The Ringer NFL Show - Harbaugh(!), Pete Carroll, and Stefanski Fired. Plus, DK's First 2026 Mock Draft.

Episode Date: January 7, 2026

The guys react to the shocking firing of John Harbaugh in Baltimore and discuss what it means for the Ravens, Lamar Jackson, and the rest of the AFC moving forward. They then break down the rest of Black Monday—including the firings of Pete Carroll, Kevin Stefanski, Jonathan Gannon, and Raheem Morris—before ranking the best open jobs, roasting the Giants’ dysfunction, and diving into DK’s first mock draft of the year with Fernando Mendoza, Cam Ward, and the other top quarterbacks in the class. (00:00) Intro (03:17) NFL coach firings (32:23) DK's mock draft (55:47) John Harbaugh fired! (01:20:52) Mock draft resumed (01:33:20) Emails Discord link: https://discord.gg/Ge8bbYHrau Check out the 2025 Ringer Fantasy Football Rankings: https://fantasyfootball.theringer.com/ Email us! [e-mail] The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Danny Heifetz, Danny Kelly, and Craig Horlbeck Producers: Kai Grady, Carlos Chiriboga, and Cameron Dinwiddie Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Okay, before we start the show, just want to note, John Harbaugh got fired by the Ravens while we were recording this episode. So we are going to talk about that, but when we find out about it later in the episode, we'll have in the episode description, the timestamp, if you want to hear directly about that. But there's a reason that when we're talking about

with the coach firings, we're not talking about John Harbaugh. So we will get to that. I promise. Okay, let's start the show. Welcome to the Ringer Fantasy Football Show. My name is Danny Hyfitts, and I'm joined by Danny Kelly and Craig Warlbeck, and we have a lot in the show today. A bunch of coaches got fired.

We're going to go over that. and Danny Kelly has his mock draft. Mark.0 up on the ringer.com. Thank you. Okay. I bet you picked up on that. Hyphus doesn't give it. He hasn't seen dumb and dumber, which is...

What did you say? To this day, the weirdest thing ever. I know. I'm ashamed of it. Watch it and then listen to the rewatchable to Jennifer Lawrence. I live listening to that rewatchments. Anyway, sorry, what were you saying? Well, you have a mock draft up at the ringer.com. People can go and look and it's incredibly got everything right.

So we'll just go over that. I nailed it. Yeah. You're done. You're done. It's January 6th, celebrate. Hayes in the barn. You don't need to do any more draft work.

You figure it out. It's amazing. Yeah. And we're going to go through, again, a ton of coaching news. The Raiders fired Pete Carroll, the Browns fired head coach Kevin Stefansky, the Cardinals fired head coach, Jonathan Gannon, the Falcons fire for he moors, head coach, and the GM, Terry Fontino, and their president and CEO of the team got promoted into irrelevance. Dallas fired the defensive coordinator.

The Giants did not fire Joe Shea, the GM. There's just a lack of. going on. The Dolphins didn't fire Mike McDaniel. So he gets to hire GM and then Tua was like, he was asked about playing for a new team. He said it would be dope. A lot happened. Stop allowing him to talk on camera. He hasn't said one normal thing in years.

Yeah. But first, just a quick bit of housekeeping. So starting on Sunday, we are going to be on Netflix. So this show is going to be on Netflix. If you listen to a big time. Yeah, there you go. Big time froze coming from this show. Big time for us.

Big time shows. Big time froze. Big time flows. So if you listen, if you listen to our show, as an audio product, you're good. Nothing's going to change. If you watch our show on Spotify, you're good, nothing's going to change.

If you watch our show on YouTube, the show is not going to be on YouTube going forward. So there still will be a version. You can still watch on Spotify video. You can still watch on Spotify, the free version. So you don't have to have Netflix to watch our show going forward.

You were able to watch it on Spotify. But it'd be a lot cooler. You also could watch it on Netflix. You could watch on Spotify. And put it on Netflix too and watch both at the same time. Double up. Yeah. If you want to see Craig's face in 4K, come on over to Netflix. No one wants to see that. So again, covering the playoffs, covering free agency. The draft,

D-Kare draft expert here at the ringer. We're going to be going through the draft, the offseason, the summer. We're going to be able to do that all year. So you can go type in ringer on Netflix. We're there. And you can go and hit the little remind me button. And then, yeah, so that's Sunday. But also, if it's an audio thing for you, then no changes. Enough plugs. Let's get to the real show here, which we're going to be honest. You know, it's a tough time for fans out there. It's a lot of anger, a lot of resentment, conspiracy theories. You know, was Kevin Stefansky trying to sabotage? Shuddera Sanders.

It's January 6th. And let's be honest, this is the day, Craig. I think a lot of fans stormed the front offices of their teams. Yeah, I mean, Austin Gale specifically. Austin Gale might have single-handedly gotten Pete Carroll fire. Do we have proof of life of Pete Carroll? Because Austin Gale has his pitchforks out for him. We were talking to him.

He's a huge Rader fan before the show started. And he was like, I'm so excited for this show. I love the off season. The Austin is the best time of year. He's like, I'm a Raiders fan. And for us, fuck the season. Yeah, this is the show. This is the show.

And there is a little bit of that. You know what I mean? It's like, I like talking about fantasy football in August more than I do in September. Like, it's the best. When you don't know what's going to happen in anything is possible, it's fantastic. And honestly, it starts today. There's an element. It's similar to roster baiting, Craig.

That's right. I mean. Which is what Aaron Rogers does every tush push. Just put your hands on your hips and look at your roster for a while. one hand on the hip the other one eye contact yeah

prolonged eye all right so we're going to run through the firings there's been a good amount here is black do they call black Monday

is that what we call it is called black Monday colloquial colloquially hmm that's not right colloquially yes that's it colloquially you don't say that

I have high fits you try colloquially oh yeah colloquial colloquially it's kind of a tongue There are some words that are not one syllable or two. They're one and a half.

Like colloquially. Colloquially is like four and a half. Colloquially. Colloquially. Hmm. I'm never going to try and say that again. No, we should that's, that's,

I'm putting that word away. Not colloquial. It's just, it's a great, that's a great call. That's ironic. It's not colloquial at all. That word's lost all meaning. It's a word fancy like English,

posh people would go and say like, that's how they described how that normal people say. Well, speaking of Austin Gale being excited for the new chapter of the Las Vegas Raiders. Should we start with the race firing Pete Carroll? My pick in the preseason for Coach of the Year.

Dude, I mean, after week one, they beat the Patriots. They beat the Patriots. They beat the Patriot. The number one scene. 14 wins. They went 1 and 0 beating the Patriots and then went what, 2 and 14 after that.

One and 14 in the middle and then they won again at week 18 versus Chris Ola-Oledokin for the Chiefs. Chris Oloidocan. So they kept their GM, their new GM, John SpyTech, who is a real person, I'm pretty sure. Brady kept SpyTech. Brady? Of course. So, yeah, the Raiders have the number one pick in the draft.

They had just about as bad of a year as you could have hoped for. They were dead last in points, yards, and first downs. High Fitz, what are your, I guess, do either of you think this was a bad move? No. I'm probably like the biggest Pete supporter at this point in time left. I still think he's like, I don't know, maybe a good coach is like too far at this point just because of obviously what happened. I think in the right situation, you still be a very good coach.

But nothing worked the way that they thought it would work. Like Pete came in and tried to change the culture. It sounds like there was just too much weird stuff going on in the background. It just didn't catch on. The players didn't buy in. They didn't have enough talent. I think it was the right move. I mean, I was wondering if they would have the money to do this,

but I think it was ultimately the right move to fire him. I mean, I don't normally endorse firing a coach after one season, but I think they had to fire him. I mean, the whole Pete Carroll's whole thing is competitiveness, right? The Raiders were not competitive. They just were not. Oh, 100%. And frankly, every decision Pete Carroll made was wrong.

I mean, like, one, again, I keep saying this, six of the teams they played had the best game of the entire season against the Raiders, right? And you can try to blame Chip Kelly, the offensive coordinator who Pete Carroll hired. But every decision Pete Carroll made was wrong. Like, they traded for Gino Smith. and Gina Smith led the league in interceptions. And you're like, well, maybe it's the coach's fault.

It's like, well, the quarterback coach is Pete Carroll's son. You're like, well, maybe it's the offensive line. I mean, Gino Smith led the league in that. It was the offensive line. Yeah. You're like, well, the offensive line coach is Pete Carroll's other son. And so you're like, well, maybe it's the running game. You're like, well, they drafted Ashton Genti, sixth overall.

They were last in yards per carry with a running back taken sixth overall. Who's awesome? He will be. Yeah. And guess what? Who's the run game coordinator? also Pete Carroll's son. He has that many sons?

How many sons do we have? Oh, but you get the point. It's like he traded for the quarterback. His sons were in charge of the quarterback and the blocking and they led the league in sacks and picks. And they just weren't a competitive team. Yeah, I agree with D.K.

And that like if you just dropped Pete Carroll right now on a talented team, the Steelers, I think he could do a good job. I think there are certain coaches like him where it's like if he has the talent and he can create, that buy-in if he has kind of the right roster around him. When you have the number one pick in the draft and you're going to be bringing in a new quarterback and the whole idea is like, okay, we are resetting once again and we need to start

fresh. It's hard to do that with the oldest coach in the history of the NFL. Yeah. Not ideal. I think this is like going to sound like I'm defending, I don't know, like standing for Pete Carroll or whatever, but I do think like if you're looking at the parallels of the way that the Seahawks got started and versus the way that the Raiders got started, like, I think number one, the Seahawks had a little bit more talent. I think it helped that Pete Carroll had overall control of everything in the organization where I don't think he had that in Las Vegas. It was more of like a collaborative thing between the GM and the owner and Brady and whoever.

And then it did take like the stars lining a little bit of luck. Like if you remember when the Seahawks first, their first season under Pete Carroll, they went seven and nine, they managed to make the playoffs. And then they had one of the most magical wins I've ever seen in my life to like ignite this flame is like, you know, the first year was kind of like, the beast quake to beat the Saints who were the defending Super Bowl champions

in Seattle after they had gone seven to nine and made the playoffs, everything is all mad about this. And then they won. And so I think there was a little bit, there was an element of magic to that. And then after that season, the Seahawks started signing all these big free agents. It became a place where everyone wanted to go.

There was excitement. They had an amazing facility in Seattle right on the water. Like, I remember the vibe shift in the early part of the, the Pete Carroll era. He was like doing things a lot of coaches weren't doing at the time. He's like playing music. He's got the college atmosphere. He's like out there running around. He does the take his shirt off thing. Yeah. He's like playing catch with the players standing up on his

skin just thinking about it. I think that what I'm getting at here is it's kind of hard to recreate that magic. And he basically like it the the embers went out before they ever could catch flame here in Las Vegas. It just didn't catch on. That's hard to make two hit shows. You know what I mean? Totally. And say honestly, weirdly the same thing that I related to what I was going to say, which is sometimes I think the more I do this, the more I realize that success is when someone who's been doing your kind of thing for a long time, and then the meta, the game within the game,

moves to where you're going. And like, look at like the Chiefs, for example, with Andy Reid, who for like 25 years, never really had a great running game. And then the Chiefs won three Super Bowls in a weird five-year period where teams could kind of win the Super Bowl without really having a running game.

Just a weird area of the NFL. And they kind of dominated. And Pete Carroll had these beliefs of how you should play defense. and then the Seahawks became one of the best defenses ever in a strange period, five-year period of NFL history where that was the perfect way to play. And I actually think sometimes it's like

the right man at the right moment. It's like Winston Churchill wouldn't have been a good leader in peacetime, but he was great for wartime as he was looking for a fight his whole life. And it's like a lot of life is like that. They kicked him out right after the war was over. Yeah, right? They're like, we don't need you anymore. You can't stay in charge.

