the way there with the full trust. And that's not the guy who got the contract to be like one of the top left tackle left tackles in the game. Villanueva, you know, a little bit different story. You know, the past couple years, his play has probably gone down, you know, a notch or two every season and then switching sides. I mean, I know we'll get to our, you know, rookie offensive tackles later, switching sides, especially as, I don't know, like an eight or nine-year vet, who has only played the one side and had a pretty unorthodox way of doing it, especially as a 6-10 dude. Yeah, he just didn't look good.

You know, Max Crosby does a lot of stuff with his hands. So as an offensive tackle, you can kind of see all the stuff and all the hand movements, and you get a little hesitant and you don't want to shoot your hands. But, like, there were times he literally never tried to even make contact with them and just kind of gave up the corner. So that was, you know, a pretty rough go from Baltimore's offensive line. Definitely not where they were, you know, last year, let alone two or three years ago when they were rolling. They're, you know, got the Chiefs coming to town.

You know, Chris Jones is out there. It sounds like Frank Clark might be healthy enough to play. A lot of good players there. So, I mean, as a Chiefs fan, you know, I'm optimistic about, you know, the defense line's chances going into this one. but as a offense alignment at heart, that was rough to watch last night. Max Crosby looked really, really good last night. I mean, just was making plays left and right,

even beyond being a pass version, some of the change of direction stuff he did. I mean, physically, he looked exceptional. And then Yonik and Gakwe, I don't know if you thought this. He looks bigger to me. He looks like more substantial than he's looked in the past. Maybe it's just that Raiders uniform. But he looked like he's put on a little bit of weight.

I mean, and just combined those two guys. it really does feel like, maybe Baltimore just had a bad night, but there's a chance that their pass rush is just significantly upgraded from where it's been over the last couple years. Yeah, I mean, the disappointing part for them is it seems like Yonik might have an injury that, you know, they said could have long-term implications, so we're not quite sure how many weeks he'll miss, you know, if any.

So that's going to be a big blow. You know, we talked about that defense, and you mentioned they only blitz two times. That's Gus Bradley. He doesn't blitz. Yeah. He gets horses. He lets them go and they have to win and that defense line won.

I didn't personally like notice Yonick and think, oh, wow, he looks a lot bigger than normal. He looked quick. He looked agile. He looked fresh. He looked, you know, fully committed. Not to say he wasn't before, but obviously he bounced around from team to team. And he just seems more at peace, you know, with everything right now. Crosby's always been a good player.

You know, I think with him, he's always been a guy who he does play hard. He throws his body around. He's always been a good run defender because of that. You know, pass rush-wise, he's had games where he's kind of feasted on not quite as good tackles against the upper echelon guys. You know, he hasn't established himself as like a top-tier rusher and being able to beat, you know, Ramcheck and all these guys. That'll be the next step for him. You know, last night wasn't the best competition he's going to face, especially as he primarily plays over right tackle. So going into this week, you know, seeing how he'll face against, you know, a better guy.

and then as the season progresses, that will be the most interesting thing for me is, you know, if this Raiders front can get home with four guys consistently, that changes kind of the entire tenor of the defense. What did you, in your mind, what does he need to do to take that step? Where does he have a little bit of room to grow, Crosby?

So I think he tends to telegraph things a little too much. You know, like I said, he does all those hand moves, but he kind of throws them from pretty far away. And so for the most part, You can see them kind of redirect it. He's strong. He's got to go to Bull Rush. You know, he threw in a couple spin moves last night,

which is good before. It was mostly just kind of like bull and kind of the outside swipe. And I don't think he's gotten an elite first step, so I don't think he's like a burner around the edge. I think he's the guy that wants to be powerful, you know, push the pocket, get inside, bend the corner when the quarterback's too deep. But marrying those three together and just being more consistent with it and having, you know, I always talk about what makes an elite guy an elite.

