The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - Unearthing wide receiver gems with Matt Harmon and a check-in from Broncos camp with Nick Kosmider

Episode Date: August 5, 2022

Is Juju Smith-Schuster the perfect fit for the Chiefs' offense? Is current Terry McLaurin the 2017-18 version of Stefon Diggs? Is Amon-Ra St. Brown Bud Light Cooper Kupp? So says Matt Harmon of Yahoo Sports and Reception Perception. He joins Robert Mays to explain why, and a whole lot more at the receiver position on this episode of The Athletic Football Show. Then Robert checks in from Broncos camp with The Athletic's Nick Kosmider. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Football Show. Welcome to the Athletic Football Show. Today's Friday, August 5th. I'm Robert Mays. Great show for you guys today. A little bit later, our Broncos writer at the Athletic. Nick Cosmiter is going to be joining us. Really enjoyed visiting with Nick at Broncos Camp over the last couple of days.

A lot going on there. If you haven't heard, they have a new quarterback. So a little bit of different feel to the proceedings there than it has been in years past. Before we get to Nick, though, I am third. thrilled to welcome from Yahoo Sports and Reception Perception, somebody I've wanted on this show for quite a while. I'm so glad we finally made it happen. Matt Harmon. Matt, how you doing, man? Robert, thanks for having me. I'm really glad to be here. Like I told you, this is, I think, the only NFL, certainly, I mean, I don't listen to a lot of fantasy podcasts. Sorry guys out there, but

this is the only NFL show I never miss an episode of, so I can't wait to listen to that Broncos interview and just fast forward through all of myself talking. I sincerely appreciate that. I've come to really need your work at certain points in the season, especially when we get into the fantasy world and preseason stuff. And we're thinking about what guys did as receivers last year. For people who don't know, Matt oversees reception, which in my opinion is kind of an invaluable resource as it relates to NFL receivers. And that's what we're going to talk about today. We're going to give you guys 10 or so tidbits about NFL receivers that we think you should keep in mind as you head into.

this season. As you head into your fantasy draft, it may be another place where you can keep some of this stuff in mind. But I think this stuff extends way beyond just the fantasy scope and really gets into why these guys are successful, why they're not. And maybe some guys we think are underrated on the rise. I think Matt does as good a job as anybody at identifying that stuff. And to do that, you guys have a pretty in-depth process at reception perception perception.

And I want to just dig into that a little bit before we get started. kind of shine a light on what you guys do over there and why you think some of this information is particularly illuminating. Yeah, absolutely. So when I first started to decide that I wanted to get into football, wanted to try to find my space here, I kind of set out to answer my biggest question about the game, which, you know, back in 2013, 2012, when I kind of got started with this, it was what the hell are wide receivers doing when they run off the screen on Sunday?

At that time, and I know you just put a piece up about like slot receivers on the athletic today. And, you know, the thing that kind of got my mind working about this was watching that Patriots team where Randy Moss, you know, broke touchdown records. But they also just always open, but you don't know why. Yeah, right. And also, man, what Randy Moss is doing is totally different than what West Welker is doing. Even if they both have W.R. next to their name. And I think that distinction has only grown, obviously since then, especially in today's NFL. So what I set out to do, I guess, because I'm a lunatic, was try to isolate wide receiver performance from the surrounding variables as much as possible because we know that wide receiver production. And I've gotten like more and more radical about my thoughts about this the longer that I've done it. Like wide receiver production is so inherently dependent on other things to go right.

You know, obviously we think about the quarterback. You know, they've got to deliver an accurate pass. All of that. They've got to be in the right offensive system. The offensive line's got to give that quarterback enough time. to get the ball to the receiver. But the one thing in my mind at this time was what wide receivers can control is route running. How often they can get open?

How often do they run each type of route? So what I do, and I'm still the only one, like any data point you see on reception, is charted by me. There's nobody else that's done it. My business partner, James Coe, has tried to get me to give up the charting. And I'm like, you're going to have to pry that out of my cold dead hands. So what I do is over an eight game sample for each. each NFL receiver and college receivers that I evaluate.

I chart every single route that they run in that game, how often they run each route type, how often they beat man zone press coverage. Really, again, the goal is to isolate wide receiver play from the quarterback surrounding variables and focus on just what they do well. There's also some other ancillary metrics like contested catch rate, where they line up, you know, breaking tackles in the open field.

I'm trying to paint the full picture of a wide receiver. But really the main thing is obviously the success rate versus man zone press coverage metrics. the route success rate metrics. I think that's what people really like the most because, you know, a lot of people are doing it now. I think there's a lot of route data out there. I felt like at the time in 2013, 2014, I was trying to answer a question that nobody else was answering. And I mean, still to this day, I'm a huge dork. I love doing this. And it really is a fun process for me. Even if there's more data out there, I think the granularity that you go into

and the types of different success rates are really important. We don't see those in a lot of different places. Another thing you guys dig into is just how often guys are on or off the line of scrimmage. And I think that smart offensive coordinators and play callers do a really good job of creating separation within the structure of an offense for certain guys. Like Cooper Cup is an example. We can dig into a little bit later. So I love it. And it's a huge resource for me. Of all the things you chart, what have you found is the most predictive as it relates to wide receiver success? What numbers that you guys have are you drilling down on the most to figure out what is telling me something here?

For me, it always, almost always comes back to the success rate versus man coverage metric. I think from just a pure scouting perspective, you'd think that, again, to try to isolate wide receiver play and performance, the guys who are consistently beating man coverage, consistently getting open against man coverage or getting off press coverage as a line of scrimmage, that seems like, and especially you got to think, I started this in 2014 was the first year I collected full season wide data. wide receivers were different than. There weren't these like Cooper Cup types. There wasn't the Debo Samuel type. So really beating press man coverage on the outside was even more important. I think now the success rate versus own coverage metric has kind of illuminated me to more of these, that Cooper Cup archetype of receiver.

You know, you and Nate talk about the power slot guys. That makes a lot of sense. We'll talk about a few examples. But yeah, the success rate versus man coverage has definitely been the driving force to predicting these breakouts before they have. And the way I look at it is this guy, and I always go back to Alan Robinson, and I know we'll talk about him in his current state, but back heading into that 2014 season, that was kind of like RP's first big claim to fame is he was putting up success rate versus man numbers that were, you know, indicative of a star level NFL receiver.

It was like, if this guy just gets the opportunity that his talent deserves, he's going to put up monster numbers. And, you know, sure enough, that is what happened in that 2014 season. So to me, that's still been the biggest one. That's been the driving force for a lot of the guys that players that typically go over that 70% success rate versus man number on RP. They almost always go on to be really good players in the NFL. So to me that's still the most important, although the zone metric I think is catching up to that. So just so people understand, looking at reception right now, the top five players in the NFL last season and success rate against man coverage, according to your numbers.

Tamante Adams, Stefan Diggs, A.J. Brown, Justin Jefferson, Terry McClorne. So if you're trying to figure out if this aligns with the guys we think are good at football, it often aligns with the guys that we think are good at football. So with all of that in mind, let's get into some of these tidbits. A couple of these are mine. Most of them are yours. You know the data better than I do. I'm just kind of digging around in there yesterday trying to think, oh, what's interesting? What jumps out to me? What maybe challenges some of the ideas that I had? And let's get into some of that zone. success rate because when I was looking at the numbers one thing that really jumped out to me was juju smith schuster because he isn't somebody that if you line him up on the outside and you force

him to be press coverage is going to be successful in that role you've written about this when he was in pittsburg a lot of the damage he did was against zone coverage and now he's going to a situation in Kansas city where he is the perfect player in my opinion to get at a discount for the way the defenses are approaching the chiefs he was 11th in the NFL last season, according to your guys' numbers, in success rate versus zone coverage. Last season, the Chiefs faced two high shells 62% of the time, according to next-gen stats, which was the highest rate in the NFL. No quarterback in the league had more zone dropbacks last year than Patrick Mahomes against zone.

It makes total sense that to go get this guy at one year and, what is it, $5,6 million to be your slot receiver as teams start playing you this way, there is a convergence of player skill set. usage and game planning here, in my opinion. And I just don't know if I'm thinking enough about how much a juju fits with the chief's need right now. I completely agree with you. You know, I kind of think that this is the beauty of having done this for almost a decade now, which is pretty unbelievable, that you kind of see the full life cycle of some players.

And juju is still very young. He's only on his second team, only on his second contract. But, you know, there was a time when, especially in like the dynasty fantasy football community. He was one of the top receivers drafted among the entire league, which I think at that point, you know, reception is kind of saying, like, this man might be a little bit overrated. I think he's kind of gone from being one of the most overrated receivers in the NFL to almost one of the more underrated guys, the chiefs to get him on that cheap contract, I think is so beautiful. It's only $3.2 million, by the way. I was wrong. I just saw it five or six. Three point two million dollars

this year for Juju, who is 26 years old. You know, there's all the like incentives and the, you know, bonuses and that type of stuff you can get up to or what. whatever. But yeah, I think it is a really great fit for him. You know, he, like you said, can't be that guy that's on the outside, the number one receiver facing a ton of pressman coverage. But the chiefs are changing. And like even last year, you mentioned he was 11th. You know, he's in the top 12 all time from his 2019 season, like his success rate versus zone coverage. And, you know, this is the database for reception perceptions, almost 400 NFL players wide at this point. So he's been at his peak form even better than what we saw obviously in Pittsburgh last year. Pittsburgh, I know we'll

talk about those receivers later. I know you and Nate kind of had Ben Rothesberger on the no-fly zone. No-file zone. Absolutely not. That's the perfect way to say it, man, because there is no more like depressing life-sucking force than Ben Rathusberger at quarterback last year for these receivers. So really with Juju, I'm willing to kind of throw out the last couple years. And even if he is the player he was in 2020 or 2021, that's a big boost for a Chiefs offense that's looking for, that archetype of receiver. I think if you squint at Juju, you could actually kind of see like a quote,

this year's Cooper Cup outlook in his range. I mean, nobody was putting Cooper Cup in like these top 10 receiver lists last year, whether it was fantasy football or just like real life NFL rankings. I think he took his game a little bit to another level last year. Obviously, you're going to lead the NFL and catches, yards and touchdowns. You probably made some improvement as a player. But that role, that archetype of players, just so huge to mom. modern NFL offenses. And, you know, this is a guy, Juju with the proven resume. He's getting a

huge bump in quarterback going from, you know, the husk of Ben Rathesberger to Patrick Mahomes. That's an even bigger jump than going from Jared Gough to Matthew Stafford. So I wouldn't be surprised if, you know, Juju has a big bounceback season. And it sounds like he's going to play a big, important role for them. I'm curious. Speaking of Ben Rathesberger, when you went back and did all this charting last year, who was just particularly disgusting? Where you felt like you really had to plug your nose before you started watching those games. Because if someone who has to watch everything, I'm sure there's one or two guys, like, I can't believe I have to do this right now.

