The Ringer NFL Show - Bryce Young vs. CJ Stroud: Who Will Be the #1 Pick in the Draft? | The Ringer NFL Draft Show

Episode Date: December 15, 2022

Welcome back to The Ringer ‘NFL Draft Show!’ Every Thursday on this feed Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck will be joined by Ben Solak to break down everything you need to know for the 2023 NFL Draft. This week, we start with the question everyone is wondering: Who will be the first pick in the draft? Check back in on this feed every Thursday for more of The Ringer NFL Draft Show. Also, check out our Weekly Fantasy Football Rankings for positional rankings and more! Email us! [e-mail] Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, Ben Solak, and Craig Horlbeck Producers: Craig Horlbeck and Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, everyone, this is Danny Hyfitz. Quick programming note for the rest of the season, instead of our weekly preview show on Fridays, we're going to be doing the Ringer NFL draft show on Thursdays here on this feed. You don't have to go anywhere else to get it. Keep coming to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show feed. And on Thursdays, we're going to have more Ringer NFL draft shows for you. That's going to be in lieu of our Friday weekly recap. Also, with the holidays coming up and, like, Christmas is on Sunday and New Year's Eve is on Sunday.

We're going to pause the Sunday shows for the rest of the regular season. And we're going to give you our weekly recaps as part of the Monday show on waivers on Mondays. So keep that coming. So Monday's going to be waivers. We're still going to be doing power hour on Wednesdays and the NFL draft show on Thursdays. Thank you.

Enjoy the show. Welcome to the Ringer NFL draft show. My name is Danny Hyphen, I am joined by Danny Kelly, Ben Solak and Craig Kornbeck. Solac, your back, baby. How does it feel? I feel great.

I was tweeting last night. It was like, maybe I'll hop on a draft show. And the people were like, yeah, go fix the fantasy feed. I said, don't worry. Papa's home. Whoa, go fix the fantasy feed. Papa. Shots fired.

I thought of that one last night. I was like, oh, I should do like, I fix the fantasy feed. That'll be funny. And Ken, I did it today. You're like the Matt Patricia coming to fix this offense.

All right. We're going to be coming to you here on the Ringer Fantasy Football Show feed every Thursday between now and the NFL draft on April 27th. And today we're going to look at all the quarterbacks

that could go number one overall or at least, I don't know, the quarterbacks that could go the first quarterback off the board. Right now it seems like it might be a two horse race between Alabama's Bryce Young, Ohio State, C.J. Stroud.

I want to start with Bryce Young for Alabama. I just like him more, if I'm being honest. D.K. Solac, you guys have been watching these guys for months. I want to start with DK, though, because, you know, age before beauty. Jeez. Solek came knives out. I'm just following. He set the tone.

Dekh, how would you explain Bryce Young in a nutshell? So my elevator pitch on him, he's a clever playmaker, uncanny feel for all the pieces on the board. Is Bryce Young a wizard? Let me finish. Can I just say I'm already so happy to be back? I love the way people talk about draft prospects. It's so fun.

He's just an incredible, incredible playmaker who has a natural feel for the position, but he's tiny. He's an outlier in size. And so that's the massive question mark. Can we get into his size? How small is he? He's listed at 6 foot 194,

which I think is really generous. He's probably like 511, 185 or something like that. He's small. So, like, how much do you weigh? At one, six, He was very reticent to say. Not reticent. It's just the last time I weighed myself was a few months ago.

And it's been football season, which means I've been sitting at home. That's a cheese. And it's been cold and I've been eating a lot of cheese. So 160 in theory. Wait, so I want to talk about his size. So he's listed at 6 foot 190. But in reality, how much smaller is he than every quarterback in the NFL?

Is there any quarterback who has ever been smaller than Bryce Young in terms of height and weight? I would go so far as to say probably not. So when Zach Wilson was drafted, Wilson was one of the lowest BMI quarterbacks, body mass index, weight adjusted for height, that we'd seen drafted in the last several years. Wilson had the lowest BMI of any quarterback selected in the first round since Jim McMahon. Jim McMahon was 6'1 a buck 94. Now, there's a chance that Bryce Young's BMI ends up okayish because he's going to put on weight now that the Alabama season is over. and he's going to try to come into the combine a little bit heavier than he played at.

