The Kevin Sheehan Show - Will Grier to the Redskins? Thrones Recap Too

Episode Date: April 22, 2019

Kevin opens the show with various Redskin reports including Ben Standig's tweet that the Redskins are very interested in West Virginia QB Will Grier. Andy Benoit from SI.com joins to talk about the Redskins and NFL Draft week. Kevin and Aaron talk about Doug Williams' press conference, the Caps, the Nats, NBA Playoffs, and they recap Game Of Thrones Season 8/Episode 2. <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. All right. I am here. Aaron is here. This show's presented by Window Nation. If you're in the market for Windows, call 86690 Nation or go to Window Nation. And tell them that we told you to call. A Game of Thrones recap, end of show. We'll do the spoiler alert again. I will confess to you, Aaron, that I just watched it this morning. Good way to start a day. Yeah, I watched it early this morning. I was away in Jersey for the Easter weekend with in-laws. And by the way, on my way home, veered east with my oldest son and went to the Borgata. Why not?

Easter Sunday, brunch early, some church, and then Borgata, here we come. What was the game of choice? I played Blackjack for a couple hours. And then we played dice for about an hour and a half, two hours. Got dinner and came home, got home really. late last night and actually won some money. One money playing both cards and craps. There we go. Yeah, so it was pretty good. Anyway, got home late last night, which is why I didn't watch Thrones last night, had recorded it, got up this morning, and we will do an end of show

recap, and I will just say, like I said, last week, I don't know any of the reaction this week, because I stayed off of social media until I had watched it. Smart move. But I liked it again. I mean, I don't know if everybody hated this one too or a lot of people hated this one, but I thought it was a great episode. More people were receptive to this one. Okay. Anyway, we'll get to that at the end of the show. Andy Benoit, who writes for Monday morning quarterback on SI.com

and really knows NFL offensive football and quarterbacking. Had him multiple times on the radio show over the years. He's going to join us here shortly. We'll talk about some of the drafted, some of the guys in the draft. And talk about really Jay Gruden to a certain extent and what kind of quarterback he needs here this year. And if Case Keenham as an example is a good fit and a lot more with him. We'll get to a couple of Redskin thoughts here to start the show. Then we'll get to the Caps who can eliminate Carolina tonight on the road.

The hurricanes will try to force a seventh and deciding game. And I think already we've got two game sevens in the NHL. Both of the games yesterday were game sixes that ultimately forced to. game sevens. We'll see if that happens tonight, but we will definitely talk about the game Saturday night in which the Caps really defended home ice like a champion does in a big spot. A couple of Redskins thoughts, just to start real quickly. One comes from our good friend Ben Standig, who writes for NBC Sports Washington. He had a tweet over the weekend that one league source told him that the Redskins are one of Will Greers, Will Greer, the quarterback from

West Virginia, one of Will Greer's most likely destinations. So he put that out there over the weekend, and I wanted to weigh in on that real quickly. Will Greer, for me, is a better fit for Gruden than Haskins, as an example, or even Locke. You know, Will Greer, for me, is a guy that, first of all, does throw quickly. He's got good quick release, reads the field well, accurate enough, people have questioned his size. I think he's big enough. Some of question his arm strength. I think he's at least very, you know, at least Andy Dalton from that standpoint. I think he competes really hard and he is a playmaker. You know, I like Will Greer. I don't like Will Greer at 15, but if they were to take Will Greer, I don't think I'd have a problem with that. I think I would find that pretty interesting. I think he's a playmaker and a competitive, competes hard kind of guy. I think Jared Stidham is the same. Cooley doesn't like Stidham at all. I thought, you know, going into this discussion of the draft when the regular season ended and Stidham became available,

I thought Stidham would be a good guy in the second or third round, like more so than a Finley. But anyway, to me, they're similar. The problem with Stidham is that he had a bad year, and a lot of the tape, more recent tape isn't good. The junior tape's much better. Greer in the second round or perhaps even the third? Okay, now, if you were to ask me, would you prefer taking that second round pick and packaging it for Josh Rosen rather than taking Greer? I would say package it up and get Rosen. That would be my preference on that, then Will Greer.

Todd McShay had something very early this morning on ESPN.com. Quote, I have heard rumblings that Washington is most interested in a, Ohio State quarterback, Dwayne Haskins. But I've also heard Missouri's Drew Locke thrown out there for them. The Redskins are a trade-up candidate, but how far? They could jump into the top five to make sure that they get their quarterback, or they could sit tight and wait until about number eight or number nine and figure out a way to deke or get past Denver, Cincinnati, and Miami. I don't know if I'm buying the Haskins thing. I believe that the football people, or so-called football people in Ashburn,

I think they like Locke more than Haskins. I've mentioned that before. I think they like Locke more than Haskins. Now, Dan Snyder may like Haskins more than anybody else. So that's a possibility. Why you ask, we've talked about this before, but I will mention it again, Haskins went to Bullis with Dan's son.

And so Dan followed the Haskins career at Bullis. if you recall when Haskins was at Bullis, and I saw him play as a high school player. He was committed to Maryland initially, and then when Randy Edsel got fired and DJ Durkin got hired, instead of Mike Loxley in that moment, Haskins said no, and then pursued really his lifelong dream to that point, which was to play for Ohio State. I just, I'm not a Haskins guy, and I haven't been from early on in the college football season. I personally like Drew Locke more. Murray, to me, is the only quarterback deserving to go in the top 15 in this draft, in my opinion. And even saying Murray is a top 15 guy is a talent call.

You know, I don't know enough about the rest of Murray. So I don't necessarily buy into the McShay thing unless Dan's really pushing the Haskins thing to the football people. The football people, I think, prefer to lock over Haskins. I think I've said that for a while now. Now, it would not surprise me as they look beyond the first round, assuming that Haskins, Locke, and even Daniel Jones and Murray, are all gone in the first round. It would not surprise me of what Ben got is true, that perhaps they like Greer a little bit. But what kind of value do they put on them? Do they put a second round grade on them? Did they put a third round grade on them? I don't know. It's possible that Greer could go late in the first round.

It's also possible, depending on which mock you look at, he could last until the early part of the third round. So I know we've talked about this before, but just to make my position clear, quarterbacks in the first round of this draft at 15 or higher, Murray, yes, nobody else. nobody else I just don't think that there is anything closely resembling a lock or anything close to it

and that includes no pun intended Drewlock I don't think he's anywhere near they're all flawed to a certain degree Will Greer for this day and age and for a Gruden style offense might be a decent fit and a decent guy to bring in

to back up and perhaps Kee and year one, and maybe they deal McCoy or release McCoy. Especially, that could be dependent on his health, too. Now, as far as Murray goes, I mean, did you see all of the reporting on Murray over the weekend, the various discussions about Murray? Like, if Arizona doesn't take him, some people think that not only could he be available at 15, he might be available when we get into the mid-20s. I don't buy that.

Someone will, I do think the longer this goes, I do think that, that it's less likely that Arizona takes. I don't think there's any way they can take him if Josh Rosen is still on that roster. So if it gets to Thursday and Josh Rosen is still around, I don't think he goes number one. But I do think there would be someone Cincinnati or Miami or whoever who ends up trading up for him. I still think that Murray's going to go number one. But imagine the red flags all over Murray if Arizona doesn't take him. If they don't, it is a warning to everybody.

because you have to assume that at least part of the reason the Cardinals hired Cliff Kingsbury was because they had the number one pick in the draft and they had a chance to draft Kyler Murray because Kingsbury is a Murray guy. If they don't take him, there was something there that really they didn't like. And they may come out after the draft and say, well, it was because we really couldn't pass on Quinn and Williams or Nick Bosa. but no, it would be a red flag. Red flags all over Murray if Arizona doesn't take him one. And then if he starts to slide, then let's say he is there at 15.

You know, what do you do? By the way, Haskins, if you listen to all of the conversation, could be there at 15 also. That, I think, is getting more and more likely. I don't know what's likely and what isn't, because I think tomorrow we could both come in and say, oh, there it is, the Giants are basically going to take Haskins. Who knows? but let's say Haskins is there at 15. Let's say Murray, Locke, and Jones are all gone, and Haskins is sitting there at 15. You know, personally, that would just say to me,

stick to your board, take the best player available, don't reach for Haskins. I know that there would be some marketing buzz over Haskins. He is, after Murray, let's be honest, after Murray, Haskins is the biggest named quarterback in this draft. You know, very, very, very, very, No question. Because he played for Ohio State and because even a casual college football fan saw Haskins a lot this year and didn't see a lock this year, didn't see Daniel Jones this year, didn't see Will Greer this year. You did see a lot of Dwayne Haskins. There will be some temptation that Haskins is a ticket seller at 15.