And I think that's kind of what this is with Pete. He's trying to do this defense from 15 years ago. And he's like, well, I'm coaching guys up. And I'm like, on something that has not been in vogue for five years. And I know, and I harp on that point because they weren't competitive. And he was trying to win. The Raiders lost to the Chiefs, 31 to nothing. The Chiefs had more points than the Raiders had plays.

Like, the Raiders played the Browns in Shadurr-Sanders. And his first career start for Shudurr-Sanders, they lost by 14 points in Shudder's first start. Like, the Raiders played the Eagles. The Eagles defense had their best game in 70 years. 7-0. Jeez. And the worst part about that is Pete Carroll was alive when they did that. But they, you know, and so I just, he was a good coach, but he did not show at all that he wanted to adapt to what's happening in the game now.

Good coach, great legacy, bad fit, the right move. And going forward, Raiders are now looking for their sixth coach in six years, which is really bad. Damn. And how many of them are they still paying three? Dude. Probably two. Yeah. This is what I was saying.

I think Pete might survive simply because they don't want to pay another coach. The next guy's going to have at least three seasons just because of that. For sure. Yeah. Okay. The next firing here, the Browns fired Kevin Stefansky. And they kept their GM, Andrew Barry. I want to run through a little bit here.

What Stefansky did with the Browns? He's been the coach since 2020. So one, two, three, four, he had six seasons with him. And first of all, I want to start here. DK, I'm assuming you're kind of know where I'm going to go based on this question. But if you just have to blindly guess, like, how old do you think Kevin Stefansky is? How old does he feel to you? 50.

He's 43. Oh, sorry. Sorry, Kevin. This is like being a president. Being the coach of the Browns ages you like really quickly. Obama before and after. Smoking cigarettes. Just looks like hell.

But no, you fell directly into my trap because I thought as well. Well, he was like, I was like, I was being genuine, though, like that. I was like 50. I don't know. Pete Carroll is 73 and has the energy of a 43 year old. And Stavansky is like 43. It looks like a 73 year old. Yeah.

I'm 43, by the way. Yeah. I mean, not that I look young, but like, you don't have as much for reference. Kevin. Yeah. So Kevin Savancy's 43 years old. He's on coach of the year twice on the Browns, which I feel like does not get, we don't really talk about that.

Coach of the year twice period is like incredible on the Browns. Like recently? They played three playoff games in the last six years, which is a lot more than most teams. I want to run through what Stefansky has done on the Browns. Bear with me here for a minute as I run through this. Yeah, yeah. His first season on the Browns, 2020, they went 11 and 5.

They made the playoffs. He won coach of the year. His quarterback the entire time was Baker Mayfield. They were 11 and 5. Was that Baker Mayfield's second year? First year, second year. Third. Third year?

Third year. He was 20 years. He was 2018. Yeah. Yeah. And that's when they beat the Steelers in the playoffs. 2021 they go 8 and 9 mostly Baker Mayfield as the starting

quarterback 22 they go 7 and 10 with Jacoby Brissette and Deshawn Watson so he started his career 11 and 5 8 9 7 and 10 then 2023 he goes 11 and 6 wins coach of the year again and his quarterbacks that season were Joe Flacco for five games Deshawn Watson for 2 PJ Walker for 2

Dorian Thompson Robinson for 3 and Jeff Driscoll for 1 they went 11 and 6 that year PJ Walker they went to the playoffs, they lost to the Texans, anyone coached the year with those quarterbacks. The next year, three and 14, his quarterbacks are James Winston, Deshaun Watson, Doreen Thompson, and Bailey Zappi, and this year, they go five and 12 with Chador, Dylan Gabriel and Joe Flacco.

So he's 45 and 56, his total record, he's one and two in the playoffs. To me, if this is like a, you know what, it's stale now, he's been here for too long. We just need, we need fresh, we need fresh air. I get it. I think Stafansky is a great coach. And I think he, like Hivitz, he's interviewing with, Schaefter reported today that he's interviewing with the Giants on Wednesday. He got, he got job requests like immediately.

The Giants, I would be so angry if the Giants didn't hire him. I kind of think the Giants will hire Kevin Stifansky because of what you just said, they're going to look at that you want made the playoffs with five quarterbacks. To me, he is by far the best option out there right now. And it's probably the only guy who I genuinely feel like I know is a good coach. I want to start and end with, I will always. lean toward the right answer is Occam's razor is it was the Browns fault

because just again, the Browns were reborn as a franchise in 1999 and that's like kind of the modern team. And in those 26 years, the Browns have had 10 GMs, 12 coaches and 42 quarterbacks in 26 years. So like, it's probably the Browns fault. But the middle, there is weird stuff with

Stefansky because on one hand, objectively the most successful coach the Browns have had. Again, they have made the playoffs without him one time and with him twice. But also it's weird that the best game they had, the entire, frankly, the best game the Browns have had in the modern era, Stefansky had COVID and was in his face. He was like on his couch. Yeah. The Browns had more playoff wins in the Steelers in the, in the 2020s. That's crazy.

Like, like, because here's, we're more than halfway through. Wait, no, we're exactly halfway through. I guess Miles Garrett maybe was just bitter. But the fact that after the, again, Miles Garrett, quite the platform when you've just broken the sack record. And they ask him about Stifansky, do you want him back? And he said, I mean, he said, my experience, Kevin like anything we've had ups and downs. Unfortunately, more downs than ups. And then he just didn't say any. Like, he kind of just had like a word soup,

but didn't take, I mean, when Drake London is out here saying for the Falcons, he's like, I want Rahim Morris back with my entire heart. And then Miles Garrett is saying about Kevin Stefanski. I would have loved to make a little bit more noise in some different years, but it wasn't in the cards. Like he didn't want a bad. Jesus Christ. They won 11 games twice.

They won eight games once. Like, what the hell is he supposed to do? You know why they probably liked Rahim Morris? Because it's been two seasons. And Rahim Morris is a great guy and a motivator and all that stuff. Miles Garrett has been with Kevin Stefanski fucking dogging it every year for half a decade. I understand that it's probably like the message is falling on deaf ears at this point. They're eight and 26 over their last two seasons.

Of course. Malice Garrett's probably like, yeah, I think this has run its course. I don't think that means DeFansky's a bad coach. And we'll talk, we're going to do DK's mock draft after we go through the coach stuff. But in terms of these coach openings, don't know what you guys think is the best. I think the Browns one is the worst because there's a weird mix of pressure. Jim Schwartz, the defensive coordinator. If he doesn't get the job, like everyone's going to say he should be the guy. The defense is elite. But you, the quarterback room for

the Browns next year is Deshawn Watson off a multi-Ailis injury. Still there, by the way. Still there. Still there. Going to be on the team next year, going to be making $46 million off of multiple Achilles tears because he tore it and retore it and Shador Sanders. And then I assume also Dylan Gabriel, like that's your quarterback room entering next year for the Browns. We don't talk enough about how Deshaun Watson re-tore his Achilles. He tore it twice. Right. And it saved the Browns from this contract because basically they insured Deshawn Watson's contract for injury. And so they're getting reimbursed for games he missed for injuries and cap credits the following season. It's like a tax refund. And so they're getting the $46 million

they spent on this year credited to next year's cap. So they're getting it undone. So the Achilles surgery saved them. They're like inviting him to like play all these extreme sports in the off season. Yeah, it's like Jalen Hertz has no golf in his contract. Like Deshawn Watson's like you have to go wakeboarding. They're like, you should try skateboarding. You guys, you guys have seen Tombstone, right? Yeah. You know, there's a scene, Billy Bob Thornton is like this really, he's just swearing. He's a card dealer or whatever. And then Wyatt Earp like takes him by the ear and like throws him outside or whatever. And then they see Doc Holliday out there. They start chatting. And then Billy Bob Thornton's just like standing there on the side and then finally doc holiday or whoever is like oh i'm sorry

i forgot you were there you may go now i'm just that's like that's like that's like how i'm picturing like every practice with toshan watson there oh i'm sorry i forgot you were here uh you can go now that he limps away yeah um i think he i would be very excited for you hyphen if if i want i want the giants to hire kevin stefansky i feel like him with that defensive line with with with Dart and neighbors in Scataboo is great. We can talk about it. I mean, the Giants, you mentioned the Giants. I mean, they kept Joe Shane as GM.

And I just want to shout out Dan Dugan at the Athletic, who wrote, I just got to read this headline that they ran at the athletic. I can't heap it. He went hard. The quote is the headline, Giants decision to bring back Joe Shane's GM makes it clear. They have no standards anymore. And they said journalism's dead. That is good for him.

I mean, this is the best thing. article by Dan Duggan at the Athletic is the best article anyone has written on the Giants in 10 years. It's the best summary of it. I can't shout out enough. But he points out, I won't go that deep. The Mara family that owns half the team is entrenched in the personnel department. They're unfireable. And this is the problem.

And whether Joe Shane is a figurehead or maybe he's incredible at his job, the point is like, he's kind of cover for John Mara who owns the team. His brother, Chris Mara, is like running the personal department. John Maro's nephew also like runs the personnel department. He's like, and they're just entrenched over this. And the idea that they would keep a GM who again, if you take out the four games, half of their last eight wins were in week 17 and 18

to lose the number one pick. Literally their wins cost them the number one pick. Take those out. They're four and 27, the last two seasons. Are there any other parallels outside of Dallas? Because I know like Jerry Jones and his family kind of like run the Cowboys. Are there any other teams in the NFL right now that like the family guys are like involved it's the lakers

also I guess now the Colts a little bit with her daughter she's involved but she's I think Carly Ursette Gordon is doing like the due diligence to work enough departments to know how people's jobs work when the Lakers just sold to the Walton family or I forget that

Mark Walters whatever his name is the first thing they did when that deal closed is they fired all the bus family members from the scouting department they were ousted like like day one it's just yeah it's just asking asking for trouble. If the Giants sold to the Coke,

the Coke brothers, the widow of the David Koch who bought a minority share because they needed money, do you guys know this? The Giants' grandfather bought the team in 1925 for $500.

What's that in today dollars? Do you know? I don't know. Like 500,000. The rumor was they was like horse racing money, like the Steelers and Giants just like one fucking, they had a good day at the track

and they bought a football team that was in debt. And they just have this now. Anyway, don't even get me started, but they're everywhere. No, I like getting you started. They'd all be fired. Hi Fitz. I saw there was an interview.

I didn't watch the actual interview, but I was kind of seeing the excerpts from it. There was a spot where Joe Shane was asked how he's going to find the next head coach. And there was, he mentioned using AI to help. Did you see this part? Did you see this? This was in the article? No, I think this was different. Hold on.

Let me pull it up. This is a tweet that I saw. It says Joe Shane on a different approach this time in selecting another Giants head coach mentions the longer runway to do research, blah, blah, blah, watching Thursday coordinator press conference as well as using AI in certain aspects. Okay, I can do that too.

I'm going to go to chat GPT right now. Hey, who should the Giants hire as their next tech coach? I'm like, dude, is there that many resumes? You're like using AI to like call the resumes? Hold on, Dickens, Dick, search in the web. Number one, Kevin Stefansky. Done. Okay.

There we go. Why are you using AI? Your whole fucking job is to make this decision. D.K., if you don't get up every morning and ask yourself, how can I leverage AI to do a better job? You're doing the wrong thing. I mean, sure. Just not a red-blooded American.