an elite guy elite, it's, you know, being able to win all three directions. And so you're really honing in on the inside move and then being not quite as obvious when some of the other hand stuff is coming, I think would be big for him. So you said it was not an easy game to watch as a former offensive tackle watching those guys struggle. I'm curious, when that game happens, when things start to snowball a little bit and you feel like you're kind of getting into quicks in and I'm mixing my metaphors here. what is that like as an offensive lineman where the game starts to feel like it's slipping away from you how do you combat that it's like you ever think gets jumbled in your mind you don't know what's going on um i tend to kind of revert into myself and kind of just kind of like recede and for it and go into a shell a bit and so for me it's being very aware of that and not letting myself get into that situation you always have to fall back on your fundamentals um you know that's kind of the hard part with villain a wave is i don't think you has those, you know, fundamentals, that comfortability at right tackle. And with Stanley, he didn't have, you know, the body and the confidence to, like, fall back on his fundamentals either. So when that's the case, and, like, you know that's the case, that's even more of kind of a mind meld that, you know,

at least for me, for the most part, I was healthy. I'd like to think I had good technique and everything. And that's like, all right, take your set, throw your hands, good body position, be aggressive, do what you do. But when you don't have that foundation, you're not comfortable with the side that you're on or your body or, you know, you haven't had a good camp and you're not confident, it's really difficult and it sucks and you kind of don't know what to do. You know, most offense alignments start to mix up their sets a little bit. And so, you know, if you are a guy who's primarily, say, vertical setter and the guy's beating you four times on a vertical set, it's like, all right, I should probably try to jump him. Like the vertical set isn't working. But if you're

vertical setter, that's what you're most comfortable with. You know, you're not as comfortable at jump setting. So it's like, do I try this thing I'm less confident in? Do I know, not what do i do you just kind of find yourself a no man's land it's like i mean obviously you watch a lot of baseball these hitters that are laid on fastballs but early on changeups like they're in that no man's land that they don't know do i start my swing sooner you know what's the what's the cue to get me back on track um you just got to go do it for the most part it's just like all right i got this take the set trust myself i'm a good player let's go do it do you have that conversation with yourself like do you like take a minute on the sideline where you're like actually trying to

have that like mindful take a step back moment for yourself pretty much i mean half the time i have that from the middle of the huddle to getting to the land of scrimmage you know i'm i'm a guy who's kind of fear based and just in the sense of like that's what motivates me um so the fear of failure and you know not doing that so i have to i'm very critical on myself and uh i like to tell myself I'm not as good as I probably am. So for me, I'm always kind of thinking I'm not doing well. I'm struggling and I have to coax the confidence out of myself. So yeah, that's something that I always did.

And I know for the most part I kind of make things look a little bit smooth and nice out there. But it's, you know, like the duck on the water. Those feet underneath are turning pretty hard. Is there an example of a game that you felt like I really had to lock back in? Like this is really slipping away from me. Yeah, I mean, I've typically played JJ Watt pretty poorly, you know, especially in the younger years where he was, you know, the best player in football. It's an easy guy to play poorly against and, you know, his style didn't match up with mine either. And, you know, I'd go in those games.

How so? Well, I can't give away too many state secrets here, you know, if we see each other again. But, you know, for the most part, I kind of do my thing. I tend to lean a little bit too much. You know, I'm a guy who's not a natural kneebender. I don't have natural leverage quite as well. And he's a guy who kind of just like shakes and shimmies. And then like the second you're out of position,

he goes inside, he goes outside, he throws you on your face, you look poor. And so that kind of split second at the moment of contact, he's just a lot better than most guys I face and most guys in the NFL. And that hasn't matched up well for me. And so for me, it's like, all right, you kind of just have to go treat him as a big guy. you know, you can't treat him as a defensive end because he thrives on that space. And so, all right, he's a three tech, get on him, use your hands, be aggressive, trust it.

