The Kevin Sheehan Show - Cooley on Joe Burrow and More

Episode Date: February 20, 2020

Chris Cooley joined Kevin for an hour of the show today. They talked Bloomberg's choke debate performance and then got into a ton of Redskins' topics. The discussion included Adrian Peterson, Jordan Reed, Trent Williams, Ryan Kerrigan, and a hypothetical "if Joe Burrow is available at #2". Kevin and Aaron finished up with the potential for a new NFL Playoff format and some college hoops. <p> </p><p>Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices">podcastchoices.com/adchoices</a></p> Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You want it. You need it. It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. I'm here. Aaron's here. Tommy, not here today. For those of you that complain that I took a day off yesterday, just get over yourself, please. Okay?

Every once in a while, I'm going to take a day off now. Oh, Sheehan, you told me the radio show would not impact the podcast. You promised that. Did I promise that, Aaron? Did I ever actually say, now that I'm back on radio, it's not going to be. to impact the podcast at all? First of all, it really hasn't. Secondly, I've got Chris Cooley here today. He's with us by phone. See? Took a day off and we come back better than ever. Remember Mike Greenberg, Mike and Mike

back in better than ever. That show is terrible. It was awful. What's going on? I haven't talked to you in a while on this show. What's up? Here's how much you care about the podcast. I called you four minutes ago because I knew your real job was over, and you said, hey, do you want to jump on the podcast? Well, I mean, you know, today's typically, sometimes, today's typically a Tommy day, and he is not feeling well today down in Florida at spring training. And you called me right when the radio show ended and we were talking. And I'm like, hey, you want to jump on? And you said, yeah, I got some time.

So we'll do it right now. I do apologize, though, for taking yesterday off. I did have something that came up sort of last minute. It wasn't planned necessarily, but all as well. So did you watch the debate last night? I watched a little of it. I didn't watch the entire debate, but it was embarrassing. It's hard to get through.

I mean, Mike Bloomberg last night seriously was borderline. the flight or fight situation scenario where people either flee or they stand up and fight, that dude won it off that stage from the jump. He got hit with a haymaker by Elizabeth Warren and just stood there and just looked like he just got trampled over all night long. I mean, I don't know if it's a combination of he's not very charismatic. He was woefully underprepared, which could have been the case. I just think he choked. I think he just basically choked in that kind of environment, that kind of combative environment just isn't for him.

But anyway, what do I know? I thought the whole thing and the whole night was entertaining for sure. I don't know how many people watched it. I'm curious to see what the ratings are. The ratings are the last debate in December, Aaron, I think were terrible. Like literally, you know, the combination of like the ratings for the debates and the impeachment hearings are like, three times less than like Trump's debates back in 2015. Like no, the Democrats have sort of turned people off here recently. And I'm not making a political statement, just by the way, as we sit here and talk about this, but I think that the ratings for this stuff are terrible outside of like DC and Hollywood.

But anyway, uh... Well, the internet views for this are going to be massive because of the performance by Bloomberg. I mean, if you want to use the Haymaker's boxing theory, it was like he'd been barring against somebody letting him hit him for, or letting him hit them for the last four years, and then all of a sudden someone punched him in a fake. Yeah. Like everybody...

What you're saying is he's nice to some women, and then his face just dropped. Like, he took one shot of face, and he was out. No one talks to me that way. I had a prepared thing to say, And now I can't say it because you cut me off. And now I don't know where to go because nobody ever cuts me off. I'm too important.

Everybody's got a plan until you get punched in the face. Yeah, I mean, and he didn't even have a plan, I don't think. Like, I mean, so many of the obvious things that you knew he would get asked about, you know, stop and frisk and, you know, all of these NDAs with these sexual harassment claims and allegations over the years, he just seemed completely either woefully underprepared or, you know, The only thing that was missing from last night with Bloomberg was happy Thanksgiving. Seriously, because he choked. Like he did not want to be there.

I mean, he loosened up a little bit at the end, but he had already, I mean, people were tweeting in the first five minutes, Aaron, last night, five minutes in, his campaign is over. I would not predict that because of all the money he has, and many more people are consuming these television commercials than consume the debate. last night. But it was certainly entertaining. Anyway, that's not why I have you on. Even though Chris Cooley was the one, one of very few, who about a week or two before the election in 2016 said,

Donald Trump's going to win. Excuse me? Yeah, I mean, I'm out here in Leesburg and in Western Loudoun County, and there are just Trump signs everywhere. I'm pretty sure he's going to win. You did predict it. It wasn't Loudoun County. It was after I spent a bunch of time in Wyoming and driving across the country. Right.

I think even Leighburg Western Loudoun County is fairly liberal. Fair enough. But, you know, your experience with being out in Wyoming and driving across the country, that was really sort of the influencer for you. You really did believe it. You thought people weren't. And one of the things you said, I'll never forget it, it was a week before the election, You said people who are going to vote for him are not admitting it to pollsters.

And you were right. Yeah. Well, I'm so versed in politics that it's not a surprise to me, but maybe that's right. All right. Let's talk some ball here. Let's start with all the Redskins news from yesterday. Not a surprise they picked up the option on Adrian Peterson, right? And part of that is because what else do they have that they can be confident in from a health standpoint?

Well, I just don't think you can trust. First of all, Adrian Peterson is incredible. What he's done is 34 years old. He deserves to be on a roster. He's probably starting running back. He makes more out of nothing and continues to work and run hard. He's an exceptional leader. I can't say enough about Adrian Peterson.

So I would like to start with that. But then, as much as we love guys, he's hurt, always. So do you know that he's going to be healthy? No, there's no chance you know that. Bryce Love coming off the ACL. Is he going to be back and healthy? You would hope so. You're probably not keeping Chris Thompson.

Yeah, no, I'm not surprised by Adrian Peterson, and I'm pleased by that. I mean, he's been really, I mean, 2018, he was their most valuable player. Last year at times in several of those games, he was their best player. I mean, it's amazing. Like, I mean, you played professional football for a long time. And at 34, you know, 35 years old or whatever he's going to be coming into this next season, he's going to turn 35 during the season, isn't he? I think. I mean, how many times do you see a guy like this be sort of the freak that he is?

He's going to be 35 in March. Rarely see it at any skill position. Sometimes you get DBs that play a long time, but they don't take a lot of hits. He's taking so many hits in his career. You look at the way he's built. You look at the way he works. I mean, there's so many things that go in to what he is as a person to have a guy be naturally the way he is.