You don't ask chat, GPT, what to think. Number two is Mike McCarthy. Maybe these things need a better learning model. Anyway. They just, I think, yeah. Shout out to, again. We can move on here. The next firing we have is the Cardinals fired Jonathan Gannon

And after three seasons, they went three and 14 this year. Overall, Jonathan Gannon went 15 and 36. Arguably a more obvious firing than the Pete Carroll one. One of the more underrated disasters since this person got the job is Jonathan Gannon. The Cardinals have just been bad for a while now. And specifically with Jonathan Gannon, the defense never really took off as people expected. The Kyler Murray thing continued to be an absolute disaster. And they shadow benched him.

Austin had a stat the other day. Austin, throw it in the chat if you have it. So it was like his success rates on defense over the three years. He was the coach of the Cardinals is like, I think 30th or worse every year. I can't remember it off the top of my head. But the defense just never got better.

I mean, this fight was it a firing or was it like a peop, pew, pew, pew, you know what I mean? I don't know. But I think Gannon was fired in a nutshell. Like every team in the NFC West got better while he was the coach except the Cardinals who got worse. And like, I, well, technically, hold on, Austin just sent it.

Technically, they did get better. 23, they were 32nd in defensive success rate. 2024, they are 31st. And then this year, 2025, 30. All right. Give them 29 more year. There we go. That's like Kyle Pitts had a touchdown.

One is first year, two, his second, year, three, is third, four, is fourth. By the time he's 35, he's going to have 15. That'll be great. Like, feel like 30 touchdowns a year eventually. I. What happened to patience in this league? Do you know how many games the Cardinals won in their division? this year.

Fucking zero. Zero. They went 0 and 6 in the division. Their last four divisional games, the Cardinals are outscored by 90 points. And they, in three years, the record inside the division is three and 15.

And so like, that's it. All the other NFC West teams are legit Super Bowl contenders. The Seahawks are the one seed. The Niners almost were the one seed and the Rams might be better than both those teams. And they're also in the playoffs.

And they're not even close. And the only excuse Jonathan Gannon has is, well, we're really injured. And that's true because the Cardinals actually have more players on IR than any team this year. they probably had the most games lost of starters to injuries this year, like top three running backs and Kyler Murray and Marvin Harrison Jr.

You know what? And yet the Niners with the second most injured team, and they literally were almost the one seed in the NSA. So I don't want to hear it. Like Kevin Savansky went 11 and 6 with Joe Flacco and Dorian Thompson, two years ago and still got fired. Like Jonathan Gannon, it doesn't make the cut. I'm sorry.

So do you think... 100%. I have to... We should pour one out because he... One of the more quotable coaches the whole time we've done this show. the, you got fire in your gut. You take the bus to work. Did you take the bus to work today?

Yeah. Unintentional comedy. We should rank unintentional comedy coaches. We should. That is great. Because I also liked it. I have to. Also, we saw,

I was it with UDK? We saw him when you're outside St. Elmo's in Indianapolis. And only taught seeing him in person and he was having a conversation hearing him. I was like, oh my God, he's Kendall Roy. Right. And hearing him in person, I was like, oh, like, that's exactly. who he is in real life. This is like one of those things where like Joe Shane, take note, man. AI is not going to help you with this. Like you're going to be you're going to be leading

a team, you know, during the off season is like 100 plus guys in the season, 53 men on the active roster and those men have to respect you. And these are like the alpha dogs of the fucking alpha dogs in the world. Most of these players are just fucking, you know, you have to earn their respect. It just never felt like he could command a room. And we saw him. And we saw the videos is like so awkward it's so weird every time he was interacting with a player we're like this is like the most cringe worthy thing in the world um i also think it's funny that if you see on eagles twitter right now like everyone is like oh god this was the easiest like we we could have told you this like immediately when he was hired like everyone on eagles twitter like hates jonathan

because he was fucking like interviewing yeah he was like interviewing during super bowl week and all this I mean, an underrated thing about coaches and interviewing is Jonathan Gannon interviewed and silently accepted the Cardinals job during the Super Bowl. Then the Eagles gave up 38 points in the Super Bowl and lost the game. And which never gets discussed, but it does get discussed by Eagles fans on Twitter. And they changed the rule. You can't do that anymore, right? The interviews. Yeah, but like, it's like there's less window now.

Yeah. Which of these 31 billionaire owners made $20 billion by like following all the rules? But anyway. It's kind of a bummer because I like having one less team in the NFC West to worry about. So now if they get a good coach, I'm going to have to worry about the freaking Cardinals now. I think the other thing to mention here is the Cardinals over the, I don't know how many years they've been doing. The NFLPA has been doing these reviews of the different. There's like different aspects.

They all get inter, they all take a poll of like how the franchise leadership treats them, how the facilities are, how the medical staff is, the food, all that stuff. I think the Cardinals have been either last or second to last, the last couple of years. So like from top to bottom, just so the organization is, you know, I don't, it goes under the radar that they're one of the worst organizations out there. I think everyone kind of like thinks guys. They were taking box lunch deductions out of people's paycheck. They're like making people pay for daycare during game days and stuff. It's like, I don't know. The other one, I know we hit the Falcons one, but they fired Raheim Morrison.

They fired the GM, Terry Fontenow, but they actually also fired the president's CEO of the team, Rich McKay. Hmm. I think that flew under the radar. I don't know if people care, but he's there for 20 years. So it's like, I feel like that's that now I'm actually mad right now from Arthur Blank because he's in his 80s. Out of the out of these 14, well, I guess we should include the Titans and the Giants, right? So we just went through Raiders, Browns, Cardinals, and Falcons fired their coaches after week 18. And then the Giants, Titans fired their coaches midseason.

That's it, right? Six openings right now. Yeah, I'm, I'm biased. Who's the best one? I think I'm biased. I think the Giants. the best. All these teams are flawed, but like organizationally too.

The owners, you start to think about it, they're all kind of weird. But I think the Giants are the best. You have Jackson Dart is like legit good. And you have a left tackle. You have defense aligned pieces. Like there's more there with the quarterback than I think anywhere. Yeah, I think I would probably go Giants one. I think maybe you could talk stuff into Cam Ward, the Titans, too.

And then it's Falcons 3 just because of the talent on the team. And then you're kind of bottom in the barrel with Brown's Raiders. I would say Raiders neck. I would say the Raiders are there solely because you're the first bit and you could take Fernando. I guess it depends if you think Mendoza is better than Camp Ward. Do you think Fernando Mendoza is better than Cam Ward? If Cam Ward was in this draft, we hadn't seen him in the NFL yet, who would you take

first? Off the top off the cuff, I would probably still take Cam Ward. But I mean, there's going to be teams I think that do like Mendoza more just because of the type of passer he is. He's like a rhythm, timing passer. I think I'm sure people are going to love the fact that he like was instrumental in elevating Indiana to a national football like contender. The Indian thing is actually the most insane thing.

India was just a punchline for literally like they were the worst team in college football for 150 years. And I think that's the exact type of player you need. It's not just Fernando Mendoza that's done that. They have a good team. But like, you know, a player that can elevate a program that has done nothing before. Like that's exactly what you're looking for. Like the Browns like the narratives like make a ton of sense for him to go to the to the Raiders right now and kind of like help them, you know, pull that team out of the funk that they're in.

But I think, you know, how he's, how he's put together in terms of, like, his personality, his leadership is the way that he plays football. I think there's going to be teams that love this guy. I think, like, tools-wise, Cam Ward's way more exciting. And I don't know. What do you think of Cam Ward's rookie year? I don't really know what to make of it. I think overall it's promising.

I think he was great. I mean, it doesn't have to be like an amazing rookie year, but like he flashed. I mean, look at the gap between Drake's day and flashes. And to Drake Mae's probably going to win MVP this year, Cam Ward, I think he had more flashes than Drake May did. He played obviously. He ended the season in a sling, which is crazy. I think Cam Ward was great and got better. I think you saw it early in the beginning, but there was like, obviously the Titans were awful.

But Camor consistently got better. I think he did the whole reason you draft guys for upside, like the uncoachable, unteachable, I'm going to make something out of nothing right here with Camer D. D.K. just open. And like, Camer D.K. feels like Kirkland brand, Debo Samuel, like he's unbelievable. And like the fact that you have a quarterback with like, I mean, I think DK is like a legit guy. And I think, you know, and everything else, there's enough of an offensive line there too that I'm very bullish in Kim Ward.

Yeah, I think the takeaway is like, I'm willing to see this out. And there were moments. If you, if you check the stat sheet, Kim Ward looked terrible. If you actually watched Kim Ward, his receivers were terrible and dropped a lot of passes. And he made a lot of incredible throws. that was like pretty high long stuff. So, yeah, I would say it's like a hopeful TBD with Cam Ward. But with that said, let's just go into the mock draft.

So, DK, you have a mock draft up at the ringer.com. And for those who don't know, DK, has our draft expert here for, I guess, eight years. And like, you have an amazing, nine years. And you have an amazing big board that comes out, like end of January, just a whole draft guide that comes out. And it's awesome. And you are the player comp king, which we'll get into later this month. But you have your first mock because now the draft order is set.

And for the, yeah, first whatever it is. The first 18 picks or whatever. It's your first and last mock, right? Yeah, we're not doing it again. I got it perfectly. And who cares about the other teams that are still in it? Was it fun doing the first mock of the year for you? It was.

It's kind of fun to like sketch it out. I feel like mock drafts get made fun of a lot because there's a million of them and, you know, you get like three right and you're like the greatest mock draft. It's a little bit like talking about your fantasy football team and say, hey, look at my mock draft. It's like, hey, buddy. That being said, I do think there's a lot you can learn. from putting together your own mock drafts. Go do a mock draft and really think about what the teams need

and what direction they might go. Like, you know, and it gives, it's instructive on what kind of players they have going into free agency, what guys on the team are getting older, what they have to start thinking. It is like one of those things where the exercise of doing a mock draft

is a good way of kind of like getting a big picture of the NFL at large. And so that's from that point of view, I think it's fun, even though I'm sure I'll get like zero of these right. Doing mock drafts, it's the ultimate bell curve. meme of like the dumb guy in the beginning and then there's like all the nerd stuff in the middle

and then the wise guy at the end just agrees like it's the ultimate like I think they're going to take DK. McCaffee's ripped and then you do all this in the thing well he can't actually turn he kind of turns like a good battleship but he actually did that kid you don't miss and it's like nah the CX took him he's ripped that's like me and DK's mock I do my only mock the day before the draft and

TK does 20 all offseason we didn't make a big enough deal about this there's this competition called the the huddle report I forget how I think hundreds maybe thousands of entries and we joked about it and we didn't submit it on time because we forgot.

We joked, Craig just did a mock the Wednesday morning before the draft. With his sources. And there's two ways they grade it. Direct team to player comparisons

and then just how many players in the first round? Craig got 31 of the 32 players in the first round, correct? Which would have won the competition and we didn't... Hyphins, I did that the year before. I got 31 out of 32.

Yes, you get a year for, we would have won it two years and row. No, as soon as I enter it, I'm going to get the worst grade of everyone in the world. Well, that's why we need to remember, but won't tell you.

Yeah. On the flight to, where was the draft Chicago? On the flight to Chicago, I did it, I threw headphones in for an hour, kind of was, pulling my source.

Like Dr. Strange. Yeah. A lot of things are coming in out of my ears. I was like, I was doing a lot. It took about an hour. That's all I need.

It's all you really need. Keep that in mind, D.K. You're like Tom Cruise and Minority Report, like putting all the different stuff on the screen and moving it around. I put on my weird gloves. I'm throwing shit around.