Because that's the other thing, right? You can think, oh, let me go jump him. But the thing we see from JJ is the inside move and a guy's on his face. So it's like, how do you trust that, like, being physical and aggressive is the right move when all you see is guys being overly physical and aggressive and him just making a mockery of them. So, yeah, he's a guy that like, it kind of gets out of control. And that's one thing Coach Heck is really good at. he understands what makes guys tick in the moment, you know, hey, Mitch, just go be aggressive,

do your thing, just trust yourself out there, throw your hands. And so kind of having that conversation with yourself and hearing it from someone else is definitely a good thing. All right. Something else that we were talking about before we started doing this that I really wanted to ask you about. You tweeted about it. I think you actually talked to Ted about it a little bit. The Bucks ran a pressure against the Cowboys in that opening game that was wild. For people who have not seen it. The very simple explanation is they had Sue and I want to say it was Veyla lined up on the edges and then they had both linebackers walked down. So every offensive line was covered, but the defensive tackles were playing off the edge. Very quickly explain why that's troubling

as an offensive lineman and why it's difficult to deal with. So most protections are six-man protections. You've got the five offense alignment and the running back. So what Tampa Bay did is they put seven guys on the line. So you're already outnumbered. They've got seven, you've got six. Five of those guys are what we would call quote unquote big guys, you know, defense alignment. So it was Vea, it was Sue. Then they also had Jack Barrett. They had the rookie Tryon and they had JPP. And JPP was lined up right over the center. Barrett and Tryon were lined up basically over each tackle, like kind of head up on them. So kind of a wider three technique. And then the two monsters. We're outside of those as wide as can be. In both A-GAPs, opposite JPP, were two linebackers,

Levanti David and White, I think it's White, right? Yeah. I get the two Devons messed up all the time from that draft guys. So, Devin White and Levante David in the A-GAPs. So traditionally, those five big guys, they're on the field. All five linemen are going to say, wherever those five guys are, those are our five. And running back, you can take everyone else. Well, the running back is now responsible for two guys, two of the best five linebackers in football, in both A-GAPs. The quickest way to the quarterback is a straight line, which is A-gap right to the quarterback. So that's just off-the-bat a rule breaker. So you can say that and you can say even, oh, you know, Zieg will just block whichever one comes. Well, they're probably going to run both of them. You know, they're smart enough to understand

that this is a rule breaker. We're going to have both guys running full speed. And if someone is blocking him, he'll back up and he'll pick a packs underneath. So there was no chance to scout this. This is what Tampa Bay rolled out with. They've got five individually dominant defense alignment one-on-one, two of the best linemakers in football. And now they're running this front that just breaks every rule in the playbook and you have no time to prepare.

So yeah, good luck. What happens when you guys get to the sideline after that it goes down? What is the first thing that happens? The first thing is we try to explain what we saw. to the coach because typically the coach like has a good idea and we're looking at the still shots and you know by the time that we get the still shots you can kind of see it but he also wants oh what did you see what did you guys call what happened who dropped whatever um you know there's some guys who relay more reliable information to their coaches than others uh so usually you know

I'd be the one relaying things even if it was stuff that happened on the left side because I just see across the formation and so you know you kind of talk to the guys you trust you know obviously Pat goes back or the quarterback goes back and quarterback coach and the coordinator saying, hey, what did you see? How did you try to block that up? What was the coverage behind it? And then from there, it's like, all right, we're going to get this again. It might not be the same look, but we have to have a plan. So what's the quickest, easiest way to try to block this up most efficiently? You know, in that case, because they're presenting seven guys with six blockers, you might have to cut a guy free in Ted's article and what we showed. Dallas kind of banned it,

which left Sue of Head Start to absolutely crush Dak Prescott. Not my first choice of blocking schemes, but that's what they did. And on the sideline, there's only so much time to devise that as well. You know, guys spend all week against these designer blitzes, like trying to figure it out, learning what to do, who to block, all right, this specific look, the quarterback should make this call. Doing that on the fly is pretty difficult for a lot of guys in the league. And so it's tricky.

And hats off to Bulls, man, because that's dirty. to come out game one and throw that at them, especially on Thursday at football. Is there an example you can think of where your heads were spinning during one game because somebody threw something at you, you had a hard time pinning down? Yeah, so you always kind of go into games and not quite sure what you're going to see. There's essentially defensive coordinators are either going to run like a bunch of stuff that they already run in their past and you don't know if it's from like three years ago, from two weeks ago, whatever.