And I think there's got to be a lot of credit given. You know, looking back... By the way, maybe one game, Duane was a valuable player on offense, maybe one. Terry, maybe another two or three. Another two or three, probably nobody. And then Adrian Peterson the rest of the game. Without Adrian Peterson in the first eight weeks of the season, they had zero yards on offense.

They could do zero. So even though they didn't win a lot of games, he was the main first of offense for more than half the game. Yeah. You know, thinking back to week one last year and, you know, the Jay Gruden not activating him, you know, sort of what was that all about? Was that a bit of a power play from Gruden?

You know, what was that all about in week one last? year. I don't think AP fit what he wanted to do. I don't really understand why he wouldn't, though. And yeah, maybe it was a little bit of a power play. Jay's going into his final year of his contract. There's obviously been some discussion with Jay not being happy with how the front office ties together and works.

And I think at that point, the one thing he had control of was, you know, was that, you know, the final roster on game day. So he exercised that control. Maybe it wasn't strictly a power play. It did not go well. Nobody in the locker and was happy about it. Nobody in the front office was happy about it. I don't know who was on Jay's side with that thing.

Obviously, he had to have four or five people on his side, but that backfired a little bit. Yeah, but I mean, you know, like thinking back to that opener, you know, even if Geis was the plan, and he was the plan, you still didn't really have a solution if Geis got hurt, which he did, and he ended up playing through being hurt. The one thing that I will say, you know, clearly Jay Gruden liked Darius Geis. Like he thought Geis had a chance to be a significant, you know, he was a significant talent and had a chance to sort of be a big time young running back

in the league. And I think in that game against Carolina, and even in that game against Green Bay before he got hurt again, I saw for the first time what maybe Jay Gruden really loved about Darius Geis. There was some real talent on display in that game against Carolina in particular. Oh, he had some special plays against Carolina Panthers in one game, and there's no doubt that the kid didn't really run the ball. And even in that game, though, what Adrian Peterson had? He had nearly 100 yards too.

Geis was 10 for a buck 29 and Peterson was 13 for 99. And so maybe Jay's theory was, I can't have Adrian Peterson active and just sit him on the bench, not give him the ball. I don't know. Geis is a heck of a running back. There's no question to that and the power that he has and the explosiveness. I think he's got a little bit more burst than Adrian does. It's not been Adrian used to, but there's a lot of it.

there is that element of a 34-year-old. He doesn't have the runaway speed. But I just don't know how you can go into a season with just Darius when you know APs is about as dependable as it gets. Yeah, it's true. And maybe this is also an indication that love isn't an absolute lock to be completely healthy. Remember, midway through the season, there was the report that he had a second surgery.

You know, that was in mid to late October. I went and watched him work out towards the end of the season, and he wasn't all the way back, but he was finally looking better. Love was? Yeah, he was starting to look better. I mean, you could tell that he had taken a bunch of time off, but he looked better. You like him?

Yeah, you know that. You and I have talked about that. I think he's absolutely terrific. I think he is. If you're looking for a semblance of what Carolina did with McCaffrey, he'd be that kind of a player because to me he's the guy that without classifying him as a third downback because that's not what he was at Stanford. He's the guy that he can move all over the field more than anybody else.

I know Darius wants to be that. I know Darius believes in himself as a pass catcher and as a route runner, but he's not quite as natural as I think Bryce Love will be. And honestly, I don't know if it's, I wouldn't play too much into Bryce. Love's not healthy, just more into, we can't let Bryce Love be our first down back, the first year back, as his first year in the NFL. We want to slow roll this in his first year because he's not Christian McCaffrey. And let it build a little bit.

In doing that, we do need a certain guy as a first downback and probably too. Jordan Reed yesterday out of concussion protocol after six months of being in it. And then the reports are he will be released. There will be an $8.5 million cap savings with his release. But then John Kime reported that Jordan Reed wants to play again, that he's 100% in on continuing his career. First of all, what do you make of just the whole sort of concussion protocol for so long? I don't really understand that. I'm not questioning it.

I'm looking for some clarification as to how you can be on that for that long. And then, you know, you know him a little bit. You think he's going to continue with his career? And do you think he should? Yeah, I'm torn on this a little bit in so much that if it were my son and he were financially set or didn't need it,

no, we'd be done. I'd want him to be done. throw in the towel. But at the same time, I don't know how much of Jordan Rees' concussion protocol might have been some anxiety about future concussions. And so if he can get past constantly fearing the next concussion, then I think he could play again. I also think he really would have to rethink the way he runs with the ball after the catch because he's a guy that puts his head down on contact.

And so that's something he would really have to think about changing is not lowering your head on contact. When you're getting tackled, go down, that kind of thing. And you don't want him to become, Mo Harris two years ago, who just hit the ground every time he caught the ball. I don't want to take that out of course. Well, Ryan Grant was more a fall-down guy.

No, Mo Harris was the guy. Well, Ryan Grant, remember, fell down after he caught every person. pass. No, Ryan Grant fell down when he was running the route. And Moeers just fell down after he caught the ball? Yeah. Okay. I know I'm right on that one. You said something there that seems totally intuitive and logical and understandable, and that is when you've had that many concussions, I mean, maybe it only takes one,

and then just the fear of having another one. but can you be in concussion protocol just for, you know, being hesitant and being fearful of getting another concussion? That's not concussion protocol, right? No, you can't, but there could be some symptoms. To be fair, and I don't know how Jordan feels or what Jordan's gone through. And so I'm just going to say, you know, there could be some hypochondria that goes into coming out of concussion protocol. You could maybe sense a headache every once in a while, which would then put you back into concussion protocol

for a period of time. They may have said to Jordan, we're not going to check you, we're not even going to do a concussion protocol until February. So don't even worry about it. We'll check you again in six months. Jordan left for a while this season, so I don't know if anyone was even checking him

to clear him from the concussion protocol. When they I-Red him, there was no necessity to, clear him from the concussion protocol. Right. So you may have just left him and said, we'll check you a week before we want to release you. If he had stayed healthy, if he had stayed healthy, how great of a career would he be in the midst of right now? Well, you saw him at his best, and I think he could have become a much better blocker if he worked at it.

And I think he was willing to work at it. could have been an 80 plus a year reception guy, who, in my opinion, should have played at least 80% of snap. I think that was a mistake by the previous coaching staff to not play him more. So I think he should have played more, and been more in the flow and feel of a game, less of a tendency. I think he could add more than 80 catches a year. I know he was in shape to do that. But it's not fair to play that game because he's hurt. or he's concussed.