They always need gloves. All right, yeah, do you want to just run through this? Mock? We'll start here with the Raiders, first pick on the draft. Austin, Powell. A new beginning. You have the Raiders taking Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza. Yeah, and mainly for the memes.

That's what I'm looking for. Fernando Mendoza, kind of like a dorky, you know, white bread dude. He speaks in like LinkedIn paragraphs. Okay, well, you know what I mean. He's like in the Kirk Cousins, like, airy. area as like kind of like a dorky guy. He makes Kurt Cousins look like 50 cent. Yeah.

And him going to Vegas is just going to be, the memes are going to be out of control. He was like a really enthusiastic Capitol Hill intern. Yeah. Totally. It's like real eager beaver. Eager beaver is exactly right. You know, I don't know. I think there's the jokes about like, oh my God, Fernanda Mendoza in Vegas is like the

weirdest fit. Maybe it's great. Maybe you need somebody who needs someone who's not going to want to leave the facility. Yeah. If they start an NBA team in Vegas, you probably don't want James Harden. Like maybe Fernando Mendoza is the perfect pick for Las Vegas. It's the ultimate like, he's just going to go to like Wizard of Oz at the sphere every night. That's all he'll do.

Because he go to circus circus and, you know. Dude, the fact that he could just talk like that after just absolutely throttling and like at the end of the of the Bama era of college football and he just like pantses them. And I know it's the whole team of the defense. But like he is unbelievable. He's really good. And yeah, D.K. who you don't have to have a final answer here. but who how would you explain who's his comp is. Or what is the mix?

Like how would you explain for Nado Mendoza? Um, so shout out Nate Tice. His first comp was Matt Ryan. Um, and I can definitely see that. I've seen the, the Jared Gough come thrown out a lot too because Gough, if you remember, he was the first pick and Gough has, he's not mobile. And I don't think Fernando Mendoza, he's like, I think he's more mobile than Gough, but he's not like super mobile than Matt Ryan. Yeah.

I see it. But like he's more of like, you know, he's the, he's in that category of, uh, drop back at your back foot, timing, accuracy, throw with anticipation, distribute the football. He's got a pretty deep ball. He's been good on like the money downs. And so, like, there's a lot to like there. But I think that's kind of, it's like the CJ Stroud, Jared Goff, Matt Ryan, pocket passer sort of archetype, I think is kind of what you're looking at.

I'm excited to form my entire opinion of him based on this Oregon game coming up. I do. The fact that, well, I was going to say, the fact that Indiana. The guy that they're going against too. In the college football playoff is playing Oregon. and if he enters the draft, which we'll get to, but Dante Moore Jr., the quarterback from Oregon, would be, what do you think?

Do you see the, I guess Mendoza's the one A? He could be the first pick. Yeah, I think it's like, it depends on the team. It depends on what they're looking for. I think Dante Moore is like the classic, the tools are better. It's kind of like exactly the conversation we just had with like Cam Ward. It's like the tools are better. And I think the upside, whatever that means is probably like higher.

But Dante Moore, one year, one year and change as a starter. so there's not as much film out there on him. I think the impression right now I have is that people will go back or that Dante Moore will go back to school, but who knows? Craig said as an off-hand comment that the Jets getting the second pick means Dante Moore will go back to school. And it's been rattling around my head a week. I'm like, that just sounds true.

We'll see what happens, obviously. I mean, he's only played one real season in college football. And also Oregon is not short on cash, if you will. He'll get five, six million bucks and more. to come back and try to win another national championship if they win this year. And it's like, and you want it to go to the Jets. I mean, the caveat there is like,

that doesn't guarantee the Jets won't be terrible again next year. And you might just end up on the Jets anyway. I know, right? Let me read you an email from Nick because I think that this sums up many people are thinking as they listen. Endbone. Nick wrote, I was considering reaching out just because of, you know, Craig having that thing of like,

Dante Moore, go back to school to avoid playing for the Jets, which isn't like Peyton Manning did that. He went back to Tennessee because the Jets are the first pick. Good job. So Nick wrote, I do would not advise anyone to play for the Jets. However, $52 million is $52 million,

which is the projected guaranteed money for the number two pick this year. It's very different, yeah. And so Nick writes something Dante Moore might not get if he waits until next year for a better situation with potentially more depth

or potentially getting drafted by another bad team, seems like a potentially bad business decision with the draft class next year that might be better with quarterbacks overall and overall talent. People like Jeremiah Smith are there. So maybe now is an excellent time,

to sell that highly drafted quarterbacks drafted by the Jets and Browns, like Baker, Mayfield, and Darnold and Judith Smith have succeeded elsewhere. And Nick says, I've never been offered $52 million to do anything. But if I had the opportunity to be the number two pick in the draft or go back to Oregon and make good money, I would go to the draft, which I mean, that's a, yeah. Of course. That's like, that's always the argument is like, it's a risk to go back. You could get her. Things change. You don't play as well. There's better quarterback competition in the draft. And then before you know, you're like the 28th pick and you're making half the money, which is totally fair. I put like, I don't know.

There's multiple ways to see it. I actually disagree with Nick. I think this is exactly what NIL has changed because you know what sucks ass, which you know, not in theory, but in reality is being the quarterback for the Jets. You know what's really sick being the quarterback of Oregon? And getting like six million bucks to do it. That's the thing. He's getting two and a half now, two and a half million dollars, I believe now.

The NIL reporting is weird. He could probably get four, maybe he might push for five million dollars for Danty Moore to to stay. I think in addition to the money, there are real reasons that he would go back, which is to get more experience at the college level. He's only been a starter for one year and changed. So basically he started a couple years or sorry, a couple games for UCLA,

but then sat behind Dylan Gabriel last year. Yeah, he sat five games for UCLA two years ago. And then out since then he's played 13 games. The, the history of guys that have played that few starts in the, in college going to the NFL is like, it's littered with guys that just,

you know, just never developed. So I think it's like he has, it's more than just purely, I get more money. if I go to the NFL. Like, you're thinking about your entire career here. Like, I just need the reps.

There's a larger conversation we're going to have about quarterbacks and just there always was an apprentice era where guys would, and it used to be you'd go to the NFL and you'd sit for a couple of years. And that was normal. And now it's like you're going to play college football for a lot of money if you're good and that's going to be the apprenticeship. And I think that's kind of what we're going to see the guys going back. But if it was any other team, I feel like we would say, well, I don't know, Craig.

I mean, I feel like we're in that era now. Like, we're in the post- Anthony Richardson era. and whether it'll last two years, and then we have one good example of an inexperienced guy reverses it, but I think we're in this for the medium all. I agree. I think the combination,

say what you will about NIL and how you think that's affecting college football, for this specific example, if this makes quarterbacks, stay in college a little longer, develop a little longer because they can get paid, stay at the same school a little longer

because they can get paid and then develop more and come into the league a little bit more prepared and ready, and it makes this whole rookie quarterback, drafting a little bit more consistent and predictable and these guys can step into these teams and actually be productive in year one and two. I think that's kind of just like a floor razor across the board. It's better if you're a fan of Oregon and it's better if you're a fan of whatever team takes

Dante more next year. It'll be good and bad because Brady put eloquently because again, Brady, when he's not announcing a game, it's like still the best person talking about football. And he was like, you used to learn a program and now you learn a playbook. And now guys are going to transfer three or four times and learn to play. You know what I mean? It's like kind of going to stunt development in some ways and teams are going to NFL teams are going to have to adjust. The funny thing about the Jets specifically for Dante Moore is, I think if it was any other sign on the door other than the Browns, we're like, this is a great situation. Garrett Wilson's a legit number one receiver.

Mason Taylor is a highly thought of prospect, the tight end who had a solid rookie year. The offensive line, they have a first round pick at left tackle. They have a first round pick at right tackle. They have a first round pick a guard. They have like pretty John Simpson. Like they've good offensive line. The problem is they're the Jets. They haven't had a good quarterback since Joe Namath.

And then this, we got an email from his name is Sam Teets. and Sam Teets, he's, he covers the Chiefs, so I'll give him this, I'll give him the shout out. Nice. Sam Tets. Sam A. Yeah, you know, but Sam Teets sent me that, I couldn't believe this. Calvin Johnson's best 17 games span, he had more receiving yards than the Jets had passing yards in 17 games this season.

And in that span, Calvin Johnson had as many 200-yard receiving games as the Jets had 200-yard passing games this season. I know it's not just like, oh, the Jets are the Jets, and you can't go there because it's like the ownership and there are like actual tactile reasons why you wouldn't want to go to the Jets out. Because Hyford, I think you made a great point. Like there are pieces.

I don't know, Garrett Wilson, the offensive line, breeze hall, whatever. But I love that there is still just like, yeah, but it's the Jets.

And that like actually factors into decisions. That this like hex, this cloud that hangs over this team actually is, is influencing the way players make, I think that's hilarious. And it still is like a little bit of, you know, people say that analytics ruin sport.

And I love that there's still a little bit of like, yeah, but it's the Jets. It's the Browns. Yeah. It's like a, there's a certain teams have a certain DNA that they can't like escape. And I think with the Jets in particular, it's like the ownership, it permeates things. The other thing I think that's really applicable here. Colloquially. Colloquially.

It sounded better that time. It sounds like the Jets. I don't know this for sure, but it sounds like the Jets are keeping Aaron Glenn as head coach. Yeah, they definitely are. And I mean, you have that's going to happen. That's going to go for another year. And then they're going to fire him. And so like if you're, you know, a quarterback, any quarterback coming into the NFL and you're like, I might, I'm probably going to go number two to the Jets.

And after a year, the head coach is going to get fired. And then we're going to have some other random fucking guy that I don't know come in. Maybe he'll like me. Maybe he won't. Also, Garrett Wilson probably gone. Yeah. And Breeze Hall, gone after this year. And then it's like, but these are, these are like more tangible thing.

he's like, I guess it's not 100% certain that they'll fire Aaron Glenn after one more year. But like, that's kind of like the writing on the wall here is that not only, not only you're going to the Jets, but you're going to the Jets, they're probably going to have a new coach after one year. Then you're going to have a new fucking playbook, a new system. Maybe you don't get along with the new coach. Maybe you don't get along with like whatever. So like there's legitimate. I think there's legitimate reasons to like not to go back to school. But that being said, I did, I did put Dante Moore here to number two to the Jets because we don't know if he's coming out or I think there's a chance he might.

Here's the truth. None of us possess a fraction of the confidence required to be this good at quarterback. And so they probably like the truth is other people in their life may think about it, but the players don't give a fuck. It's like, you know, they're just like you need so much confidence to be this good at quarterback that worrying about it is almost a red flag. All right.

Third pick here, Arizona Cardinals, you gave them Spencer Fano, the tackle out of Utah. I have no thoughts. You didn't like his tape, Craig? You didn't watch Utah tackles all college football season, Craig? Not a lot of Utes tape for me so far. There's two Utah tackles in this class that are part of the first rent. The two Uts. The two Uts.

Toots. The Toots. I generally never have an issue with somebody taking a lineman. Like anytime you're like tackle, I'm like great, great pick. I think this is going to be another meat and potatoes draft. I think we talked about this last year where it's going to be like a lot of edge players, a lot of defensive tackles, a lot of offensive tackles, maybe throw out a few guards. It's just going to be one of those drafts where it's like less sexy and just more just like,

I want a guy who's really huge and he can block. Well, the question I have for you here, D.K., is if Kyler Murray is not on the Cardinals next year, is there a quarterback at three that Arizona could take if Dante Moore and Mendoza are gone? Or a no shot. No. Or a quarterback that Jets could take if Dante Moore goes back to school. Yeah. Right now, the other guy that's like in the conversation is Ty Simpson, but I don't think he's going to declare based on recent.

play. Sure. I got benched. Let me. There's other guys in the class, but I think generally speaking, most of them are considered like day two guys at this point. Late, late round one. Nussmeyer, Drew Aller.