Can't believe I have to spend two hours watching this guy right now. Are you talking like receivers or just quarterback and offense? Just anybody. Offenses in general, quarterbacks, just the one team you just did not enjoy interacting with as you did this offseason. Well, I mean, I'm not going to talk about your bears. I'll leave that alone. Oh, that's totally fair though.

It's totally fair. Honestly, anything giants related from the Jason Garrett era was particularly depressing and life-sucking. And, you know, I mean, those guys literally going from like the outhouse to the penthouse in terms of play calling, play designing. At least we hope so with Brian Daibel and Mike Kafka there. So, yeah, there's always a few where it's just like, God, it's not one of those, you know, because the process is the process with RP. The rubric is the rubric. Yeah, I'm not squeezing in six games or five games. Like, it's got to be eight.

and it's got to be every route in that game. So there are definitely sometimes where I really don't enjoy certain players or, yeah, it's certain roles too. I mean, Rondale Moore last year playing like fake wide receiver. That was not particularly fun to chart. He's got like the weirdest RP profile. I think that I've ever charted. In what way?

So when you look at Rondale more last year, I mean, I'll pull up the notes here. It's just insane some of the differences between what he was, like I said, I mean, he literally, to me, wasn't even playing wide receiver, really. Rondale Moore last year in reception, and Reception Perception ran a screen on 29.9% of his charted routes. That is the most in RP history by a country mile. And again, you know, this is like 400 players I've charted since 2014. The previous high was Debo Samuel in 2020 at 18%.

And I kind of wish that going into last year, I'd just thrown out Debo's 2020 season because he was so banged up clearly. even like going from Debo to the next highest screen route player was Albert Wilson in a partial sample in 14.8% of his routes were screens. That's still a 50% drop off from what Moore did. Face zone coverage on 89% of his routes. Even just his average depth of target was so insane. So I hope that there's something more for Rondale Moore there coming into this year because that's just like, I mean, that's just not even real. As one of the five people in America that probably went back and watched every a ton of snaps.

for a ton of routes from the Giants offense last season. Who do you think stands to benefit the most from that outhouse to pet house transition? Is it Tony? Is it Gowaday? If you're going to try to roll the dice on one of those guys, who would it be? I think it's got to be Cadarious Tony just because he has rare, rare ability as a mover in open space. I still have a lot of questions about his route running and just his technique in general. I was looking at his success rate versus press and some of the other stuff that you had. I was surprised that it was as low as it was.

And you have to remember, too, you know, one of our subscribers actually pointed this out to me in Discord that his 20, or his 2021 season looks a lot like Debo's 2020 season. I kind of wonder if there is some injury. You know, obviously, Tony was on and off the field a lot last year. But his success rate versus zone number, you know, at 80%. That's pretty good. You want to see that. And that's really the, he's going to, I think, exemplify that not slot receiver, but almost like a Robert Woodsish flanker receiver that gets moved around the formation a lot. I think they'll find creative ways to get him lined up against zone coverage,

lined up against linebacker, safety, slot corners, stuff like that. And that's going to be beneficial to him. But really with Tony, last year, among all the guys charted, he had the lowest dropped on first contact rate when he was in the open field. Again, just rare movement skills. Kenny Gallaudet, man, he was one of the most disappointing guys I charted last year. So I'm kind of like, we'll see what happens with him. But Tony, I do have a lot of optimism for it.

Just from a deployment standpoint, like you said, outhouse to penhouse. it's going to be a big deal for him. All right. Number two, Alan Robinson is not cooked. I think you and I both share this opinion. What is your view on this rooted in? Yeah, I mean, I've been very excited here and the thoughts coming out of camp from you,

from Jordan Rodriguez, about Alan Robinson and the plan in this new staff. And that's one thing too. I mean, I'd love for your listeners to trust me and my evaluation on wide receivers, but you can really trust the Rams on this, Robert. Like, when's the last time they blew a pro evaluation on wide receivers, you know.

They brought in Robert Woods when they got laughed at for that contract. He was a huge player for them. They traded for Brandon Cooks and he was, I mean, it didn't work out their long term, but he was like the missing piece that offenses needed in 2018. They bring him Beckham when there was all these questions about him and they don't go to the Super Bowl and win the Super Bowl without Odo Beckham last year. So bringing it back to Alan Robinson, you know, this is a guy from 2019, 2020 was finishing at like the 97th percentile, like in success rate versus man press coverage.

Those numbers are a little bit lower last year, but I do think that was a everything that could go wrong, did go wrong situation. I think from a pure technique separation standpoint, he can still win against press man coverage. And I love the idea of him not just actually playing that ex-receiver role that you and Jordan have talked about. But, I mean, that really is, that role has been so huge for the Rams offense over the course of the Sean McVey era, plopping Robinson, who's just always been so underrated as a route runner and separator and technician. You know, we know he's great in the contested situations, but reception perception is always shown that he is good against press man coverage as a route runner and separator. I think he is, you know, again, maybe not at that peak form that we've seen, but if he's even, shoot, you know, 90, 85% of that player, I think he's going to have an awesome year in L.A. And to put that in perspective, he may not pay that peak form, even in a down year, quote,

unquote. He was still 12th in your guys' metrics and success rate against man coverage. And success rate against press coverage, I want to say he was fifth. He was fifth, yeah. So it might be a relative downgrade for him last season. But my thought is the conventional wisdom on him is that he was awful last year. Yeah. And I think it's much more a product of a terrible situation in Chicago and the structure of that offense and what it had to be with Justin Fields. Talking to people in L.A., their opinion of what the Bears' offense looked like last year, they kind of threw up their hands. This guy has had no chance whatsoever. And with us, he has every opportunity to play all over the field, do all these different things. So in your mind, he's not far off from the player that we

always expected him to be at his peak. And I think that's a really important note to take away from this, because I'm not sure everyone shares that opinion. 100%. I thought the idea that he was washed up or cooked last year. You know, and you hear, obviously, we go through the course of the season. I do almost 80, 90% of my charting work in the off season. So you have these narratives about guys going into it. I was like, you know, and I love Alan Robinson. I've, you know, interviewed him a couple of times. He's a great guy. I'm like, geez, I hope I don't go into this and find he's just cooked, right? Like, I'm nervous going into charting Alan Robinson, but I was so pleasantly surprised with what I got out of it. And, you know, like you said,

that bears offense. Even darn Al-Muni, who's a speed-based receiver, you look at their route percentage charts on RP. Like, these guys are running. slants, flats, curls, just nothing downfield. I think there's going to be a lot more for Robinson to get done in L.A. for sure. All right. A selfish question for you. I can keep Juju Smith-Schuster at $6 in my Dynasty League or Alan Robinson at $26 in my dynasty league. Who would you rather have?

Oh, man. I mean, I got a tier, like in my tiered rankings. I've got Robinson a tier higher, man. I think that, and I like Juju this year, I'd keep Robinson even for the 26. I don't know if that's the wrong answer, but. That's where I'm leaning. You don't want to miss out. You don't want to miss out on like this Robbins.

You're gassed up. You're excited about this. Everybody's excited about this. You don't want that pain. You don't want that pain, man. You suffered enough. That's exactly why. That's exactly what it is.

It's the fear of missing out when it comes to one of those guys you can clearly just see is on the rise like that. To me, it's just also stylistically, I would rather root for a guy and be tuned into a guy that's going to win in the ways the Robinson is compared to a guy who's going to win in the ways the juju is. That's not a good reason. Like if you're just trying to extract the most value. you possible. Maybe that's not the way to think about it, but my fantasy enjoyment is a huge part of the process for me. So fair enough. All right. Let's get to number three here. Michael Pittman is the number one wide receiver that people aren't ready for. Going back through the numbers that you guys had, I was kind of shocked at the company he was keeping in the reception stuff. What did you see for Michael

Pittman last year? What kind of year do you think he's in for? Yeah, I was in on Pittman coming into last year because he hit that like seven, I believe it was 71.6% success rate first man coverage number in his rookie season. So that's, again, that sort of barometer getting over that 70% is good for a receiver of his archetype. You want to see that. That's, that has been very predictive of future success. But yeah, so I was in on him last year. He has a pretty nice season, but going back and looking at him last year, man, he was awesome. I think there's, in the way that he beats press man coverage like we were just talking about, it's very similar to an Alan Robinson. Actually, they're both at 96 percentile success rate versus press last year.

But then in some ways, too, like you just look at his success rate on digs, curl, slants. It's almost very keen and Allen-ish to me. So like a blend of those two players, that sounds pretty good. But yeah, the company that he keeps is legitimately awesome. I know there's some consternation about the other guys in the Colts passing game. Totally get it. We'll see what happens with Paris Campbell.