And if it wasn't a concussion, there was almost always something that came up with Jordan. So me thinking about it and really liking Jordan as a person, I would want him to feel, I would want him to enjoy football at this point in his career. If he wants to go back and play, it should be because he loves football and he doesn't have any fear doing the thing that he loves, as opposed to looking at it like he's afraid every day on the job that he does. Right. Trent Williams, what do you think is going to happen with Trent Williams and the Redskins?

I don't know what's going to happen with Trent Williams. I would really think about extending Trent Williams' contract. I think that they're a pretty good team as they are right now. With the new playoff, they've got to, with the extra team, they've got even a better chance. But it's really hard to find left tackles. There are a couple in this year's draft, so only a couple that are going to be early round. They say it's one of the deepest left tackle drafts of all times.

Some of the people say that. Of all time? Yep. I don't know about that, buddy. A kid from Georgia's good. There's a kid from Louisville who's a freak. Yeah. There's probably only three.

or three first rounders, so three or four first rounders at best. That's a lot of the deepest of all time. It's so hard to discern that. Dane Bruegler, the draft analyst for the athletic the other day, said maybe the best left tackle, best tackle draft in 30 years. Yeah, I don't know about that. Bill Williams can play. He's a top five left tackle in this league the second he steps on the field.

I think he's going to be past putting the helmet on at this point. And I think it's going to cost him dollars to get that helmet on. I would really think about playing him. The other thing that I definitely saw with Trent is when he was back for, what, five days? Yeah. They like him in the locker room. I think the players respect him and enjoy him. Now, if you're really concerned about an underlying,

we don't believe in our strength and conditioning staff, which they're making changes do, obviously. There's a different situation. Yeah, made change. Probably going to continue to make change. But I don't know, man. I'd try to get something done with, you know. I mean, would you give him...

Here's the thing that's crazy about it to me a little bit. It was not... It was a fairly common practice to... extend guys contract, take some cab saving, give more guaranteed money. Even early in my career, Chris Samuels did it, John Jansen did it. They kept guys. I know he had two years left, and that was a little bit of the strategy of the last group was it's not time for a new deal.

You sign this deal. We're out. But Trent Williams is not your average guy. You don't have to treat everyone the same. He has two years left. I don't care what Ryan Kerrigan, who has two years left, going to think, or how he's going to feel. You're not getting a big deal. Ryan, we need to pay Trent.

We don't have to pay you a big deal. There's no need for fairness in the NFL. Get the guys you want, keep the guys you want. And they probably should have thought about extending Trent before it became a massive issue. And I would still think about extending Trent because I don't know if you're going to find, you're certainly not going to get anyone better at this year or in the next two years. He's going to be the best left tackle that the Redskins could have without giving up a massive deal for a trade for a current starter. He'd be the best player for the next two years that they could have at the position.

You know, in thinking... It goes a long way when you're starting a young quarterback as well. In thinking about what you just said, yeah, of course. I mean, look, they have a significant need. They've got a young quarterback. I mean, you know, they don't have a left tackle right now on the roster that, you know, can line up and play next year in the opener. But in listening to you talk about that, you know, it is, it's amazing to me. Like, you know, this was not an uncommon practice, despite, you know, Trent Williams signing a deal and having two years left on it.

And everybody, you know, there are a lot of sticklers, hey, you sign the deal, you're going to play to the end of the deal. But they had done that previously during the Snyder era of taking, you know, a guy who's into the last two years of the deal and putting more guaranteed money on it. And by the way, simultaneously making it better for the team on a per year basis with respect to the cap. And they didn't do this with him. And think about all of the headache and all of the bad PR and all of the ugliness that would have been avoided had they done that. For both sides. For both sides. And it was, as I thought about it, because really when this initially happened, I didn't, you and I talked about this, and you've got to take trend of this word that it's about the medical staff to some extent. You know, I think both of us had a sense

that it was a combination of things, including money. But you could have put three years on that deal and just put in legitimate money and probably not had any of it. Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, it doesn't mean that there may not have been some stuff with the medical and some concerns and a report may be written about how Trent didn't like the way certain things were handled. But at that point, you know, they would have already extended him and satisfied at least half of his issue. He admitted that that was part of the issue. It's not like we're speculating at this point. And, you know, and by the way, you wouldn't be in a position now organizationally where you don't have a left tackle. It's an important position on the field

with a young quarterback. And now to keep him, you're probably going to have to get in the range of Taylor Luan, you know, Luan through Lane Johnson, this 16 to 18 million per year to keep him. If not, he'll just come back and play and go into unrestricted free agency next year. That's exactly right. And it's such a league of recency that we'll remember last year until Trent plays well for four games and then we just don't care anymore. And there might be some bad blood or some animosity, but when he plays well for four games and probably make the Pro Bowl for you, like you probably will, we move past it immediately.

So I think it's something that even if you're frustrated with Trent, you've got to do the right thing for the team. And if he were a bad guy and it wasn't good for your guys or your locker room, that's the one thing. I don't think that's the case. I think Trent's a good locker room guy. I think he's a great teammate. I think he plays through anything he has to play through.

And I think he just wants to be rewarded for it. If I told you right now that you could go back and have the choice of Cleveland's first round pick or Trent Williams extended at a very high number for the next three to four years, which would you choose? I think I'd choose Cleveland's first round pick. Yeah. So, I mean, I think it's actually sort of a tough call. They've got number 10 overall. But I think that I would take the first round pick too, in part because I've had this feeling going back to last January before all the ugliness with Trent started,

that the Redskins should be in reboot long-term thinking mode anyway. But, you know, of course, they weren't really fielding calls on the guy that was sitting out, that they ended up having to pay anyway. And they didn't get Cleveland. I don't think Cleveland was going to give their first round. Well, the reports were that Cleveland was willing to part with their first round pick. Well, I think part of Cleveland was willing to part with their first round pick, and that being Freddie Kitchens wanted to get it done because he was in fear of his job.

and I think in part knowing you were going to fire for you wanted to keep that first round pick. I don't know exactly how that played. Okay, so I'll switch it and say Houston's first round pick, you know, and whatever else they would have given up. You know, I'm not saying it would have been the Laramie Tunsell deal, but you would have had a first rounder out of Houston wouldn't have been the same as Cleveland's first round pick.

But still, would you have taken Houston's first round pick? No, because you think Houston's going to be a playoff team. Well, no, Houston's first round. run pick, you'd know where it is now. Cleveland's was 10th overall. Houston's, where's Houston picking? When it happened, you've got to think where the pick was going to be. Right. Okay, so you're saying, would I take the 20 seconds?