Kyler Murray did this a few years ago, right? Kyler, I wanted to say he tipped the scales of the combine somewhere around like 210 if memory serves. He wasn't playing it that weight. And actually in the NFL, he's played at a heavier weight than he did at Oklahoma because the hits in the NFL a little bit harder and it's nice to have more density, more thickness,

both as a runner and as a guy in the pocket who might get hit. However, in terms of what he played at Alabama, Bryce Young played below 190. I'm quite confident in that. So we're talking about 10 pounds lighter than one of the lightest quarterbacks we've ever seen go in the first round. So if you go and you look at like mock draftable's data,

for example, mock draftable being a site that accumulates combine data over the course of the last like 20 or so years of football run by Marcus Armstrong. It's not like a perfect encapsulation. Exactly. Yeah, it only goes back to 1999. And of course, it's only people who are invited

to the combine and get measured there. But your lightest quarterbacks are Joe Hamilton, 192 at a Georgia Tech in 2000. Anthony Wright, South Carolina, 99, 195. And then Seneca Wallace out of Iowa State, who was 6 foot 1, 196. It's the third smallest quarterback to be in the last 20 or so years. Bryce Young is remarkably smaller than Seneca Wallace. And this is the third smallest quarterback that you can think of.

So it's a, like, I don't want to say it emphatically is because there's probably some guy I don't know. But yeah, this is pretty much the smallest like top five, top 10 selected quarterback we're ever going to see if he goes in that range. So, D.K., is this just a matter of Get Bryce Young, a Jewish grandmother who's like, eat, eat your skin and bones? Just, like, pinching him. Yeah, I mean, and the important aspect of all of that is those other guys that Ben mentioned

are all, like, third and lower rounders in terms of, like, where they're drafted. Pat White in 2009, Kellyn Moore in 2012, like, these are the recent names, and they were all middle-round picks. I think there is a little bit of, I don't know what the term is, like selection bias or whatever, just because I think the NFL is more open to the idea that you can be small. and play quarterback and then they were in the past, whereas these guys would have just been eliminated from even the idea that they could be NFL quarterbacks probably like 10 years back.

And so maybe there's just like there's not a big enough sample. But at the end of the day, to round it all out, like this guy is historically small for quarterback, especially for a quarterback that's expected to go early in the first round. Like this is, it's unheard of. Okay, but if Bryce Young were 6'5, Solek, what would you say about taking him first overall? If you were 6'5 and still 185,

I'd be very concerned. You can't just drag the top square of the picture up. You have to get one of the corners and drag it off and out. That's the important thing. You can't have made you size it correctly. Can't throw off the aspect ratio. I have no doubt that if Bryce Young had zero size concerns, he'd be the first quarterback selected in 2023.

He'd be the top player in everybody's board. In terms of arm talent, in terms of accuracy, Danny brought up the creativity. Bryce Young is a wonderful playmate. maker. Awesome, outside of structure. So cool, so confident, so poised. Take a hit, avoid a hit, find a guy downfield, find a guy short, do it with his legs. Like the last Bama quarterbacks we've seen have been Mack Jones and Tuatunga by Loa, Bryce Young is not cut from that cloth. He does so much more out of structure than either of those

quarterbacks did at the college level when they were with the Crimson Tide. Even Jalen Hertz when he was in the Alabama offense, not as clean of a descriptor of what Bryce Young is out of structure because Hurst was really in a QB run first offense when he was there in Alabama. Young is in a past first spread out offense, and then he'll create with his legs. That creativity, though, you know, your Jewish grandmother, make sure you eat joke, is in large part because Bryce Young is very twitchy. Twitchiness is a result of him being live.

He's thin. He doesn't have a lot of wasted weight on him. And so when he moves, he does move quick. And if you were to, like, try to bulk him up to be Kyler Murray size, he would lose some of that, right? Murray is, like, really explosive. Bryce isn't explosive so much as he's twitchy. And you'd lose that if you added weight.

So it's a tricky conversation. The NFL is widening. Like Danny said, there's selection bias. Previously, a guy of Bryce Young's size would never be playing quarterback at the college level. They would have already moved him to slot receiver. Like, we're not doing this, right? So the NFL and college level are widening

their parameters for what a quarterback looks like, right? They are more accepting of certainly shorter players. And as you get shorter players, you're going to get lighter players. This, for right now, for 2023, it might still be a bridge too far, where I think there's going to be teams top five, top 10, who take one look at Bryce Young's measurable and say, we don't draft players who come in this below size.

And then they don't consider taking him relative to the other guys we're going to talk about. So there's two questions here. There's one, will he physically hold up to the punishment of like NFL hits and stuff, meat on his bones, et cetera, et cetera. There's also just the height question, which Russell Wilson, Kyler, you know,

all these Baker went first of all. And we're kind of seeing a strange thing happen with height in the NFL where it's like, it seems like shorter quarterbacks, the concern was, well, they can, can't see over their offensive line. And that is actually kind of true. And what we've seen is it's fine if you have other superpowers that kind of let you

to handle that. Drew Brees did it because he could manage the pocket. And basically young Russell Wilson did it the same way that Kyler Murray was doing it, I mean, until this week, which was insane athleticism, creation out of the pocket, like just kind of making people miss with insane scrambling. And I'm wondering, is Bryce Young basically the same deal? Like he has almost this Patrick Mahomes-esque magic of like he just does crazy stuff. at the line of scrimmage and wandering around the pocket.