I don't actually, I think some of these guys are going to transfer. And Drew Aller had a bad injury this year, right? Yeah, he missed a lot of year for Penn State. And I believe, I mean, Garrett Nussmeier was benched at one point this season, right? I mean, that went from like fringe number one pick thoughts. Yeah. I liked him a lot last year, man. Nussmeyer and Aller.

There was a time when those two were expected to be, you know, top five picks in the draft. The thing with Ty Simpson is just like before and after Halloween, it would almost be better if he was hiding an injury. Because honestly, a real demerit for loyalty because Ty Simpson went to Bama and waited his turn and waited his turn and got the job. And honestly, if Ty Simpson doesn't declare for the draft, I think he wouldn't start at Bama because they have this six-foot-six, gawkey Trevor Lawrence clone. I mean, honestly, the most interesting part of the Bama Indiana game was when the backup quarterback came in and threw freaking lasers. And I was like, there's no way Ty Simpson's playing for Bama next year unless he's hiding an injury. So the idea that Typh Simpson would enter almost because he couldn't win back the old Bama job

is just like such a red flag where I'm like, how could you possibly pick this guy if he couldn't outdo the five star behind him at Bama? So, you know, maybe he's a back end of the first. But yeah, it's a meat and potatoes draft. It's like there's one quarterback in Mendoza. If Dante Moore comes out, there's two. frankly, the drama is if Dante Moore comes out. There's no drama.

It's Mendoza 1 and Dante 2 and then Ty Simpson maybe is like a Tyler Shuck back early second round pick or late 1st. And then other than that, it's freaking linemen, man. Yeah, there's some receivers mixed in. So let's just get to the next two picks here. You have the Titans at 4 and the Giants at 5. You have them both taking linebackers.

For the Titans, you gave him Arvel Reese out of Ohio State. And for the Giants, you gave him David Bailey. Well, like outside linebacker, right? Like past rushers edge. Arvel Reese is kind of like a linebacker slash pass rusher hybrid type of guy super explosive super flexible like ascending type player super exciting

high fits I actually had the Giants having him before the Giants won in week 18 so sorry about that David Bailey is a good consolation pick though because he's just pure speed off the edge you know high energy player tons of pressures tons of sacks tons of tackles for lost He's always in the backfield.

It's going to be a very interesting kind of like what happens in the top of the draft this year, I think, because some of these guys, like Arval Reese, a little thin framed. There's, they could be, he could be picked apart like because he's not quite big enough and strong enough. You know, there's a bunch of pass rushers this year that are like short armed guys that I think teams are going to be. Oh, yeah. We're going to be talking about arms so much this pre this off season. It's going to be it's going to drive you crazy. What a dumb. Yeah.

This will be the draft where we have to follow through on the joke that we actually should just get these guys tailored. We want to find out their suit sizes and that. You know what I mean? Like that'll get his same side track. I mean, I mean, well, the number one, Ruben Bain, the Miami pass rusher who was considered like maybe a top pick in the draft. And then there was a, it's funny to say a rumor about our length. You'd think that AI could figure that out. But there's a rumor that Rubin Bain's arms are under 31 inches long.

Yeah. I always laugh saying that out loud. But that would be like. I think Dane Bruehler. I don't know if reported is the right word, but he's like saying that that's what he's hearing. And so like it's probably second percentile in the NFL, like literally at 98%

of like you just don't really see pass rushers in the NFL with sub 3.1 in charge. Right. It's like T-Rex out there. Yeah. So there's like there's going to be a lot of that. So it was actually when I was putting together this mock, I was like, I don't know, the top 10 could be anything really.

It just depends on what teams have, you know, like these thresholds that they want for certain players and, terms of like their arm length or their weight or their body mass or whatever. There's going to be a lot of that kind of conversation, which I look forward to. So, it's going to be great. The question I have for you, DKs is less the individual players, like the outside linebacker are at all recent Tennessee. I'm more curious about why you decided to go with defense for Tennessee versus offense

because, you know, you have Cam Ward and the receiving room, you know, is not great. Yeah. Is there a, is there a receiver in this draft? you had like a carnell tate going deeper beyond him like is there any guy you think could be considered as like a top five pick in this draft or not really from a talent no i do i think the two guys i've seen that people i think consider the top two receivers in the draft are jordan tyson from arizona state and carnell tate from ohio state i personally really like carnell tate he is fucking fun to watch krague i bet you'll like him a lot he's one of those players that he reminds me a little bit of devonte smith just like a little

bit thicker version of DeMonte Smith where he's like really long really twitchy smooth route runner and he just skies over dudes and catches everything um so he he's going to be to me i think if i was going to make my list right now he would be my number one receiver um i just really liked him when i watched him and i think he's a really really good player so it wouldn't surprise me at all if he went number four or even really number three i guess the cardinals although they probably don't they don't go for a highly yeah he could more of an ohio state receiver again. Yeah. But, you know, I think Cardinal Tate would be a guy that would not surprise me go on the top five. I guess Tyson, um, uh, Jordan Tyson is another one that might go that high, but he's

got like injury history that I think some teams might block at. Again, this is like, it was actually kind of hard to make the top 10 because I think there's like reasons that you can move every guy down. A lot of variance. I think there's a lot of variance. And outside of frankly, the quarterbacks at the top. And I think there's going to be variance. I agree that Spencer, like Fano, the tackle. and then I even like the other Miami tackle and see if I don't put your up. It's, it's Maui, Mauioga. No, Maui Go on. Francis Mauioga from Miami.

I really like him a lot. But he's, but he is the classic. Some teams are going to see him as a guard because he's a little, he's not quite as tall and lanky and long as like a lot of NFL tackles that you see. So, you know, this is the discussions we're going to have, but I really liked him a lot. I think like, high fits, a lot of people are going to think Arvel Reese is the best player in the draft. but, you know, because of its size and everything,

you might go down a little bit. I'll tell you who's the best player of the drafts. Same with what you're going to say here. Caleb Downs might be one of the best players in the draft, but no one's going to take a safety. Well, I tell you, Caleb Downs is the best player in this draft. And if you want to say quarterback, fine. You're getting out ahead of it.

Take the quarterbacks out of it. Caleb Downs is the best player in the draft. And I'm saying this now. And if future me changes my mind, then I hope that I hope this knee punches that one in the face. Because Caleb Downs is like, you know, Craig, you always joke like we could probably do a better job at the draft in January.

If we just stopped it right when the games ended and we just watched the games and we're like, no more information, please, outside of tell me if their knees are fucked. When I watch Caleb Downs, it's like when he was at Alabama, it's like, well, he's as good as any Bama defensive back, I can remember.

And then he transfers to Ohio State and they win the national championship. And it's like Caleb Downs is obviously the best defender at any position in America. And then it's like all offseason and it's going to be, well, you can't take a safety in the top 10. And then in the rookie year, it's going to be like, oh, wow, Caleb Downs is like already the top two safety in the NFL.

And I... I'm thinking of abandoning positional value altogether. Oh, I think it's going to be a huge conversation this year because Jeremiah, there's a huge gap between like Jeremiah Love at running back and the next best running back and teams are going to talk to themselves into it. And the same, the thing about positional value, I think is very misunderstood is people will be like because the the base point of it is like well you want to I mean quarterback obviously is important but like well a left tackle or you know it's a mix of supply and demand but also well if the

Justin Jefferson is like the best receiver in the NFL and he's worth like say 40 million dollars a year and you find a rookie who can be like that at like eight million dollars a year then you're getting 30 32 million dollars a surplus higher the problem when people apply that blindly is you should be factoring in what is the percentage chance you think that will happen So if Caleb Downs, you're like, I think there's a 90% chance that Caleb Downs is actually going to be worth the top end of the market. That changes it when you're like, well, let's just take a higher paid position, but the guy's probably going to suck. My confidence in Caleb Downs, you never know. I love Jeff Okuda at Ohio State.

I am as confident in Caleb Downs, honestly, not since Kyle Hamilton. And that's the exact same conversation. Kyle Hamilton fell to the Ravens because he's a safety and he ran a four or five. How fucking stupid does that seem now? How many people play faster than Kyle Hamilton? Oh my God, guys, news. John Harbaugh got fired. Get the fuck out.

Ian Rappaport, Ravens, a long time, decorated head coach, John Harbaugh, parting ways after days of discussion. They're parting ways. This is like Pete Carroll. We're going to not having to be the head coach anymore, but we're parting ways. Mutual separation. Huge. So Harba was the second.

Harba out. 10ured coach in the NFL. So, the Steelers, Mike Tomlin with the Steelers was number one. And Harbo was hired in 2008. I think this was brimming for a little bit.

I'm curious what you think, DK. The first thing, the first thing I think of when I come to this, we were talking about like needing a new voice eventually. I think the truth is sometimes when you get really close multiple times. You can only kind of, it kind of breaks teams sometimes.

And I think the Ravens, I mean, 2019, they win 14 and two and they don't want a playoff game. And they had the best. team that year. And then, oh my God, yeah. 20, 23. They had the best team and they should have beat the Chiefs in the FC championship game.

Zay Flowers gets chopped at the goal line and like fumbles the game away. They have the fewest design running back carries in the history of the Baltimore Ravens and they lose on the doorstep of the Super Bowl. They were like the only team that'd be number one of defense and overall DVA and not make the Super Bowl. And then they don't. And then the next year they get further and further away. Conference title game and then you're a divisional round. You lose. And then you don't make the playoffs. And I think frankly about how they got brain drained. And I don't know why it took so long for the NFL to brain drain the Ravens,

but Mike McDonald leaves on defense and suddenly Zachore isn't really the same coordinator. And like the Joe Ortiz, your freaking doppelganger goes and runs the charges and people need to go there. And then suddenly- I have like six doppelgangers, I swear. You do. It's all white, bald white guys. He's your, no, but he's your evil twin older brother. Yeah. This is so interesting because I've seen so like the last few days, like obviously I said on the other show, I think Harrod is going get fired and then I kind of walked it back because I was like, oh, is that not like something people believe? Because I was just kind of like, you know, truthfully, I was just basing it off. I was talking to my buddy Jay, who is a Ravens fan. And he was just like, yeah, I think it's like

time. That's kind of like what I was like going off of more or less is like just the general gist that it feels like they need to move on. And so I was like looking at, you know, basically we're kind of checking out like Ravens Twitter and stuff. And there'd been rumors the last couple days that they were actually going to fire Todd Monkin and Zach Orr and keep John Harbaugh. And everyone was like, what are we doing? You know, D.K., you joke, this is the worst case. You joke about all the analytics for fourth down decisions. The perfect model would just be recreating what all the fans of the opposing team.

Sometimes, man, yeah, sometimes you just need to like get the, yeah, like the bigger view. Yeah, like other, your opponents figure out what they want to do the opposite. Craig, you're a Steelers fan. You've rooted against John Harbaugh and the Ravens for 17 or 18 years. gut check, do you, are you, are you like more or less afraid of the Ravens firing John Harbaugh? Are you relieved by this or scared by this? Probably scared because I, I mean, I'd be scared if I were you too, High Fitz, now looking at where Kevin's DeFancy's gonna fucking land.

