The Kevin Sheehan Show - 10-7

Episode Date: July 25, 2024

Kevin went early and all-in on Washington's 2024 season with his most optimistic prediction in 7 years. On the day of the first day practice of the 2024 season, he's got 10-7 and the playoffs for the Commanders. He explains why in the opening segment of the show. Aaron Schatz/FTN Fantasy, the creator of DVOA, jumped on with Kevin and gave his thoughts on what Washington will be in 2024. Plenty of NFL talk with Aaron as well. John Ourand/Puck News was a guest explaining the breaking news that the massive $76 billion NBA media rights deal is done and it excludes TNT. The guys talked some NFL too.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it. But you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Cheehan Show. Here's Kevin. The show's presenting sponsor, as always, is Wind Donation. Give them a call at 86690 Nation or head to Windonation.com. Mention my name for a free, no obligation, in-home estimate.

Two guests on the show today. Aaron Shats is going to be on with us. Aaron is with FtNFantasy.com. Aaron, the creator, the inventor of the DVOA advanced metric. We have referenced that many times on this show. Aaron was with football outsiders for years, now with FtNFantasy.com. We've had Aaron on the show before. He will join us in the next segment.

We'll talk obviously expectations for Jaden Daniels and Washington, but also we'll talk a lot about the league as well. Following Aaron, my good friend John Orand will jump on with us. John with Puck News used to be with Sports Business Journal, one of the best sports media and sports business reporters out there. He is going to jump on with us upon short notice request for me because I just read this news that the NBA has finalized its media rights deal with ESPN, with NBC, and with Amazon, and that means TNT is out.

Yeah, no more. Barclay, Kenny, Ernie, and Shaq, pregame, halftime, and postgame. I think one of the best things about the NBA over the last 20-something years has been that show. John will jump on with us to talk about that. just an incredible media deal for the NBA, and we'll talk some NFL media as well. Okay, training camp day number one in the books. They started at 9 a.m. this morning. It was 90 minutes long.

There was good news before the first practice. Johnny Newton off the non-football injury list and on to the 90-man training camp roster. That was much quicker than anticipated. Yesterday, Dan Quinn and Adam Peters were asked about Johnny Newton, but they certainly didn't give indication that he would be off the NFI list and available for the first training camp practice yesterday. Nice example, by the way, of underselling and overperforming. You know, long have we talked about the off-season, over-promising,

and underperforming when we got to the regular season. They did not oversell Johnny Newton's, health or potential availability. There was some discussion that he might not be ready until late in training camp and close to the regular season opener. But the second round pick from Illinois is available and practiced today. So that was good news. There was a highlight today from camp.

I'm not big into training camp play-by-play, as I've discussed over the years, but given that it was day number one, and this was written about, and there's a highlight out there. Jaden Daniels on a perfect dime to Brian Robinson, Jr. in the corner of the end zone in red zone work. He's got great touch. He can throw a really good football. And Jaden Daniels, let's face it, he is the number one storyline of training camp, and he's the number one storyline of the upcoming season. This season will be judged at the end of it, not really on wins and losses, but on whether or not they got it right at quarterback in the draft. That's it. After 17 games and early to mid-January, we all need to be able to look at each other and say they finally got their guy.

And there will be off of how everybody feels about Jaden Daniels' rookie season, ancillary storyline. because if we feel really good about Jaden Daniels, we're going to feel really good about Adam Peters. If we don't feel really good about Jaden Daniels, we're going to question Adam Peters. I understand drafts and off-season, you've got to wait a couple of years. But when you draft a quarterback number two overall, and you play him right from the jump, which I'm expecting that they will, and he plays 17 games if he does, how you feel about that quarterback after that first year will extend to others in the organization. Anyway, I'm going to do something right now that I did on radio this morning, and it's not a bit.

It's also unusual for me because I don't think that I've given an early season prediction in a while. Typically, we wait until that week of Labor Day, Tommy and I on the podcast, we'll do our NFL predictions, and then we will give you our Washington season record prediction with a few footnotes. But I was thinking about this the last couple of days about how optimistic I am for the product on the field. We talked a little bit about this yesterday on the podcast that there may be more anticipation, more excitement. for what we're going to see on the field than there's been in a long time. And again, as I said yesterday, I understand that many of you can't generate the level of excitement that you used to be able to generate for a lot of reasons, name included. But in terms of just focusing on the state of the organization on the football side and the

product that they're going to put on the field, the excitement and anticipation over new owner, new GM, new coach, new quarterback, lots of new players. Even though the expectations for this year are, they're very low. I mean, Washington's over under number in Vegas is six and a half. I have seen a couple of seven and a halfs out there. They may be on the move upwards because there may be a lot of action on the Washington over. I've heard people out there suggest that Washington could be that surprise team this year. And obviously that stems from, you know, Jaden Daniels.

And those that are fans of Jaden Daniels and think that he can be this year's version of C.J. Stroud look at, you know, the new coaching staff and Cliff Kingsbury and Dan Quinn and Joe Whit Jr. And some of the additions on defense like Wagner and Chin, you know, Louvo, et cetera. And they've become, you know, I don't think. they're the chic, you know, upset or surprise team pick, but they have been mentioned. I've read it a few times. I've heard it a few times. And I'll get to my prediction in a moment because it's going to be a prediction, and I gave it on radio today, that will make some of you wonder if I've been drinking before doing the show today. I promise you, I have not been. But there's

just this level of excitement and anticipation for the state of the organization on the football side. Normal structure, some good people, some smart people, and some excitement over some of the players, most notably the quarterback. And again, I don't usually, you know, when the schedule comes out, we do sometimes, we'll go through the schedule. I even hate doing that and end up on a number of wins or a final record. I don't think we did that this year. But usually the official season record prediction comes shortly before the season opener. But I'm going to do it right now. Now, I will mention that I reserve the right to change my mind in what will be the actual final prediction sometime, you know, during the week after Labor Day and before the opener against Tampa Bay.