But does the magic he has in the pocket make up for the fact that he might be too short to run a regular dropback offense? Is that like an unfair criticism, D.K.? I think the reason he is going to still go high in the draft and the reason he might be the first overall pick is because, yes, he has the ability to mitigate his height and his size with what I think is really rare and unteachable field vision. I actually kind of compare him to like a Jason kid type guy. He just knows where everybody is at all times.

That's why he can spin around three times, avoid two pass rushers, step up, and still know where the open guy is going to be. And he does it repeatedly, does it really consistently. It's like insane. The other thing that I'll add is like there is a chance he has this ability to be, and I'm not going to compare him to directly to like a Hall of Fame or Drew Grease. But like from what I've seen, he actually can see over the middle of the field pretty well.

He's like not afraid to pass over the middle. You know, he's got that vision. Like I said, he has the ability. ability to synthesize, like, coverages and where his routes are going to be, all that together. He seems pretty comfortable passing over the middle field. When he gets into the NFL, we'll see. But obviously, with like Russell Wilson, that's been a big problem throughout his careers. Like, he just doesn't see over the middle of field very well.

From what I've seen from Bryce Young, he's pretty good about like knowing where he needs to go with the football and seeing, you know, finding passing lanes and all that stuff. And that's why he's so good out of structure. And that's why he's so good at, like, finding guys in the scramble drills because he has that vision. Does him being an Alabama quarterback Help him or hurt him? Is he quote pro ready Or is he a college quarterback?

Awesome question. One, the Alabama supporting cast this year Is not what the Alabama supporting cast Has been of years past. Don't get me wrong, good supporting cast relative to like all of college football. But overall, the line isn't the quality that we're used to seeing

And certainly the wide receivers, not the quality. There's no, no GM Waddle, Devante Smith, Henry Ruggs, Jerry Judy. Then they had that run. You know what I'm saying? Like, this, this, this, this, this, not the, yeah, not the same caliber of first round players coming out.

And so the, the advantage of being a Bama quarterback in that regard, less so. And then the scheme aspect of it. Well, this is what Nick Saban's been doing over the last few years, right? He's going to be kind of borrowing NFL castoffs and being the little Nick Sabin rehabilitation center where like you, your NFL officer coordinator flames out. He spends a tie year with, with Nick in Alabama, and then all of a sudden he's good again. The office coordinator is Bill O'Brien. They run NFL concepts.

They absolutely do. More so than like, you know, we're talking about C.J. Shrardt, Ohio State a second. Stroud runs a lesser menu of concepts and a simpler menu of concepts relative to what Bryce Young has to run. They run like NFL protection stuff. Their office line coach is Doug Marone. They suck at it,

but they try to do it. Right? And so there's a- I was going to say NFL concepts, is it the concept's the same with the Cardinals concept as Kyler do something because just watching Alabama this season, just casually watching college football games. It felt like the Alabama offense was Bryce.

I hope you just figure out something. play doesn't work. So like I'll say like a high low stretch over the middle of the field. There's offenses in like the SEC that just don't do that. Like the Josh Hoypeau offense in Tennessee head and hooker is a guy who might come out like he's going to come out. He's like 25 years old. But like as a quarterback who might get drafted, might get some hype. That's like the old Baylor RG3 offense, right? They just like they don't. It's all vertical. It's all slot choice. It's all this vertical stretch. Like Bryce Young would get three receivers in the general middle of the field, one deep, too shallow and he would read out a linebacker and make him wrong.

It's like traditional West Coast spacing, right? There's, that's not unique to the Alabama offer. It's not like just Alabama does that, but Bryce Young did that more than like C.J. Stroud did it in the way that his office works more than like Hennon Hooker and Anthony Richardson and some of these other cats. So there's a better case for Alabama pro-projection in terms of the scheme and the system and the way the weapons helped him

for Bryce Young than there was previously for Mack Jones and for two at Tungovaloa, who even though they were playing in NFL-E sort of systems, we're doing so with huge talent advantages. And accordingly, he just ran like RPO's and play action until the cows came home. Bryce Young had to carry more of the load for sure. And he did win a husband last year doing it and has like 75 touchdowns like 12 picks in his career. He's won like every award possible.