Uh-oh. Oh, no, dude, I mean, I mean, the Giants are going to hire John Harbaugh. I'm telling you that right now. You think so? Well, if you're John Harbaugh, do you want to go to the Giants and the Titans? The only thing he'd be scared of is the ownership entrenched in the front office, but I don't think that outweighs. What about Stifansky? The Giants are going to want John Harbaugh.

Let me tell you something. They're going to talk and pretend for some shit. They'll interview some people to do the Rooney Rule and Saturday for that. They're interviewing Stefansky tomorrow, apparently. Guess what? The Giants are going to hire John Harbaugh. I'm telling you right now. And that's what, mainly because the Giants love the idea of bringing in somebody with that, like, that name tag, that prestige.

Maybe, let me rephrase. Maybe Harbaugh turns the Giants down. I promise you the Giants prefer candidate will be someone that, I mean, after Pat Schumer and Brian Dable, they would love someone who was a head coach. Yeah. I mean, look, the Ravens have been underperforming. You know, we talked about how it's like it grew stale

in Cleveland, even if Stefansky was maybe a good coach. It's kind of the same thing in Baltimore where it's like they're just like, they were just doing it in the playoffs rather than the regular season failing. But the fact that they never even got to a Super Bowl with Lamar Jackson, it's just one of those things where it's like, eventually it has,

to run its course. Maybe it's similar to Pete Carroll and Seattle, like, ending. I think it's very similar in a lot of ways. It's just like your voice, at some point, it's like you're doing the same speech every year and you're doing the same program every year, the same strategy. It's just like it just gets stale. I mean, think about like, if you look at what the Steelers have done in this decade and what the Ravens have done in this decade, the Ravens are basically only averaging one more win per year than the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 20s. And the Steelers have been rolling out Mitch Trubisky and Mason Rudolph and Kenny Pickett. And the Ravens have had Lamar Jackson this entire time. And it's never really materialized

to anything. So yeah, I think you're right. And here's the thing with the Ravens. I think, you know, it's funny. My mom, who's like late friend had this saying of like, beware people who keep the crazy on the inside. You know, it's like I like people wear the crazy on the outside. Sure. The funny thing about the Harbour brothers is Jim Harbaugh wears the crazy on the outside. He's just straight up crazy. I think John is very serious. Chickens are nervous birds, guys.

He walked that back. He then raised chickens. He then raised chickens. He kept the coop. But I think John... Is he eating the chickens, though, or is he just raising up? I think he's eating the eggs. Dude, he told him the eggs.

This is we should... The fact that we're having this conversation is just more than enough to point out that he's a crazy person. Okay. He's great. But my point with John Harbaugh is like, I think John has just as much of that in him, but it's a little more composed. But the difference, I think, is that the Ravens have had way more sloppiness in certain areas than you would want from someone who's been there so long.

And it's like you could start to see the cracks and the fissures. I think, frankly, John Harbaugh, getting, there were just coaching decisions, certain timeouts, certain end of game situations that I think were just being made up by Lamar. Having said that, I think the giant should hire him. I think I would take John Harba. Like, if everyone, if every coach can't get thrown a hat in the ring, I'm like, give me John Harbaugh. Yeah, but now you have to start talking about who's the. OC going to be. I don't fucking care. Let him figure it out. I mean, it does matter a lot. Okay, but like, you got a young quarterback. I understand that.

The most important person in the building, more than John Harba. On who shows up. If Clint Kubiak shows up to the meeting and he's like, oh, well, he's like the most prepared candidate we've ever seen. This is like what Sean McVeigh sounded like, then like, yeah, you should probably hire him. But the, I don't know. The truth is that when people are doing offensive stuff, offensive coordinators, it's like, that's not your job anymore. you have such a larger operation you're running and like John Harbo has done that. But I got to, I actually trust Steve Pichotti, the owner to make the decision. I kind of think he's the only owner that I'm sure is like, it seems like a value ad.

I've always, I never really care much about the bios for anyone on their team websites, but I've always been interested that Steve Pishottis, the owner of the Ravens on the own Ravens site, it starts with Steve Bishotti wants consistency. His goal is to have the Ravens in the playoff hunt every season, avoiding dips that plague some franchises. And a lot of that's, a lot of other people's bios are kind of bullshit. But like, that's been crazy true. The Ravens went to Baltimore 96 and they've basically been a Super Bowl contender, like two it of every three years.

Do you feel like we just talked about, right? It's hard to do it twice. If you're the Game of Thrones guys, it's hard to make another one, three body problem. Yeah. You know, do you feel like Harbaugh is like the same way when Jim Harbaugh came to L.A. And everyone's like, this is going to work. Like, he's, there's going to win 10 games every year because that's what the Harbaugh's do. Do you feel that way about John Harbaugh at 63 coming to the Giants after the Ravens?

Do you need a sabbatical in college for a few years? It's crazy that he's not sabbatical, but exactly halfway in age between Mike Tomlin and Pete Carroll. Is there any chance that Harbaugh takes a year? If he doesn't like the Giants job, yeah, it's funny. Waits for a better opportunity. Well, you know, you know what's interesting is like, we, we talk about Andy Reed, you know, getting a little long in the tooth and stuff like that. I mean, I feel like Harbaugh used to work on the Eagles of Andy Reed.

They're very close. You wonder if they take a year off, Andy Reid calls it and then just Harbaugh steps into the chiefs. Yeah, but that would imply that Andy Reid's going to see Mahomes' tears ACL and hanging up. I think I do think Matt Nagging is going to be the guy waiting the wings for the chief's job. That's a good call. I think in three years, five years, D.K makes a face, but I'm like, I'm just like, oh, God, that nothing could be less like tantalizing. But Andy Reid's not going to get fired from the Mahomes area.

He's going to pass it on. he would retire. I think my point is Matt Nagy will probably never take another job and wait and hopefully get that chief's job and I think they would transition it internally. Maybe. This is a bigger question here,

which I think is really interesting, is who is who is going to be the Ravens coach? Because we have a two-time MVP and Lamar Jackson. This is still a very talented team. Where are they going to go with this? Do you think they would hire from within like Todd Monkin would be the coach because he's getting head coaching interest?

No way. I think it's fascinating. defense looked horrible. I love Todd Monkin. He's like a football. He's getting head coaching interest is all I'm saying. The Browns already gave Joe Flacco to the Bengals. Why don't they just give Kevin Stefansky to the radio?

DK, the Monkin thing gets to the other reason I think this happened. I think it's one third. It's been a long time. One third maybe Harbaugh had, you know, there's stuff going on the scenes we didn't know about. But it's one third. I think this is kind of a little related to when the Titans fired by Grable. And it was Amy Adams Strunk or Amy, yeah,

Amy Adams Strunk, the owner of the Titans, was fucking piss. that Matt Lafleur was crushing it in Green Bay. And Matt Lafleur, like, was absolutely, had like, the best winning percentage since John Madden. The bell of the ball. One 13 games every season. She's like, we let this guy go and our quarterback suck. And she fired Mike Vrabble and hired him.

She fired Frable. Good guy. Yeah. And like, well, I want, like, an offensive guy like Brian Kellan, I think part of this is that Mike McDonald just got the one seat in the Seahawks. I'm not saying it's the entire reason, but the Ravens defensive coordinator, which obviously the Ravens defense was the quiet engine. The offense with Lamar has peaked invalid MVPs, but also looked untenable for portions,

almost in a like an operator like- D-Dontolm is that's got a sting. Yeah, it's like you want if basically they probably talked about to do. No, I know. No, I know. To promote McDonald's. It's like an impossible decision. No one ever does it.

But in retrospect, you wonder if you should have. Is a coordinator rises up, becomes a star and they have to leave. Yes, but it bothers you in retrospect. And I think that's the fear of having. But then you make decisions on that. later. It does happen. Yeah. Hi, so right now, you'd rather have John Harbaugh than Kevin Stefansky. It's 20 years younger.

That's crazy to say. Wait, how old is Harbaugh? 63. Wow. I would have guessed like 50. I think I'd rather have Stefansky. Maybe that's an insane thing to say. It's so funny because it's like, it gets to the nature of like, the truth is, and we talk about this whole time is like, it's hard to know why things succeed. Well, even look at it.

Well, there's so many moving parts. And I, the truth, and this is maybe a cop out, I want to hear their plans. Like, yeah, John Harbaugh. I'm like, all right, was it connected, man. I want to hear his vision for Jackson's art. And they need to hear it. And I want to hear Kevin Stavansky's vision for Jackson's art. I, you know what?

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Gen. doesn't want to bring John Harbaugh in because I got to tell you something. I don't, like, now I'm thinking about it. The mayor of family might be like John Harbaugh. Let me tell you, it wouldn't be good for Joe Shane. I don't think if John Harbaugh came. He's like, why are you here?

What's AI got to say about this? Yeah. Yeah. That's kind of like go get your shine box. You know what I mean? It's gonna be like Joe Shane sits John Harbaugh down. He's like, how are you planning to leverage AI to make the giant study? How are your prompts?

So John, have you been, you know, have you seen Boris Johnson, the British politician say AI? Them's the brakes. He's like, I. He calls it like I. Oh, like he spells it. He's reading it. He reads it. He's like, I.

Yeah. I. But Joe Shane's like, how does I, John Harbaugh. That's good. It feels weird to go back to. a mock draft now, but I know. Well, I had, I had a point I wanted to say about the mock draft if we're ready to move on yet. Or do you want to, do you want to linger on Harba? I wanted to ask you guys that Joe Shane running the Giants search. Do you remember that scene in Hard Knocks where they

were all those different kids were suggesting different quarterbacks? Yeah. Do you think we're going to get another one? It's going to be like, I want John Harbaugh. And the other's like, I want Kevin Stefansky. And the other one's like, Mr. Beast, do Mr. Beast. last one wait so who should the ravens hire sorry before we move on it's funny because this is one of the what i've seen so far as like one of the least inspiring like coaching carousels in recent memory maybe that's just relative to like what we've had like last year was great obviously in the year before um but i honestly don't know i honestly don't know like who are the who are the big just list off some of the big candidates right now i mean kevin stefansky which it's worth

I mean, first of all, Bill Barnwell had a great post that said, John Harbaugh is obviously the best coach on the market, and the Ravens are obviously the best job on the market, which is absolutely true and kind of funny. It's worth noting, if we're talking about Stefanski to the Ravens, the Ravens were the Browns. The Browns moved to Baltimore, 96, and became the Ravens. And then the Browns were reincarnated in 99.

So I'm not saying that they're that connected, like an actual organization. But the Ravens not picking Stefansky would be kind of interesting. if it made, yeah. Like they've coached against him for six years. Like if anyone you think would be in a position to understand, to be able to separate what, what did Stefansky do, what was he responsible for?

And like, did he do a great job with what he was given? Or like, is he overrated or whatever? The Ravens passed against Defensky, I think would be interesting. Yeah, I mean, DK,

to answer your question, based on, there's been a lot of reports over the last day or two from like guys like Jeremy Fowler or Graziano about like who are the candidates at there right now. It's not. It's not that great. There's the guys who have been coaches before.

There's like the Robert, Sala, Matt, Nagy, Cliff Kingsbury types. Kingsbury. And then it's like a lot of like the hot young coordinators. It's like the Jags defensive coordinator, Anthony Campaniel. It's like the Packers defensive coordinator, Jeff Halfley. There's Dayball in the mix. You have the Rams, the Rams, D.C. Chris Shula. The Chargers, D.C. Jesse Minter.