I liked Alec Pierce a little bit as a potential deep threat guy. But Pittman to me. He apparently looks great, by the way. And that's a Nate Tice special. So if Alec Pierce hits, that's a victory lap for Nate. I also, you mentioning the slants and the digs and all the in-breaking stuff and Keenan Allen-esque side to Michael Pittman's game. I think he's one of the most understood offensive players in the NFL. Michael Pittman is.

People look at him and they see that 6-5 frame and think, big guy, ball winner, outside the numbers, vertical player. They want him to be more of a slasher than anything else. And I think that's the encouraging part of how he pairs with Alec Pierce is. If you get that big volleyball type down the field element with Alec Pierce, it allows Michael Pittman, I think, to slot into more of his natural fit within that offense. And I also think Matt Ryan is definitely a quarterback who's more equipped to take advantage of a player like that than Carson Wentz was last season. Yeah, I mean, I'm all about like dismissing wide receiver stereotypes and stuff like that. And I think people look at, you know, Michael Pittman coming into the NFL and they thought he might be like a Kenny Goliday type of player. but he's not at all.

I think a blend of Robinson, who is underrated for his ability to separate underneath and in the intermediate areas, and Keenan Allen, who's like the master of that, he really strikes me as that type player. If he had a top five season by some sort of metrics, I wouldn't be surprised at all, Michael Pittman, just because this marriage with Matt Ryan

is so much better than it was with Carson Wentz. So if we're trying to identify this year's Michael Pittman, second year guy that for whatever reason may be a tiny bit derailed as a rookie, whether it's injuries or usage, any of that. Looking at the numbers, the guy I would land on is probably Rashad Bateman. Do you agree with that? Oh, yeah, 100%. I'm all in on Bateman.

I think he checks every box that you want, you know, not just from a success rate versus man number, but from success rate versus zone coverage as well. I mean, he does it all. I think he is a player unlike anything the Ravens have had, certainly in the Lamar Jackson era, but even in the last 10 years, man. they haven't said somebody that they could line up as an ex-receiver and beat man coverage, beat zone coverage, when deep, when short, when intermediate, when contested catches, when after the catch, I mean, to me, he is the next, I think he's the most obvious breakout

player in the NFL this year. And I really am very, very confident on him as a player. I wouldn't be surprised. I think if you were to look back on it, Rashad Bayman right now in this exact moment looking at fantasy pros is wide receiver 37 and ADP. I've got to assume Michael Pittman was about the exact same spot last year, if not a little bit lower. Even lower. He was probably like 42-ish in that range. So that profile, I think, a lot lines up with both of those guys. Yeah, and just big receivers. I mean, Pittman's bigger than Rashad Bateman, but just outside guys who can do a little more than just win jump balls down the field. And I think Lamar Jackson's a misunderstood as a quarterback, right? Like, if you think Lamar Jackson is a negative for

Rashad Bateman, I think you're kind of overthinking it. This passing game is going to be really concentrated between Mark Andrews and Rashad Bateman. And that's more than enough to get you what you need out of Bateman this year. Volume, I think, is more of the question than anything else. I think it's approach. It's not aptitude when it comes to Lamar Jackson and that offense for receivers. All right. Number four, this one I love because I was not ready for you to drop this. The Denver, I guess after the Tim Patrick injury, but we can move past that here for a second. The Denver skill position group might not be that good. Lay this out for me.

Man, I just have a tough time evaluating Cortland Sutton and Jerry Judy because I think both guys have to wear some of the blame for just how miserable the production was in that passing game last year. You know, Teddy Bridgewater is not a star quarterback. Teddy Bridgewater ain't like a scrub, right? I mean, he got several guys to over 1,000 yards if you want to throw Curtis Samuel. I will throw Curtis Samuel in there because, you know, my guy. Over a thousand yards total for Carolina a couple of years ago. Like, I think Cortland Sutton did not play his best ball last year, but I will also say this.

This is an article I'm hoping to put on the site at some point before week one. Again, since I've tracked this now for a while, guys who are coming off their first year in an ACL tear can be expected to lose 2.7% off their expected success rate versus man coverage numbers. So kind of willing to write off last year for Cortland Sutton. For Jerry Judy has the high ankle sprain. But this is a guy who's got a reputation as a great route runner. He actually had a really nice success rate versus man number in his rookie year. But just totally fell off the map last year, kind of to that like average rain, like 68%. So I just want to have my mind open to this Denver situation not working out or at least getting off to a slow start, right?

Because I do think that if I'm buying one of these guys, I'm buying Sutton because he's got the, the best peak season on his resume in 2019, pretty good reception perception results really showed out to be kind of that true vertical X receiver, maybe a little bit shy of like a legitimate number one territory. And obviously, Judy had a nice rookie season, but I don't know, man, without Patrick, I'm just, I'm now more curious than ever. I listen to the show, like I said, where you and I think it was Josh Norris and Evan talked about like Tim Patrick lining up as a big slot.

I was like, that's great. That's actually what I wrote in my RP profile for Tim Patrick. Like, he would crush in that role. So I guess good guess. But, you know, this is just a situation where I'm not really sure where Judy's going to line up. I'm not really sure where I want him to line up either. I think he fits best as a vertical flanker receiver. But then who's your slot guy?

Is it KJ Hamler? Like, that's, he's coming back from an injury too. So I just have my, I just want to be open to this like week six, week seven. We're kind of looking at the Broncos. I was like, this is it? Like, this is the best we got? I would assume that there isn't going to be a one-for-one replacement for Patrick in that role. I would have to assume they're going to try to piece it together in a bunch of different ways.

We'll talk about this with Nick later on the show. He thinks we might see more 12 personnel with Alberto and Dolcich out there because, and then if they want to use Hamwar as a speed slot and just try to cobble it together, because there's no one guy that's going to step into that role and give them what they need to do in terms of flexibility. So I have to assume that it's going to be a variety. of different ways they try to fix this thing with Patrick Gar. Yeah. Again, I think the biggest problem for me was just neither of these guys are coming off their peak season, Sutton and Judy.

Maybe there's something there, but, you know, Cortland Sutton last year, 21st percentile success rate versus man, 36 success rate versus zone, 33 against press. And it's the longer he played, the worst I think he got, which again could just be coming back from the injury first season back from an ACL and Judy, you know, coming off the high ankle sprain. but I'm, I don't know. I'm not like, I guess when Russ got traded there, I'm like, all right, they've got a great group of receivers to work with. Now without Patrick there, it feels a little shakier than ever, I think. That's totally fair. And again, I think something that not many people would say at this stage. And I like being challenged and what my perceptions are in that way.

All right, let's get to our next one here. Amon Ross St. Brown is Bud Light Cooper Cup. This is a favorite of yours. Explain what you mean by that. Yeah, I think this is one that I've said like a hundred times. And his college prospect reception profile, I think I compared him to like he needs to be in a Cooper Cup type of role. And I think last year he was put in that. This is something that gets lost in the weeds in like the fantasy world.

You know, he averaged like 11 targets per game in the last four weeks of the season. And I think a lot of folks get lost in that there were injured players that weren't there. But when you watch him, he was being put into a well-crafted role by Dan Campbell. And, you know, this play-calling group turned over in the middle of the year. Like Anthony Lynn was kind of marginalized. He's now out the door. Dan Campbell took over play-calling duties. He had a new offensive coordinator.

And, you know, he started seeing after their byweek, like his snaps go up, his routes go up. And then by the end of the season in his RP profile, man, it does look like the early career Cooper Cup numbers. You know, maybe not the best separator versus man press coverage. but he ran 67% of his routes against zone. And an 80.4% success rate versus zone coverage number, that's what you want to see. And like, it's all about creating layup targets for the quarterback. And there's nobody that loves the layup target more than Jared Gough.

And, you know, that Cooper Cup crossover there makes a lot of sense. So I just want to buy into this archetype of receivers. These guys who make their lives easy for the quarterback, the guys who can win in contested situations, can win after the catch. but these zone beaters who get, you know, lined up in the slot, get lined up at flanker, even like some backfield stuff for Amon Rae St. Brown, like the longer the season went on. So I know that, again, he's, it probably is not as much on like a pure NFL sense, but in the fantasy world, he is like the most polarizing player out there, which is so strange to me

because he just seems like a simple, clean evaluation in my perspective. I don't think we should ding guys for what they can't do to say, well, you know, he's never going to be somebody who can beat man coverage and if you lined him out up outside, he wouldn't, he wouldn't be a dominant effective player. Neither would Cooper Cup probably. Yeah. We don't have to worry about that. Exactly. Because he plays in an offense where he's not asked to do those things. And one of the biggest things with Justin Jefferson this year that I think is really interesting to take a look at is not him lining up inside as much. It's him lining up in bunches and stacks as an inside receiver. It's him being off the line of scrimmage a little bit more.

It's him being put in positions where he's not going to have to win one-on-one matchups. And that's clearly what the Lions have intentionally tried to do with St. Brown, and I think it's what more play callers around the league are trying to do. It's how can I hide this guy, not because of his deficiencies, but because I want to give him a slight edge. And that's to me what a lot of the younger offensive play callers in the league are doing. It's not trying to put these guys in really specific spot and saying, we're going to make you go win because that's what we expect you to do. It's how can I press the easy buttons as often as possible. And I think Amon Ross St. Brown is exactly one of those guys, and there's nothing wrong with that.

No, it's all about what can you do for me, not what you can't do. And man, I just think, again, this archetype of receiver is more important than ever. And I want to buy this archetype of receiver, especially in maybe the lines are actually a pretty good offensive ecosystem, which seems weird to say. But yeah, these guys to me are more important than ever. And, you know, there are things I said on receivers based on reception perception results. You know, I've always said, like the data is always right. I might be wrong in how I interpret things. But there are things I said seven, eight years ago that I would never say now about receivers.