I can't imagine, well, I can't imagine, but I bet if Haskins falls to 15, it's, telling you that almost everybody's board had Haskins much further down the board. And in this particular draft, with all of the defensive players available, that the pass rushers in particular, which Charlie Casserly told us about, and by the way, just as an aside, if you miss the Casserly interview on Friday, go listen to it for 30 minutes. If you tried to listen early on in the volume, we had some trouble with the volume, Aaron fixed fixed it, so you can just go to the Kevin Sheeonshow.com and click on, I think it starts at like the nine and a half minute mark. Cassarly was great. We also talked about a lot of old Redskins

stuff too, which was interesting also. But if Haskins is sitting there at 15, most boards had Haskins way down the board. If he gets by Denver and Miami and the Giants and then the Redskins are sitting there with an opportunity, I personally believe that if they were to take Haskins at 15, they would regret it. I think the bus potential on Haskins is so much higher than it is, Rosen as an example. At the very least, what you know about Rosen, if he, you know, wants to play here, he's going to be, at the very least, a really good Jay Gruden-style system quarterback. At the very least, Haskins has much more bust potential, much more. Doug Williams is speaking as we're recording this podcast, or he's about to. So we're going to get this podcast out a little bit later,

because I want to hear what Doug Williams says. So we're going to put the the Doug Williams conversation at the end of the podcast after he has spoken and we have a chance to just review it quickly. But we will come back to that a little bit later on. Andy Benoit from SI.com, MMQB is coming up. Let's talk about the caps real quickly. And the 6-0 Saturday night Game 5 shutout, blowout win over Carolina. Aaron, you were there. I was watching the game. it was a championship team style defense of home ice. It was the confidence of a champion. There was never, they out hit them, they outplayed them.

This was as dominant as Carolina was in game three. The caps were in game five, and that could change tonight on the road, where Carolina was very good in games three and four, and it could force a seventh and deciding game. But my number one takeaway, and you were there, My number one takeaway was, even if they lose tonight, they're going to win the series. I mean, if they play the way they did yesterday, there's Saturday. Excuse me, Saturday.

Then, yeah, there's absolutely no reason they shouldn't win this series. And go on farther. This was the first time, I don't necessarily want to say all season, but this reminded me of when they started to turn things around in the playoffs last year. The, you know, it turned from the finesse caps. They can't do it to the total full team. we're going to forecheck you, we're going to hit you hard, we are going to beat you into submission caps that we saw in that run, playoff run last year. Like you said, the 48 hits, the 32 hits the for checking.

There was one play. One of the goals was set up because one of the Hurricanes players was very clearly a little bit scared, a little skittish of being hit there. He didn't want to be touched, which allowed, I believe, Billzovetchin to get the puck, passed off to Connolly for the third goal of the game. You had, you know, it wasn't a perfect game. They faced a lot of, you know, they made a lot of penalties, faced a lot of power plays on the other side. But they were able to kill all of them.

And for the most part, Carolina didn't even get a whole lot of shots off on it. They got a few. There was one penalty. They got a little bit of a flurry, but Hopey was able to stonewall them. But were they O for five on the power play? Yeah. And there was a stretch in the second period within, I was say it was the first half of the second period. Like the first 10 minutes, they faced three power plays, was able to shut them all down.

it really did remind me of that moment. Remember last year people were still like, okay, can this team win the playoffs? Then all of a sudden you saw that little change in them, the little change in the style. This reminded me of that. How about the series Baxteram is having, at least at home, all of them? He's got eight points, five goals, three assists, and three home games in this series. And Holpey was brilliant too because the Keynes did have opportunities on some of those power plays. and Holpe came up huge, stopping 30 shots in that game in that game five.

Again, I don't know if they're going to win or lose tonight. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised at all if they lose, but I think that the way they played in game five, to your point, was the point in the Columbus series where they started to turn their whole postseason upward, you know, arrow upwards. And they dominated Carolina. They won a game in which, you know, they seemed to be to be, team that was reeling coming off the injury, a devastating injury to Oshy, who, you know, broke his

collarbone as it turns out. And he's essentially, you know, done for the postseason. Now the Keynes get the Svetnikov back potentially tonight. So that would be, what, four games after the punch. No, three games after the punch, right? Yeah, because that was game three. And we'll see what happens. These hockey players, are impossible to predict, but the one thing that, you know, for anybody that felt like the caps were going to be, you know, feel the pressure of a series that had been evened up, those days are in the rear view now. There's not a choking dog element to this team. They've got big game players now. You know, it's one of those things where once they got through it last

year, once they came from two nothing down to Columbus losing two home games to start this series, Once they came from behind to beat Pittsburgh and to get rid of those demons against the penguins, once they won back-to-back games in game six and seven against Tampa in shutout performances, and once they lost game one in Vegas and won four straight, they now have a swagger that they never had before. They looked like the defending champion

and the team that should be favored, quite frankly, to win the whole thing. Now, Boston, who was the second favorite to win the cup when the playoffs started, they avoided elimination yesterday, winning in Toronto in game 6-4-2 to 4, say 7th, and deciding games. So if the Bruins get through that series, it'll be interesting to see if the Bruins are the caps, which of the two teams are the favorites. I would assume, I haven't looked at the odds this morning like I did after game five to see if the caps had fallen, which they had.

But I would assume now that the caps have taken a 3-2 series. lead, that they are close to the favorites once again to win the cup now that they're on the verge of eliminating Carolina. A lot of hockey left, as they say. You got game six tonight and a seventh and deciding game would be on Wednesday night at home, but with the way they played on Saturday night, Aaron, I don't see them losing too straight to Carolina. I don't know how they match up with the Islanders. We'll get people on to preview that series before it's starts at the end of the week, if it's going to start, if they get through this. But I just saw the heart and the mind of a champion, of a defending champion on Saturday night,

a team that was reeling a little bit, the injury, having lost two games, one game by blowout fashion, a lot of concern, as there always is with the caps, from people who follow the team closely, talking about how, you know, something's not right, and Carolina's taking it to them, and they've had the upper hand for the majority of the series, et cetera, et cetera, but not on Saturday night. Yeah, the only question is how much of that was, because the crowd was great on Saturday, by the way. That was the other thing.

It sounded like it on TV. The crowd was really, really raucous, one of the better non-Stanley Cup playoff games I've actually seen from that crowd. The only thing, I wish when they had gone up six nothing, I turned to someone in the press box. I was like, they need to spend the last eight minutes trying to find a way to get DSP to. score. Because if they do, that would have been the single loudest reaction I think I've ever

heard in a building before. So you wonder how much of that was the crowd and then feeding off the energy from the crowd. But yeah, I mean, if they play that way, they should have no problem. I just found the updated odds. I don't have the Stanley Cup odds. I do have the Eastern Conference odds. And the caps are the favorite to win the East now. They are two and a half to one. and then it's Boston, Columbus, and the Islanders all at three and a half to one to win the East, followed by Toronto and Carolina, the teams that are still alive and haven't been eliminated. All right, I want to do a quick read, and then I want to bring in Andy Benoit. Then we'll get to the Doug Williams stuff.

We'll touch on the Nats briefly, the NBA playoffs briefly, and then we'll finish up the show with what Aaron can't wait for. and that is a Game of Thrones recap. Dude, you say I can't wait for it. Over the past couple days, I have gotten so many tweets saying, I can't wait for Monday, I can't wait for Monday, we need to hear this. No, I'm glad that people are into it. Have you started your spring checklist?

Your hose is it working? You got to check that. The lawnmower does it start? You got to check that. Windows open. Can't get them open? This one's crack. That one's fogged up.

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their industry best customer service with a free in-home estimate. Trust me, these guys are amazing. I've had windows installed twice in my home over the last 10 years. Harley, Aaron, Eric, everybody at Window Nation is first rate. Mention my name when you call and they'll take good care of you. Let them put a check on your home upgrade checklist for this spring. Call 86690 Nation today or go online at windownation.com. Again, that's 86690 Nation. You will not be disappointed. Tell them that I sent you. All right, let's bring in Andy Benoit. And Andy, of course, writes for Monday morning quarterback on s.i.com, and he was a guest on the radio show with Cooley a couple of years ago, maybe even as recently as a year ago. I forget Andy exactly, but I'm so glad you made time for me on this podcast.