Yeah. It's an oversimplification to say that the whole conversation on Bryce Young will come down to, is he tall enough for us? Yes, first overall, he is he not? No, we're not drafting him. That's like kind of how I think it's going to be, but it is an oversimplification. I will say that I'm a little bit more bearish than Dan. he is in terms of the creativity and in terms of the field vision. It's definitely one of his strengths.

Hyphids you said Mahomesian. I don't think it's Mahomesian, right? I think it's like, you know, solid, it's very good. I don't think it's at that elite tier. One of the things you notice with Bryce Young is when he drops back, he just back pedals, right? He just straight heels backwards. He doesn't turn his hips at all. He has a weird back pedal. His feet are very close together when he's like in the pocket. And the reason is because the further your feet come apart, the lower your head goes. He needs to keep his feet close together so that way you can see. He's like on his tiptoes, you know, almost.

It's a strange. He's like a freshman going to prom with a girl who's way taller than him. He's like got the inserts in his shoes. He is like a rod in the pocket. He is straight up. Like he's like filling his chest out, just trying to occupy as much space as he can.

The player, right, you brought up Russ. The player reminds me the most of is Lamar. Like, Lamar doesn't need to do this because he's super short. It's just like, whenever you watch Lamar in the pocket, He's just kind of like, I'm super athletic. Like, I'm just going to kind of walk back here. It's going to, like, vibe out where the field is. Like, Bryce Young has never takes like a timing drop back.

Five step, drop, back foot, hits, turn, and throw. He's just like, no, like, I know generally when the route's going to break. I'm going to feel it. My release is lightning quick. So the ball's going to get there on time. Don't worry about it. But he just has this, like, you know, posture to him where he's just trying to make sure that he can see everything he needs to see.

And that is indicative of the limits that are going to be on this player in terms of what he can see at the NFL level, the areas of the field. the areas of the field that he can access. I just think that, like, it's asking a lot for him to be the level of creator in the NFL that he was at Alabama because the margins just become so much thinner. He's so weird. Sometimes you almost can't even tell if he's left or right-handed. Like, he, like, backs up and you don't know which way he's going to turn.

Because he doesn't turn his shoulders. His shoulders are parallel to the line of scrimmage. Nobody cares because he's awesome. But, like, this is like heresy. You can't do this. Hold on. Wait, okay, he's like, he has incredible field vision. You tell him he just looks at the whole field at once instead of just cutting off half,

having his back to the one side. And that's why, like, he has a great. Mack, like Danny said, he's cunning, he's creative, he's ingenious, whatever the frick Danny said about his wizardry. Right, exactly, right. But part of that is, like, you wouldn't trust another quarterback to do this because they would get overwhelmed, right? Like, Mac is a perfect counter example.

Mac was so good in the Bama offense because his feet and his timing and his rhythm and his drills were incredible, right? It's just like, three step drop, five step drop, balls out. It's like, always like, boom, my feet are timed to the concept. He did it robotic. He had it set. He knew the formula. Bryce is just like, I know what it's going to break.

I'll be ready to throw. Don't worry about it. We're good. And then he always is. And that's where Danny talks about that feel, right? Where it's just like, Bryce doesn't need to perfectly marry his feet and his drop and his depth to the concept. He can just, boop, three quarters release, balls out right on time between a window.

And that is feeling. It's impressive to watch. I think one of the worries, though, that you have when you watch him is because of that, because that's the way he plays and the way he dropped back. It's almost like watching old football. If you ever look at like really, really old football, the quarterbacks literally just back up straight from like the line. and they don't do like the grapevine style like back,

you know, back pedal or whatever. It's just like straight back pedal. It's kind of weird to watch. But then his feet are so close together when he's like scanning around the field that when he tries to throw, it doesn't feel like he gets as much oomph into the football. You know what I mean? Like he has a quick release.

But I do worry sometimes the velocity isn't there because he's throwing from such a like a thin base. He's got a lot of juice in his arm. Like he makes throws like he's getting hit and like he's falling away from contact. I'm like, how did that ball go that far? He's got a ton of juice in his arm. He can whip that thing. It's just he doesn't include his lower half the way that he should in a lot of throws.

And if he did, he could probably throw with even greater velocity, which is wildly impressive for a player of his size. The flexibility in his body, the elasticity is crazy. All right. So switching gears here for a second. The other guy that seems to be really at the top of boards here, C.J. Stroud for Ohio State, he's, you know, actually six foot three. I believe an actual six foot three.

And 215, not wiry, not C.D. Lamb's style wiry. D.K., what is, how would you describe C.J. Stroud in a nutshell? Silky smooth pocket quarterback, beautiful deep ball. But I think he struggles a little bit when, like, structure breaks down. He's asked to do second reaction stuff. So basically he's awesome in structure, has work to do when things fall apart. That sounds like the opposite. It is kind of the opposite, yeah.