Because I think the possibilities have been opened more by these new offensive coordinators, these new offensive minds and getting these guys out there. I mean, Cooper Cup, like you said, he's freaking leading the NFL and receiving yards and catches and all this stuff. 10 years ago, if he came into the league and some guy I looked at him, he's like, oh, he's a pretty big guy. Let's throw him out there as our ex-receiver. You might have watched out of the league. I think that's a legitimate thing to say, which sounds insane.

but that's just how good guys are now at getting these receivers in good spots and actually getting the best out of them, which is good for wide receivers as a whole, good for the league as a whole, good for offenses as a whole. Some context. I love this number. He spent 80.4% of his snaps behind the line of scrimmage last year. That was the third among the guys that you looked at. Cooper Cup was at 70.5%. Cooper Cup was 10. So they do have a lot of similarities in the way that they were used. And I don't think it's worth thinking a guy because of that. All right. I love this one. This is one of my favorite ones. The gap between Debo Samuel and Brandon Ayuk is going to start closing. You are a brave man because you are as far in the Brandon Ayuk bucket as anyone was last offseason. You were burned and you are totally unafraid of going back to the well here. I respect you a lot for it.

Thank you. I'm glad somebody does. But yeah, these are two guys, Brandon Ayuk and Debo Samuel. and I think they're probably not Debo, but definitely Brandon Ayuk. I think is a bit of a misunderstood player because coming to the NFL is like, oh, isn't this a little samey like Debo Samuel and Brandon Ayuk? And I think now even still folks think of these guys as the same type of player. I think they're really, really different.

Now, they're both great tackle breakers. Actually, if you look at the in-space attempts in the tackle breaking date on reception, the two guys that are one and two in the most percentage of times in the open field where they broke multiple tackles, it's Brandon Ayuk and Debo Samuel. So they're similar in that regard. That's Kyle Shanahan, baby. You got to love that. But I think Debo is definitely one of the best zone beating receivers in the NFL.

You know, in his rookie season and last year was top six in both seasons in success rate first zone coverage. Which, again, this is another guy that is schemed into great situations. You know, if Debo Samuel had gone to some dumbass offensive coordinator that was going to throw him in some stupid role, he might not have been the player that he is now. So let's bring back Giants Jason Gaines. Jared here. If he went to that team, I'm not sure I would have gone quite as well. I know. And that's the funny thing about Cadarious Tony to bring it back to him is when he got drafted by the Giants, I'm like, I mean, the worst possible outcome. And Tony did, to his credit, kind of make a little more noise than I thought he would in that situation. So good for him.

But yeah, Debo and Brandon Ayuk, I think are very, very different because I think Ayukes been so much better against press man coverage than people give him credit for. His rookie season especially. He hit all of those benchmarks, like 75% success rate versus man, that those guys are, those guys go on to become like the Terry McLorins, the Stefan Diggs, the Justin Jefferson type of guys. You know, obviously IUC had a rocky second season, but I'm kind of willing to take, and there are two players in the NFL, Brandon Ayuk and Deontay Johnson, where I feel like I've just tracked like every interview with these guys, like every interview, everything their coach says about them, their quarterback says about them. And the way that Shanahan talked about,

Iyuk, like, responding to the whole doghouse thing, I've been willing to just kind of throw out weeks one through six or weeks one through seven, really, because weeks eight to the NFC championship game, he produced like what we probably would have expected coming into last year. So I really think that Iyuk is just a totally different archetype of receiver than Debo Samuel. I think he can win in that ex-receiver position, can beat press man coverage, can win in tight coverage situations. And, you know, this offense is going to need that now with Tray Lance, take. over. Even last year in a down season for Brandon Ayuk, his success rate versus zone coverage bumped up. His success rate versus press coverage was still 76%, and 71% success rate versus man, lower than his rookie season, but still a very, very good quality number. And I think just again, I'm willing to totally ignore the mess that happened at the end of last season, or the beginning

of last season, focus on the good that he put on the field and the growth that's apparently coming out of 49ers camp right now. I mean, I wouldn't be surprised. if that gap is much closer from a statistical standpoint at the end of this year. I think it's about trying to find some breadcrumbs to create optimism for a guy like that. If he disappointed, how many leaps of faith is it going to take for me to talk myself into him? With Iyuk, it doesn't take that many. You can absolutely build a case. I think it's twofold.

One, it's the development stuff you talked about. Calshanahan said that earlier in training camp. I think our David Lombardi had the whole quote on Twitter talking about how Ayuk's rookie season was a lost season. He had no training camp. It was the COVID year. They really didn't have much prep work. And I don't think he did enough prep work, how Shanahan essentially alluded to, going into his second season. He was going to be the next guy. He didn't come in ready. And that's why he got off to a slow start. And Shanahan had lauded the way that he's approached this season. And it really feels like his first real offseason. And that's given him a huge head start. And then the way the offense is structured and how he's used.

You mentioned it in his RP profile, a lot of vertical routes, a lot of deep, outbreaking routes. Those are routes that Jimmy Garoppolo is not throwing. Nope. That's not the way that Jimmy Garoppel plays or wins. That is what you would expect from Trey Lance. So the way the offense is aligning with Brandon Iuk's skill set and everything about the intangible aspects to who he has as a player right now, I think all of that stuff is pointing to exactly what you're talking about right now.

I mean, I'm a huge route dork. so this is probably only going to resonate with like me, but I think Debo runs the best dig routes in the, one of the best dig routes in the NFL and one of the best slant routes in the NFL, and those are Jimmy Garoppolo routes, man. You know, God love Jimmy. He'll rifle that thing into zone coverage.

It gets him into trouble, gets him picked off a decent bit of time. But, man, he will be fearless and he will take chances. And Debo just right there and never lose his speed. It's such an impressive thing to watch. And he's such a cool player. You've managed to the alignment.

Stats with some of these guys. I mean, we know Debo is the movable chess piece. He was in the backfield more time than any guy sampled last year. Obviously, of course, some of that is with the running back stuff. But Brandon Ayuk was outside on 80.7% of his sampled snaps and reception perception was on the line for 84.1%. I mean, if he's going to stay in that role and Debo's going to stay in his role, like, that might as well be two different positions.

I mean, I'm not even evaluating those guys in the same way, honestly, because of that alignment data. So for me, I, I, I, I really just the arrow is all the way pointing up. I don't want to be pointing down on Debo at all or anything, but I think this is all just a credit to the growth and development that Ayuk is going to take as a player and within the context of a Tray Lance offense. I was at Niners camp for one day. He made two ridiculous plays. I was there for one day. So you hear about this stuff for the last week from everybody who's been there, all of the local beat guys. It's happening every single day. He made a play down the right sideline on just a missile.

shot from Lance the sort that we did not see very often over the last couple years. And then in a red zone period, in traffic went up over Chavarious Word and made a ridiculous catch that he should not have been able to make. I mean, that guy is absurdly talented. And if you're combining the absurd talent now with, in my opinion, a drastic shift in circumstances. The movement from Garoppel to train Lance, even if it's not about quality, the stylistic difference is there.

I think those are the things you have to keep in mind. when you're really trying to project huge breakouts and huge discrepancies from one season to another with receivers. All right. Let's get to our next one here. I love everything about this sentence. Current Terry McLaren is 2017-2018-2018 Stefan Diggs. Explain what that means. Yeah.

So Terry McLaren, you mentioned it earlier, number five last year in Success Rate versus Man coverage. He has been, since he jumped into the NFL, one of the best performers against man coverage, against press coverage. 94th percentile success rate versus man last year, 94th percentile success rate versus press number. And even back to 2020, man, he was still putting up fantastic numbers, 96 against man coverage. So, oh, God, he's such a good player. I think he is, and this is the Diggs comparison, I think he's an elite player. You just don't know it because of the circumstances. And I felt that exact same way watching Stefan Diggs with the Vikings in 2017, 2018.

You know, this is 2017, Stefan Diggs was number one in success rate versus man coverage that year. But we didn't know that just based on the stats. It was purely about his individual play. Again, this is the goal of reception perception, right? Isolating the wide receiver from the surrounding variables from the quarterback. And when you do that with Terry McLauran, man, I think RP is the perfect thing to show you just how good he is. And Robert, this is my, I think my favorite stat of all the things I collected last year. And again, it's going to kind of deride my guy, O'DU's finest Taylor Heineke here.

Terry McLaren, like I mentioned, number five in success rate versus man coverage, but it was also second in percentage of contested targets in reception last year. So if you've ever struggled with the idea that a guy can be a great separator but can be thrown into contested situations, go ahead and pop yourself some Terry McLaren 2021 film on. So the dig's comparison here is just if he ever made his way, Terry McClure, Lauren into a great situation like Stefan Diggs did. I think he'd put up top five elite level numbers because I believe he is that good. Unfortunately, I don't really trust Washington to ever put that situation together. So I was going to ask you, as someone who watched a lot of Carson Wentz,

throwing him, my guys like Michael Pittman and had to watch a lot of Tara Heineke, how much of an improvement do you think his circumstances are this year, McCorns? You'll understand this because I've done this with Alan Robinson over the course of his career where I've been like, Nick Falls is the best quarterback that Alan Robinson has ever had. Like Andy Dalton's the best quarterback that Alan Robinson's ever had, like all through gritted teeth.

I think through gridded teeth you can say Carson Wentz is the best quarterback, Derry McLoran's ever played with. I think the difference here is the way that Carson Wentz can at least drive the ball down the field. That's the biggest thing with how to... That's it to me. Yeah. Listen, and again, I hate to take shots.