And I do want to get to the draft as a whole. But I want to start with some Redskins stuff because the last time I remember calling you to have you on the radio show, you would written something about Jay Gruden and how Jay Gruden was very well respected as a pass offense designer, et cetera. And I agreed with you at the time, and I think Cooley did too. But what did you make of last year when Alex Smith, before he got injured when he was healthy, and they never seemed to get on the same page. There wasn't quick game. There wasn't as much play action. You know, the stuff that had worked with Kirk Cousins, there was more dropback. There was more RPO2, but it seemed to

to a lot of us that Jay and Alex Smith never got into rhythm and perhaps it was coming before he got hurt, but what did you think? Yeah, no, I thought that was true and I thought it was zero percent surprising. That's why I was shocked that they made the trade for Alex

Smith in the first place, because from the get-go, I thought, well, that's not a good marriage, because Alex Smith is not an on-scheduled, decisive timing anticipation thrower. He very much has to see it and then confirm it before throwing to what he perceives to be the open receiver. And Gruden's offense is not set up for that.

Gruden's offense is set up for more of a gun slinger is probably the wrong word because that implies a little bit of a recklessness. But a very decisive trigger puller, that's what Gruden's offense needs. And that's not what Alex Smith has ever been. So, and I know for sure, they felt Alex Smith was leaving throws on the field last year. And when I heard that, I said, yeah, but you guys knew he was going to leave throws on the field. So, yeah, absolutely we knew that. But it's still hard to deal with that once you're playing offense.

So when that Alex Smith trade went down, it was at the Super Bowl week, and I was with someone from within the NFL. And the first thing they said, and I agreed immediately, was they said, there's no way Jake Gruden had a voice in this trade. Yeah, well, I think we know, you know, after the fact that in a lot of these trades, he didn't have much of a voice, although we think, Andy, that he had, had more of a say in the Case Keenham trade. Before we get to Rosen and the other quarterbacks in the draft, what kind of fit is Case Keenham for Jay Gruden? A better fit. I don't know if he's a better

QB than Alex Smith. I think he is, but we could debate that. It gets into style of play. But his style of play is what you need in Gruden's offense. And that's why Keenham was successful in Minnesota a few years ago. He's willing to play decisively. And then when things do rate down. This is where he's been inconsistent. And by that, he's been high and low. But he can make second reaction plays when he's comfortable and playing well. And that's what he did a few years ago in Minnesota, actually with regularity that season. You know, some of us believe that Bruce Allen in particular, you know, there was a lot of self-congratulating going on a year ago or more than a year ago when they traded for Alex

Smith and gave him the contract extension as their want to do. in Ashburn. And I feel, and some people feel the same thing about Case Keenham, that he essentially got him for next to nothing on a one-year deal for three and a half million dollars. And, you know, he, there was some sense that Bruce perhaps felt he was on the verge of being proven right about Alex Smith because of the team's record, whereas Jay had a little bit more frustration about the reality of their offensive struggles. And because of the Keenham trade, Andy, that they may try to let this thing play out and go with Keeneham. Keenum next year. What do you think? Well, I mean, not to jump ahead, but I think they'd be insane not to trade for Josh Rosen, even if that means giving up their first round pick. So maybe they play with Keenom. Maybe they

don't. That's probably a function of how they feel about this year's draft class. And maybe they love one of the guys. Maybe they love the prospects or Dwayne Haskins or Daniel Jones. I don't know. I haven't been in their evaluation room, obviously. But Keenom's a bridge guy. We know. that much. And next year's draft class is strong at QB as well. I don't know if that would factor in or not. It would for some teams, but I don't know if the Redskins grass has the job security to be thinking like that, like, well, we might get a QB next year, because that kind of implies you're thinking you'll go four and 12 this year. Yeah, right. On Rosen, because I was going to get there. It sounds like you think he'd be a very good fit for Gruden. Do you see a lot of,

with the exception of Rosen being more of a risk taker, reckless, you used the word earlier, he will throw it into traffic. Do you see him as sort of a version of cousins, but with more stones to throw it into tight spots? I think potentially, I don't know how he is yet as far as being decisive because he was hard to evaluate last year. They changed offensive coordinators and a lot of their system as a result, way through last season. So out the window went all of his training

camp preparation, all his preseason work early season work. And then they had nobody a wide receiver and their offensive line was maybe the league's worst and that was before it got rocked by three or four major injuries. So he just was not in any kind of position to be the quarterback. No one would have been that the quarterback that they're designed

to be. So I don't know exactly what he is in the NFL. We do know this. Stylistically, he's a timing and rhythm player, which what Kurt Cousins is. And I would think, based on how Rosen looked coming out of UCLA, and on the little spare flash moments last year where he was comfortable, I would think he'll be a more aggressive trigger puller.

And that's a positive with him because his greatest asset, in my opinion, is his precision accuracy. He's not just putting the ball where he wants. He's putting it exactly where he wants. And in the NFL, that's demanded for high-level quarterbacking. So he's got the trades to be a really good, and I mean this in a very positive way, in this case, a really good system QB. I think he can run your offense in a professional manner. I don't think that's true with Alex Smith.

I don't know if that's always true with Case Keenham. And we don't know, you know, Rosen's still a prospect, so we don't know if it will be true with him, but I think that's what he's capable of being. You say that you think it would be fine if they gave up 15 overall for Rosen. Do you think they'll give up or do you believe that they will try to. give up something for Rosen, if not a first? Well, I would have to believe that if they were willing to give up the first, that that trade would have happened by now, because Arizona would, if they would do that to save

face. So I don't know what the driving price has been behind Rosen, but if Rosen were coming out right now out of UCLA, there would be reasonable people debating whether he or Kyler Murray is the top quarterback prospect in this draft. So why wouldn't you trade the 15th pick for that guy when we know that by the time 15 comes around, there could be at least two or three quibies off the board. Well, because I guess one of the reasons, if you're putting a big board together, he might be the best quarterback after Murray, but there may be a ton of defensive players that you have rated in the top 15 ahead of him, and he might be the number 25 player on your board, even if he's the second quarterback, right? Sure, absolutely. And if that's the

case, then go with the defense aside and do what you're doing with Keenum. I would totally understand that. That also, though, would probably get into a little bit of how you view next year's quarterback draft class then, because it's unlikely Keenoms here is your five-year solution. So you've got to find a QB to play with at some point. It's got to be on their radar at least. All right. Let's talk about the quarterbacks in the draft. Which of the quarterbacks, forget about whether or not you think he will be there at 15. which are the good fits for Gruden in his system? Oh, that's a good question.

I would probably say, I think Daniel, John, I mean, we're just talking style of QB at this point because, yeah, it's the best you can do with all these prospects. We don't know who's going to become Carson Went and who's going to be Jamarcus Russell, yeah. So stylistic, I think Daniel Jones, and I haven't studied these guys away I do NFL guys, but Jones, I think the style of QB that you can play with. Murray would be interesting because he's such an armed talent as well.

It gets lost with his mobility being so dazzling. At his size, though, it's not realistic to think he's a true every down pocket passer. And I do think that's what you want and need with Gruden's offense. So probably to answer your question, Daniel Jones stylistically, Haskins you could probably put in there as well. So whoever it is has to be willing to play on time. And one thing I know that was valuable with Cousins,

and it's just style again, but he had a quicker release, a shorter throwing motion, and the quicker you release, the easier it is to play on time. Of the guys that are right now perceived to be, you know, top 15 at worst picks, from, you know, Murray to Locke to Haskins to, you know, potentially, I guess, somebody like Jones. Who's left at 15? Well, that's a good question, too, because it's when you, And I don't get into mock drafts a whole lot, but when you get into team needs and where everyone's picking, it's most likely that someone's trading up to get the quarterback, which if that tends to happen sooner than later in the draft,

the quarterback should become more valuable as rookies because as the price of veteran QBs goes up, that artificial contract, that rookie wage scale keeps those quarterbacks cheaper that much longer, especially on that fifth year option now, even that's become a bargain. So someone's going to probably trade up and do it. So I guess to answer your question, Kevin, to be safe about it, can they say two and a half QBs left if we're making an over or under kind of thing? I bet there'll be three QBs off the board by that point. You know, all of these drafts each year, and I think it happens more often than not,

but it's not a guarantee to happen. Teams get crazy with that position, and we end up seeing the Jake Lockers and the E.J. manuals and the other guys sort of fly up the Christian ponderers, fly up the board in the last week or so, and they end up being much higher taken than you previously thought. I mean, do you expect this draft to go that way or in a way in which teams don't reach as much? I would err on the side of teams will do the reaching,

especially with, again, with Russell Wilson when he just got paid. It's not just that you have to pay that to the next guy. It's that moves the market for everybody. That Prescott, who's not as good as Russell Wilson, his price probably went up 15% after the Russell Wilson deal. So veteran QBs are becoming so expensive, and if the rookie wage scale remains in place as it's designed, that's always going to make the young rookie QB contract guys

that much more of a bargain. So I would imagine we'll see more teams trade up rather than sit and wait. But again, if next year's draft class or the Trevor Lawrence here, whenever that comes about, if the future looks brighter than the present, like significantly brighter. They won't reach. Yeah, they might be a little less inclined to reach. I think it takes some stones to do that, though, is the front office.