But barring any significant injuries, I don't think I'm going to change my mind. I think Washington this year is going to be the surprise team of the NFC. I think they're going to win 10 games and go 10 and 7 and be a wildcard team in the NFC, potentially finishing second in the division behind Philadelphia, maybe third behind Philly and Dallas, but still with 10 wins qualifying for the postseason. This is the most optimistic I have been since you know who was the quarterback in 2017. I'm pretty sure that that was the last year I predicted a winning record for this franchise. It's funny, I got some tweets when I did this on radio.

Man, God, you are the ultimate homer every year. I don't know what you're talking about, man. I have been at 500 or worse once Kirk left. And by the way, justifiably not very optimistic about the team year and year out. There have been a couple of years, the Alex Smith year. I thought if everything comes together and the defense had improved in 2017, but remember all the injuries that they had in 2017. And I liked Alex Smith.

I didn't like him as much as Kirk, but I thought he was a solid, you know, middle of the pack, NFL quarterback, game managing quarterback with some playmaking ability. And if everything went well, they could be kind of a 500 team. And they were well on their way to being that, if not better, when he broke his leg. But I was not very optimistic and wasn't really pleased with the direction of the team at that point. And look, I mean, it's been 10, it was a 10-year run of being really down in the dumps about what the organization was capable of being as long as Dan Snyder was there. You know, we didn't feel that way during the Gibbs years. It really started, I think, with kind of the true first rock bottom, which was, you know, 2009 and the second year of

Zorn. And yeah, I got excited about Shanahan and those years, but, you know, ultimately we just, I think we all came to the conclusion that it didn't matter who they had here as long as he owned the team. But the last time that I had a winning record prediction was 2017. I did predict 8-8-1 two years ago, and they finished 8-8-1. I think that's the only time I've gotten it exactly right. But I like this team, and of course it comes down to whether or not Jaden Daniels can play and can play early in his career. And I think he's going to be able to.

And I think the combination of Daniels and Cliff Kingsbury is what has me so excited to watch this team. Like I can't wait for the game against Tampa. You know, part of the rooting interest isn't the same as it used to be because, like many of you, I feel differently about the franchise for all of the reasons. that we've talked about. But man, I'm a big fan of the quarterback. And the quarterback happens to be on the team that plays here. And a team that we all have incredible history with.

And I'm excited to see the combination of him and Kingsbury together. You know, all of the people that I know, Scott and Stanford Steve and various other people in places that communicate with a lot of college, coaches, Cliff Kingsbury is revered as a quarterback guru, as an offensive creator, and he wasn't bad as an offensive guy as a head coach at Arizona. I think this job is perfect. I think they gave them the perfect quarterback. We'll see about the other areas of the offense. You know,

there is, as we talked about yesterday, outside external concern. about the offensive line. But I don't think they feel as concerned about it as we do. You know, they have some playmakers, not, you know, a plethora of playmakers like some other teams have, but I think a Terry McLaren and a John Dotson and a Luke McCaffrey and a backfield with Echler and Brian Robinson, Jr. And I think Ben Sinit could be a big-time reveal, you know, as a, as a, as a potential playmaker at the tight end spot.

And then combined with the way I feel about Jaden Daniels and the combination of Daniels and Kingsbury, I just think it's going to be hard for this defense not to improve by a lot. Of course it's going to be better than it was last year because it was so bad. But Dan Quinn, Joe Witt, Jr., the staff overall, you know, all of the assistant coaches with all of the experience,

You know, Ken Norton, Jr. on defense. You know, and Anthony Lynn on this staff. You know, Brian Johnson, I mean, the list goes on and on, but I think the defense has a chance to take a major step forward. The additions of Louvre and Wagner in Chin. Duron and John are good players. They were just on a team that was playing lame duck all season long last year. Yeah, it's early to do something like this. I don't think I'll come off it unless there are significant injuries. Knock on wood, that doesn't happen. I doubt I'm going to get to the point where we have concluded the preseason and I feel a lot differently in a negative way about Jaden Daniels and his opportunity

to be great right away. I'm not saying he's going to be great. I'm not even saying he's going to be C.J. Stroud. But I think that high floor of being able to create as a runner, along with what I watched in college, a poised pocket passer, you know, a guy that on the move will be able to make plays with his arm. I just am very optimistic about him and him early and everything else. 10 and 7. Don't take it to the bank.

please. The most optimistic season prediction for me since 2017, I think I was 10 and 6 that year, maybe 9 and 7, but coming off that 2016 missed playoff season when they were 8, 7 and 1, but remember they added a bunch of defensive personnel drafted John Allen that particular draft, and I felt like if they were just any better on defense that they would bounce back with a season. Now, we all knew that that was going to be Kirk's last season because they didn't trade him and they didn't get him signed to the long-term deal. But anyway, there you go. There it is. July 24th, I will talk to Tommy about this on the podcast tomorrow. I'm sure he'll get a big yuck out of it. All right, Aaron Shats from FtnFantasy.com next. This segment of the show brought to you by

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Use my promo code, Kevin D.C., and they'll take really good care of you. Jumping on with me right now is Aaron Shats. Aaron is the chief analytics officer for FTN Fantasy. But we've had Aaron on this show previously. Aaron was with football outsiders for a long period of time, and Aaron is the creator of the DVOA metric, something that we've used here over the years to better analyze or better describe teams and teams units like offense, defense, special teams. It's defense-adjusted value over average. It calculates a team success based on much more than traditional statistics.