I was actually at, this is a stupid piece of trivia that nobody cares about, but I'm going to say it anyways. I was actually at Taylor Heineke's first ever game action at O'DU because my sister went to O'DU and they were in the same class. So I've weirdly had Taylor Heineke in my life for a long, long time. Shout out to him all that for making it to the NFL. That was not expected. I'll tell you that. But he just can't drive the ball down the field. It's just not there.

I think he was a very, very limiting factor on that entire offense. But, you know, another thing, too, with Terry, McLaure. I think this is important for all of, like, Washington's entire offensive ecosystem. And I kind of think, I don't know if you agree with this, but I kind of feel like Scott Turner is an underrated play caller and play designer. I absolutely agree with that. I think he puts his guys in consistently advantageous positions. And we forget. That's all you can do is an offensive play caller. A hundred percent. And I think we forget, because we focus on Heineke, like, he was not supposed to be the starting quarterback. Like, they lost Ryan Fitzpatrick from the jump. And then

even beyond that, there were several times because my guy Curtis Samuel was hurt, Lynchburg, Virginia's finest, Logan Thomas was injured as well. It was like Terry McLaren in the preseason boys and like Antonio Gibson with a broken shin in the backfield. Terry McLaurin was number three in percentage of routes doubled in reception behind Devante Adams and Stefan Diggs. He was the focus of the defense on so many snaps last year. If they can get anything out of Samuel, which I'm not, I don't know.

even, like, I really, if talk about something, Robert, I probably got to let go of it. It might be that because, you know, Ron Rivera's sitting there talking about, he's worried about his conditioning, you know, he's practiced for three days and immediately gets hurt. But Jahan Dotson, I'm a big fan of. Like, if, if they can just take some pressure off of it, if they can get some other threats out there, that's going to help McLaurin as well as the whole Carson Wend's thing. And if you can tell, I kind of half answered to Carson Wend's question. I think all of that makes sense, though. And I think the, the Dotson thing, is an underrated boost to McCorn for the exact thing you mentioned.

If he can't, John Dodson forces defenses to double Terry McLaren at the 10th highest rate in the league. That's a significant difference. I mean, there's little tiny things if we're trying to build cases for optimism with those guys. And I think that Carson wants to be able to drive the ball, plus just a little bit more talent on the field with McCorn and in that receiver room. I can understand trying to build to that.

All right. Number eight here, Drake London could actually be the key to unlocking Kyle Pitts. I love this. Yeah. What did you think of Arthur Smith's first year as a play calling head coach? I think that the ways they wanted to use their receivers were difficult because they had no size. Yeah.

And that's a huge portion of the way, obviously with AJ Brown and Tennessee, how he wants to use those guys. When you have a guys like Russell Gage and Omeet, Zakias, and players like that, you're just not going to be able to attack the middle of the field. in the way that Arthur Smith wants to. And I think that that's exactly why they went out and got somebody like Drake London. Because in my opinion, I think you're going to see a lot of Kyle Pitts as an outside vertical receiver in this offense.

And I think you're going to see a lot of Drake London as an inside slot player within this offense. And I honestly think that's the right way to use both of them based on their skill sets and the way they fit together. The only thing that bugged me last year about the way they used Kyle Pitts was, I mean, they threw him out there as an ex-receiver so much, like a pure outside. outside guy like you're talking about, which is great because he can do that. And it's almost like, yeah, we can have this guy that has TE next to his name. You know, we can throw him out in this role. That's, that's fantastic. But because of the construct of their offense, I mean, talk about a guy that

was supposed to be part of their plans in Calvin Ridley, you know, just gone and then obviously suspended for this coming season. They were so limited in the other threats that they had that it's easier to take a guy away when they line up, when they line him up outside as opposed to like lining him up as a tight end or lining them up as a slot receiver. So in ways, I'm excited about Drake London and Kyle Pitts potentially like flip-flopping those rolls back and forth. I think that's exactly right. I think that's exactly right. It's that on any given play, you don't know which guy is going to be lined up where and their skill sets are multifaceted. I mean, the one play that Kyle Pitts had last year that after the catch, like a 60-yard touchdown that he had, where he just,

the way he can just explode after catching a slant as a tight end is absolutely insane. And looking at some of the numbers you have for Drake London, his own success rate in college and his just awareness of defensive structure working from the slot for a guy with that body type is so incredibly rare. And I think that's what allows him to survive in there. So if you have a tight end that can survive as an ex-receiver and an ex-receiver body type that can survive as a slot receiver, the flexibility that provides you on offense is immense. And that's exactly the vision they have for what they want to do. Yeah, it's crazy. You know, Drake London got all this for not being a separator, I never found those concerns to be valid based on the games that I charted.

You know, 73rd percentile success rate versus man for college prospects, 93rd percentile success rate versus zone, like you mentioned. I think he's so good on those in breaking routes in the short and intermediate areas. I think he's just going to pile up catches and yards in this role. This is going to be a very fun offense if the quarterback play kind of cooperates. I'm not sure that's going to happen. That's the only problem here. We might have to wait until 2023 for this to be a fun offense. When Bryce Young is the quarterback for the Falcons, it's going to be really enjoyable.

Us like film dorks will be like, there's so many cool things going on in this Falcons offense. You don't even know how they've got like this guy lined there. Everybody, you know, who cares? They're going to be one of the worst teams in the NFL this year most likely. But yeah, once we get a good quarterback in there, that'll be fun.

I'm fascinated by the sequencing the teams are going through as they're building their skill position players and trying to find their quarterback right now. the NFL. And if you, I had the conversation with Nick today and after talking to personnel people in Denver this week, their thought was rather than drafting the quarterback in the first round a couple years ago when they could have gotten Justin Fields. They said, we're going to build the rest of this thing up and we're going to see if we can drop the quarterback in last.

And I think that's exactly the thought process of the Falcons have gone through here where they could they have drafted a quarterback before a couple years ago? Yes. But what are you putting a quarterback in if that's the sequence that you do it in? And I understand there are concerns. Are you going to be drafting that high again, is this going to be your best chance to find one? I don't know how founded those concerns are. With the amount of guys that are available in the veteran market now, with how you can kind of move around the draft, with how bad they're going to be,

I think you're really setting guys up for success if you try to build it up a little bit around them and have the quarterback be one of the last pieces in the sequence rather than one of the first. What happened with Josh Allen is a rarity. That is not going to happen to most guys where they can endure that slog of a first season thrown into Robert Foster and whoever else.

Kelvin Benjamin. Calvin Benjamin. We just don't see that happen very often. And now whoever plays quarterback for the Falcons next season is going to be dropped into an offense that has Kyle Pitts and Drake London and potentially some improvements along the offensive line they wouldn't have had this year or last year. I understand the thinking behind that.

Russell Wilson getting to play in an offense now with Tim Patrick, Cortland Sutton, and Jerry Judy before the Patrick injury. that looks a lot different than it would have if you had done the quarterback first in that sequence rather than last. So I understand more teams wanting to do it that way because I think there's been success.

Think about the Jets this year and Zach Wilson. When Zach Wilson went out to play after Elijah Moore, who I love Elijah Moore, but when he went out to play in like weeks 15, 16, 17, 18, whatever, not 18, but you know what I mean. Like he goes out and plays

like with those guys last year after Moore got hurt, it's like, you're just throwing a goofballs. And now you look at just the guys that are going to be in that offense, it's a totally different world. And it's a different situation because it's the second season. But man, I mean, that looked pretty exciting much more than some of these other guys get dropped into. All right. Number nine, CD Lamb is ready to be an alpha level wide receiver.

I watching them at camp, it seemed like he was lining up a lot inside. I asked him explicitly. I said, is your role in terms of inside outside? Going to change it all with him already gone? He said it's not. I assume we're going to see him a ton in a bunch of different roles. What about CD's performance last year and his RP profile leads you to believe that he's kind of ready to take that step? Well, for one, shoot, he's going to have to take that step, right?

You just look at their receiver depth chart. It's pretty crazy that they lose James Washington and, you know, he's James Washington and we're like, what the hell are the Cowboys going to do a wide receiver. I like Jalen Tolbert. I'm a fan of him coming to the NFL, but he's a third round rookie. Like C.D. Lam's going to have to. That's still only two guys. Yeah, and that's it.

And that's it. I mean, like Noah Brown after that. I mean, it's some crazy stuff there. But I think to me, when you look at CD Lamb through reception perception in isolation last year, he was already performing at a guy that deserves that type of target share. 91st percentile success rate versus man coverage, 82nd percentile success rate versus press, and still a pretty solid mark against zone coverage as well. I think if they wanted to line CD Lamb up as a pure X receiver, he could do it.

If they wanted to take him and put him in Amari Cooper's old flanker role where he kind of was a little bit inside and out, you know, off the line of scrimmage a ton, he could do that. I just think he is a near complete player. He was above the NFL average and success rate versus coverage on a per route basis on every route except one last year. That's how good he was at getting open and earning those targets. And now we're just going to see him in that role. I think he's a dark horse to lead the NFL in targets this year. I mean, based on like betting odds and stuff like that. I wouldn't be surprised one big of the feet.

I don't even know if he should be that much of a dark horse. I think he should be right there in the conversation with anybody else based on the competition. The other thing you mentioned in his profile that I think is really important to isolate here, he needs more opportunities in space because his ability to kind of sift through defenses as a receiver, but also do work after the catch, I think is an underutilized part of his game compared to what we expected of him as a college prospect. And even watching him at Cowboys Camp, him winding up inside and his ability to just kind of understand, I'm sifting through this zone, I'm going over this person under this guy. He does a really, really good job with that.