In the NFL, it's not a job security environment. Andy Benoit does such a good job and has for a while evaluating football and offensive football and quarterbacks in particular. And you wrote a column last week titled Scouting Tom Brady to analyze college quarterbacks. And you wrote about how sometimes we focus on the wrong things when evaluating quarterbacks who are entering the draft. What are the wrong things? What are the right things? Well, it's more, there are two really right things. And if you don't have them, then the other things become borderline irrelevant. And one of the things we hear about, but it's really not

emphasized enough, but we do hear about it, is accuracy. And we just talked a second to go about And the NFL, it's not just accuracy. It's precision accuracy. Brady's great because the ball goes exactly where he wants it to go, and his receivers catch and stride. And that's why their slot guys always are so productive and run after catch. That's why their quick strike passing game marches them up and down the field because everything keeps on schedule and on rhythm when it's a precision accuracy

passing receivers don't have to adjust to the ball. The other thing that Brady does better than probably anyone who's ever played, or at least he's right up there, is moving. within the pocket. And that's the one that never gets talked about before the draft. People talk about mobility and they want to know can Dwayne Haskins run in the NFL? Look how Kyler Murray runs. All of that is irrelevant. If the quarterback can't at least play and move comfortably within the pocket first. You do need to be able to run at times, but it is so ancillary. And Labrady is a great example. How many times does he scramble for big plays in

his season? Maybe once every two years, the greatest that's ever done it is just weird, Kevin, because We also, Brady's amazing, but no one ever sits down and says, well, why is he amazing? What are the physical traits? Because he's not just some mystic QB. He has physical traits that make him great like any other player. And the two biggest ones, and we're talking physical traits because it's football IQ is also very important, of course, but it's precision accuracy and pocket poise. You know, it's interesting when you mention both of those things. In conversations with Mike Shanahan over the years, he always mentions those things.

And then he mentions a third that he says is one of those things that's hard to teach. It's more innate than anything else and natural, and that is throwing with anticipation. He's like, if I don't see a guy that can throw with anticipation, I know it's going to be very hard to teach him to throw with anticipation. And I think feel in the pocket, pocket poise and having that peripheral vision and feel and also that accuracy, you've hit on three things that sometimes if they don't have it coming out of college, they may, never have it, right? Correct. I think all three of those things can be honed, but not taught. So you can polish them up, but you've got to, you've got to pretty much have them coming in in the NFL. You're not going to develop them from, certainly not from scratch. You're probably not from a

low level if you're into that way. The Shanahan thing is interesting because that gets into a little bit. That kind of brings us back to our Jay Gruden discussion in certain systems. Not every system demands anticipation passing. Shanahan absolutely does because it's built. off play action. You're turning your back to the defense. So when you turn around, you've got to be willing to throw because you're not going to have seen the defense for the whole time. So you've got to know how to throw to a spot. New England's offense, for example, and it's not only this, but they do a lot of option routes underneath. And on those you can't throw with anticipation, because you've got to see which option your receiver takes first. So Brady has, and he's made some tremendous

anticipation throws in his career, but that's never been his style of play. Aaron Rogers doesn't throw with anticipation often either. Some guys in the nature of their schemes are see it and then throw it passers. That's what Alex Smith is, but that's because that's what he has to be. The Brady's of the world, that's what their system asks for them.

Rogers will be interesting, by the way, Kevin, because he this year in Matt LaFleur's offense will be asked to throw at anticipation. And I'm eager to see how that goes. I think he'll be very good at it. Yeah, I mean, you know, it's going to be the McVeigh system. the Shanahan-McVey system, more than it's the Gruden system. Back to the feel in the pocket, the pocket poise, and the accuracy,

and let's take throwing with anticipation out of it because that, as you described, is sometimes more system-driven. Which of the quarterbacks in this draft have those two things innately, throwing with accuracy and pocket poise? That's a good question, and to answer that intelligently, you probably would have to watch those guys for eight to ten games on film, which is not something I'm aware of them. I've watched them a little bit,

but I haven't studied them the way I study NFL guys. I'm not a draft guy. So I don't know if I've got a good answer for it. I do know Murray, and we can, it's interesting about where the conversation goes from here. His downfield precision accuracy is sensational, very similar to Russell Wilson. And I think Murray's got a livelier ball than Russell Wilson.

And so that brings us to a different type of offense because your downfield anticipation is a little bit different than your drop back, throw a slant, throw a dig route inside the numbers. Those are two different types of anticipation passes or precision accuracy passes. I guess I'm keeping the whole conversation. No, no, no. I'm following, and I think most people are. I'm wondering if you've thought about, you know, the quarterbacks over the years that haven't made it. And we've seen many more here in the first round. I'm talking specifically about first-round guys that haven't made it from, you know, the E.J.

manuals to the, you know, Christian ponderes and Jake lockers and Blaine Gabberts and all of them. That in many cases, I think, in sports, this is so much more the case in basketball sometimes, but it's about right place, right time, right fit. Do you think it's possible that any of the quarterbacks drafted over the years just got drafted by the wrong team? and if they had been drafted by the right coach in the right system, it would have worked out much differently. Yeah, and I think that it'd be naive to say that's not possible. And Jared Goff is a great example of that probably coming to fruition. I mean, there was no sign of life from him as a rookie.

Not that you can expect the guy to step into a subpar situation and thrive as a rookie, but Goff was not in the same dire circumstances that Rosen was in last year. And then when they switched offensive staff, they switched entire coach. coaching staff, McVeigh came about, Goss, a good fit for their approach. You know, we've seen that work. So yes, but I will also caution that it's a little bit of a chicken or egg thing. For years, people said, well, look at Alex Smith. He can't, you know, he hasn't had a chance to develop because he's had a new coach every year, new system.

And my counter argument to that would be if Alex Smith were running the previous system really well, would there be a new coach and new system there? Mike McCarthy was never thought of as a genius in Green Bay, but he's, his quarterback executed the offense well, and Mike McCarthy stuck around a long time. So it's a butterfly effect, chicken or egg kind of thing. It's a hard argument to have, but I think it's a valid argument. Two more, and I'll let you run. You have been asked many times in the last few years about Kirk Cousins,

and you've evaluated Kirk Cousins a ton over the last few years. What happened last year in Minnesota? Well, first of all, I always look over my shoulder now because a few, a few times ago, I was evaluating cousins, actually in Minnesota, Super Bowl week. And I was saying something, I think critical. I think he's a spying player, but I looked up and he was standing right there at Radio Row, right next, like right there. I thought I'd conjured him out of thin air. Well, let me just say this real quickly.

I may be in this city. I could very well be, people could debate that I'm the biggest Kirk Cousins fan of anybody in the media over the last several years. But I promise you, he's not sitting here next to me. So go ahead. Okay, well, very good. And he's, I had a coach say to me once, he said, you might have an advantage over us coaches about analyzing cousins because we don't, you don't know him personally.

I've since gotten to know him. But he said, if you're around Kirk every day, it's, it's huge your perception because you like him so much. He's such a great guy. I think overall what went wrong with cousins last year is that they didn't trust the offensive line at all. So they didn't have any kind of a foundational running game. John Dave Philippo, their offense.

and did not view the running game with the same importance as Mike Zimmer and Dave Philippa felt that way if even if we wanted the run, we couldn't anyway because our guards and tackles are not very good. And Cousins is a type of kid who needs the offensive line working. He's tough in the pocket. In fact, he's really tough. So he's not utterly dependent on his O line, but he needs the O line working within the context of the offense.