Hearing that, I'm like, I'm out. He's good in structure at Ohio State and the second thing's break down. He's screwed? I'm good. He's screwed is not, that's probably too strong. That's like where he is not as elite. But isn't the Ohio State offense like to design? towards, you drop back, there's the open guy, you hit him, that's it?

Designed in the sense that they have all five-star receivers. Yes, that's the design. It's just like a freaking, just constant first-round receivers just like through there every year. They got the young Marvin Harrison out there just doing work, man. It's unbelievable. So is he a better pastor than Justin Fields? No. Arm strength?

No. He's a quicker processor. I'm so out. He's not a better passer than Justin Fields. He's not a better pastor than Fields, but he just shot's not like a runner, right? He's not particularly fast. Yes. So he's not as good to pass to Justin Fields.

And Justin Fields runs like a 4-3 and is one of the most gifted runners at all time. So what do we like about CJs? Ohio State quarterbacks. Here we go. Before Justin Fields, he had Dwayne Haskins, right? The first round peg of the Washington football team.

And Dwayne was a big-bodied pocket passer. He's accurate. Like, he threw down the field nicely. He had no mobility, no creativity at all. Then after Haskins, he had Justin Fields. And Fields, big guy in the pocket, could stand in there, red his drum. He had a beautiful deep ball.

He was an accurate passer. Like, I know, like Chicago, like, he had a very tough year one. He's much better than year two. But Ohio State, he was extremely accurate through to unbelievably catchable ball to all three levels of the field. And then when Justin Fields would tuck and run, I mean, he punish you, right? He's built like a linebacker. He runs like Cam, unbelievable.

So that's, those are your polls. CJ Stroud is somewhere in the middle of that, right? He's definitely more mobile than Askins. He's more willing to run. He's more effective throwing on the run. He can actually do something when he tucks and runs. He's more creative. he can move around in the pocket and make a pass rusher miss and buy an extra half second.

He's definitely better than that. He's also definitely not as athletic as fields, right? And does not bring anything in the red option game, isn't going to break into the second level, break a tackle and rip off a 20 plus yard run. So now the question becomes, if we're going to use just like this basic construction of Ohio State quarterbacks, just how much of a scrambler do you have to be, just how much creativity do you have to be to really warrant like a top five, top 10 draft pick in the NFL? And that's where the rub's going to be for CJ Stroud.

But what's his thing? Like when we just went over Bryce Young, I feel like I get it. It's like he's athletic. He makes a lot of cool plays. He can see the field. He's a little short, might limit the offense, and he might get hurt because he's really small. What is C.J. Stroud's thing.

Like, what is his knack? What does he do? He's more accurate than Young is, in my opinion, which I don't know where people are going to fall on that. Like, Bryce Young had a bit of a weird year because he had a shoulder injury, and he wasn't as accurate after the shoulder injury. And so there's some debate there. I think Stroud's more accurate than Young.

Stroud's got legit arm talent. He also really understands ball placement, which I always appreciate when a college quarterback does this, because you can get away with it at college but not really caring about the details. But Stroud will try to throw his receivers away from hits, right? So he's got a guy running middle of the field. He'll try to throw him into the ground, right?

Throw that ball at his waist or lower, take him down into the turf so the safety he'll take his head off. When he's throwing back shoulder, he'll try to put it on the outside, like, you know, against the sideline, pull him away from the safety that's coming in. He understands, like, placement. When he has a clean pocket, he's throwing in rhythm,

and he's trying to make a throw. He doesn't just go like, oh, Marvin Harrison's down there somewhere. He legitimately and earnestly tries to throw the perfect ball. And if Stroud hits, like if you tell me you come five years in the future, Stroud's a good NFL quarterback, he will be so in the model of like a Trevor Lawrence,

who just sits in the pocket, has bodies flying around him, but steps up and with great arm talent, with great precision, makes tight window throw after tight window throw, after tight window throw, and just beats you on all madden all the way down the field. However, that's a narrow path to walk.

So when you ask what's Cedges Stroud's superpower, it's accuracy. And for that to be your superpower, you're really, really, really got to be good at it. If you're not bringing anything in terms like the creativity and the scramble stuff that we see so many quarterbacks do now in the NFL. Can we give him, I know that sometimes this is an oversimplification, but can we give him a comp for a current NFL quarterback? Yeah, I haven't talked to Danny about it. I want to really like some curious here what Danny says. I have a couple comps. The one that is floating around on the interwebs right now that I think is funny because it's,

it's going to be very, it's going to make people feel a certain way is Jared Goff. Oh, boy. The high end comp, the high end comp for C.J. Stroud is Jared Goff. The low end comp. The low end is God is God? Listen to what I'm, listen.