It's the down and distance of each play during the season. It calculates how much more or less successful compared to the league average. And it takes into consideration the opponent's strength as well. And it is adjusted for that. And it's been one of those things, Aaron, that you and I have talked before. I know a lot of people have referred to the metric that you created, but it may be as fair as anything in evaluating. teams. And it's good to have you back on. You know, I want to talk to you about your thoughts on Washington

and the upcoming season for them. But I first want to go back to last year and ask you, what was the one thing more than any other you got right about the 20-23 season? Oh, golly. I mean, I was really big on San Francisco before the season, and I picked them to go to the Super Bowl, but I'm sure plenty of other people did as well. I didn't get the Houston. I didn't realize Houston was going to blow up, so that isn't it. Right. I don't remember what was in particular. I don't remember what particularly stands out as what I was really, really good on last year, except for San Francisco, obviously, was great.

That was that was a good pick. That's fine. Was there something from last year that surprised you and you got it wrong that sticks out? I mean, one that's obvious is that the New England Patriots brought in a real offensive coordinator, and instead of Mack Jones rebounding, he just got worse. Yeah. All season long, I was following sort of your description of the season that Baltimore was having,

because I think historically it was one of the best DVOA seasons of all time. In fact, correct me if I'm wrong, but at one point during this season, they were trending towards maybe the best all-around team in the history of the regular season, right? Yes, because it's not just that they were winning huge. It was that they were winning huge over a hard schedule. They were dominating good teams like San Francisco and Miami. So how much of it was a surprise for you that they didn't make the Super Bowl and win it? Oh, I mean, it was a surprise. Not that they didn't win it, because San Francisco was right behind them, right?

Yeah. So, I mean, and I said during the playoffs, I said, look, the fact is even the best teams don't always make the Super Bowl. I said, San Francisco and Baltimore, one of those teams are going to win the Super Bowl, and the other one isn't even going to make it. But I was wrong because San Francisco lost in overtime. I was close, but I was wrong. But Baltimore was so good during the regular season last year that I think you have to consider them the top team in the AFC going into this year, despite the losses that they've had, in particular on the offensive line and the loss of defensive coordinator Mike McDonald. I don't think they're that far ahead of Kansas City and the rest of the AFC, but I think they have to be considered number one.

And they're my Super Bowl pick this year. Is San Francisco your Super Bowl pick in the NFC? Yeah, they're my pick to win at all, San Francisco. They just come out so high in our projections. And we know that they're so good everywhere, offense and defense. They're just strong in pretty much every way. They are my pick. When you have a team like Baltimore, because obviously the 2007 Patriots, right,

are one of the greatest, they may be your number one regular season team of all time. Am I right about that? They are. They are. Yeah. A new version that I did like a year ago moved them ahead of the 1991 Washington team. Yeah. For those that don't know, and we've had Aaron on the show before, just to talk about the 1991 team. The 1991 skins are, you know, I think obviously the greatest of all of their Super Bowl championship teams.

And the DVOA metric has them as the second best regular season DVOA team of all time ahead. of the 85 bears, but behind the 2007 Patriots. But what I was going to ask you with respect to Baltimore season last year and maybe New England in 2007, is there when you've had a team that's been dominant during the regular season and they don't win the Super Bowl, is there a common reason for it? No, I think that those teams are all over the place. Like the best teams to not win at all, the reasons that they didn't win at all are in our life. There's all kinds of reasons why they didn't win at all.

Like looking at the best teams to have lost the Super Bowl, like the 83 Washington got stopped. Right. In the Super Bowl, right? Like, there's no, that wasn't close, right? The Patriots and the 49ers were closed. But the Washington team in 83 got stopped. you know, Green Bay in 97, Denver in 2013 got blown out. So that was nothing like the 2007 Patriots. So I think it's kind of all over the place. Yeah, I always think about it. It's the one team,

believe it or not, that some of the players that played on the 83 team and even played on the 91 team, they will often say that they thought the 83 team was as good. It was probably their best offensive team. but defensively, that team was not very good, and it got exposed in the Super Bowl against the Raiders. By DVOA, that is the third best Super Bowl loser behind the 2007 Patriots and last year's 49ers. And I will point out, that team ranked third in defense, in DVOA during the regular season,

first in offense, but third in defense. The defense was pretty good. There were specific weaknesses, and the Raiders just took advantage of them, the Raiders just had a really good day. I think it's, well, it's the all-time turnover margin, you know, team, the 83 skins. And they ended up with a lot of takeaways, but they gave up a lot of yards and a lot of points during that season.

That's interesting. Yeah, but a lot of that was like with a big lead and that kind of stuff. Yeah, maybe. Yeah. Interesting. You know, you do such a great job. Like, I'm curious as to what you have more fun with, which is going back because you're very much an NFL historian

and looking at some of those teams that haven't been measured before and doing it in some of those seasons we're focusing on the current. I love both. I love both. Like right now I'm spending part of my time promoting the book and talking about our projections for this year. And part of my time on a project where I'm going back on YouTube

and watching old games to clean up old play by play. So my work is completely split between the history and the upcoming season right now, and it's fun. It's just a lot of fun. Isn't it so interesting to go back? I do it all the time. Sometimes I get sucked down that hole, and for hours I'm watching some of these games from the 70s and the 80s in particular. You know, as they were broadcasted on CBS or on NBC or Monday night football, man, the game has changed so much. Right? Like what really stands out to you when you watch, when you're going back and you're watching a game from, say, the early 80s or the late 70s?