And I just think I want to see more of that and how he's used in that offense. Yeah, broke multiple tackles on 15% of his in-space attempts. He definitely needs more of those chances. And I think the Cowboys, too, just need to, this is what he is, this is what you are and stay in that role. Because I think they've done too much like flip-flopping with him based on who else is playing. I mean, this year they don't really have to make that decision. I guess once Michael Gallup gets back, they'll have a true X receiver there. But yeah, they need to just decide what role to put him in and not flip-flop him too much either.

So our esteemed producer, Michael Beller, is telling me that CD Lamb is 14 to 1 to lead the league in receiving yards this year. Beller, who's like in the top five? It is Justin Jefferson. Cooper Cup, Jamar Chase, Devante Adams. Okay, all right. So Ced is fifth in that list. So he is up there near the top. With tied with Steph Diggs.

14 to one, though. that's pretty juicy. You consider the type of offense they're going to be in and the competition he might have there. I like that a lot. It's crazy, yeah. I think it's only like, you know, back earlier in the summer. I think people weren't given enough credit for just how dark this depth chart was beyond him.

All right. Last one here. Number 10. You spend a weird amount of time thinking about the Steelers receivers. And with Deontay Johnson's contract news today, let's dig into this a little bit. What should we know about the Steelers receiving group before we get into the 2022 season here. I guess I probably spend a weird amount of time thinking about wide receivers in general.

That is very fair. Yeah. So any group, I guess, I guess the percentage of the already large, weird amount of time I spend thinking about wide receivers, the fact that the Steelers wide receivers take up so much time, although, you know, they have a storied history of drafting receivers. So maybe I should give myself a little credit here. But last year, Deontay Johnson was number two in success rate versus zone coverage, which he's only number two because Cooper Cup went absolutely.

nuclear last year posted the second best success rate versus zone coverage number I've ever charted since 2014. Who had the best? Antonio Brown in earlier. That makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah. That makes sense.

Yeah. Number one all time for success rate versus man, by the way, is our guy, Stefan Diggs. Still holds that title. So that is great to see. But yeah, Deonti Johnson, number two in success rate versus zone coverage last year. In 2020, he was number one. But he's also a great man beater. You know, I think people kind of view him as this little pop gun receiver threat because, again, he was playing in the no-fly zone with Ben Rothesberger, and that's all Ben Rothesberger could do.

But I actually think you can make a really good case that Ben Rothesberger has been holding Deontay Johnson back because he was a 91st percentile success rate versus man coverage last year. Again, even better in 2020. And he beats press. Like, he's right shy of that elite territory in success rate versus press coverage, too. was at or above the NFL average success rate on every single route last year. To me, I know he got paid a little less than some of those other stars from 2019. That was interesting for me to see there, but generally, I just think he's an underrated, true number one receiver.

He drops the ball too much, whatever, but I think he can win at all levels. I'm actually kind of excited to see him play with the quarterback who, you know, maybe he doesn't get 160 targets, but he gets 140 targets and they're, you know, not all six yards down the field. Like I kind of think he's on that Calvin Ridley, Terry McLaurin, Stefan Diggs, access of outside separators. And I don't think that he gets enough credit for the play that he has put out so far. How do you think the three guys that potentially line up for them in 11 personnel with him,

Pickens and Claypool, role-wise, what do you envision? What's the best outcome for that? See, this is where I've spent the, like as soon as they drafted Pickens and Calvin Austin, too. and I kind of like Calvin Austin as a potential player down the line. That feels like more of like an ingredient sprinkled into the offense with Calvin Austin, right? Like you line him up as a speed slot every once in a while. It gives you an aspect of your offense you don't typically have with the three guys that you're going to try it out there the most. With those three guys though with Pickens, Claypool and Johnson, I've been racked my brain trying to figure out what the best usage of them is.

And I haven't landed on anything that I like. Well, people forget that they lost not just Juju, their primary slot receiver, but also Ray, McLeod went to San Francisco. And he was there's no, he was there a slot receiver after Juju got hurt. So they were bereft of slot receiver options heading into the draft. And I think that the move to take George Pickens, who is a pure X receiver to me, like he's got to be an outside the numbers guy, which is interesting because Deontes been an X receiver, like has taken the most snaps outside and on the line of scrimmage of almost anybody last year.

He's never been a slot receiver. So I think Chase Claypool is probably their big slot guy. It sounds like they've been experimenting with that a little bit in camp. That makes sense to me because Claypool was just terrible last year. I want to give almost everybody a pass for playing with the no-fly zone last year in Ben Rothesberger, but Chase Claypool on an individual basis was one of the most disappointing guys I looked at last year. Because his rookie season was legitimately promising. Put up some pretty good RP numbers in his rookie year.

But his second season just, I think he's got to wear some of that blame. He's never been a good contested cash player either as Chase Claypool. So the idea of getting him more routes against zone coverage, you know, in that big slot receiver role, I do think that makes a lot of sense for him. And then, you know, maybe you have Deonté as your flanker and then George Pickens as your ex-receiver. But to me, it's Johnson and Pickens have got to be outside. And then you decide what to do with Chase Claypool there. I think he probably fits best at this point as a big slot. It's fascinating to me that we had so many conversations about whether teams would elect

not to pay these guys because of how many players might be available in the draft. And all of those guys who are up for contract extension except for AJ Brown, everyone got paid. Every team decided it's better for us to have this person in-house even if we're paying a premium for him than to go with the uncertainty of a rookie receiver except for Tennessee, who in my opinion is at a different financial place because of what they're paying their quarterback. And I also think there's some injury concerns with AJ Brown and lingering with the knees and things like that that maybe aren't there with some of these other guys.

What do you make of that? What do you make of these guys actually getting paid in teams deciding that it's worth paying these guys and it's worth paying them at the top of the market rather than rolling the dice, even if the understanding is there are more receivers available than ever. I think there's a couple of things to think about there. Number one, the best example we have of a team pulling this off is the Vikings trading Stefan Diggs and then drafting Justin Jefferson. But Robert, let's live in a different world for a second where Howie Roseman does the right thing and just takes Justin Jefferson one pick before the Vikings. We are not

having this conversation about how the Vikings pulled this off by taking Jalen Rager to replace Stefan Diggs. So, I mean, there is that alternate universe where that might have just not worked out and then the Vikings get panned for that trade. But it did work out. They took a great prospect who I still can't believe the Eagles didn't take Justin Jefferson. I'm sorry, Eagles fans. I'm sorry, but it is what it is. I mean, the thing is too, that these guys are all so unique now. I think that's the big thing is that a wide receiver is not a wide receiver is not a wide These guys all might have WR next to their name, but they fill these very specific roles. So not only if you are, if you're the San Francisco 49ers and you trade Debo Samuel or whatever,

you're now reimagining your entire offense too. I mean, Shanahan certainly could pull that off. I'm not too concerned about that. But I think it's just that factor of Debo's totally different. You know, D.K. Metcalf is even totally different than some of these other guys. Even Deonti Johnson, like if he was traded from the Steelers, are they after another, you know, pure separation route running based receiver? Or do they want to take a George Pickens type and put him in that number one receiver role?

Because he's pretty different than a guy like Deonti Johnson. So I think the diversity in the amount of wide receivers and not just the breadth of guys that are available, I think that comes into play with some of these teams as well because living with, you know, paying up for your guy that you've developed, that you've crafted this role for, and not having to start at square one with an unknown prospect, and maybe it's the guy that you don't even imagine. I mean, I know that Trayland Burks looks like A.J. Brown from a size perspective, he's not, I don't think he's A.J. Brown, I don't think he's going to become that guy.

I don't think he's going to be, you know, AJ Brown's a guy who's top five in success rate versus man press coverage. I'll, I'll bet that Traylin Burks is not there in his second and third season. So I don't know. I just starting over from Square 1, especially when these guys are so unique and specific, that's got to be pretty scary for an NFL team. Matt Harmon, thank you very, very much for the time, my friend. You do a better job with this than anybody. Yeah, and your specialization here, I think is a huge resource for people.

For everyone that does not have a reception, perception, I highly recommend you go check it out. It's something that I use consistently, both in my fantasy prep and during the season. It's an unbelievable resource, and you should definitely be checking out Matt's new daily show. Yeah. On Yahoo? Yeah, the Yahoo Fantasy Football Forecast. I'll be hosting five days a week during the season starting. This Monday will be the first episode where we transitioned to five days a week.

But we have shows out from last week where I am taking over the host chair. And yeah, man, I'll be doing a lot of talking this season, that's for sure. Hosting a podcast five days a week is an interesting experience. I wish you the best of luck. I've really enjoyed it, but I'm not sure it's for everybody. Well, I love to talk. I love football. And yeah, I appreciate you having me on, man.

This is awesome. I love this conversation. I love thinking about wide receivers in this way. It's just what a time. What a time for the position, that's for sure. We will certainly be having you back, my friend. Really appreciate the time. We'll talk to you down the road.

Thanks, ma'am. All right. I am thrilled now to be joined by our Broncos writer at the athletic. Nick, how's you doing? I'm great. It's great to have you in Denver, right? I am so happy to be here. This is fantastic.

It's beautiful out here. I love spending time in this area. I'm happy to finally get here. It's not a normal stop on the training camp tour because it's not close to anything. Right. You got to really go out of your way to get here. But I have some personal stuff this weekend that I'm looking forward to. So it was a good two birds with one stone sort of situation.

Those are the best kind of trips. Yeah. Knock out work and a little bit of play at the same time. Denver's good for that. You know, there's always something to do. So before we started recording, you mentioned that you ran into Sierra today in the course of your work. It's a different feel here than it's been in the last couple years.

Beyond the pop stars that you run into in the lobby, what feels the most different with this new staff, with that? the new quarterback than it's felt like over the last three or four years. Yeah, I think just sort of the, you know, I hate to use the word energy because it's just so sort of nebulous and overused, but I would say just the general, I think, enthusiasm from players. Going into the last several years, every time you would have those sort of pre-camp addresses, and Justin Simmons even said this to start this camp, was that you would be trying to almost bend yourself in pretzels to come up with ways to sound optimistic about what it was.