Let me finish. The high end comp. Jared Goff. The low end comp, Jared Goff. Jared Goff has been two different players in his career, if you remember. Like when he's got guys around him when he was early Rams, like under McVay or whatever,

when they went to the Super Bowl, I could picture CJ Stroud being like distributor. He's pushing. the ball down the field, like there's fireworks. Like, dude, some of those games during the Rams era, when they're really good under McVeigh at the beginning of his tenure there, like, that was one of the

most fun offenses to watch. Of course, then things started to fall apart. They started to figure out that offense, and Goff was not able to do anything on his own, you know, and create out of structure and things like that. So he just needs, got it. So he needs a generationally talented play caller with the best running back in the league, and then

he could be serviceable. This is not my comp. This is a comp. This is a comp that's flying around the interrupts. I think it's actually funny because it gives you a visceral reaction, whether you think Goff is good or not. I would say my high end, like my personal comp, when I watch him, I think of like, and this is again, this is like the best possible scenario. I think of like a late career post ankle fracture, Dak Prescott. Like he, to me, he's very smooth. Like just mechanically,

his, is the way he throws is very like compact and smooth. And he can layer a ball. He can throw with velocity. He can feather it down over, drop it over in a bucket. To me, when I'm watching him, that's like the top tier, what he could be, is like a late career not running around Dak Prescott. Does that make sense? And then like early career, like,

or low end, I don't even know, like Teddy Bridgewater potentially came to mind. I don't, I'm not, I haven't got a great comp for his low end yet. Maybe just Jared Gough. Gough is the guy that immediately comes to mind. I didn't know how it was going around the interwebs. But golf was the first overall pick. We got it around 2016, seven years ago.

When Seasier Stridevention gets picked, it'll be seven years since golf was the first overall pick. since then we've learned a lot about quarterback scrambling. We've learned a lot about how valuable it is to have quarterback who's mobile, who makes second reaction throws, you can play outside of structure, such that golf would never be the first overall pick if you were back in the 2020-3 class. But that which got golf selected one is that what Stroud is going to sell on. You say, I'm wicked smart, pre-and-prose snap.

I throw a nine ball like you've never seen. It's beautiful. And I'm huge. I can take hits. And I'm a leader. And so if you want to run a offense where you got a pocket passer and I just dice up and down the field, right? If you want to run traditional West Coast stuff, Bryce Young can't do it.

Not big enough. And Will Levis is not as accurate as I am. He's not smart in the pocket as I'm. Anthony Richardson's not ready. Tanner McKee is not ready. Handed hooker's 90 years old. I'm the guy. And for as much as the four of us say,

we'll give us a creator, give us a guy outside of the pocket, give us somebody who can elevate. Kenny Picky went first round. Malik Wilson went third. You know, the NFL's still on that train a little bit. But how's this top two compared to past years? So like obviously, it sounds like Bryce Young or C.J. Stroud would go miles above Kenny Pickett.

They obviously would have been the best two guys. Steelers fan, correct. But they would have been the top two quarterbacks in last year's class. And then let's say like 2019, you know, Kyler goes first. I assume they're better than Daniel Jones. And like, Dwayne Haskins was the first round that year. But like, you know, they're in the year with Kyler. You know, a couple years ago, you had, you know, Trevor Lawrence, just.

Field, Zach Wilson. Like, how do these guys compare to previous classes? Would they have been at the top of these groups? I still think Lawrence probably still be at the top of all of those. Ben, here's a good question for you. You think Fields or Stroud for like NFL evaluators? Not necessarily a draft winner. I said that I think Stroud is somewhere between Haskins and Field.

Haskins went 15, Fields went 11. I think Stroud's going to go like fringe top 15. Obviously, so what we know of that class, Lawrence went one, and then Zach Wilson went two. Trey Lance went three. mitigating circumstances, but still, like, Joseph Fields probably should have gone before 11. I think that I'd be surprised

to Stroud go top five in a average class. I think this is a below average class, and I think he has a shot. Wow. So it sounds like he's almost a top two option by default, because he doesn't really do anything poorly, but he's kind of a jack-of-all-trades master of none. Everybody else has quirks and irregularities in their game.

See, Stroud's just kind of solid. The other thing we always have to discuss is what character of team is taking these players, right? We're talking about, like, where could they go right now? we don't know exactly what the top 10 of the draft order looks like. If you are starting from zero, you're not going to be as enamored with what Stroud brings in terms of pro readiness and professionalism and the armed talent.