Yeah, I'm just saying right now. Is it 22? I think I'd probably, I honestly, it's got to be around there. I don't know exactly what it was. Maybe somewhere around there. A top 10 pick, I would have absolutely taken. Actually, Miami has their pick, so it's 18. It's either the 18 one, either 18 or a later one.

18 may have been the Pittsburgh deal for Fitzpatrick. Whatever. You could have also gotten Gidevian Clowny and. 26 from Houston. Yeah, 26. 26 was Houston. You could have gotten Judevian Clowning for Trenton, and then you would have had to work on that deal with Gidavian Clowny. You'd have managed paying him.

Instead of paying trans. Would you extend Quentin Dunbar? Yes, and no. Yes, if it's not too much money. I think Dunny's a good player, and I think he probably caps out of being a good player. I just, he's a two-corner. But even you need three corners.

The thing you've got to think about is, who do you have? Yeah, it's the same left tackle situation. almost. Yeah, except you need one left half, four corners. Right. You know, pro football, you know pro football focus ranked him as the number two corner. Yeah, yeah, I don't care. Not at all.

They, when Josh was playing, they always put Josh on the one side, whether or not they should have done. He wasn't usually playing the one side. None of it matters to me what pro football focus has. I thought Dunny had a good year. I think Dunny's absolutely underpaid for what he's done. Whatever it is, he's like a couple million dollars under the average corner per year. If you put him just over the average corner and he's willing to get that deal done, then yeah, I would definitely think about doing that.

But I don't want to pay him $14 million a year. Right. Well, it's hard to. He's missed like 14, 15 games the last two years. You can't put him into that range. He's not Stefan Gilmore. It does just seem like it's getting more common that guys are missing. It's more rare to play 16 games now than it's ever been.

Yeah, but he played 7 and 11 the last two years. No, I know. I know, I got you. But what I'm saying is you're getting 13 is the new 16 in the NFL is what it seems like to me. That's probably true. What would you do at tight end here in the offseason? I think they'll sign Greg Olson. Well, they didn't.

Olson signed with Seattle. You missed that. That was yesterday. I missed that. Yeah. Yesterday. Okay. There are a couple guys I really like in this draft.

I think that that's a position that you can start young every year. We went through this one time. Tight end is a position that can start as a rookie in the NFL. You've got to get a good one, but there's a couple very good ones. in this draft. The kid from Notre Dame, that's going to be a first rounder, likely. There's a kid from Georgia who, Charlie Warner, who I

absolutely, absolutely love. Did you work with him? He was at the NFL-PGA game with him, and I've talked to him on the phone a bunch of times, too. He's about as good a kid as you can get, and he's the best blocker in the draft by far. He only caught ten balls, but he can run.

He can run, man. He'll probably run. If he runs in the four-sixes, he could get himself into the first round. looking at him right now. He's projected, you know, fifth through seventh. He's not. He's going to go on the third. Unless he runs under 4-7, then it's going to go higher. You worked out on that West Coast College All-Star game. You were out there for the entire week and got to work with the tight ends. And not all the best tight ends were out there. The kid from Notre Dame Cole, I forget his last name. the big dude, he's like 6-5, something like that.

And then you had, and then you had the guy, then you had Randy Moss's son. He's a projected, I think he's a projected, like, second-round guy from LSU. Colquette, by the way. Cole Comette, right. Cole Comette, yeah. Moss's son played a lot of receiver, though. Yeah. Right?

Yeah, but he was a tight end, too. I mean, he lined up as a tight end more. They threw to him a bunch. I mean, I think he had like 50 catches last year. A couple of big ones, like a couple of impossible ones, including that one in the Alabama game. Yeah, he could go high. There's a kid from Missouri that a lot of people like.

He has a long last name. Yeah. I'm not in love with him. But I think you can draft a guy. So you wouldn't trade for Austin Hooper if he gets franchised, which has been sort of, you know, sort of one of those speculative things? You wouldn't do that?

The thing that's hard with Hooper is he's going to dictate 10 million plus a year, and I'm not sure if he's a $10 million a year guy. The guy I really like is the tight end in San Diego, or in Los Angeles for the charges. Hunter Henry, yeah. Under Henry is the best free agent tied end. I can't imagine. and they let him leave the chargers,

but he's a guy that I think is really, really good. The thing is, to me, it depends on what they want to do. To me, you need every down tight end that doesn't come off the field. You need a guy that plays 80-plus percent of the snap. And so Henry is that kind of guy. I think Hooper could be that kind of guy. I went through almost all the free agents available. There aren't those guys.

Tyler Eifert is one of the other times I really like. I doubt he leaves Cincinnati. He's had an injury history. But I thought he had a very good rebound year. He didn't play as many snaps for the Bengals, but he's still naturally a pretty talented guy. So it's one of those positions where there's not a lot available, but if you can find the right guy,

and I think they're a couple in the draft, that's the direction I would go. I've got one for you. I've got one for you. Go ahead. Because it's a guy that you liked when he came. out. And Aaron, this is off of Aaron's favorite team, and Aaron has told me that he's been a little bit underwhelming based on his draft position. Would you give up something for O.J. Howard

who's going into his last year of his deal? Yes, because I heard O.J. Howard's a hard worker. I heard he's a good kid. He's a hard worker. They've had, what, three offenses since he's been there? At least two. Well, at least two. They're not going to move O.J. Howard. Well, he's going into the last year of his deal, so they're going to have to make a decision on him. They can pick up the fifth year. Well, I guess they could pick up the fifth year option. Yeah, he's a first round pick.

They don't have to do anything with him. He's not going anywhere. They just didn't throw to him a ton. 53 targets last year. Yeah. No, remember that after that bowl game at Alabama, watching that kid? Yeah.

This guy's a beast. He's made some plays, though, in Tampa where you go, wow. You did tell me that you like Hale Hentius, the kid from Alabama that was on the roster this year, right? Yeah, I do like Hale, but Hell's, I just don't quite see it that Hale's your primary guy that you want on the field every day. Well, then can Sprinkle be that? What if they didn't get a guy? He's not. No, Sprinkle can't be that. He's not that.