Or they're a blitz of the weak team that, like, designs a blitz to beat your protection. And so those guys, once you've seen it, that's what's going to come. And so they don't really have, you know, a deeper package than maybe those first couple blitzes. And like, all right, we think the chiefs block them up this way. We think this is going to be successful. These are our blitzes. You know, they're probably going to run some of their other base stuff. But there's not much more depth to it.

The other guys that are more kind of junkball coordinators, they just throw whatever at the wall and hope it sticks. You know, you kind of have to be prepared for everything, but you're not necessarily going to see something new because if they're junkball coordinators, they probably aren't successful enough to, you know, create new stuff on the fly. So going into a game and seeing things, but I mean, Denver, you know, has always been, you know, pretty good in terms of bliss packages. I mean, Fangio and then, you know, coordinators before one of the few times I've ever flipped out on the field and just like absolutely lost my mind. You know, we had a certain tell, you know, the direction, the, the, the,

We were sliding the line one way, and then they were saying, no, no, no, go the other way. And I was like, no, no, no, go over there. And I freaking knew it. And I knew it. And it was a silent cadence. And it was a double count. And like half the line jumped off sides. And I went ballistic and started cussing everyone out.

Because I was like, it was a big leverage situation. Like, I knew the blitz. I was prepared. No, that's the guy we need to look at. The blitz is coming from that side. Go over there. I made the right call. And we freaking blew it and jumped off sides.

And I just lost it. was that what against Fangio? So it was 2019 then? I think so. I want to say, yeah, 2019, maybe 2018. I think. His first year there was 2019. So if he was there, then it was probably 2019.

Because that's, it's come up over and over again. You talk to offensive coaches and, you know, people talk a lot about like the too high stuff with Fangio. Every offensive coach that I've talked to, just he's a master. of understanding protections. And the ways that he can kind of manipulate your rules and keep it back in, he's really, really good at stressing those things. And with the Shanahan teams especially, he was able to understand exactly how to attack their play action protections in a way that no one else did, where when they saw the quarterback do

a certain thing, they would send another body. So it's not surprising at all that Vic Fangio is the one sending wonky shit at you in blitz packages, and it's a real pain in the ass to try to pick up. Yeah, some of those guys are pretty impressive. And like you said, I mean, having played for Shanahan, the pass protection schemes are relatively simple. You know, especially the play action stuff. I mean, good luck trying to figure out what plays to call it on because he can do anything. But in terms of like the true dropback stuff, it's not the most high level.

He kind of cuts the field in half, sends a line in one direction, and sends it back to the other side. That's what kind of made the Super Bowl thing. Even funnier is, you know, the protection. is very, very simple, and the running back should have known, like, I blocked that one guy who's on my side, and he didn't. So, you know, I'll defend Shanahan on that one because it's a very simple protection. The running back just blew it. All right. Before we get out of here, let's talk about the rookie tackles because both of them had notable performances. Sewell thrown to the left side right before this game starts because Eric, or excuse me, Taylor Decker can't play. He looks great.

Like, it's amazing that there's such a contract. between the way that he looked during the preseason at right tackle and then how he looked on the left side, even against Nick Bosa. I went back and I watched the game today. A lot of chip help and, you know, they were conscious about helping him out against Bosa. But I absolutely, he did look really comfortable, really set up in a way that he did not during the preseason. Yeah, it's like he looked like a seventh overall pick. You know, they drafted this guy because of the things he did allow tackle. Like, you know, we've all, okay, so what, 90% of us are right?

right-handed, the other 10% of left-handed. When we've had something happened to our dominant hand and we've had to use our other hand, it sucks. It doesn't matter if it's like eating a bowl of cereal, showering, whatever else. Like, it is really difficult to do something with your non-dominant hand. So imagine trying to block a Bosa brother with your opposite hand. You know, that's the analogy. Like, it's difficult to do.

And yeah, you can say, oh, well, he had a whole training camp to practice it. But, like, it's difficult. I don't know what to tell people. It's not that easy. If it was easy, then he wouldn't look that way. This is 100% confirmation of what a lot of us were saying, that he needs to stay on the left side. Like, that's his most comfortable position.