And he said, it wasn't that I didn't believe in the guys around me. But there's just something there that kept me from going full bore of like, I believe we can make the playoffs and this stuff. And they did not shy away from having those sort of expectations this time around. And so I think just sort of that lightness, the kind of, you know, just sort of joy that that brings to not just have to convince yourself that you have a chance, but to truly authentically believe that that's true. That has translated in a lot of different ways. Beyond the on-the-field impact of a guy like Russell Wilson, the building. is different when you have a guy. The way that George Payton's day-to-day is is different when you have a guy. The way that Nate Hackett drives to work is different now with Russell Wilson than it would have

been if Drew Locke and Teddy Bridgewater were still here. And I think we underrate that when we're thinking about the dynamics that a star quarterback brings. It changes the entire complexion of every single day for the people in the building. And that's why I asked somebody here earlier this week, I said, were there any reservations about Russ and the price based on the way that he played at times last year? And even some of the hiccups in 2020 during the second half of the season. And they said, zero. Like, as soon as that option became available to us, we knew that we had to go down that road because when you have a guy, it changes everything. And I think you already feel that here.

Yeah. And I think the interesting part about it is that, you know, George Payton didn't allow himself when he took the job to let the, you know, the past four or five years of, like a fan base and players really wanting a quarterback to sort of speed up his process, right? You know, we know they were involved a little bit in the Matthew Stafford chase in early 2021 before, you know, the Rams ultimately paid a pretty large price for him. They had the number nine pick in the 2021 draft. So after the Stafford thing didn't happen, they're saying, okay, he's going to take one of these young guys with this pick and didn't want to rush into that just based on sort of that desire

around here to have a quarterback because this is a franchise that's been spoiled by franchise quarterbacks over the last 25, 30 years with two guys, right? And so I think the fact that, like, to your point, knowing certain guys were going to be worth that price and that he was going to be that guy, I think that's what you sort of respect because he did build it in a way that when the quarterback became available, this roster was a lot different going into March than it was even when he took over in January of 2021. The idea of building the support system and then adding the quarterback last, I'm fascinated by.

Is that the sequencing that's going to put you in the best position as a franchise these days? And I think there are several examples we've seen recently where it is. You look at what the Rams did last year. That's the most recent one, Tom Brady even the year before. There are other examples where, obviously, they've done it in conjunction, like Josh Allen, they built it with the team. But Mahalms is somebody that was added last? So is it worth saying, we know we're.

quarterbacks are going to be available. The tier of quarterback is the question. But if you look at the guys who are probably going to come available this spring, they could find a starter. They could go get a Baker, Mayfield, or a Carson Wentz, or whoever. So you're almost making sure that the foundation of it is solid enough that when you have to add that final piece in, you're just ready. And I think more and more teams are approaching it that way. And I've kind of had to rewire my brain for the acceptance of approaching it that way. It's like, this works. Like maybe this is the way that more teams should be doing it. And I think that them signing Tim Patrick and Cortland Sudden to those extensions last fall, that, like, kind of set off some alarm bells in my head of they want to do it this way, where they're trying to make themselves as attractive of a destination as possible. And now you can coax the guy like Russell Wilson to come to town because of it.

Yeah. And a couple of key free agents, right? You know, Randy Gregory, obviously he's still working through shoulder rehab after having surgery back in April, I believe. But, you know, guys like him, guys like DJ Jones. and then to do what they did in the draft during Peyton's first year, to get a guy like Pat Sertan, as we talked about, you can just talk to anybody around here, and it's just sort of a wow kind of explanation for what he can bring.

They thought he was special. And that is when they're thinking about quarterback versus him in that draft, they said, we saw a special player. I'm not going to draft a quarterback because we need a quarterback. And in the moment, I think that there are a lot of questions about that. Now you look at the way the last year and a half has unfolded, seems to be a pretty good outcome. Yeah, it does.

And it was just really interesting because George Payton, to go back to, you know, the start of camp, that was sort of the explanation was that everybody was rightfully excited about what Russell Wilson is bringing to the table. You mentioned it. He's changed everything. I mean, more player-led meetings, you know, just more accountability, more, you know, taking guys aside, just stuff that was not around the last five seasons and that guys who have been here during that time are just totally kind of blown away by because they just haven't had anything resent. assembling that. But for all that being said with everything that he's brought, George Payton said, listen, if we hadn't built it up since, you know, since I got here, if we hadn't started putting this all together, I don't think a guy like Russ would want to come here, you know, because he wants to come here to win right away. And they believe that they were in position to win. Even as you mentioned, if they had been able to kind of just go out and get a starter, I think they believe they would have still been competitive. Now the ceiling changes. But again, they had to have all that put together, the Pat Sertans, the Javante Williams, the going out

Free Agency and getting the DJ Jones, resigning Tim Patrick and Cortland Sutton. That was all part of the process to be ready for a guy like Russell Wilson. My sense is that the Randy Gregory moves and some of the other things that in free agency this year are accelerated by the Russell Wilson thing. You bring that guy in, say the ceiling changes.

All right, let's microwave this thing. Let's go get some guys and throw some money around because we can win right now. And that's another thing. Like the motivation behind building your roster that way and what your expectations are. It all starts to sort of shift. So that's all sunshine.

and rainbows and unicorns and bullshit. Why is this not going to work? Where are the potential kind of cracks in the foundation of this Nate Hackett Russell Wilson partnership on offense where it's not going to be this rocket ship right away? Because I think interrogating that is important. Well, you know, I think you saw a little bit of a sample of it over the last two, you know, kind of full practices that they've had where, you know, they started for the first time this week incorporating Red Zone drills.

And it didn't go well. The first day, it did not go well. And the first two-minute drill they did today was not going well. All of a sudden, it's fourth and four, and it's not looking good. They're out about midfield. And all of a sudden, Russell Wilson checks to a play that even Nate Hackett didn't know that they were going to be running and gets Cortland Sutton deep down the left side. And all of a sudden, he strikes for a 40-yard play.

It's a touchdown on a drive that seemed doom. But what Nate Hackett said afterward was interesting. He said, listen, it's going to be two-minute especially. That's the hardest thing to get going. and doing that because it requires so many people to kind of process everything quickly. And I think that's where you're going to see it is as much as we know how brilliant Russell Wilson is in terms of diagnosing things and getting to the line and seeing the field, this is brand new. He has never been anywhere other than Seattle.

And so Nate Hackett has never been a head coach, hasn't called plays in three years. So I think the reason that it might not work right away is if those speed bumps, if that learning curve is just a little bit wider than perhaps we thought with a new coaching staff that it's kind of doing this all for the first time. That's where you see, to me, the potential for cracks. And then, of course, Tim Patrick suffering the ACL tear doesn't help either. Shitty moment. It sucked to be here for that. When you watch it happen in real time and clearly they knew it was going to be bad right away.

I mean, some training camp injuries, guys limp off or the cart comes out because people are far away. This one, the entire team went and kind of huddled around him after it went down. He just kind of felt like that was going to be. a bad outcome. And now it shifts the ordering of the receivers, right? And so now who slots into what spot? I was fascinated by the idea and the potential of Patrick playing more inside and them using Jerry Judy in all these different ways. And that group of three, probably one of the best receiving cores in the entire league potentially this year, now things change. So with Patrick out, what do you think of kind of the ripple effects of that for them on offense? Yeah, it's a great question

because, you know, as you mentioned your piece about the kind of the evolution of slot receiver, that's, to your point, they wanted to do that with Tim Patrick more. And there's really not, you know, another replacement for him from a size perspective. A lot of smaller guys. A lot of smaller guys. You know, like we saw, we saw here the guy that's been kind of replacing him, the actual lineup has been Montreal Washington, kind of the pint-sized fifth round rookie, who's had a nice camp. He's impressed and he's going to be their returner. But I think it's going to have to change some of what they do schematically. I think one of the things you'll see. is Albert Okuibunam, the third-year tight end.

Good for you. And Greg Dulcich, yeah. It's been a lot of practice, Robert. I could not have nailed that two years ago. And then Greg Dulcich, the third round pick out of UCLA. I think you're going to see those guys kind of be incorporated into Patrick's role a little bit more, even a veteran like Eric Saobert, because it was interesting talking to Okuwebunom yesterday, he said we feel a lot like receivers in this offense.

Like they are putting them in position. to sort of, again, have to play every single one of these spots. And so I think they're trying to interchange it a little bit because they are two tight ends who can really get up the field. That's one thing Nate Hackett is stressed is like, yeah, they're big guys, but these guys can run. They can cut. And so I think that's going to be part of how they change it up as well.

That's really interesting. I think that makes sense. That's a logical solution. And I was talking to Justin Outen earlier today, their offensive coordinator, I was talking about some of the empty looks that they have, the fact that Giovante can line up in all these places. and you have this positional flexibility and murkiness that really serves them. And if you can play in more 12 but have it express itself as three receiver sets

because they have juice in ways that most tight ends don't, maybe that gives you a little bit more flexibility with Patrick out. The offensive line feels like a more complicated situation than you might have thought at first glance coming into the season. Like where does Graham Glasgow fit into this? I think Billy Turner's banged up right now. In an ideal world, who do you think are the five starters there? Yeah, it's a great question.

I think a healthy Billy Turner at right tackle is probably still going into this offseason what they kind of were hoping and leaning on. It wasn't long ago that Aaron Rogers said something to the effect when he was over there that he thought that Billy Turner should be in the Pro Bowl the way that he was playing. And so he knows this offense well. But the more time Calvin Anderson has to kind of get this head start, I wrote today about how he spent some of the off season working with Joe Staley. and trying to get a deeper grasp of what the outside zone scheme required for a tackle.