Mentor is an interesting one because he came up in the Ravens organization. The hard boss, he's a hard game. It's like a Jim John disciple. Oh, that would be very interesting. Is there a world, would you, if you're the Ravens, would you send a, would you send a first round pick to Miami for Mike McDaniel? Oh. Be like, what if Mike McDaniel could design an offense for fucking Lamar Jackson? I probably wouldn't, but it would be awesome.

We would have two years ago, we'd be like, I'd be like hoping he'd get fired. Yeah. Rather than sending a first round pick. All these owners have the same conversations about the coaching candidates. And I'm like, I think if we're going to see a coach trade, it doesn't happen a lot. We might see it. Dude, if Stefansky goes to Baltimore, because Stifansky had two more years on his. deal. So the Browns would have essentially

paid out Kevin Stefansky for him to go to Baltimore and kick the shit out of them. Dude, if the Ravens hire his DeFansompson. What's Tomlin got to say about this? They must be smarter than me. Andrew Barry must be a lot smarter than me. Can't eat soup with a fork.

Oh my God. Can't go to sleep. Stand it up. Wow. I don't know. I'm just imagining shit he would say. Wow. Okay. All right, so at seven, you have the commanders taking edge rusher at Keldrick Fult. Well, to get back to what we were talking about, because we got interrupted, Hyfitz was talking

about positional value and safety and all that stuff. I just randomly talking about Kyle Hamilton. Yeah, Kyle Hamilton is a good example. I just think, I'm thinking, because for a long time I sort of subscribed to the school of thought, like, you should actually pay attention to like how much these guys are going to be making, how much value they bring relative to free agents and all that stuff. But now I think I find myself just going the opposite with it because in recent, recent memory and I've been as guilty as anybody of like kind of like grading down for when

teams take like lower positional value players in the draft you think about like what the lions did a couple years ago and forgive me if I get the order wrong but it was like Jack Campbell Brian Branch and Sam Laporta and it was like line offball linebacker safety tight end and and Jim your Gibbs right so it was running back tight end or sorry running back linebacker and And then safety and tight end. I think those were their first four picks. And I was like, these are all the least valuable positions,

blah, blah, blah. Guess what? They're all fucking good and like core foundational pieces of this team. And I'm like, and now I think about it. And like what the Seahawks did in this last draft, Gray's able, guard.

Their second pick was Nick Hammond Worry, safety, low value, quote unquote low value position groups, but these are two core guys. These two guys in particular help turn around the Seahawks franchise. You know what I mean? It's like,

why do we, I understand why we do this. But what Hyphus was saying where it was like, you have to make that a variable. It's a factor. But also this guy's going to be really fucking good. We're really confident in that. I think is not factored in enough.

And I think people, the response that would be like, no one knows who's going to be good. It's not just about the money. Like position value, it's not just about the money. And the other part of it, like I think the running,

like positions are different. Running back, like I think we've talked about this, but I think where we've landed with the running back debate thing is now we're at the point where the running backs aren't paid that much money. And the answer seems to be obvious. It's the cherry on top of the Sunday. And if you put the cherry at the bottom, that's stupid.

And what the Raiders did to Genty was probably dumb because taking Genty before you have an offensive line, you end up lasting yards per carry. And when it works, the lions, who then use four first-run picks on linemen, all right, well, you take Jimere Gibbs is probably going to be sick. And if you had put Genty on the lions, he probably wouldn't be sick. And Gibbs on the Raiders, maybe it would have been great. And so we've learned that. Sake one of the Giants doesn't help him win. Because Christian McAfro and the Niners doesn't help him win. You put them in the, or sorry, McCaffer and the Panthers doesn't win.

You put them on the Niners. You put Sake one in the Eagles, it works. Clearly, running back depends on offensive linemen. The difference is a guard is also not paid much money, but a great guard makes other positions better. He makes the center better. It makes the left tackle better. It's a force multiply. Like it, he's holding the pocket together.

Exactly. The interior. And it matters more, especially you want to get. back to a power running game. And he's opening up inside runs. Yeah. Safety to me with Caleb Downs is the same thing. A good safety in the modern NFL. I mean, there were teams playing three safeties all year. It's like a good safety. He's making everyone better. Like Kyle Hamilton, the Ravens defense went from like the worst in the league through six weeks. And they traded for Lowy Gillman, a safety to move Kyle Hamilton to a different spot in the defense. And then

they just were transformative. The worst defense to like probably a little above average. I mean, immediately. I mean, the Steelers moving Jalen Ramsey to safety. The Steelers turned into like a completely different defense the second half of the year. It is a, like, Caleb Downs to me, it's like, it is an old, you know, it's kind of like, frankly, I guess the simplest way I put it

is conventional wisdom that a safety is not worth the pick. Smart teams like the Patriots and Eagles are consistently ahead of conventional wisdom. The Eagles paid Sequin Barclay when it was conventional wisdom not to. The smart teams are ahead of it. The idea that a safety, like, as special, and again, anyone could fail.

I think I'm as confident as Caleb Downs will be successful in the NFL as any safety prospect I can remember. Maybe my confidence in him is a sign he's going to suck because that's just how it's gone. We never know anything is the problem. Yeah. But I, the idea that if he's as good as he could be, that that's not valuable, I think that's crazy. He might fail.

But if he succeeds, it's unquestionably worth the top 10 pick to me, a top eight pick. I think outside of the top two tackles, a quarterback, I'd rather have him maybe than some of these pass rushers. Did we discuss or maybe we did and I missed it, that that the commanders, Did fire Cliff Kingsbury today? Have we discussed that? No, we didn't even get into that. So much stuff has happened. The Lions also fired their OC, John Morton, whose name I can barely remember ever.

The commanders fired their offensive coordinator and their defensive coordinator and their offensive coordinator and their offensive white coach. So this, let's, yeah, let's get. So only the head coach. So Cliff Kingsbury theoretically could get fired as a head coach, hired as an offensive coordinator, fired as an offensive coordinator, fired as an offensive coordinator, and then hired as a head coach. And that would be the second time that's happened to him because he got fired a little, but he got fired. at Texas Tech, hired as a USC offensive coordinator, and then given an NFL head coaching job in like six weeks. Getting fired as an offensive coordinator in the NFL

and then hired like a month later as a head coach in the NFL. So I believe what happened there, and I could be wrong, is that Kingsbury clashed with Adam Peters, the GM of the Niners. And the further I get back from that, the more. The commanders. Sorry, Adam Peters came from the 90s. He used to be from the 49ers. I keep thinking about Bill, the, the,

remember when Ben Johnson, the lines up, coordinator who's now the coach of the bearers turned down the Washington job. And there was like, the Washington was very nasty about it publicly because they turned the plane around, which they could bitch about, but he was saving them time. And they very publicly made fun of him. And Ben Johnson leaked basically that they were basketball guys. And that's why he turned down the Washington job. He thought that Josh Harris is a basketball guy. And they had a lot of Magic Johnson. They had a lot of Bob Myers, the Warriors, GMers retired. A lot of basketball thoughts. He was like, I don't, I think Dan Quinn is probably.

fire next year of Washington doesn't make the playoffs. And I think this is like, I think Kingsbury wasn't going to along with Adam Peters. But I think the Washington resurgence might, I'm a little worried about Jen Daniels and I'm a little worried about the Washington resurgence. But Cliff also seems to wear out his welcome consistently. I think he's really tall and really, really, like has a really sexy voice in a great jawline. And he's great talking to 60 year old billionaires and 18 year old high school recruits. Probably right.

Well, you guys just don't know what to do with that one. I don't know what to do with that one. But yeah, I think, Craig, your point that he could fail up is very funny. I just love the idea of getting five as a coordinator and hire a little head coach in a month. Man, the commanders, the commanders, the commanders. I don't think that's going to happen. I don't think he's going to go back to college or something. It sounds like they had like, they worded it, at least what I saw is they worded it kind of like this Harbaugh thing where they, they met and they decided mutually depart ways or whatever because of,

So Clint Kingsbury has like other options that he wants to do. The Jeremy Fowler reported that the Browns were thinking about firing Cefansky and they said that the Browns wanted Mike McDaniel. Mike McDaniel seems like kind of a hot commodity. He's more popular outside of Miami than inside Miami. Yes. Interesting. I don't know.

I think Carlos was happy. Add this to the list of episodes where Carlos is going to be bad at what we said. I think Carlos is thrilled to Chris. grew, the GM got fired. And I think that was the right decision. I kept waiting for McDaniel to be fired. The defense never, the team didn't quit on him. Carlos just texted us saying he wants Harbaugh in Miami's. Oh, well, that's, you know what's so funny. I think the, the Ravens did the right thing, but the Ravens could have traded John Harbaugh. I think maybe you don't want to get into a protracted situation and maybe the rules, the timing

doesn't work out where you don't want to wait to do that. But I feel like teams would have traded picks to the Ravens for him. I know that extorting, he's been there like almost 20 years. Well, it's funny. It's like, how valuable is a coach like Harbaugh, like as a trade piece when he's not really a play designer, play color. He's like a culture guy. It's a CEO. He's literally a special teams coach. That was his background. Which one in the Ravens special teams. But ironic, you know what's so funny. This all happened because a priest blessed the end zone of the Steelers Stadium and then the kick. That's why it happened. A 40 yard field goal in the end zone that priest blessed. Tyler Loop got Harbaugh fired.

That guy, dude, I think Harba also kind of knew because he was the one to walk loop out. And I think Carbaw had an inkling, this would happen. I think he was trying to make me be like, I'm going to lose my job. Not saying it, but I think he knew I'm going to lose my job and I don't want this kid to fucking feel mad about it. Also, it appears as though there are videos circulating. I'm trying to get every angle. I'm reaching out to my sources that Boswell's extra point was perhaps tipped.

So back to that. There you go. Craig's on the Steelers Reddit, checking it out. It's a pruder film. Back into the left. An un-purestically hard. Right. Yeah, yeah.

I hit the wire other coordinator right the cowboys fired mad eber flus the defensive coordinator who again was the bear's head coach and then flus is loose once again flus is loose i mean that never made sense at any point that that make up with the cowboys and flus and i don't think he will i don't think the cowboys are a winnable situation i don't think i don't know what does he have to say about uh caleb williams though yeah who knows you know well he didn't we want to kind of blow through the rest of this mock draft and have dk kind of like pull the the bus wire when he wants to talk about a specific pick? I want to pull the bus wire a couple places.

Yeah, we can do that. All right. So Washington commanders, you give him an edge rusher from Auburn, Keldrick Falk. Mm-hmm. Any thing there? You want me to move on? Big, strong explosive, well, pretty fast guy for his size, like just a big defensive end. I got to be honest.

Big powerful defense. If you have a guy and edge rusher going seventh overall in the NFL draft and you tell me big, powerful explosive? I'm like, yeah. People are comparing him to Michael Williams from the 49th. Niners last year for the 49ers like that kind of player okay it doesn't get you going is what you're saying keep I think no you got to say really this is the first edge rusher like are that you know one of the top three edge rushes in the NFL draft I'm like yeah of course he's gonna be

explosive he better he's yeah he's like I think he's still up and coming young player like okay he's not a tight end Craig we don't know if he's a flag okay it's not like dick's dog or secretary it's pick this kind of surprised me DK you gave the saints a wide receiver to pair with chrisel lave you give him carnell tate your guy ohio state. I think after I think it's like the way I look at it is like they've got something good going here and potentially with Tyler Shuck as like the future of their franchise. Kellan Moore, it seems like he did a pretty good job given what he was what he like took over in New Orleans. So I'm just kind of like let's build the offense up. Let's get the offense going. You can see some

explosive stuff happening with there and you know two former Ohio state receivers. I don't know. I just kind of like that that parent. It was like basically to give Tyler Shuck some more help. Okay. And then next pick here, we have, this just will never seem normal. The Kansas City Chiefs have the ninth pick. Ninth pick. What are we going to, how long into the draft season will we stop being flabbergasted

to see the Chiefs having the ninth pick in the draft? Incredibly bizarre. D.K., can you pronounce the name of the person you are giving to the Chiefs? Mansour Delane. I'm not 100% sure that's right. That was my guess. But yeah, they I think it's just like

they need to get better on defense. They have a lot of holes actually in their offense. I was tempted to go like offensive skill player, but they've done that so much and like completely failed at it the last few years. I was just like, let's go defense here.