You know, some guys, biomechanically, it's just difficult to do it. Some guys can never do it. You know, I've played with a few guys who are just right side of players. I mean, my brother was one. He could play right guard or right tackle. He might not have had the right speed and body profile to be a right tackle, but he could do that better than the left side because his body was just more comfortable and balanced with the right side.

you know, there's an explosive factor, like for Sewell, you know, his right leg, the one he's pushing off of, that has built up so much strength over time because that's the one he's pushing off of. You know, if I went and tried to play love tackle, which I do every now and again, like it's just, it's different. Your body has adapted to it, and it's not that simple, and I'm glad to see him there. I hope he never moves off that spot because he should be the Detroit left tackle for 15 years. And I think he proved it because, you know, I saw some of the lines people like, well, you know, I think Decker's pretty good, but I couldn't see him having a game like that. that against Bosa, it's like, okay, well, then you found your left tackle. You're going to move Decker.

Like, it's that simple. If you don't think that your six-year veteran could have had that game against Nick Bosa, that your rookie who just switched sides after two months of playing the other side could have had at what, like 20 years old, he's not even 21 yet, then you found your answer and you find something else to do with Decker, whether it's left guard or right tackle. It doesn't seem like that O line is completely figured, even though I've seen some stuff saying that they could be one of the better O lines. I don't really get where that was coming from. but if you want to put Decker at left guard and Sewell at left tackle and just have those guys smash dudes all day and run behind them and have a quarterback that feels very protected on the left side, yeah, sign me up for that. He was crunching people in the run game.

I mean, just destroying people, which was very fun to watch. There were a couple plays, and it was funny because you mentioned this about Joey when we were doing the AFC West preview, a couple plays where he overset a little bit, just a little bit, and Nick just took that inside path instantly. If you give those guys the slightest sliver of daylight, they always have an answer. So not surprising that he got beat a couple times for a couple hits, a couple pressures. But again, we're talking about like a top five edge rusher in the league. Even with those pressures and even with some of the help that he was getting, still a really impressive performance. Yeah, I mean, you're going to get beat. Like, guys don't throw perfect games, let alone your first career start in the circumstances he was playing.

So, yeah, pressures happen. You know, a sack is going to happen every now and again. especially like you said against one of the best rushers in the NFL. Yeah, the boasts, man, they're just like, they're snakes. They just, like, attack you and they're kind of doing the slither thing. And, like, the second they find the weakness, they just, like, find the open spot. It's nuts. But, yeah, major props to Sewell.

And the thing I noticed, you know, I have two TVs, so I kind of switch between four games. I just have, like, two on each and just keep pressing back, back, back, back to try to catch everything. I wanted to watch the 49ers Lions game to see Sewell. and because they like watching the Niners offense. And every time I turned it on, like, he just looked good. He looked explosive. He looked comfortable. He looked under control.

You know, obviously he had a few, you know, pressures here and there. But like, there's just that comfortability and that like, wow, this guy looks awesome. We never saw on the preseason or on the right side. It's so funny. You talk about Ronnie Stanley not feeling comfortable. Like you just the difference between feeling confident and assured and knowing what you're doing. It just makes all the difference in the world for an offensive line. Speaking of that, race,

Sean Slater, some superlatives thrown around about him. For those who don't know, he has the left tackle for the Chargers. I have to be better about this when we're talking about offensive Wyman. He was fantastic on Sunday. And Sewell was getting a decent amount of help. They were leaving Slater on an island a ton in that game. And he was having no issues whatsoever. How much of that game did you watch and what were your takeaways watching him?