I would say today, it's been an adjustment for the offensive line. I mean, they've really kind of had to reprogram the way that they play. And I think that's a really, that's a really, really good observation. Because if you have any sort of familiarity with it, you can have one step ahead, that's important. Yeah. And it's one of those things, too, where, you know, you kind of think about it coming in and just like, okay, who's the best player in that spot, right? Who's the best right guard?

Is it Quinn Miners? You know, is Graham Glasgow better there? And one of the things you talk about having to kind of change your way of thinking is that with the zone blocking, it's purely about how the five guys, you know, dance together. That's a great point. And so that's why you can't necessarily think of it in these terms of like, okay, who's, like, who's their best right guard? It's who is the best in this system. But I think obviously Garrett Bowles and Dalton Reisner at Tackling Guard will lock down that left spot. There's been nothing to make me think that Lloyd Cushenberry won't keep that job for the third straight year at center, even though, you know, going to,

each camp so far it's been like who's going to potentially replace him and then i think again quin miners is a guy third round pick last year had a good second half of the season when glasco went down um i i think he'll ultimately grab that right guard spot um with with with turner or anderson filling in the right tackle but it is going to be interesting about graham glasco he's a guy a couple years ago they spent a lot of money making a lot of money i was going to say can you afford to pay him as a backup based on what his salary is and they restructured his salary a little bit and he took a pay cut in order to kind of come and be back here but it's still it's still it's still a hefty deal. And you have some guys, some other guys that have positional versatility,

you know, like Tom Compton's dealing with the back injury right now, but he's played inside and out. Billy Turner, that's one of the reasons they liked him as much as he could be their starting right tackle has played all over the line, which is what they want to see. So I agree with you that the bottom line is that there are still quite a lot of questions about the offensive line. Not like can it be good, but who is it going to be? And that's going to be interesting these, you know, in the preseason and last couple weeks of August to see how it shakes out. Compton's another name you don't think about, but he's played in this system. He's had to play a couple different positions. Having those guys is just backup plans.

Yeah. If you have to kind of break in case of emergency, those types of players are important. Defensively, I'm so interested in this that, you know, now that this system is kind of taking over the league. So you have Vic Fangio here, who is the father of playing this way in the NFL for the most part. Jiro Evereaux was the passing game coordinator for the Rams over the last couple of seasons under Brandon Staley where, again, the DNA of the defense is similar. So in my mind, when you're doing that, it's like, all right, it's the same defense. In reality, they're always going to have different wrinkles. The same way we've seen different flavors of the McVe-Shannahan offense from stop to stop.

We're going to see different flavors of this defense from stop to stop. From the outside looking in, it seems like a pretty complete group of players on defense. Now that you have Bradley Chub, and when Randy Greger gets back healthy, obviously the secondary is very, very good. They bring on Kwan Williams, who is a favorite of this podcast. Patrick Sertan, maybe even taking a step. They have three safeties that they feel good about. Where are the spots on defense that you think you have some question marks a week into camp?

Well, I'll just start by saying I think that the defense has been better than I, than they kind of thought, right? And some of that is just you lose a guy like Vic Fangio from a player, play calling perspective, and you just automatically kind of think of a step back, given the continuity that they had with him. But I think that the personnel is every bit as good, if not better, going into this season than it was last year. There are a couple question marks.

You know, you look at the defensive line. DJ Jones, I think, is a big upgrade on the interior of that three-four scheme. He's going to be great. And then Draymont Jones is a guy that, you know, kind of keeps getting better. Maybe he hasn't fully kind of realized the potential that they have for him, but it is certainly, I think, a force. I think they're enthusiastic about him. They are.

Based on how the week is gone. And how they finish, how he finished last year, too. And really, he's kind of a victim of, you know, what Derek Wolf dealt with a lot, was that, you know, early part of last year he was getting some great interior pressure and making quarterbacks run all over the place. And then, oh, here's Von Miller with a sack falling in his way. And so, you know, when people bring up the fact they didn't have any sacks the first half of the year, he just says, you know, turn on the tape because I was getting Von Miller sacks.

And so he's a guy that can be really disrupted. They need him to take another step. But really, there's not a lot of spots where you look at and say, oh, they're in trouble. People in this town tend to get really worked up about the inside linebacker position. I think it's unnecessary energy for a number of reasons. A, that, you know, the impact of that spot from a past coverage perspective doesn't need to be what I think a lot of people believe that you need an inside linebacker to go cover Travis Kelsey. It's not how it works now. Yeah.

You know, but, but all that being said, Josie Joule, really intelligent player who, who really wanted back. And Jonas Griffith is a guy who kind of a diamond in the rough that they got in a trade from San Francisco at the end of camp last year, played really well in his like four-game cameo at the end of last year. He's going to start, I believe, alongside Jewel. Interesting. Okay.

So, you know, and Alex Singleton is a guy with a lot of experience. If they need him in there, you know, led the Eagles and tackles the last couple years. So I think they're, they're fine there. And we know who the safeties are. You know, Ronald Darby. They'd like to see him stay a little healthier than he's been able to do since he got here at the beginning of last season. But I'm going to be interested to see, yeah, you mentioned the difference of flavors. How do they pressure in this defense?

Because that's one thing, you know, Vic Fangio said, wanted to get that pressure all the time with his front four. And he's by nature, not a guy that was sending a lot of blitzes. I'm curious to just see how, where the pressure comes from, how frequently they try to change it. Obviously, they hope they don't need to, right? They hope that Bradley Chub is healthy and looks like his rookie version. They hope Randy Gregory is back and that they can get more sustained base pressure. That's one thing that they really need to do better. But I'm still just very curious to see how they're going to bring pressures.

They're going to bring more. I feel very confident that they are going to bring more pressure and more different pressure looks this year with the Giro Ebro here. And I think if we're talking about different flavors, that's one of the different flavors. Think about what the Rams were at the end of last season, where they really tapped into something with those sort of 5-0 pressure looks at the, they were using. I would assume you're going to see something similar here. We're going to see a more diverse pressure pressure package. Third down is going to be a little bit more voluminous that it might have been under Vic over the last couple of seasons. I think that's kind of where it's going. Like up front, the way that Evereaux and Rahim Morris approached that last year and just what that

can do for you and the one-on-ones it could create for you, even if you have a Bradley Chubb and Randy Gregory, you still want to be able to give those guys positions where they can just destroy people. And I think that trying to create those matchups intentionally, I wouldn't be surprised if it was part of this defensive plan. And maybe it wasn't last year. Yeah. And how do they use, how do they use Pat Sertan, right? Everybody, I think, just looks at Pat Sertan and says, okay, well, maybe he could do what Jalen Ramsey did, right? But he's a different player. So I don't necessarily think that you see him in this, like, star position role like the Rams do. But what are some ways that they can move him around because he has been such a, I mean, you can't pass on him right now

in camp, no matter how hard Russell Wilson has been trying to make that happen. So I'm curious, you know, kind of your thought on what you think they could do with, with Pastor Tain. Just flipping math. In this team, K-Wan is a nickel, right? Like, that's what he's always done. And he's had to really kind of retrain his brain because he's played in a very type of different type of defense over the last few years. But that's what he does. He's going to be your nickel corner. He's physical. He's really good in that spot. So I don't think it's about moving Pat inside and out, I think it's about, all right, if we're facing a team where they have a true X receiver, it's a three by one formation, he's locked on the backside one-on-one with Patrick

Sertan, we can flip the covers to the other side of the field and not have to worry about it. And that's how you change the game. And they've, in L.A., when J.1 was playing more outside and they're playing the DK. Maccaf's of the world, you see that structurally, where you can devote your resources in a way that is only possible because you have a lockdown corner like that. Even if you're playing zone, he's manned up and allows you to kind of attack things differently. And I think that's what I would suspect to see with Pat's or Tamp. If you're going to try to weaponize him, that's the way I would assume.

Yeah, and you even started to see that toward the end of last year. I remember Justin Simmons saying somewhere in the back half of last season, like it's gotten to the point where I don't even really worry about Pat's side of the field. And that's, of course, not to say that he doesn't know, you know, what his checks are over there and all those kind of things. But there is just sort of this, like, kind of exhaling factor when you have a guy on that side that can do what he's been able to do. and I'm just really fascinated to see just how much you can grow in that role this year. Yeah, I mean, he's one of the most exciting young players in the league. I think it's hard not to care about football.

It's hard to care about football and not be excited about what Pazertan's going to turn into. Nick Cosmiter, really appreciate the time, my friend. Really good to see you. Really good to spend some time out here. We'll talk to you soon. Yeah, man. Enjoy the weekend. Thank you.

All right, guys. That's all we got today. Thank you so much to Matt Harmon. Thank you to Nick Cosmiter. Really enjoyed those conversations. We will be back on Monday with my buddy Ben Solac from the ring. are really excited about that. In the meantime, please rate and review the podcast on your podcast platform of choice.

Please subscribe to The Athletic, Theathletic.com slash football show. I wrote today. I wrote this week. I wrote a piece about the evolution of slot receivers in the NFL. These guys are supersized these days. Power slots, if you are to be so bold, as Nate Tice puts it. I really, really loved working on that story. Got to talk to Frank Reich, Bruce Ariens, Nate Hackett,

DeJiro Evereo, the Broncos' defensive coordinator, There are a few other play callers and head coaches throughout the league about the way that they see it and why this shift has happened. In my opinion, the way that their slot receiver has changed over the last few years is a reflection on the way a game has changed over the last few years. And the defensive response really shows where the league is going in a lot of different ways. So if you guys want to go check that out, athletic.com slash football show is where you can find it. We'll be back on Monday.

In the meantime, enjoy your weekend. Talk to you soon. This was the Athletic Football Show. Thank you.