So if the play action rhythm comes, that you get the moving pockets naturally off the run game. That's just not their approach in Minnesota last year. It will be this year, though, and that's why Stafansky's there, and that's why Stafansky told Zimmerhey, let's go get Gary Kubiak if we can get him, too. Yeah, I mean, I think the Kubiak edition, and you know, they lost their offensive line coach tragically as well, right before the season started, which had major impact, but they could not, for a significant portion of that season last year, protect them or run the football at all. I mean, I'm sounding like a defender. I also didn't think at times, he played well late. I think you could say both things simultaneously. But Kubiak, and coming from,

you know, the Shanahan, you know, a lot of play action, a lot of boot, you know, I think if they can run the football, should be perfect for him next year. Running the football will be important, though. Last one, and I'll let you run. Who's the starting quarterback for the Redskins in 2019 on opening day? The safe bet would be Case Keenum, I suppose, because two things have to happen for it to not be Case Keenum. I guess, I mean, Colt McCoy, I guess, is in that conversation. I think it'll be Keenham, though, but they'd have to, A, draft the QB, which we don't know if they'll do, and then B, Gruden has to be willing to play the QB right away, which we don't know if that'll happen either.

So the safe money's on Keenum, but it's not a bet I want to make one way or the other. I don't know for sure, to be honest with you. But you believe that the best move they could make would be to figure out a way to get Josh Rosen into this system. Oh, unequivocally, especially that they'll probably get them at a bargain rate, I think that's the best move because for them, Rosen's the perfect style of QB. Now, the people making that decision, though, I don't know how they view Jay Gruden,

if they think Gruden's our coach for the next three to five years or if they think he's on a year-by-year basis, and maybe that factors into the decision. I'd love to see Gruden continue to have the job, and if that's the case, give him a chance to succeed and give him a QB that fits the system perfectly like Rosen. I lied. I got one more for you. If Jay Gruden doesn't make it,

if the Redskins struggle in 2019 and they do move in another direction, would he be a sought-after offensive coordinator? Yes, absolutely, because I think he's one of the leagues in the top third, certainly of offensive designers. And the stories about him as a play caller when he gets in the zone on that, those stories make their way around the combine, the owner's meetings. He's highly regarded within the NFL. It's so funny because I think a lot of us believe that some of the success that, some of the

success they had there offensively when at times they were really difficult to really stop in 2015 and 16 were more because of Sean and less because of Jay. And I think that's fair and I've heard that too and I understand how those stories come up. I think McVeigh and Kyle Shanahan right now are one and one A for probably best overall offensive guy in football. Maybe put Sean Peyton in there as well out of respect for what the Saints have done and continue to do. So That's totally fair, but think of it this way. Let's say Peyton is, or Peyton, let's say Gruden is Jimmy Garoppolo, who looks like a very good NFL starter, just because Sean McVeigh's Tom Brady doesn't mean Garapolo's any different of a player.

Lied again. Flacco or Foles, who has more success next year with his respective team after, you know, the trade and free agency? That's a tough one. Foles, we know fits what Dave Filippo can do, but I would imagine if you got Dave Filippo in an honest moment, he would tell you yes, and Foles has limitations that you have to play around. That's why he's been a fringe starter or backup for most of his career, even though he's had amazing success at times as a starter lately. Flacco has been anemic the last few years, and his pocket poised back to that conversation, it looks different now than it did a few years ago.

I don't know if it's the knee or he had a back injury, a couple of seasons ago, whatever it is, he's not the same player, and I don't think he reads the field with the same clarity. So I would need to know what kind of offense they're running with him, and I guess it'll be the Shanahan approach because Rich Scan Galero, their new offense corner. After he came from Kyle Shanahan's Niners staff, I guess that folds of the safer bet on that one and that's a close call. Two good defensive teams, if they can get any kind of offense and any kind of quarterback play, they could be surprised teams. I mean, Jacksonville. being in the AFC title game, you know, the year before last, but Denver still has some

really good defensive talent. I really enjoyed this, and I really appreciate the time, as always, Andy. Thanks so much. All right. Thank you, Kevin. You got it. All right. Thanks to Andy Benoit. Andy was great. Really enjoyed the conversation with him. The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast, by the way, on iTunes, subscribe, and then rate and review it. It doesn't cost you anything. Rating and reviewing it really helps us and let everybody know it's available on the Kevin Sheehan Show.com.

By the way, the one thing I have noticed is when we do make a technical improvement after the show has already been released, it's not going to change on iTunes or any other platform because it's already been downloaded, but it will change on the website immediately. And you can always go and delete that show and then download it again to get. the updated version. Like Friday, we definitely had an issue with the volume on the Charlie Casserly interview. And several of you told me about it. I went and listened to it. Aaron did. We fixed it. But if you had already had it downloaded on iTunes or on Stitcher or Spotify or anywhere else, you got to go back and sort of refresh it or download the new version of it to get

that. But you can always go, here's where it's always updated is on the website, Kevin Sheehan's Show.com. Don't forget to ask people to listen on Kevin Sheehan's show.com as well. All right, Game of Thrones recap coming up in a few minutes, but first of all, I'm sorry, before we get to that, a couple of things. Number one, Adam Schaefter had a podcast this morning, and he named the Giants, Dolphins, and Chargers as frontrunners for Josh Rosen. Did not mention the Redskins at all. I think it's a real simple case of Arizona is going to have a chance potentially to get a later first round pick or something more attractive than what the Redskins are offering. The Redskins are not going

to give up number 15 overall for Josh Rosen. Now, if they took Daniel Jones at 15 or they took Drew Locke at 15 or they took Haskins at 15, then it will be a reasonable debate to be had as to why they didn't give up 15 for Josh Rosen. If you believe that Rosen's a better prospect and a potential a better quarterback. All of that other stuff that we've talked about before could be in play with Rosen though. The due diligence is turning up things that we don't know about and potentially even things about his thoughts on playing in various places like Washington. One other quick note too before we get to the Doug Williams stuff. We were talking about Haskins versus Locke and I said earlier I think that the football people like Locke more than Haskins. But maybe Dan Snyder likes Haskins.

more than Locke. The Jay Gruden quote from a month ago, either at the Combine or the league meetings, where he essentially said, Haskins is more of a developmental quarterback. You're going to have to wait on Haskins, whereas Locke is more ready to play now. That tells you to me that Jay Gruden, who could be in his final season, doesn't want Haskins. I'd be very surprised if Jay Gruden wanted Haskins. Now, that may not matter. You know, like Andy Benoit told us, that if we're up to Jay Gruden, they wouldn't have traded for Alex Smith, that if it's up to Jay Gruden, I don't think they'll draft Haskins. I do believe that he was more involved in the Case Keenham discussion. I do, much more so than the

Alex Smith discussion. So hopefully he has been looking at all of these rookie quarterbacks. He has weighed in on the quarterbacks he likes versus those that he does not. The Redskins will have to take into consideration, or have to take into consideration. Is Jay thinking short term for his own preservation, or is he thinking what's the best long-term solution? I still think that the football people like Locke more than Haskins is my guess. All right, now Doug Williams today, what are the big takeaways? There weren't many, right, Aaron? I mean, overall, you know, he's still sounds like taking a quarterback at 15 is a possibility. But he also says that the chances of trading up are less than trading back. I think he has said that now for the last couple of years,

too, before these drafts. I think that, you know what happens with the trading back is there is this feeling when your team trades back and picks up extra picks that it was really smart to do it. You know, it was, oh man, how smart was it for the Redskins to trade back and pick up those extra picks? Well, you know, in 2010, in the 2010 NFL, I'm sorry, the 2011 NFL draft, 2010 was Trent Williams, right? The 2011 draft is the Ryan Carrigan draft. Am I right about that? Yes. Well, you know, the Redskins traded back, picked up some extra picks along the way, and you know who they passed on?