Oh, the biggest thing that stands out by far is the rise of the three wide set at the Bay's offense. Right. Right? Like back in the 80s and even in the 90s, like the base offense was two running back, two wide receivers and one tight end, and then a few teams like Washington did the two tight end thing instead of having a full back. Right. But three wide was only used very specifically in passing situations. So, like, I mean, all the other differences, like the size of the pads and the quality of the broadcast and the running ticker of scores, like nothing is as big as just the lack of three and four wide sets. What about defensively?

I mean, you know, base defense now is essentially the nickel for most teams. Was it that way then? No. I mean, the same thing on defense. Right. Base defense was the 3-4 or the 4-3, and when the nickelback or the defense, you know, it was only with the run-and-shoot team

that they would introduce the third and four receivers before the game, and they would introduce the nickel-back and the dime-back from the defense that had to face a run-and-shoe team because the run-and-shoot was seen as being so weird. Yeah. It's funny that you mentioned, you know, the introduction of, really what was the H-back, you know, that Gibbs introduced. And, you know, a lot of that was really around just, you know,

designing something that made more sense to handle Lawrence Taylor. Yeah. I mean, that's the cycle of the NFL, right? The cycle of the NFL is offenses come up with ideas and then defenses come with ideas that stop them. And then offenses have to come up with new ideas and then defenses have to come up with ideas that stop. Was there anything more gimmicky in terms of it looking so different, but ultimately it couldn't produce in the postseason, in the postseason, then the run and shoot. Mouse Davis is run and shoot. Yeah, it would have been fun if they had a championship. It's a good idea, right?

Because the basic idea of lots of choice routes, get your quarterback on the same page with the receivers, read the coverage, run the route based on, you know, that's modern. thought. Yes. Like a lot of modern offensive thought comes from the run and shoot. It's just that they became very extremist about some things like the never having a tight end. And you know, I mean, I'm an analytics guy, right? We're past first, past first, past first, past first.

But, you know, you've got to be able to run when it's time to pound that thing, you know. Yeah, you know, in some ways, right, you know, the RPO, which really was more of a college creation that now, you know, you see in the NFL. That was a part of the run and shoot, although they didn't really call it that. Yeah. No, it's, the run and shoot is surprisingly relevant today, as I think anybody who plays Madden will discover. Yeah. Real quickly, do you think Eli Manning makes the Hall of Fame? Yes, but I wouldn't vote for him if I was on the panel. Would you vote for Philip Rivers? That's an interesting one.

I'm leaning yes, but I would want to hear the arguments. All right. Let's get to the team here. And let's start with Jaden Daniels. How does he compare to the other rookie quarterbacks, the six that were taken, you know, in the first 12th overall? I mean, we mostly don't know, right? We have a projection system called Q-Base that we use to project quarterback.

But there's a variability to it. Like, it's not, it's no, it's far from perfect. And it has Daniels as the number two guy in this year's class. So Washington took him in just the right place. They had the number two picks. They took the number two guy. How good he's going to be? We really don't know.

You have to expect that rookie quarterbacks will be bad because the average performance of a rookie quarterback, even a top pick, is bad. That's what an average rookie starting quarterback is. Right. But they also could be really, really bad. like Bryce Young last year, or they could be good, like Matt Ryan or Robert Griffin or C.J. Stroud. Yeah, like, I mean, I think everybody understands that, you know, you look at the quarterbacks that get drafted, and this year there are six, and it was an unprecedented year.

But the odds sort of, you know, indicate that one third of those or two of those six will actually be with the teams that drafted them five years from now. How do you go about... And others will struggle as rookies and then get better. Right. Right? Just because guys who get good don't necessarily play well as rookies. Eli Manning didn't. And Donovan McNabb didn't.

Matthew Stafford didn't. And Peyton Manning was only average as a rookie and so on and so forth and so on and so forth. What's the indication in year one more often than not that it's not going... That they didn't get it right? there isn't one because frankly because frankly Jared Gough

was one of the worst rookies of all time and and Alex Smith was horrible as a rookie and ended up being a useful starter like there are

all Jonathan McNabb was terrible like there are all kinds of rookies who are awful and then get their act together the sign that a guy is not going to be a real guy is year two

is how they perform a year two that's the sign And then what is it typically in year two that is the sign that they've gotten it wrong? Playing bad, like just not playing well. Yeah. Just poor staff. And in particular, I think, sacks, like, that's the deal with Justin Fields, right? Like, Justin Fields makes these highlight plays, and they look awesome.

But my God, he takes so many sacks, so many facts. Like, you've got, if you didn't learn pocket presence in college, you better learn it in your first two years in the year. NFL or you are screwed. So what is it about Jaden Daniels that you think would lead to a successful career? And is there anything specific about his college game that would concern you? The concern for me is that he jumped so much in his last year, right, when he had the help of the great receivers, and he was a little bit older than the average college player. The positives aren't like great deep ball, the elusive.

missing the scrambling are great. Right? He's good accurate. As far as I know, nobody said anything negative about him as a person, like no character concern. I mean, all of that points to a guy who can be successful in the NFL. All right. Let's talk about the team. How do you see Washington in 2024?

I mean, to be honest, they're near the bottom of our projections. And again, part of that is you just have to expect a rookie quarterback to struggle, even though sometimes they don't. And I think that the other stuff that they have, there was a lot of in and out. There was a lot of in and out this year for Washington. But it overall adds up to like zero. Like they lost, what they gained is about what they lost.