I watched a decent amount. That was one. I wasn't quite as interested in the moment, but I taped it to go back and watch it. haven't gotten the time to do that yet, mostly because his whole game has pretty much been on Twitter at this point. It's been on Twitter the whole time, yes. My brother and Baldi and the Chargers own Twitter. So, yeah, pretty much all the plays. But yeah, he's a guy that looked really smooth. He looked confident. You know, his technique is awesome. I think the one thing that both Slater and Sue will have that you really can't coach him and you can kind of coach it, but like guys have it or not

is leverage. They understand leverage really well. And, they don't really lean on guys. I mean, we were talking about that earlier. You know, if you're leaning on a guy as an offense alignment, all your weights forward and basically anything the defense alignment does, aside from running to you, they're going to expose you. And both those guys just have such a good ability to play with their hips under them, leverage, get their hands on guys, you know, lift them, punch up, put your butt down, kind of all these coach-speak things from the offensive line perspective. But it's natural to them and you can tell. Like, it's not something that they have to consciously think about. remind themselves of. You know, that's something I had to do. There's a reason I wasn't a first round pick, you know, it's athleticism. It's, you know, knee bend. It's something, you know, USC didn't want to recruit me back in the day because I wasn't a knee bender and I wasn't, you know, it's fluid of an athlete. Of course, they had Tyrant and Matt Khalil, so I get it. But, you know, that's the thing. It's something I have to work at all the time in my pass sets. And those guys have that ability. And it just, it's really cool to see. But yeah, it's a little bit contrasting styles. It's almost like

you know, a tyrant versus a Trent, Williams. I think, you know, Sewell is more of the Trent Williams. He's going to go, you know, jack someone up. He's going to be a beast. Slater is more of a tyrant Smith. It's just a little more smooth. It's going to look a little bit prettier. It's going to look, you know, more in control.

And the thing that I thought was really notable about Slater is that what? The main question about him coming in was what? Length, right? He's a shorter guy for a left tackle. He has shorter arms. Montez Sweat has the longest arms of pretty much. much any defensive end in the entire league, and he had no issues with it whatsoever for the exact reason that you're talking about. He's sitting down so consistently, and he's never

leaning on guys, and so he's able to mitigate that length in a way that you absolutely can notice. So I thought that was kind of an interesting test considering some of the conversations that were had about him coming into the process, and he passed it with flying colors. Yeah, and I mean, everyone went into the air saying, you know, Chase Young's going to be this and that, and, you know, didn't really hear much from that game either. You know, I know Swet's a pretty good player, but that D-Line, you know, especially on the edge, it's kind of led by Chase. You know, Slater had a pretty good game against him a couple years ago in college as well.

But, yeah, it's the kind of thing that technique really is the defining thing. I mean, there are little variations in athleticism. You know, obviously me running a 545 versus Trent running a 4-6, like, that's a noticeable athletic difference. But for the most part, we're all in a kind of a spectrum. The thing that separates you is your technique, your smarts, your awareness, your confidence, how, you know, trusting you are and your technique, as we've talked about all episode. And those guys have it. And, you know, they've got some stuff that is pretty deep-seated in their mind and in their body and that they don't have to consciously think about.

And they can, you know, think about those individual things like, all right, I'm going up against sweat. I got to make sure my hands here. I got to on the long arm do the Hamilton or whatever else. And it's cool to see. And for these guys to come out that early, both guys took the year off, I think. So, you know, the first actual game action in two years is 20, 21-year-olds and go up against some awesome competition. Yeah, hats off to them because my first game did not look like that. That's for sure.

We will get into what the Hamilton is. And I'm sure a bunch of other just nerdy offensive line bullshit here over the course of the year. But for today, that's all we got. Thank you very much for doing this, buddy. I cannot wait to do this with you every single week. I hope people get a kick out of it because I know I'm going to learn a lot and I feel like other people are going to as well. Yeah, I had a lot of fun. You know, I know people think you're already O-line heavy.

So, congrats to you guys. We've got more O-line-heavy. Maybe we'll see some of the feedback. We'll pair that back a little and just go general conversation. But I'm here for whatever the people want. Awesome. Guys, thank you very much for listening. We'll be back tomorrow.

I'm very excited to talk to. to Lindsay Jones, which we will be doing every single Thursday. Also, Michael Sean Dugar, who covers the Seahawks. It's going to be joining us for our weekly team visit to break down their performance against the Colts. Until then, please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice. I sincerely appreciate that. Also, please subscribe to the athletic. The athletic.com slash football show.

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