J.J. Watt. So trading back, for whatever reason, there's this reaction that many have a lot. Oh, how sharp they were trading back. They picked up an extra fourth and a fifth, and we can turn those into, you know, complimentary players, and we still got the starter that we wanted. Well, you know, sometimes trading back isn't a good thing, because in 2011, it wasn't necessarily a good thing, passing on J.J. Watt. to take Ryan Carrigan. I'm not saying Ryan Carrigan isn't a good player. He's been a good

player. It's been a very good player. J.J. Watt was a major impact superstar player, even with the injuries. Look, in 2008, when the Redskins ultimately traded out of the first round to acquire those additional picks, and then they went nuts in that second round, remember how smart they were with Devin Thomas and the receiver from Oklahoma, whose name is, Malcolm Kelly. Yeah. Man, how smart the Redskins were to draft all of those great players in the second round, which included, of course, Fred Davis as well. So you had Devin Thomas, Fred Davis, and Malcolm Kelly all in that second round after trading out of the first round and trading with Atlanta

and passing on players along the way, none necessarily that turned into superstar players. but certainly they were picking at 21. It didn't work out with the three second round picks that they take. So I guess my point is, for whatever reason, this organization, and I don't think that they're alone on this, but they like to talk about how, oh, trading back is so smart. And trading up is too much of a risk. Right now, if you tell me that they're going to trade up for a massive impact player

on defense or a game-changing quarterback for the next 10 years, And I got to give up, you know, a third and a fifth to do it to move up six or seven spots. Yeah, give me that. Give me that over trading back and looking smart in the moment, but missing out on a true, you know, generational type of player or talent. In this particular draft at 15, the Redskins are going to have a chance. I really believe this to draft an incredible defensive player. I don't want them to pass on a potential impact, you know, havoc-reaking, game-changing defensive player to look smart by picking up a couple of mid-round picks and then getting, say, you know, Drew Locke at 23 or whatever it would turn out to be. I don't want that.

I want a really good player. That's what I want in this draft. I hope that that's the direction that they go. But you heard that from Doug Williams, and that's the first thing I thought of when I heard that from Doug Williams. is, boy, they love to talk about trading back as if it's, you know, so brilliant all the time and that it'll always work out. What else did he say of note? There wasn't a lot.

It was interesting that he really, you know, obviously he hyped up the D line and he really did make it seem like in a draft with a lot of past rushers with a lot of front seven, potential front seven help. They're not really looking in that direction. Now, we did say if someone fell, he would take them. But, you know, the way he talked about it made it sound like they are not. looking there right now. But that's more of an interior player on defense, not necessarily a pass rusher. If the Redskins don't believe that they have a need for a pass rusher, they are

delusional. He did say with respect to wide receiver, we have to have a go-to guy, which tells me that Paul Richardson is not like this answer because he was hurt last year. He may be Bruce Allen and Jay Gruden. Jay Gruden, like Paul Richardson from what I've been told, but they need a true go-to guy, which they will have a chance potentially to get in the second round. Charlie Casserly loves Marquise Brown from Oklahoma, and the more you watch this guy, he really is uncheckable.

He really does look like Deshawn Jackson. Now, I said to Charlie, does Paris Campbell look like Deshawn Jackson to you too? And he said, not like Marquise Brown. I think Paris Campbell looks like at times an uncheckable guy too, and a real, playmaker as well.

Doug said they've got their draft board set, could tweak it, a little bit, you know, here. But, you know, the overall takeaway from those that were there, and I'll use JP as an example, J.P. Finley, you know, he said the biggest takeaway is that, you know, he felt that Doug was essentially saying, you know, we've got lots of needs, and we're not going to be desperate anywhere. So anyway, don't expect to trade up for a quarterback.

I think he kind of told you that. And I wasn't expecting that anyway. If that happened, that would be owner-driven at this point. That would be the takeaway if you got to that point. That was always the most likely scenario, though, as far as why it would happen. It would be an owner-driven thing. All right. I think that's everything on the skins today.

We're checking Twitter as the day goes on because we're going to have these days here over the next couple of days where news is going to break as we're on the, as we're recording this and shortly after. And again, if anything massive happens, we'll come in here and do a special podcast. Before we get to Game of Thrones, let's do a quick weekend DVR. Did you have a busy weekend? Don't worry. We've got you covered. It's time for weekend DVR. All right, quickly on the Nats, I mean, they needed Strasbourg to come up big yesterday.

They couldn't get swept in Miami, and they avoided the sweep yesterday, winning 5-0. Strasbourg went eight innings, allowed just two hits and struck out 11, one of the best performances for him in a long time. But God, did they need that win, Aaron. That would have been an ugly weekend. And Ryan Zimmerman, by the way, woke up yesterday with two home runs as well. But to get swept by the Marlins would have been, would have looked real ugly this early in the season. Yeah, it would have been alarming, especially after Saturday's loss, where Scherzer was kind of lit up a little bit.

And Scher has not had a good start to this season. His location has not been on point. And it kind of quietly last year, he started to get hit hard, but he was so good that he could get around it. Now his location's not there, at least in the early part. I assume he's going to get back to being Scherzer, but there is, I think, a little bit of a reason to be concerned there. So yeah, they desperately needed that win. Straussberg looked great. Bats came alive a bit, so that was nice to see.

Three games in Colorado upcoming, and the Rockies, actually, after a very slow start, have been on a roll as of late. they took two or three from the Phillies over the weekend at home. So you get Colorado for three games, and then I think that the Nats finally come home. But, you know, they've essentially been going through the first portion of this schedule, you know, a game below 500 and then 500, you know, it seems like it's, you know, 7 and 8 and 8 and 8 and 8 and 9 and 9 and 10 and then 10 and 10, the Nats right now hovering right there around 500. I guess they were a game above 500 before they headed 2.

Miami and took the finale yesterday. NBA playoffs over the weekend, and I saw some of this over the weekend. I am very disappointed in the team that I wanted to advance, and that is the Oklahoma City Thunder. And last night in particular, I put it all on Russell Westbrook. Russ was terrible. I mean, I think he scored one point in the second half. He was five for 21 from the floor. You know, he talked about being more of a distributor when, you know, when defense is collapsed on them. And I get that. But at some point, you know, you look at Russ versus Lillard, and Lillard's just killing him right now. Lillard was fantastic in the second half as Portland pulled away to take a three one series lead. I don't see Oklahoma City winning three games in

a row with two of them in Portland. I don't see that happening. So you're really looking now more likely than not at a Portland, Denver or Portland, San Antonio, you know, semi-final series, and we're headed for Houston Golden State. Golden State got a terrific performance yesterday in Los Angeles to take the second straight game in L.A. Durant had 33, and Clay Thompson had 32. Thompson went off in the first quarter, had 17 in the first quarter. I watched the fourth quarter from the Borgata in Atlantic City. That's where I watched the fourth quarter as we were eating dinner. But Golden State now firmly in control in that series.

And the Bucks play a game four to try to sweep the pistons tonight. And you had the controversy, I guess, Saturday in the 76ers' Nets game, but they're in control in that series, three games to one. And the Rockets got one of those performances from Hardin, where he was awful for most of the game and then turned it on late and ended up with 22 points. for 20 from the floor. But he got to the free throw line

16 times, and they won game three, so they're up three nothing. I think game four in that series is tonight, right? Rockets Jazz? I think that's tonight. I think Bucks Pistons and Rockets Jazz are tonight. We mentioned the NHL from yesterday,

both Boston and San Jose, avoiding elimination enforcing game sevens. Double overtime. Double overtime, and it was great. Short-handed goal in the second overtime won it. Exactly. And the first overtime was coming to an Ingesto's Game of Thrones ended, so I kind of stayed on to watch that. Got two overtime hockey in the playoffs.

So good. Overtime period in hockey is so awesome. All right. You ready? I think I'm ready. We don't have anything else to touch on, right? Not that I can think of. All right.

Let's get to our Game of Thrones recap. All right. You've been warned. We're now going to talk about Game of Thrones. Final season, Episode 2, last night, which I watched early this morning. It was the calm before the storm, Aaron, no blood, no death, no goryness, no dragons, no white walkers. On the very end of the show. But ghosts?

Ghosts. All of the goryness, all of the stuff that makes a lot of you and has been the reason that a lot of you have fallen in love with Game of Thrones. That comes next week. That's never been why I've been into Game of Thrones. Last night's episode, to me, is what makes Game of Thrones so awesome. Because I've never been a fantasy, you know, television watcher, movie watcher, you know, sci-fi. None of that stuff has ever interested in me. But this particular series has always been very light on the fantasy and very heavy on the characters.

That's why I love the show. And last night, like we did last week, we got the characters, you know, for two straight episodes. You know, we got all the reunions. We've got all of the betrayals addressed. We had all of the seven kingdom power minus Searcy in one room. I thought that was awesome. Oh, it was great. It was such a great portion of it.