Now, the only asterisk I'm going to put on that is that our projection system doesn't assign value to adding off-ball linebackers. Because historically, adding free-age and off-ball linebackers even really good one, you know, in general, doesn't really improve your defense. But Frankie Louvre might be a special case because he's part edge rusher and part off ball lineback. So I may be discounting the value that Louvue has to the defense. But you see them near, they will start the season as, what, the 30th, 29th ranked team?

Yeah, they're 30. They're, golly, I believe they're last and projected teams. DVOA, right, right neck and neck with the Giants. With the Giants. So you have Carolina as a better overall team entering this season. Yeah, partly because you have to expect that Bryce Young is going to get better in his second year, and partly because they have the easiest schedule in the league. Like we have Carolina 30th in the DVOA projection, but they're like 23rd or something in wind projection because they're scheduled.

associated. With Washington's 30, they're 32nd, they're dead last in DVOA projection for 2024 right now. 31st on offense and 25th of defense. So 25th on defense, 31st on offense. Interesting. So you got Washington and New York at the bottom of the league, so that's where they'll be in the NFC East. How do you see Philly and Dallas shaking out? And let me say the difference between Washington and the Giants is Washington has hope. Right. Like, Washington has hope. Like, I could be wrong, and they could be really, really bad if Daniels is really, really bad.

But I also could be wrong, and Daniels could be good, and then they're going to be much better than this. Because, well, that would be a Houston example. That would be a Houston comp. Yeah. Yeah. Philadelphia, we have lower than the market. They were just much worse last year than their record in the first half. half of the year, and then collapsed in the second half of year.

And I don't see any reason to believe that they've dramatically improved. I think people are discounting the loss of Jason Kelsey too much. I think that really matters. I won't be surprised if a brotherly shove is not as successful without Kelsey at center. Yeah, I think the Jason Kelsey loss is going to be a big one for Philadelphia, for sure. I remember, by the way, last year, when Philly was like 10 and 1, mentioning that you had them, I think, outside the top 10 in your DVOA rankings. You were not impressed with them, and it ended up sort of foretelling the rest of the season, although I don't think you expected

them to lose six out of the last seven or seven out of the last eight or whatever it was. But anyway, does that mean that you've got the Cowboys winning the division? Yes, I expect Dallas to win the division. And honestly, I mean, in general, I'm a believer that you don't do it in the playoffs until the year that you do. And I don't think there are a special thing that makes you bad in the playoffs. But honestly, I'm expecting Dallas to have the same season. They've had the last three years. I'm expected to win like, well, maybe not 12 games, but like 11, like 10 or 11,

and then get to the playoffs and then not win the Super Bowl. So what is it about them where you, even though you're a believer that it doesn't happen until it happens, but you're leaning towards them bowing out early again. So why do you think that? I don't believe that certain players raise their game in the playoffs, but I do believe that certain players might lower their game because of the stress of the playoff. And maybe DAC is one of those guys.

I hope not, because I like Dak, and I like to see Dak be successful, but, you know, I don't know, maybe he is. All right, two more for you. Give me the team that you guys really like to surprise. New Orleans Saints. Why? Because they are boring. Okay.

You had them as a top half of the league team last year, if I recall. Yes. Because they are so boring, people think they suck. But they don't. They're very, very average. They're average on offense with an average quarterback, and they're average on defense, and they're average on special teams, although nobody really knows where anybody's going to be on special teams this year. Right.

And on top of that, they have the second easiest schedule in the league. And the rest of their division, we think, is below average. So therefore, they, in my opinion, should be the favorites to win the NFC South and lose in the first round of the playoffs because they, they're boring and mediocre, which is a lot better than most people think they are. You know, I'm remembering, and I just pulled it up, a lot of their losses last year were very tightly contested and winnable games for them, and they won nine games last year. By the way, you've mentioned schedule a few times.

I'm assuming that you base schedule strength off of your DVOA projection, not on last year's records. Yes. So, for example, playing the Jets is playing an above-average team. Right. Not a bad team because they're, because the new quarterback. Exactly. All right.

What about a team that you expect to sort of disappoint based on the expectations? I mean, my opinion is that based on the expectation, either Indianapolis or Chicago will really disappoint people, possibly both. because the expectations for Caleb Williams and Anthony Richardson are so high, and we just have no sample to go on of how good those guys are going to be in the NFL. Between Daniels, Williams, and Richardson, one of them is probably going to have a pretty good season, but I have no idea which one. And if it's Daniels, then both Chicago and Indianapolis are going to disappoint people.

One of the three, and you count Richardson because he only played a couple. couple of games as almost having a second rookie season. Right. I mean, I don't expect Drake May to play until December. Right. And I'm expecting the Minnesota is going to probably start Darnold for at least a month at the start of the season. Yeah, Pennix won't play.

And I don't think Bo Nix. Yeah, and I don't think Bo Nix is good. So when I'm thinking about who's going to, like, have the C.J. Stroud year, first of all, nobody. Nobody's going to have it because he had the second best rookie year we've ever measured. okay so nobody's going to be that good but if I think who's the guy who's going to be good it's either going to be Richardson Williams or game I mean it might be two of them probably not second best rookie quarterback season to whom who was first

a Dak Prescott Dax rookie year interesting anything else that you as you look forward would sort of surprise people to hear heading into the season, or did you just essentially give us New Orleans, Indy, and Chicago as the three surprises? Yeah, we have Atlanta lower than the market. Okay. It's sort of the flip of New Orleans. I think people are expecting too much from old men coming back from Achilles injuries. Yep. So Aaron Rogers and cousins? Yes. The difference is we have Atlanta with the number 32 projected defense. And we have the Jets with the number two projected defense. Is that behind Baltimore?