I say that when I, in turn, I say that I think that Sprinkle hasn't got anywhere near his potential. I think Sprinkles is better than he's best than he's played. But I don't, it's going into your fourth year here. Yeah. Kevin, tight ends reveal themselves fairly quickly in the league. It's usually by the second year, you say this guy can't legit play. Okay. We should look through and see how many tight ends didn't really evolve until they're sixth year in the league or fifth year. What do you think Ryan Carrigan, what happens with

Ryan Kerrigan? Will he be back with a contract extension or will he be dealt or will he be released? There's an $11.7 million cap savings with him. This is a position where they do have players. It's not left tackle or corner or tight end. What do you think happens with Ryan Carrigan. I'd be surprised if they didn't float that before the trade deadline, just to see what the potential value might be out there and maybe for the offseason. But I just, I don't think you can trade Ryan Carrigan. Obviously, I said nothing's fair, and you can trade Ryan if you were to get a six or something conditional, but I think there's a level of disrespect at that point for everything that he's done

that's given away for nobody. What if you got a third form? You're not going to get a conditional late. You're going to get something, you know. If they were going to get a third for him, they would have taken a third for him at the trade deadline. I don't think that. There's no chance they wouldn't have.

There's no chance they were going to get a third form. Dan loves him. He's a redskin. He's going to be in the ring of fame. Let me just assure you something. There's no chance that you were going to get a conditional. You're not getting, there's no. chance you're getting better than a fifth. Really? For Carrigan, the perception of him around the league

is that he's a really good player. I know, but don't do this to me right now. Don't make me do this. A fifth is the best you're going to get. I love when you do this to other people, but I really disagree with you. I don't think it's a sixth round pick, which is the first round you mentioned. I think it's something much better than that. Okay, well, it's not. Are you going to do that thing where you say you can think what you want, but you're wrong. You don't think whatever you want to think. You're not right. So here's my thought on Derrigan.

He can't pay him what his contract's going to be next year. That'd be wrong. I see his next two or three years playing out like the type of player like Chris Long was in his last three years of his career, where you can bring him in and play him of 30 to 40 percent of snaps and you're changing to a four. three, and he can have a big impact coming off the edge with his hand in the ground as a rusher on a very, on a skilled back level, half as many plays. And so you're probably going to draft Chase Young, and you're going to have wet,

and Kerrigan would be a great guy to have in the room. You've just got to have him negotiate his contract. He's got to take a team favorable deal, and that'll be something. something that him and his agent can go through and say, how much are we going to get paid anywhere else? Do you like your life in D.C.? Do you want to play for the Redskins? Blah, blah, blah. If you do, take the deal, move on. I would definitely keep Ryan Kerrigan. It's just not at 11 point, whatever. Yeah, so you're suggesting that the extension would be to lower his per year average,

lower the cap number to the team, to play out final two to three years at a lot less money instead of essentially restructuring his deal rather than releasing him. Yes. Okay. And it's going to be a pretty thorough restructure. I really don't think that they were looking to move Ryan Carrigan before the trade deadline. I don't think anybody could have off. I mean, the reporting at the time is that the Redskins were not interested and that there may be interest out there in Ryan Carrigan,

but the Redskins were not interested in even listening. I mean, they weren't listening on Trent Williams. Well, you're not doing his job if you're not trying to calculate the value of all your players. And so making a call or two to see what someone might give up for Ryan Carrigan is not anything is not malpractice in the NFL. That's what you're supposed to do. It also can help you dictate what the next change will be for him. how you restructure his contract could be based on the fact that nobody's going to get anything

route for him, so no one's going to really see him. Yeah. Which is precise, which is pretty, I mean, you're, you've also essentially said, because he's not going to have a lot of options, that gives you the opportunity to keep him in Chris Long fashion for a lot less money over a two to three year period. We'll see. You know what? I hope you're, if you're right, that's not a bad way to go.

Redskins fans wouldn't be angry. I wouldn't be upset if he's, you know, on sort of a team-friendly deal for two to three years. And by the way, with a better coaching staff, you know, with Rivera and Del Rio, they figure out a way to get a lot out of them, you know, in sort of a specialty role, especially if they draft Chase Young. What I don't want is I don't want him here because ultimately the owner thinks he's a true Redskin and deserves a contract extension out of loyalty. Well, that won't be the case. For whatever he has in deficiencies, I think his work ethic and the way he goes about his business and what he would be in a role of 30 plays a game is he's very worth keeping. But that's going to be up to him. Right.

Last thing. And then you can run unless you want to hang out and talk about the new NFL playoff format next year that looks like it's going to happen. So the other day on this show and on the radio, I talked about the quarterback situation. And the assumption here, and I think it's a fairly safe assumption, you can dispute this after I say it. But the assumption here is that the odds are more likely than not that Alex Smith is not going to be available to play football next year. And if you assume that, then the Redskins have to go out and get a quarterback. because they would only have one that would be available to play next year, and that would be Dwayne Haskins.

And so there are multiple ways you could go here. You could go with the true backup, you know, the Matt Moore, the A.J. McCarran, the Brett Hundley, the Chase Daniel, et cetera. You could go with, you know, sort of the veteran short-term starter where you're going to bring in, say, Philip Rivers for a year, and Haskins is still your long-term guy. You could come in with the veteran like Ryan Fitzpatrick, who could be the backup, but also could compete with Haskins to start in the short term, or you could go with the veteran guy that you

think ultimately is going to be your quarterback or could be your quarterback like a Teddy Bridgewater. What do you think the Redskins will do at the quarterback position, assuming Alex Smith is not available to play next year? Well, I know that you don't want to draft. cousins, you know, the fourth rounder who's maybe going to take the guy's job. So, yeah, if you're going to draft, if you really feel like you're going to draft a quarterback that might have a chance, you might as well draft Tua. Yeah, no, if you're going to draft, I don't think he draft to put any pressure on

DeWayne. That's, to me, pressure doesn't make diamonds at that position. They don't want to feel added pressure from the outside. don't want to feel, you don't want to create pressure from your media or your fan base. Because if you play bad, everyone's going to go, what's this guy going to, Matt Moore would probably be the role that I would expect is five to six year veteran in this league, guy that's played some, not a guy that's completely raw, that understands when he comes here what his role is. Your role is to back up Duane Askins, you're going to help him no matter what. You're going to make him better. We hope you never go in, but we know if

you do, it'll work out. Even if Fitzpatrick's too high, because Fitzpatrick, a guy like that, everyone's going to say, if Duane struggles for three games, we'd win with Fitzpatrick. I don't think you want that. Yet, this coaching staff may want him to earn it, and Fitzpatrick would be like a real competitor, but also capable of backing up. the way, Matt Moore is 35 years old, but, you know, he is an older version. You know, Brett Hundley would be a younger, you know, version of a guy that is coming in and knowing his role potentially as a backup. I mean, the thing that gets interesting with the draft, though, is it's getting harder and harder to evaluate quarterbacks, and good quarterbacks are falling

in the draft because they're playing in offenses that you don't quite understand, like Gardner-Mintu is playing in this spread-out offense at Washington's. state and no one really knows how to put a place on him. And what you do understand is he threw about 7,000 balls in his career. So he's probably a pretty capable of playing. You also, I mean, when I say you don't really want to take a guy on the fourth, man, if you've got a guy that falls to the fourth that's been a starter and throwing a ton of balls in college that could play, it's hard to pass on that guy.