We had them in a war room together. We had them at the beginning addressing Jamie. the scene that opens the show with Jamie in front of John Snow and DeNaris and Sonson, Tyrion, and Bran. To see Tyrion come to his defense, but more importantly, to see Lady Brienne get up and come to his defense, was really moving. I mean, I think, I don't know, this show is very emotional at times

over the last two, three seasons. You know, when you've lost somebody that you really liked, whether it was Catlin Stark or Rob Stark or whomever, it was. I mean, Ned Stark, obviously, in season one. But some of these relationships that go back so many seasons, and to see in these first two episodes, I don't know, when Jamie Knighted Brienne, that was a choke you up moment. If you've been really into this series, Sonset and Theon last night was a choke you up emotional scene. Remember, you're shaking your head. Remember,

Theon saved Rick on Brann and Sonsa from the worst person in the history of this show. Ramsey, right? Well, not Rick and Brann. Well, remember, he lied to Ramsey about who he had killed. Well, but he had lied not to save them, but to make himself look better. Because he didn't lie to Ramsey. He had lied to everybody. To everybody.

Yes. Anyway, he saved Sonsa. Yes, absolutely. From Ramsey. He had the redemption. And he came back for that moment last night. When we saw him with Yara last week, he was coming back to Winterfell for that moment. And to see everybody embrace Theon, I don't know, I kind of liked it.

To see Sonsa come to Brienne's defense to convince Calisi and John about, you know, Brienne's defense of Jamie was, I thought, very interesting. And to see her and Tyrion both defending, you know, she defended Jamie via Brian. And Tyrion, you know, defended Jamie right there. I thought it was a little cheesy that there wasn't more with Brand calling Jamie out in that setting. And then they go to the tree and they have that conversation. And somehow, at least for now, it's resolved. Right.

Because Brand says, well, we need every man in this fight or whatever. I'm paraphrasing. I don't know. Next week is going to be, you know, bloody and gory and probably the bloodiest and the goriest of all of the Game of Thrones battles. Of all of, I mean, right now, it's supposed to be the longest. battle scene in the history of movies or television. How long is the episode next week? 80 minutes.

It's 80 minutes. Right now, Helms Deep and Two Towers, the second Lord of the Rings movie is the longest continuous battle scene. And if this is 80 minutes of battle scene, it's going to blow that away. I can't wait for next week. Don't get me wrong, but I loved last night. I loved it.

I thought, you know, Sonsa's sit down with Dineris was really interesting. I mean, you know, in these first two episodes, one of the big takeaways is how they've made Sonsa out to be the smartest person in anywhere actually Sersi and Sonsa are like the twos it's almost like remember when Marjorie was the one that had Sersi figured out yes and no one would listen to her basically Sons is the one that's got a lot of this stuff figured out and of course we get to the end of the show and we get we get John and Kaleecy in the crypt with John staring at Liana Stark and he breaks the news.

And I don't know, what did you think her reaction was? Because I think it's a subjective thing. I mean, they had to move on quickly because the horns started blowing. And here comes the Army of the Undead and we're ready for the battle scene. But I don't know what the reaction from everybody's been. Has it been mixed or did everybody have one single definitive feeling about that interaction? It was definitely mixed. I liked it because I thought it was very much in character.

That's what her reaction would have. have been not so much the emotional part, but he is ahead of her in the ascendant, in, uh, yeah, I guess the ascendancy. Yeah, well, he's the, he's the rightful heir. Yes, he's the rightful air. And by the way, some people I actually got a few questions about this really quickly when it comes to like medieval England passing down. The child of the air would come between the sibling of the air.

Right. It comes to who's first. Well, the child of the older. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. So that's why, even though DeNaris is older and DeNaris is, you know, the daughter of the king, why John would come first. Plus, they threw in the, oh, because you're a guy, you would come first. That's also true. But yes, because he is the son of the air, he comes first.

Here's the immediate reaction I had to that scene was, boy, she's less interested in her incestuous relationship with John, which, by the way, is very Targaryen. I was going to say, I mean, he had said in season one, oh, I always thought I was going to marry my brother. Right. So sleeping with her nephew is not going to face her. And much more interested in, oh, I'm not the rightful heir to the throne. And so, but they did end up moving on and looking at each other outside as, you know, as they're getting ready to face the army of the dead. And I don't know. I don't know how it's going to play out because all of a sudden there was this,

this moment between Sonsa and Dineris where you're like, okay, they're coming together. But then the last thing said was, well, what are you going to do with the North? And that's when they were interrupted because Theon had arrived. Right. I really thought for a moment there that she was going to make Sonsa a hand of the queen. I don't know that she recognizes. Well, first of all, how about Jora's defense of Tyrion? Yes.

that that's and then so now we went from clearly she isn't trusting tyrian because he's now blown like two or three calls in a row and the surcy call is questionable and sketchy because you know you have to wonder was he defending his sister or did he just make another tactical error yes um but sansa came to tyrian's defense you know in in her conversation with Dineris. And then you, instead of him going to fight, Deneuris says, no, I need you in the crypt. I need, I need your brain. I need your brain. Your mind is more important than anything.

And that was because of Jor's defense. Yeah. That was a bit, you know, of a reach. There was a lot of things. I really loved the episode for all the reasons you loved it. I thought that, again, yeah, the relationship. So you did like it. I really liked the episode.

I do think there were a few things that were, rushed a little bit. I thought the Jamie thing was felt a little bit rushed in the trial. I thought theon, like I kind of wish we got more interaction with Theon coming in because while Sonso was certainly going to embrace her, there's a lot of people who have a reason not to embrace him. Well, remember the last time John saw him, it wasn't pleasant. Exactly. That's, that's kind of my point is I would have liked a little bit more than that. I would have liked a little bit more of John and Deneers, but we're presumably getting that in the future. They had it, they put in a reason to rush that one a little bit. There were a lot of individual scenes. I thought

could have been stretched out a little bit more or at least got a little bit less results. I mean, just the fact that all of them were in the war room together and they all seemed on the same page seems off. Now, granted, you can say, oh, because of necessity, they have to do that, but how has that ever worked in this show? Well, yeah.

I mean, they have now, they know it's coming no later than daybreak the following day. I mean, they all acted rationally in a show where people don't tend to act. Well, I mean, it's just, it's also in this particular show, odd to see every single powerful person minus Searcy in one room on the same team. Yes. And so if you're not sort of for eventual everybody coming together and let's figure out a way to all survive together, then maybe it wasn't your thing and maybe it was a bit cheesy. I don't know. Oh, we forgot about Aria losing her virginity.

I mean, I was going to get to that. I want to talk about a couple of these, you know, specific interactions. At least she did it like in Aria, you know, fashion. Like is it tough, tough girl? I'm going to take what's mine. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, the... That's actually, that's probably the most controversial scene amongst...

From last night? Yeah, from the fan base and stuff. A lot of people did not like it. They didn't want to see Aria Luser Virginity. They... At least she lost it to the right guy. Yeah, it was more that they still view Aria as this young girl. I know.

show, she's 18 now. Sure. I mean, and Ari is so much more than Sansa, because Ari is tiny physically. And by the way, younger than Sansa. But Sansa was at the beginning of this show, a girl too. Yes. The fireside chat and sing along. Tormond is my favorite character on the show.

Well, part of me was thinking this was the scene sort of like the dragon riding from last week that people were going to have the biggest problem with. Like it was a bit too much of a reach and it was a bit too, I don't know, too happy and except that it ends with Jamie Nighting Brianne which I think everybody loved. And in front of those people specifically

getting pot in there, getting Davos in there, getting tormented in there. It was perfect. It was perfect. Yeah, it was I don't know. For me it's always been much more about the characters in the show

and their relationships in this show than it's been about dragons and white walkers always has been. I mean, if this show were just about battles and dragons and white walkers, I would have never, and many of you would have never, ever liked this show. Now, Brand does not know what it takes to kill the Night King.

Why not? I mean, because he's never been killed. Okay. I thought he's got all the answers. He's got all the answers, but he only has answers based on memories. And if he has no memories of the Night King ever dying, then he, you know.