Cleveland. Cleveland's defense, yeah. Man, they were really, really good there for a while last year until the playoff game. You know, it actually makes me think of something, and I know I've indicated that we're ready to wrap this up, but I love talking to you. But I want to ask you, who do you think the most valuable defensive player in the league is? It's probably either Micah Parsons or Miles Garrett. Yeah, I was going to ask you if it was Miles Garrett or T.J. Y. It might be TJ Watt and it might be Max Crosby. Like those guys are all really good.

Aaron, thanks. And I would put them all ahead of the best corners, and the best linebackers. So you still feel, like that dominant pass rusher is more valuable than the lockdown corner. Well, if there was a Darrell Revis or Dionne Sanders playing right now, not necessarily, but there isn't. Yeah.

Thanks for this. I always enjoy our conversations and really, really appreciate the information at Ashat's NFL on X on Twitter. You can subscribe to FtN fantasy to get all of their advanced. information on the NFL. Thanks, Aaron. Hope you're well. Absolutely. FtNFantasy.com slash almanac if you just want to get the almanac.

Perfect. Thanks so much, Aaron. Take care. Take care. Aaron Shats, everybody. Up next, John Oran will jump on to explain this massive NBA TV deal, $76 billion over the next 11 years. We'll get to that right after these words. From a few

of our sponsors. Rate and review the podcast if you get a chance and you haven't done it. You can pause the podcast right now and on Apple. Give us up to five stars if you think we deserve it with a quick one to two sentence review. It's really, really helpful for us. If you can rate and review the podcast, if you haven't done it already. Following the podcast on Apple and Spotify is big for us, as is subscribing to the podcast.

My guest right now is my friend John Orrin. John Forever, one of the best sports business reporters out there. He was with Sports Business Journal Forever. He's now with Puck News. You can follow him on X on Twitter at Orand underscore Puck, O-U-R-A-N-D-U-R-A-N-D-U-Puck. John, I called literally five minutes ago after reading this story about the NBA finalizing their new television deal, a massive television deal. And I said, John, do you have a few minutes? And as always, you are coming through for me, and I really appreciate it.

So I'll let you explain it. But to me, the headline as a longtime NBA fan and a huge fan of the TNT pregame, in-game, post-game show with Ernie, Shaq, Kenny, and of course Charles Barkley. this deal excludes TNT ending this incredible, incredible run for one of the great studio shows of all time. Okay, you read their obituary a little bit prematurely. They still have a lame duck year. And can you imagine Shaquille O'Neal and Charles Barkley as a part of a lame duck year with live microphones in front of them? Right. It's going to be must-see TV, I'm sure.

The headline on this is really the NBA is going back to NBC. And NBC already, their first announcement was Roundball Rock. You know, the John Tesh and NBA theme from the 90s is coming back to NBC, which is going to have two primetime games on broadcast TV on two night to the week. And then they're going to have another primetime game on Peacock one night of the week. The other big headline is that Amazon is coming in. So you'll be able to see games on Amazon Prime. They're also going to have the playing games around the playoffs.

They're going to have the in-season tournament. And they're going to have a bunch of playoffs over on Amazon Prime as well. And not quite as big of that announcement, but still noteworthy is ABC, ESPN. they are the main, they're going to be the main rightsholder of the NBA going forward for the next 11 years, just as they have been for the past 20 or so years as well. So they'll handle what, the finals and a lot of the playoff games, and NBC will have the others? Exactly. ESPN is going to have the finals every single year.

It's an 11-year deal. They're going to have the conference finals for 10 of those years. So they're basically every year. And then Amazon Prime and NBC, they're going to split the conference finals. And then at one point, I'm not sure what year it's going to be. The conference finals will be on Amazon and NBC. But that'll only be one year of this 11-year deal. Look, most NBA fans loved the NBC years and the NBC theme,

although I'm really partial to the CBS years, and the CBS themes, plural, of the 70s and 80s with Brent and Dick Stockton. You know, Stockton really was the last play-by-play guy for CBS when they had it before it went to NBC in, what, 1991? I think it was 91. I think the Chicago Lakers series, the first title for Jordan. Right, and we had to live through the NBA finals on tape delay in DECD.

Isn't that amazing? We did. That's within our lifetime, Kevin. I know. It was. Yeah, game five against Seattle and the NBA finals on tape delay. So I'm curious as to why it wasn't important for the NBA to keep their most popular show by far. You know, any NBA programming, the most popular show, and I think at this point, the golds,

standard, along with college game day. You and I've talked about this before. I'm with you. The college game day's been right there. And maybe the old NFL today with Brent, Nerve, and Phyllis and Jimmy the Greek from way back in the day. But the TNT pre-game, in-game, post-game was for many more popular than the games themselves. Do you think there's a risk in saying goodbye to that?

The NBA is viewing this as a very low risk. They feel in the NBA offices that the main components of that inside the NPA, which is really killing on Charles Barkley, will find a new home because there are now going to be three media companies that are going to be falling over themselves to hire those two. but even more so than that, if you sort of strip away, you know, the pregame show,

because it was a pregame show, then, like, maybe a little halftime show, and then it was on at like 1.30 in the morning. They view TNT, in particular, and TBS as well.

It's part of this cable system. And the whole trend of what we've been talking about for as long as I've been coming on your show, Kevin, is the move to streaming. Everybody's looking at streaming, and that Amazon, when they stream those games, it's going to go globally, which the NBA loves. When ESPN has the rights to put some of their games on Disney Plus, which goes globally. But then you're stuck with TNT, where you have to buy a cable subscription.