So the last one actually, and then you can roll if you want to. What if Cincinnati doesn't draft Joe Burrow? What if, you know, this conversation about Burrow, perhaps, you know, pulling in Eli Manning or whatever? I don't know. Maybe Burrow won't want to play here either. But what if Burrow fell to number two and he's sitting there at number two? Take him. That easy.

Take him. Deal with it. Do you think they would? No. Yeah, and why not? I think that if Ron's fully in charge, it would be hard not to take him. Yeah. And so I think that's when you'd find out.

Yeah, that's true. That's true. I mean, you could potentially find out even before then. I had a guy on the radio show the other day, Chad Forbes from NFL draft bites, who basically said he thinks Teddy Bridgewater is going to end up in Washington. Teddy Bridgewater wants to leave New Orleans. Well, Drew Breeze is coming back next year. He could start an indie or Carolina.

It's got to be his last. Yeah, but then you got the Taysam Hill situation. That's actually true, Taysen Hill. I thought that, well, here's the thing with Tassam Hill. This changes things completely in our conversation. I think that they played Bridgewater not necessarily because they believed that Bridgewriters a better quarterback than Taysam Hill, it's because they didn't want to lose the value in Taysam Hill

playing 19 positions on the field. Right. If you play him at quarterback, now you can't play him on special teams, you can't play him at fullback, can't split out at receiver, you don't have the gimmick package. I don't think they wanted to lose Taysam Hill's value as what he was, the Flash guy. So assuming that you think they think he's actually a better quarterback,

do you think other teams think Tassum Hill is a good quarterback and we'll get an opportunity to start and get a contract this year. He's a free agent. I think there's Lamar Jackson written all over him in some spots. I do too. It's just going to take a guy like Greg Roman

and a guy with some real creativity to be able to use Taysham Hill the way that you have to use him because you can't evaluate him as a quarterback in the league this far. He doesn't play enough quarterback. It's almost impossible to know what he could be as a quarterback. By the way, your answer, which was very quick to Burrow being available at number two, you take him.

You don't feel the same way about Tua, though, right? I don't. No, I think Tua is going to take longer to develop in the league. I think Tua has some incredible potential. But I also think he's a guy that should have some injury issues. To me, the Tua thing's not a short thing. The Joe Burrow thing seems like the most short thing I've seen since Andrew. left. At quarterback.

All right. Do you have, you got to, what? I can sit here with it for a minute. Yeah, because I wanted to do this NFL playoff format thing. For those, God, the broke, God, can you imagine if Cincinnati decide, look, Cincinnati could just decide Chase Young's, their number one player on the board by far, and they're taking Chase Young. They're not going to do that.

I don't think they're going to do that either, but they could. Then the other part of that is, well, they could do that. But the other part of that is just Joe Burrow, you know, threatening to, you know, sort of dictate where he goes. And why would he dictate to come here? Why wouldn't he do the same thing to Washington if he's at number two? Good question. Washington's a major market team, though. With a guy that drafted number 15 overall last year.

In that deal, if there was an actual discussion with Joe Burrow and Joe Burrough's agent about, drafting him. It would also involve the movement of Duane Haskins. Right. You wouldn't say you're going to compete with Duane. They'd be talking about where Duane was going to go. You know, though, I don't see Cincinnati passing on Burrough. Where it gets, I think, interesting is, does somebody else want to give up everything for maybe Chey Shung and take Chishung at number one?

Does somebody else want to trade with Cincinnati to get? Chase Young. I just don't think that's, I just, or I mean, if they weren't going to take him, they're going to make a trade to get, someone's going to trade up to get Burrow. I don't think people will trade up to get Young with Cincinnati and leave Burrow on the board. Yeah, I don't, I don't think so either, but I'm, but I hadn't really considered that, I mean, we do know that, you know, a lot of the draft experts have Chase Young as the best player on the board and by, by a lot. So if NF, if their NFL, teams that feel that way. And if they're NFL teams that believe that Chase Young is the next elite pass rusher of the next generation, you know, like the Giants at four, and you just go with the Giants at four. Might they give up something to move up to number one to take Chase Young? Because they drafted Daniel Jones last year and they love Daniel Jones. I don't know. That seems... I don't see how you can say by a lot that Chase Young is the best player on the

First of all, consider value of position. And although pass officer is probably the second highest value position, yes. Quarterback is trumped that every day. Doesn't mean it's your evaluation of the players. I understand the position comes into play. But in the pure evaluation of the player, you can have changed. What's your bat?

What's your valuation on Joe, on Burlvan? Bat. Not. 50-50, mix? No. Burl was amazing. Incredible. I mean, if you believe as an organization at number one, number two, whatever, that Joe Burrow is going to be Patrick Mahomes or Aaron Rogers and that kind of player.

And that's how you have them evaluated. Obviously, even if you have Chase Young evaluated as the next Vaughn Miller or the next Killeel Mack or the next great, you know, Nick Bosa, you're taking Burrow. Let me put it to you this way. I'd get fired 10 times out of 10, taking Joe Burrow and having a fail based on what he did this year and the value of that position. I would go down with that ship all day long. Yeah. And I trust me, I know how good Chase Young is. I'm excited that he should play for the Redskins.

He is unbelievable. But I'm taking the quarterback first if I don't have a quarterback. Here's another way to put it then. If you're that sure about Joe Burrow and you're only one spot away from number one overall and Cincinnati really likes Chase Young and may really like Tua, would you think about trading up a spot to take Joe Burrow? Yep, I would. I mean, if he really is what you think he is and you're only one spot away.

So, you know, what's the draft value chart on that? I mean, you throw that sort of out of the equation. I'm a point, but you throw it out. Yeah, you throw it out at this point in the draft because it's the value of getting the player you want. You know, the Redskins might have to give up, you know, more than you would think to move up one spot to get Joe Burrow. Yeah, they will. What would they have to give up to move up one spot two to one? Well, what did Chicago give up to move up from three to two, two years ago to take Trubisky?

because it was three to two, right, with San Francisco? They gave up the next year's first and their second, right? Yes. Something like that. It was. It was a lot more than you would think for one spot. It's because of the position in the draft. I'm looking that up real quickly.