He can maximize the players right away. If you were like last year's Steelers and you're like, hey, like we were just in the playoffs. We had good receivers. We got a good defense. Like let's just plug a quarterback in and go. Stroud looks mighty nice because I would feel very confident putting Stroud in and saying, all right, he's going to be able to keep his head above water.

He's not going to be overwhelmed. He can handle pressure. He can handle blitzes. he can distribute, you can make the correct reach, deep short, whatever, and then he's going to get better over the course of the year

to the player. If we go to the playoffs again, hopefully this guy's ready to actually start punishing some teams. So if Stroud isn't going to go first, are you saying Bryce Young, you think is going to go first? I don't think either.

I think it should go first. Really? You don't think either. Neither of these guys? This is the NFL we're talking about. We don't draft the best players early. We do it later after we do some stupid nonsense first. Wow.

Okay. Well, should we do a little cliffhanger action? Yeah, we'll come back. Our next episode next week, people are going to have to stick around to find out who's going to be the number one pick in the draft, according to Ben. Yeah, wow. All right. So, yeah, we'll stick around. We're going to do a little two jargons that a lie.

And then we're going to get to who Solek thinks is going to go actually first quarterback off the board in our next episode. Spicy. We're like, we have a trilogy going. This is the first movie in our three-part series, I guess. Tune in to find out what happens next. Not enough quarterbacks for a three-part series in this class. Give me back to 2018 and we can do a three-part series. We're going to condense everything into just like a few episodes yet.

I'm for America's favorite segment here. It's two jargons and a lie. If you're just joining us, you didn't listen last year. So basically, there's a lot of draft jargon, quite honestly. People talk about the draft. Really weird. A lot of weird terms have thrown around. Silky hips, you know?

Oily. Oily. They're oily. They're not silky. Sorry. I mean, they can be silky, potentially. Somewhere between weird and extremely uncomfortable, the way that the terms are just thrown around.

So we invented a game. Sexual connotation at times. Yeah, it just feels like synonym soup. People are just saying shit that I don't know what I don't know what anything means. So we were so convinced that some of these were fake that we actually ended up playing game called two jargons and a lie where we had Dekin and Solac give us two real draft jargons and then one of them was fake that Craig and I had to guess which one of them was real and which one was fake. So we're going to do that. And then actually people liked it so much. People started emailing us at ringer fancy football at gmail.com if you want to play along.

People started emailing us two jargons and lie from their own jobs, which was just magical. So we're going to read one of those two. But if you have your own two jargings and a lie, email us at ring your fantasy football at gmail.com. But yeah, D.K. Solek, anyone want to go first here? First of the year? I'm ready. I've been waiting. Let's do it.

I've been Googling. I've been reading, you know, Bill Belichick scouting reports in the 90s. All right. I've been finding it. Hell yeah. Here we go. The inaugural 2022, two dragons, one lie. Trash can full of dirt.

Washcloth tackler? Walking on stilts. Washcloth tackler. Well, walking on still sounds like what you wanted to say about Bryce Young. Trash can full of dirt, washcloth tackler. It's not taking a bayon. He got a red trash can full of dirt. Is that just like the man is thick and heavy?

Vivid imagery and I like that a lot. I draft a trash can full of dirt. Play him in the nose, no problem. Hell yeah. Frank Ragnow for the lion. She can't move him. Trash can full of dirt. Yeah, you just thick and heavy.

Washcloth tackler. I just don't know what that means. I don't know if that means. I mean, is it just like he's not good at tackling? He's just throwing a washcloth at him? Please recall the rules. You may ask for definitions if you like.

He's got definitions. Give me a definition of each of those, yes. She's like the spelling bee. Can I get a definition please? Yeah. Language of origin, West Coast offense. Language of origin, West Coast offense. Language of origin, the Shanahan tree.

A washcloth tackler, what the imagery is, is like, you ever like had a really wet, soggy washcloth and thrown at something? It just kind of like sticks on it and then just like, it falls off. That's washcloth tackler.

trash can full of dirt is precisely as as high fits intuitive a trash can full of dirt is thick and tough to move baby I'm trying to move a trash can full of dirt ain't easy it's heavy

that's that's what you got there and then walking on stilts is actually not Bryce Young because it's meant it's meant to be more an image of a player who's super high cut it's got long legs

right and he doesn't have a big body up top Jalen Hyatt the receiver out of Tennessee for those who've already done their drafts homework is walking on stilts right whenever you have a player

has got really long legs but he's got a thin build he doesn't have much mass on top. That's the sort of like frame that you're talking about. This is some of Ben's best work. I came, I came,

you got to prepare to an on your own episode. I think washcloth to Ackler's fake. I do too. I do too, but I like that one a lot and we should start using it. All the fake ones are great. All of you wrong