And so the Night King's coming. for Bran, the three-eyed raven. Well, hold on, according to Brand. According to Brand and what he told them, we don't know that Brand is 100% telling him the truth as much as telling them what they need to hear. Yeah. I think that's a very

important thing. There are a couple lines he said in there. You know, just for example, in the Night King's motivations, I don't know if we're supposed to 100% believe what the motivations were pretty damn depressing, you know, to basically wipe out humankind and have this

endless night of darkness. If that's the case, why is it taken so long? I don't know if I believe him when he said that. But they needed the dragon to get through the wall. But they were starting to march before they got the dragon. So I don't know if that's the case. I think that that might have been more what

brand feels or, you know, saw in the future that they need to hear more than what it might actually be. Well, I mean, clearly John and Ari and Sonsa, you know, are, I guess okay with Brand being the bait, but they don't, they're going to protect their brother, even though he's a, he's a weirdo at this point. You know, you did go for an entire episode without anything from down south. You had a whole episode without CERC. We don't know if Yara's actually taken back the Iron Islands yet. That's, that's critical. You're going to want her and whatever

remaining ships they have. And I still, I know that you said that you weren't necessarily, you're you know, waiting pins and needles on this, but I do want to see Yara and Theon kill their uncle. I want to see that, that episode. I hope we get that before the end of this year. I mean, we have to, right? I would think so. I guess unless it's not them killing him, and that's one of, you know, I've been trying to come up with, you know, Aria needs a huge kill in this last season. I've been trying to figure out who that huge kill is going to be. And I've kind of narrowed it down. I was thinking maybe it ends up being, you know, the mountain eventually.

Yeah. But I guess Yaron would be a possibility for that if we're assuming that, you know, Cercy's going to get got by Jamie or Tyrion. You know what? I was just thinking, too, we did not get the conversation that Tyrion started with Brand. I wanted that so bad. Yeah, so why did it? I mean, there was no indication of where the conversation was going either.

Right. I really wanted that conversation because. How about the moment between Lady Mormont and Jora? That actually, when I was talking- And then Jorra and Sam. When I was talking about scenes I wanted to go a little bit longer, I wanted more between Leanna and Jora because that should have been a really interesting conversation based on what the relationship should have been between them. She should have hated him. I know, but they're cousins.

She wished him, you know, good luck. But that should have been. Like the whole Mormon family hates Jorah. Yeah. So. Well, the fact that Jora supported Tyrion last night in that way was just a bit of a reach, considering that he so desperately wanted to be her. hand and wasn't there to be your hand, but especially given the mistakes, like anybody that wanted to be against Tyrion has ample reason and reasons to do so now. He's been wrong multiple

times in a row here over the last season and a half. Yes. I don't know. I love the episode last night. And now we get ready for an 80-minute battle. Yeah. I do feel they telegraph some of the death. Like they went a little bit overboard with the, all right, here are the pairings. Probably one of the, and they're talking about the future, probably one of these two people are going to die in the next episode. You know, you had the gray warm and Missande's scene and you had the and by the way that day on in Sansa scene. Yeah. By the way, the gray worm and Missande basically saying when this thing's over, let's get the hell out of this cold place. Yeah. It doesn't seem to like us very much. I'm guessing. I mean, it wouldn't shock me if both of them end up dying next

episode based on that scene. What about also, we forgot to mention the little girl who was almost a Shireen, you know, replica for Davos. Yes. I liked that. Yeah. And Sam, you know, is going to, I, Sam's going to end up in the crypt with Gilly and his child. Well, he was, in the last, he gave away his sword to Jora. Well, and in the last montage, you saw them laying together with the little Sam in the middle. I did actually like the little thing with Sir, because you now have, you know, John has the Mormon's sword. You have, um, Jora now has the Tarley's sword. It's just kind of a little interest in there.

There you go. I mean, we could go on and on. I mean, I hope. I love those shows. I mean, I think there have been a dozen, no less than a dozen moments in this show over the last three seasons where you are just, you're emotionally moved a little bit. I mean, last night, to me, the best moment of the whole show is Jamie and Breyan. That was the most emotional.

I will never stop loving the Torman-Briand interactions. Those interactions are always great. And I like the interactions between The Hound and Aria, which we saw another one last night, too. That was great. And then Barrick coming up. Yeah, exactly. I mean, anything with that. I really want Torment to survive.

I just want more of it. Yeah. Like, he is, as far as secondary characters go, far and away, my favorite. Great show. Awesome show last night. I have enjoyed both of them. It's, you know, being up with family over the weekend, a lot of people are into the show. And still, overwhelmingly, more people than not, just did not like episode one.

I thought it was fine, and I thought last night was even better. I saw the one thing I did see a few times, which I wouldn't necessarily disagree with if you made the episode long. Like, if you had combined these two episodes into like one 90-minute episode, I think, and you felt that would be better, I'm not going to really disagree with you there. But I would, you know, at the same time I'm saying I want some of these scenes elongated. Who buys it next week? Okay. So gray worm, I think Theon.

I think Breene probably buys it. Theon, because he's the closest to brand. I think that any time. Because he's going to go protect Brand. He's going to protect Bray. And I think any time you had those pairing off scenes, at least one of those people are going to die. I think Breyan, like, that is the peak of. Brian's arc. There's nothing left really for

Brits. She's probably going to sacrifice herself to say, Jamie. That's kind of my thought there. Um, so Brian bites it. I think when the President of Gendryrd dies, wouldn't shock me if Pod dies. I think Barrick definitely dies. Um, by the way,

where's Bron at this point? He's on his way, right? Yeah. Braun. Oh, no. He's, I think he's chilling in Kings Landing. Well, he just got the offer to go kill Jamie and Tyrion. It was a if they survive the north. Oh, okay.

So I think he's supposed to be kind of in the middle somewhere. I think there's a shocking death next week. It's going to be somebody big because it's so thrones to do it. If someone big dies and I'm going out on a limb here, I don't expect it here. But if someone really big dies, I think it might be D'Naris. I think, well, if. I actually thought about that, but I also think you're right about Brian that her arc basically has reached the end. I don't think that would be a big, big enough.

Like if you're talking about big, like main character big. Here's who doesn't die. The people that don't die next week, there's no chance that Jamie dies. We still, the Jamie Tyrion, Searcy thing is still to come down the road. And by the way, one point from last week that I forget if we made off the podcast or not is that, you know, Cersie was drinking wine with Uron. Now, if she's truly pregnant, it may be an indication

if she wasn't really pregnant, that may have been an indication that she's lying about the pregnancy and she's fooled Jamie and everybody else again. Because Tyrion and Jamie right now, last night, are still buying that she's pregnant. And they specifically said that. They specifically asked, do you still buy it? Once the Whitewalkers are taken care of,

once the army of the dead are taken care of, that's when you get into this whole, how will Jamie react to fighting his sister with his child? Right. Right. There is one more, I did see one theory that I kind of like, I don't necessarily buy, but as far as, you know, after this scene, like, everything down south is going to feel like a little bit of a letdown. I don't think so. I think so. I think that it's, I think in some ways it's more interesting because Searcy gets into it. Yeah, but how do you do three episodes worth of enough? I feel. I don't think so. I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think. I think it's, I think it's, I think it's, I think it's a

but how do you do three episodes worth of enough, I feel like, especially... Well, you may have a setup episode. Yeah, another setup episode with the third or last episode. Well, it would be a setup as they're going south or being pushed south. Here's a theory that I kind of liked. So we didn't see the Night King at all yesterday. We saw kind of the line of White Walkers, but we didn't see the Night King when we...

Is the Night King? Do you think the Night King's the Mad King? Actually, I think Brand's the Mad King. I think Brand is the... No, not he is the Mad King, but he's the reason that he started acting irrationally. Just like, because you set up the hodor thing for, Brand can affect things in the past. I think we're going to find out that he, you know,

you hear him, you know, I burn them all, and that somehow was Brand talking through him. Someone suggested, what if this is a feint in the Night King's actually going down south? Like flying on the dragon down south and wrecking things at King's landing. So what? We're going to open episode three with them flying over?

Not open, but at some point, you're going to see, you know, you're going to fight them. There's going to be like a where is the Knight King thing. We haven't seen him the whole episode. And it's going to be like he's going to have ended up flying south and destroying stuff down farther south. What if Ned and Robert and everybody else are part of this army? I don't think that can work, but you never know with this.

I don't know. It was great. I enjoyed it. That's it. We got to get this podcast out because it's late today. Enjoy the day back tomorrow. Tommy will be with me. Thanks to Aaron, and it was really nice to have Andy Benoit, who I think is really smart on the show today.