It was a third and fourth that year and a third the next year. That's it. So two thirds and a fourth to move up one spot from three to two. It's not. Obviously, you're swivel. swapping first, too. Yeah, and you're doing it with John Lynch. And three and two versus two and one, which does make a difference.

Right. You swindled Lynch that they didn't want to a, or they didn't want Trubisky. I mean, if we get closer to the draft and Joe Burroughs being, you know, evaluated in the same way that the, you know, Bumahomes and Rogers and that kind of impact, then you can love Dwayne Haskins all you want. You can think that Dwayne Haskins is a legitimate top half of the league quarter. But if you have a chance to get a generational quarterback and you're only one spot away, you should be thinking about that. You should.

No matter how much you like, Dwayne. I'm with you. Absolutely. And if Joe Burrow goes number one to Cincinnati, the Reds, you know, I think we're going to see two of, you know, climb too. I think, you know, these quarterbacks more often than not climb. They don't fall. The guy that I don't know if I've mentioned this yet on the quarterbacks, and I don't even know if you and I have talked about it.

I am not a Justin Herbert fan when it comes to quarterbacks. I think he should be a day two pick. He's going to be picked in the top five, top ten. But man, that dude was wildly inconsistent as a college quarterback and didn't really... But there was also games where he was wildly accurate. Yeah, well, that's the problem, though. He's a weird one, because he's got some... He's more athletic than you think.

He can be, can be very, very active. He has very intangible. Six-five, strong arm, big kid, can run, can move, good throw, good release point. He's going high. Yeah, I understand that. I understand. I would be surprised to see him go over to him. All right.

Go ahead and run. I know you've got to run. You're busy, and I'm going to get to this playoff format, and we can talk about this another day. but I appreciate you jumping on here at the last minute. We can do it. Call me tomorrow. Okay, very good.

Chris Cooley, everybody. All right. Thanks to Cooley for jumping on last minute. And I didn't really get into it in great detail. I think Tommy's fine, but he wasn't feeling well down in Florida at spring training. So he wasn't going to be available to jump on the podcast today. So maybe he'll be with us tomorrow. So a couple of other things to get to before we wrap it for the day.

First of all, Georgetown, they didn't have a bad loss last. Providence has won games against three ranked teams in the last two weeks alone. They're a bubble team too, but man, did Georgetown need last night? Yeah, it wasn't a bad loss as much as a big lost opportunity that they needed to get to the tournament. And then if McClung is, you know, he walked off the court apparently. He came back and then got hurt again, right? And then apparently he was heard telling Patrick Ewing, I'm done. Maybe that was just for the game, but if that's anything more, then yeah.

Here's the problem. You know, before last night's game, Georgetown was actually in the field, at least Joe Lannardi's field. They were among the last four teams in, 15 and 10, even though they had a losing Big East record. The Big East right now, for those not paying attention, is the second best league behind the Big Ten. They're going to very likely get six of their 10 teams into the field, maybe seven. Providence could end up being the seventh. And that's why that game was so big last night for the Hoyas.

It was sort of a bubble game between Georgia. Georgetown and Providence, and now Providence probably inches closer to the right side of the bubble, with Georgetown sort of falling off of it. The good news, they've got other opportunities. They're playing three ranked teams over their final five games. They play Marquette. They play Creighton. They play Villanova. They're going to have to get two of those three minimum. And then they're going to have to win the games against the non-ranked teams to Paul on Saturday night. And Xavier, who's decent enough. And that game, I think, is at Georgetown, maybe next weekend or the weekend after. But the Hoy is tough loss there last night at home.

They played well in the first half, and then they allowed Providence to go shoot 60% in the second half. Another team I just want to mention real quickly in college troops, and then I'm going to get to this NFL stuff. Virginia, you know, I know we've talked about them and their lack of being able to score. They have now won six of their last seven, man. Tony Bennett can just flat out coach.

BC, they beat last night handily and actually scored a lot of points. I saw the point total for Virginia last night. They scored 78 points, and I'm like, is that the most points they've scored all season long? And guess what? It is, all right? The most they've scored all year long, 78 points. The closest was 73 and a loss at Louisville a couple of weeks. But Virginia now really solidly and getting to be in pretty good shape with respect to the tournament.

They were sort of on the outside looking in a few weeks. weeks back, but this wind street now has them solidly in fourth place in the ACC. I can't see the ACC getting less than four teams in the tournament. Duke got blown out by NC State last night. NC State needed that win to sort of become a team that might be in the conversation to be the fifth team in the ACC. So anyway, last night Adam Schaefter and others reported that the NFL is considering expanding their playoff format this coming season. Even if they don't have the 17-game regular season ready to go and next year is a 16-game regular season, they are talking about expanding their playoffs next year from 12 teams to 14 teams.

Now, this, according to Schefter anyway, is contingent on the CBA, the new CBA being ratified. but even if it is ratified, the 17-game schedule, which I believe will be a part of it, with a reduced pre-season schedule, which would be three games in the preseason. The new 17-game schedule may not start until 2021 or maybe not even until 2022. However, what was newsworthy about the Schefter report and others, I think, that came either at the same time or afterwards, is that Schefter said the new playoff format could start this coming season, you know, with the 16-game regular season. So this has been discussed on this podcast before, you know, the expanded playoff format.

But basically what the NFL is considering is going from 12 playoff teams to 14 teams. So you've got two conferences, and I went through this this morning on the radio, and not in a condescending way, but just in sort of a way to correct some of you. I hear people all the time, Aaron, you probably hear it too where somebody will say, man, that Redskins, Cowboys, Eagles, Giants Conference. that's a really tough conference that they're in. No, that's a division. Okay, that's a division.

The conference is the NFC. The NFL is the league. The league has two conferences, the AFC and the NFC, 16 teams in each. And then in each conference, there are four divisions, the east, the north, the south, and the west. The Redskins are in the NFC east with the Eagles, Cowboys, Giants, and Redskins.

That is a division. It's not a conference. I hear people do that all the time. And people that are like so-called experts will say, man, you know, that NFC West is a tough conference, man. The Seahawks and the 49ers and the Rams, that's one of the best conferences in the league. No, it's a division. Anyway, we move on from that. The new playoff format that would potentially start next year, it's pretty simple.