on the first two jargons one line of season. Is it trash can full of dirt? It's walking on stilts. Oh my God, what? I think it's funny because I'm pretty sure at one point in the time we did high cut before and it was like the same concept it's where you just said really long. But Hikekut is

real. I'm just going to start guessing that that one sounds the most real. I'm just going to start guessing that one's the fake. Yeah, yeah. So washcloth, Dackler, and then the article that I'm doing this off of us trash can full of dirt, I've never seen before. And what's hilarious is the description goes from the Latin luteum

for dirt. Lutum's not even trash can full of dirt. It's not, they're just made up. You can't just add the Latin word's not part of it in the phrase. But they added it in there. Yeah, trash can folder. It's a great one, though. That's getting incorporated into the lexicon for sure.

Two jargons and a lie. This one's from Randy. Randy. Randy Johnson. Randy, baby. Randy, basically, he, he installs cable. And this is two jargons that lie for cable's installation. Okay.

Gorilla snot. Real. Sheepskin. Yeah. I accept. I'm in. Sheepskin or fish. tape. Sheepskin or fish tape?

This gorilla snot, like snot from your nose. Grillo's not. A lot more zoology and cable insulation I expected, man. And fish tape. Those are the, two of those are real. One is a lie. I think fish tape is fake. What would be distinct about fish tape? Sheepskins like a condom.

Lanskin. Get a lambskin. I could see people being like, yeah, these wires are really thin or, I don't know. I can't believe people use that as condoms, too. Oh, my God. Didn't like the ancient Egyptians do that? What's happening?

Yeah. In ancient times they used fucking, you know, they had to use stuff. I'm fully committed to guerrillas not being real, because I want that to be a thing. I think sheepskin is fake. I think sheepskin is a real thing, but not in cable insulation.

I agree with that. Were sheepskin condoms, like actually sheepskin? Or was that the name for it? Well, pig skins football were actual pig skins, right? I think at one point in time, they were hyphen. Yeah. If a condom were not made of sheepskin, and the PR department was like, you know what I'll make people trust these?

If we call it sheepskin, like that, that's bad. That can't be true. What if we say the condom is made of animal skin? Impenetrable animal skin. People will be into this. This will be good for folks. Sheepskin, final answer. Yeah, I'm going with, I'm going with Solek.

No, here's my theory. I don't know if he explained it. My theory is there's some sort of tape that's got like scales into it, right? It's got like a little bit of space and it looks like fish scales. That's my theory. Okay. Okay. So you're saying, which one you're saying is the lie?

Sheepskin. Same. DK, you writ that? Craig, what are you saying? I'm going to stick with fish tape as a lie. All right. Sheepskin is fake. Yeah.

I'll never lose this game. I'm going to undefeated this year. Drop this down. Predictions. Wow. It's 90. No. Please email us at ringer fantasy football at gmail.com.

If you have your own two jargons and a lie, honestly, like, yeah, it can be from your work, can be from whatever. It's like, it's really fun. So just please email us. And also, like, draft questions, too, I guess. If you have questions about, you know, yeah, I mean that draft. But also mostly two jarrings.

jargon to lie. All right. We're going to get part two. We're going to finish your cliffhanger, figure out the other quarterbacks. It's going to be our next episode coming out Thursday. Thank you for listening. We're really excited. This is going to be an incredible pod. Thank you, D.K. Thank you, Solaq. Thank you, Craig. Thank you, Kai, for production help. Thank you to everyone who emails us and most of all. Thank you, Lauren. Thank you, positive K. Who? Yeah, I don't know. That's... Danny and I shared a band on our Spotify top five rap this year. And it made me so excited.

It made me feel like a real music boy. I don't know how to pronounce their name. It's a problem. Crungbin? Yes. Ben, you and I as well. The last two jargons of a lie we did on this show to end the last draft cycle was we literally gave Solac three members of the Beatles and a lie.

And the lie was Aldous Snow, who's Russell Brand and Sarah Marl. He got it right, though. He identified the failure. By process of elimination. And he was like, Ringo star? That sounds so fake. Ringo. We'll bring that.

back just at a time in which my self-esteem is higher and I'm ready to handle it. I'm still recovering from last time. DK. What's positive K? Give me a run down. I got a man. You know, what's your man got to do with me. Oh, wait. I actually think I know what you're talking about. Yeah, you know that song. If you, if you, uh, look it up, you'll definitely recognize it. I believe he does both the woman's voice and the man's voice in that song. I'm listening right now. He's into it. It's a good song. It is good. It's really catchy. Cool. If you're at home, go play it. I got a man, positive K. Shout on positive.

All right. Goodbye, everyone.