Got to be part of a cable bundle. And that's seen. It's, uh, the TNT has seen the number of people that subscribe to the cable bundle that has TNT go from a hundred million or so, uh, about 10 years ago, down to it's in the 60s now. And it's, and the fall is going to be even more precipitous over the next 11 years. So if you're at the NBA, yeah, that's a great show. It's a, it's a fantastic. It's one of the two best studio shows of all time. But if you're the NBA, in 11 years, do you really trust that TNT is going to be the place that you're going to want to have your games? Or do you want to have it on a $3 trillion company in Amazon, which goes globally and is investing in the NFL, and it's investing in a lot of other sports that suggest that it's going to grow?

TNT really feels contractually like their offer of $1.8 billion should have been accepted. Explain that. So it's not over, even though it's over. I mean that the likelihood of TNT winning this is the longest of odds. I would mark that on them. But basically, TNT in 2014, negotiated into its contract the matching rights. So if somebody else came in and tried to take the package away, they could say, oh, we want to match that package.

And that was something that they relied on as these negotiations went forward. And so they put together the matching rights. Well, the NPA said the Amazon package was, a streaming only package and Turner they want to put that on a linear television so that's not an act that's not an absolute match right there. They made it so that again Amazon is a three trillion dollar company. This is pennies to Bezos. But so Amazon said, we're going to pay you up front the first three years.

And so this is a $2 billion a year deal. Turner couldn't do that or TNT couldn't do that what they did was they had a line of credit saying like we're good for the first three years but that again there are certain little like differences with that as well

and so the final thing was that Amazon Prime goes to you know 200 million worldwide homes I think Max which is TNT streaming service that's in about half the number globally.

And so the NBA is saying, we know that you have a streaming component, but it's not nearly as comprehensive as the other one. So you can't match there. And so what is matching right? A judge is going to end up deciding that if it goes that far. Most likely, I expect one of those discovery to actually take this to court or at least to sue to see what they can get out of it. And that's going to be a, for me anyway, that loves chaos.

I'm a reporter after all. It's going to be a fun process for the NBA and for TNT, not so much. You know, for many listening, I know this, and you know this too. You and I love the NBA, especially the NBA playoffs. But I think it's a surprise to a lot of people that the NBA TV deals are worth $76 billion over 11 years. So why is it worth this much? It's like buying a house. If Amazon wasn't interested in getting the NBA, the numbers would have come way down.

If NBC wasn't interested in getting the NBA, the numbers would have come way down. So what the NBA had was that they had three packages and they had four bidders. And so that bids everything up. But the knock-on effect of this is that for NBC is now paying the NBA more money than it's paying the NFL, even though Sunday Night Football is the number one show in prime time for an all-time record. I think it's 11 years going on 11 years right now. You know the NFL is taking a look at that and raising their eyebrows. the Amazon Prime, they're paying more for the, or they're paying just about as much for the NBA

as they are for Thursday night football. So if you're the NFL, you're going to admit, the NFL is the biggest entertainment genre in America today, by far. Nothing is close. And you're looking at some of these numbers, ESPN 2.5, that's about even with what they're paying the NFL for money and a football.

So when the NFL is one year into, I think it's 11-year deals, they have an out in their deal in 2029, and I think they can't wait for that to come. They're seeing what happened here, and they're like, okay, we are, it's incredible that the NFL did $110 billion worth of deals, and it looks undervalued just one year in. It's crazy. A hundred and ten billion was the NFL aggregate.

it deal, and here we are just over a year later, $76 billion for the NBA. And as you described, they're getting more the NBA is from NBC than the NFL is. That's crazy, John. And the fact they have to wait so long, you know, do you see the 18 games schedule waiting for the next opportunity to renegotiate TV deals, or do you think it happens sooner? I think it could happen sooner. The one thing to take a look at is CBS right now,

their parent company, Paramount, is being sold to Skydance Media. And so Larry Ellison of Oracle theme, his son, is running Skydance Media. In all the NFL contracts, there's a change of control provision. So now with Paramount leaving and somebody else coming, in, they have the opportunity to open up that contract. And if you're the NFL, I mean, you've covered the NFL for how long, Kevin?

Have you ever seen them not use leverage when they have it? Like, that's sort of what they do. What I'm looking to see is where they use that leverage. Will they really try to punish CBS, or will they try to take it and say, like, okay, CBS, they're negotiating with CBS right now to produce the Netflix Christmas Day games. So would they say, we want you to do that? Or, you know, there are lots of other ways that they can exert their leverage than by opening the deal. So that's, I don't know what's going to happen.

Nobody quite knows yet. It's still a year to go, but that's not. It'll be a big bellwether, I think. Are there provisions in the current NFL deals with the various networks that they are partners with, that if they add an 18th game, it comes with more revenue? because think about it, John, if they go to an 18th game, it probably comes with a second buy week. That adds two additional weekends of NFL football to the season. You'll have 20 weeks of regular season football,

whereas right now you have 18 to play 17 games. Do you think that the NFL can go to this 18th game and increase the revenue with, It's TV partners because the contracts allow for it? I can't answer this specifically because I haven't seen the contracts and I don't know. But this is what I do know, the idea of an 18th game has been around for a decade now, right? How long has it been around? Yeah, about that.