Seven teams per conference, okay, and the top team, and this is the only way to do seven in a conference, The top team would be the only team with a first round by. The other six teams that qualify would then play in the opening weekend of the NFL playoffs, what we have called over the years wild card weekend. So you would have three games in the NFC in the first weekend of the postseason and three games in the AFC. You'd have six playoff games that first weekend. You know, triple header on Saturday, triple header on Sunday,

one o'clock game, 425 game, 825 game, here we go. Now, a couple of years ago, maybe last year, Maskey and somebody else reported that the league was considering playing around with maybe a schedule that would include a Friday night primetime game and a Monday night primetime game in Wild Card weekend. You know, you get some competitive advantages and disadvantages off of that. Like the Monday night game means that the winner would not, the winner would not be able to play the following Saturday. They'd have to be locked into the Sunday divisional round game. I feel like there would be a lot of outrage on that. Maybe, but the NFL is into money. You know, more primetime games means more money from the networks.

So the reporting did not indicate anything about seating, but based on what others have written recently, Maskey included in the post, the NFL's not interested in changing their seating format, which I think is a big mistake, because I absolutely believe in the divisions and the division structure and the integrity of the divisions and the importance of the divisions. The NFL divisions are, you know, they're brands. The NFC East is a brand.

You know, you're never going to change that. The NFC East and SEC football and ACC basketball and, you know, the American League East, these are well-known brands, you know, when it comes to divisions or conferences. I don't want that to change. I want the importance of winning the division to remain that. And if you win the division, you qualify for the postseason. Now, the way it's proposed to work now, four division winners, next best three records, you know, and then basically the seating would be the four division winners would be seated one through four based on record, and then the three wild cards would be five, six, and seven in terms of the seed. And that's how it works now without the seventh team, where the four division winners are seated one through four, and then the two wild card teams are seated five and six.

even though in many cases one of those wildcard teams, sometimes both of them have a much better record than a division winner. And that's where my change would come in. I've mentioned this in the past. I would absolutely qualify playoff teams in the same way for division winners. Even if a division winner has a seven and nine record, they're in. But I would cede the teams one through seven once you have the seven playoff teams based on record. I think that that is much more fair. I think it also puts much more emphasis and much more weight on the team that had the really good regular season at 12 and 4, but didn't win their division against the 7 and 9 or 8 and 8 division winner,

who qualifies for the playoffs. That's the reward for winning the division. You're in the postseason, but you're not playing a home game against a 12 and 4 wildcard team. That's what I would do. I would make that one change. you know, the east winter, the north winter, the south winter, and the west winter, you're all in. Even if, you know, the east winter is Philadelphia at 8 and 8. You're still in.

You made the playoffs. Even though there are seven teams in the NFC that have better records than you, you are in. But once you're in, your seating is based on record. I just think that that's more fair. And not only that, I think you more likely than not create more opportunities for more meaningful games late into the season. Now, the seventh additional spot in each conference is automatically going to mean that more games will mean something late into the season. Fewer games will be insignificant throwaway games. You'll have more games because you've got one more spot to battle for. But if you

add on top of that playing for seating, then you increase the probability of even more games being meaningful and fewer games being, you know, less meaningful. That's true, but there are situations where the last week would become less meaningful because you look at someone brought up 2017 when the Ravens just missed out because of that crazy Andy Dalton Hail Mary. Right. The Ravens would have been in no matter what. So those would have been locked up going into week 17 as opposed to being a question on who would be that last. But they might still be playing for seating.

You know, their position may have been locked up with a win or a loss. Sure. But you're playing for seating. Look, somebody brought up the scenario to me on, the radio show. Well, that San Francisco Seattle game wouldn't have meant much this year because they both would have been in. Well, they were both in already. You're playing, in that particular case, you were playing for the one seed in the first round by. There will be some of those one-offs where it is less meaningful because of the new format than it used to be, but many more games will

matter with the additional playoff spot. And if you were to seed based on record than you had before. I don't anticipate the NFL doing a seating system, although I think it would make the most sense. But I do like an additional playoff team per conference. And I love the whole idea of a triple header on two days to kick off the postseason. The NFL still ends up with percentage-wise fewer playoff teams than the NBA and the NHL. Well, sure, but you could make the case the NBA has gone so far off the deep end that it's made the regular season meeting. half their teams. Exactly. And the NHL is exactly, no, it's, it's more than half their teams. It's 16 out of 31. Yeah. It's, it's, it's more. 14 out of 30. This is 44%. I think it's too much. I think it, I'm not

going to go so far. Some people are saying, you know, it renders the regular season a little bit more meaningless. And it might in this case, a little bit more meaningless. But for me, it's that, you know, I'm looking over the last five years. There's not a single team who missed it, who would be in it on it that I wanted to see in the playoffs. I didn't want to see Duck Hodges getting a number. other game. I don't care about the, you know, the Steelers the year before or the Rams this year or the Vikings or the Lions in 2017 or the Falcons at 8 and 8 in 2015. Like, there's not any teams I want to see in the playoffs. What was the year where you had some 10 and 6's missed? 2015, the Jets missed a 10 and 6. What about the NFC year? Was, I only have it back to 2015 right now.

I can look it up real quick. Yeah, 2017, you had multiple, you had three nine and seven's miss in 2017. You had the Cowboys, Lions, and Seahawks all miss at nine and seven. I mean, look, the Redskins under Joe Gibbs way back in the day when you had even fewer playoff teams, that was the reason. They missed the playoffs on multiple occasions with 10 and 6 records. That's a bit painful to go 10 and 6 and miss the postseason. Yeah, I mean, I understand your position.

You know, more times than not, that seventh team wasn't going to contend for the Super Bowl. But here's the deal. If you're going to 17 games, you know, you're going to get more revenue from that additional regular season week. And actually could be potentially two additional regular season weeks if they go with two buys in the 17 game schedule. And then you're talking about two additional playoff games to be bid on. just too much money. The NFL's been on this format since the division realignment in 2002. Yes. So it's a pretty long run, 18 years, you know, of the same sort of structure and playoff format.

And, you know, a lot of what makes the NFL popular is that, you know, everything sort of is the same and it becomes habit and it's tradition. I don't mind the extra playoff team. I just wish that when we get to that, you know, the four seed isn't hosting a first round game against the five seed where the five seats 12 and four and the four seats seven and nine. It's going to happen, though. Yeah, I don't think the NFL is going to go that route. I think they should.

I think it's competitively fair versus competitively unfair. And again, it doesn't take away the urgency or the reward for winning the division. You win the division, you're in the playoffs. And that wouldn't change. All right. I think that's it for the day. I don't think I had anything else. We're done. Back tomorrow. I think Tommy will be with us tomorrow. So tune in for that.