When they negotiated these deals, it seemed virtually certain that they were going to increase the number of games, and I would be gobsmacked if there wasn't already in the contract, just a regular pro rata type of increase that the networks would have to pay for that to happen. It's unfathomable to me that they don't have that sort of clause in there and that they can just rip up the contract and start over. But almost certainly they're going to have a pro rata clause in there. I mean, I think that 18 game schedule with the second buy week is coming within the next couple of years. Do you have a feeling?

It's certainly happening, yeah. And everybody I talk to is prepared for it and ready for it. And like I said, when they were doing these negotiations, three or four years ago, they knew that was coming at some point. Or they knew that it was a distinct possibility to happen at some point. Real quickly on Shaq and Barclay, you said that there will be, you know, a bidding war, I guess, you know, I'm paraphrasing, for them. but Ernie Johnson can't go, right? He's staying at TNT, so it won't be the same show if Barkley and Shaq end up on Amazon or NBC.

It won't be the same show. And, you know, I've talked to people at different networks, and, you know, they look at like Kenny Smith, and they all believe, like, well, we have our own Kenny Smith, you know, and the two big, and the same thing with Ernie Johnson, who is a fantastic host of the program, But everybody's like, we have our studio host. The two bona fide stars of that show are Charles Barkley and Shaquille O'Neal,

and those are the ones that are really being identified by others. There's also a big question about what's in their contracts and whether or not Turner would allow them to go elsewhere, whether there's no competes. That still has to sort of come out in the wash. All right. A couple more since I have you on, and we'll just switch it back to the NFL here quickly. Do you see NFL TV ratings in 2024 being impacted by the election in the way that they were in 2020?

Is there any concern among networks that ratings actually during, say, October and November, early November in particular, are impacted by the election? Yeah, and then 2020 they were down, but 2020 also was the COVID year. So everybody views that as the aberration. If you go back to 2016, the NFL ratings were down a good like 8% at that point. Most people expect that to happen. But I love talking to thinking deep into the weeds on this, and you like it too. So last year, there was a writer strike in Hollywood. And as a result, the NFL allowed ABC to simulcast every single ESPN Monday Night Football game.

Right. So that added a simulcast, not just a simulcast, but a simulcast that was a broadcaster that brought it, that actually got bigger ratings than ESPN. This year, they're going back to where, I believe it's five games that ABC has this year. So buckle up for headlines saying that NFL ratings are going to take a step backwards, partly because of the election, which is just going to suck a lot of energy and a lot of viewership out, but partly also because of ESPN's move and move back to the ESPN as well. It doesn't mean much.

The NFL is still by far the most popular programming that's out there. There's going to be a lot of hand-wringing about it, but it's almost the people, I talked to, all of them are virtually certain that there is going to be some sort of rollback all told this year. The last time I talked to you, I remember we were talking about the two Christmas Day games on Netflix, and the fact that Netflix has never, you know, actually produced NFL, you know, games for its streaming service, and that they may have a difficult time finding people to help them because it's the holiday season and every other network has a lot of games.

including college games that time of years. So has Netflix figured out the two Christmas Day games yet? How they're going to handle it? They have not. They've, ESPN has told them that's right in the middle of their college football playoffs. Right. So they don't have the bandwidth to get one of their top producers out there and get it done.

NBC has to, the day after Christmas, they have an Amazon game, a Thursday-A-football game, that NBC produces for Amazon. And then two days later, they have their own Sunday night football games. So they really don't have the bandwidth to do it. So Netflix and the NFL, this isn't just a Netflix negotiation. Both I've been talking with Fox and with CBS, the NFL and Netflix, especially if you're going to be on Netflix and they're paying for this,

they want it to be top-not production quality. So does the NFL. And so they're negotiating right now with Foxx. and NBC, and there are a couple of outside companies, too, that have a little bit of experience doing it, but that still hasn't been figured out. They will figure it out. No problem, but it's one of the fun stories that I've been following. Do we know who will call those games?

Most likely it would be somebody. If they do CBS, it would be one of CBS's top crews, if not Nancy Romo, like the number two or three down. I don't think it'll be the bottom of the barrel for them. Right. One last one. You probably don't have the answer to this. But why is Washington's first preseason game in the Meadowlands against the Jets on August 10th? A Saturday at noon in the midst of what could be a brutally hot day? Almost all those games, unless they're nationally televised, are at night. And this one is not. The NFL Net has a double header that day with a 1 o'clock game and a 4 o'clock game.

Do you have any idea why Washington and New York are going to play at 12 noon? I haven't. I haven't befuddled. But you say there's another game at the same time. I have thought they tried to stagger all the games so each one has some sort of national window to get out there. But it sounds like that's not the case on this one. I'm totally befuddled. Yeah, I'm looking at the NFL Network television schedule. the week one of the preseason, there are no, there's no CBS, Fox or NBC or ESPN game.

They're all NFL network games. And on that Saturday, there is a triple header on the NFL network starting at 1 o'clock. But the Washington, New York game is an outlier at noon with no national television attached to it. I just thought that was odd. I thought maybe you might know. The artificial turf, can you imagine how that's going to be? Yeah, it may just be a metal lane. issue. I mean, but you know, with these preseason games, there's a lot of flexibility. They can play them

Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night, Sunday night, you know, in that, in that first weekend. I just thought that that was an odd time for that first game. Thanks for doing this, especially on such short notice. You're the best to do this for me. Thanks, as always. And when I see your name pop up on the phone, I pick it up at the evening. Always, always, yes. Great catching up. John is followable on X at Orand underscore Puck. Go to puck.com. News slash newsletters to read him every single day. Appreciate it. As always. Anytime. Thanks, man. One of the best, John Orand, a local, huge fan of all of the teams here in town. All right. That is it for the show.

Tommy will be with me tomorrow.