I think when we get closer to the draft, I would, I strongly think this will be a trench guy. I think they're going to replace right tackle to one table is the highest paid player on the team that is. I thought about offensive line a lot there. Yeah.

Maybe they took a tackle last year too. No, yeah, they have Justin. at left side, right side, maybe they could find someone who can line up correctly, like, we'll see. But I also think they would go defensive tackle here. Peter Woods at a Clemson, I'm probably, he didn't have a great. He like did his 2024 was better than 2025, which is always weird, but also I kind of don't

give a shit. Well, he's like, he was the type of player who came. I think a lot of people had him as like the top player in the draft coming into the season and he's falling a little bit, but he's still, you know, the upside is he's got like freaky twitch. as from a big guy. Yeah, and then it's like, so he could go higher than I have. I think the Giants could take him at five and I'd be fine.

I also, this is a conversation what happened to guys over the next few months. It's just like, I just think defensive tackles, honestly, I think they're more valuable than past rushers. I think edge rushers are overrated. I think,

I mean, super anecdotal, but if you just look at the last like 10 Super Bowl winners, most of the time, the best defensive tackle in the fucking league is on the winning defense, Super Bowl team. Well, the Seahawks,

like this is again, you know, the CX defense is one of the best defenses we've seen in a really long time. Like, Byron Murphy quietly has been playing so good. He's amazing. He is a freaking just brick wall. Like, teams can't move him off the ball, even when they double him.

He's so good. And he's like, I think there's so many, like, fun players on the CX defense. He does, he kind of flies under the radar, but he's been so good. And that's the thing. It's like, I just, we don't have to go into a rant about defensive tackles. But I think the Chiefs, next season, right now if you look at the roster, literally all of their defensive tackles in Kansas City, except one guy. will be 30 or older in next season.

And I think the one guy that is like a practice squad undrafted free agent is the only defensive tackle that will have in the 20s. So I kind of think that's the floor for Peter Wood. Yeah, I like that. I like that. I like that. Because Chris Jones is going to be like 31, 32. I mean, you know, but crazy that they get to pick that high.

10th pick Cincinnati Bengals. You're giving them Jermad McCoy, cornerback out of Tennessee. This is kind of like the old thing that they gave up. more yards than any other team in the NFL. Maybe we should have some corners. That was kind of like my thinking. McCoy missed the season with the ACL injury that he had off during the off season.

But I mean, yeah, if you just look at the Bengals defense, they gave up every metric that matters really. They were like top or bottom three or four. I mean, is there a team that's considered a good team that needs more things than the Bengals? The Bengals haven't made the playoffs in three years and they kept second. They need more trench guys too. they could use more offensive linemen. They could use more basically every position in the defense. Yeah, I don't know.

This one was tough, but I think like I was just looking at the passing stats, the defensive passing stats. I was like, Jesus. Speaking of Carlos' Miami Dolphins, the 11th pick, you gave them the Oregon tight end who was the biggest biceps I've ever seen in my life. This is so cheap.

His biceps are crazy. I actually think they're triceps. I think his biceps are also biceps. His biceps on his biceps. He looks like, Craig, it looks like someone who could get in the salty spoutoon. Yeah, he looks like he has anchor arms like from, yeah, like you got that you have to blow up from SpongeBob. He is genuinely one of the more jacked people I've seen.

Just him sitting. There's a, there's a shot of him sitting at a press conference. Dude, his arms are fucking like I, I, I, I, we can't make a big enough deal about this. His arms are the biggest I've ever seen in the tight end. It'll be, yeah. And he's not super tall, right, D.K. He's only like six three. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

He is, he looks kind of like a move tight end. I, I, my initial sort of reaction to him like first, first, first. watch was he kind of reminds me of like Laporta where he's a little smaller. I think he's like 6.3, 245 or something like that, but he's pretty good at blocking and he works really hard at it. And I think he's the type of tight end where despite the fact that he's not like 6, 566, he could still be pretty instrumental in the run game in terms of like what Mike McDonnell wants to do. Sorry, Mike McDaniel wants to do in the run game. Like that's a big part of their their philosophy and identity on offense. But he's also, you know, explosive after the catch. He's

really good at the catch point. I just remember two years ago when Johnny Smith was like a huge part of their offense. I'm like, I could picture him having that type of role, but he's probably more effective as a blocker. So that was kind of where I was going with that. I just think they need more weapons on offense. And he is the type of guy who can be a factor in the run game too. So that was kind of my thinking on that. I don't know if he'll go this high. It's always tough to know with tight ends. You know, I think the last few tight ends that have taken, have been taken really high have panned out really well for their teams. If you look at like Brock Bowers,

Colston Loveland this year ended up on a really like high note. Like he's looking like he's going to be a great pick for the Bears. Tyler Warren has been really good. So there's like now a little bit more precedent of taking these, you know, quote unquote like past catching tight ends early and them having like big impact early on. There's also way more precedent. We're going to have to talk about this in depth due an investigation.

Kenyon Stedek is at the cutting edge of, These guys are showing more skin during games than ever. He has the tiniest little shoulder pads. He tucks his shoulder. Like, David Bailey, Texas Tech does that too. Like David Bailey is dominating the Oregon game. It's like Michael Bennett.

Do you guys remember Michael Bennett's shoulder pads? It's like the Vince Pappali shoulder pads, like the little bitty ones. Yeah, yeah. But also they tuck the jerseys, the shoulders into the pads. They keep the jerseys tucked into the pads like Michael Parsons with the It makes it really makes your arms pop, though.

It does. But then also. Yeah, yeah, same. Maybe I'm just old, but I feel like more players than ever are wearing their pants above the knee, like exposed skin. Oh, it's like up to your quad. If you skin your knee on turf, it fucking hurts. But like David Bailey is just dominating this Oregon game. And he looks like, that's how guys look in practice or like warmups like the jersey.

Like you see the pads at the bottom. Yeah. Like it's cleavage. And then I also seeing his knees. And I'm like, this guy is like barely dressed that he's dominant. They're showing underboob out there. Yeah, it's like underboob. It's fucking dominant.

version of under poop. It's provocative. It gets people going. In general, when like I see, like, sometimes I realize, like,

how little pads NFL players actually wear, like, just like some receivers who don't wear leg pads, like no thigh pads at all. They're just like compression. How much it hurts.

Yeah. None of them wear pads on their lower half. When you, high school football, knee pads, no, no, because speed is the name of the game

and makes you slower and they fix you feel tight. None of them wear knee pads, none of more hip pads, none of more any of that. Yeah. What is this, the 80?

Like the fact that like waist down no pads, you can like see their midriff, you can like just see their stomach. I'm like, man, they got their pads tucked into their shoulders. There's like not a lot going on in terms of protection. Yeah, yeah. Soon it's just going to be like they're wearing these like giant alien concussion protective helmets and the no pads below it. It's like the old scuba diver helmet things with the cord. That's just all they're wearing. Okay, let's round this out.

So you have the Cowboys at 12 taking Cale Downs, High Fitz's Boy. Yeah. He'll probably go higher than this. I don't know. I was like, it's one of those things where the positional value is there. It's like people don't. It's hard to predict where he'll go. And then you have one more. 13th pick. You have the Rams who have the Falcons pick taking Avion Terrell, the corner out of Clemson. Yeah. No more flat Stanley. Well, no more relying on him wholly. I think it was like one of the main issues for the Rams this year has been like some cornerback issues. So that was kind of where I was thinking about that. This is the younger brother of AJ Terrell.

Did you do that on purpose? That was really fucked up to give the Falcons pick to the Rams the younger. I did not do that on purpose. I didn't do that on purpose, but I like. Agent Terrell, the best cornerback on the Falcons and you gave his brother to the Rams with the Falcons do. Yeah, I did not actually think that, but that's funny. Yeah.

It's pretty cheeky. He's a fun player to watch, man. He's like always around the ball, super tenacious. A little bit of like Devin Witherspoon personality. to him. He's fun to watch. Okay. That does it. That's D.K.'s first thing. Check out the rest of the mock draft on the ringer.com. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the website. What's the URL? Any other, it's quite long. I have a, never mind. Yeah, we'll put it in the show. We'll put

it in the show notes. Yeah, yeah. Link description. And the discord is in their Instagram, TikTok follow us, but most importantly, Netflix type and ringer. He's hit the set reminder. I have an email I want to read you guys, but first, anything else on Harba being fired or any of the other. Did anyone other, oh, Bengals Taylor. Britt, sentence to five days in jail. Oh, five days. All right. They don't need a quarterback for that. Any other people get fired while we were recording? John Morton, but that's about it, I think. That's like, yeah. Still coming in. Still stuff happening. Any last thoughts of John Harbaugh? Oh, no, Carlos is sending us Dolphins propaganda. Yeah. Carlos is already like following the breadcrumbs.

Yeah. Jordan Rodriguez reporting that the dolphins are requesting an interview with the charges assistant GM, Alexander, who D.K.'s doppelganger brought into L.A., and they spent a lot of time in Baltimore under Harbaugh, and so now I guess the Dolphins want to bring in this GM formerly of Baltimore, which could then reconnect with John Harbaugh. Ooh. Interesting. And then Scott Hansen weighed in and said, whoa, you don't part ways with the coach to make yourself feel better.

You part ways with the coach to make the franchise better. Can you do it in his voice, please? Whoa. You don't part ways with the coach to make yourself feel better, folks. You part ways with the coach to make the franchise better. We'll see which version this is over the next year or two. Coming up next. In the off season, this is the firing hour.

When wins become losses and losses become wins. Jackie hates the witching hour. 18 weeks in a row, Jackie's like, I don't get it. I don't get it. Oh, boy. Where hirings become firings and firings become hiring. Nice. All right.

A couple emails here. We get out of here. Emails. We did the rewatchables. We did basically like our awards for the season, which I was a really fun episode, and I highly recommend listening to that if you didn't give it a chance,

but I would listen to the awards episode from last week. And a couple people emailed in with some things we forgot or didn't realize. Starting with Sean, very important email from Sean. The subject line, there's no text. The subject line is just, Cub Buck is the same name when said forward and backwards. What is it really?

Cub Buck. Backwards is Cub Buck. Oh my God. Maybe that's why he's named that. Cubuck. Oh, that's really funny. What's the word for that? Like an anagram or a palindrome.

Palindrome like race car. Yeah. Cubuck. Wow. Steve Holt. Cup buck. Oh, it's called. Yeah, what is it called?

Palindrum is with a spelling. Palindrome, yes. Dimitri Martin also has written the longest palindrome in the world, which is awesome. Oh, really? You, like, told the joke that's like a palindrome. Which, again, shouldn't palindrome be a palindrome? That's good. They're like a list of words.

Yeah, they really missed an opportunity there. They should change palindrome to Kabuk. Cobbuk. What's your favorite palindrome before Cubbuck? Race car comes to mind. I probably don't have a favorite. It's just whichever ones I can think of. There's like an express, I'm trying to remember like famous one that from

childhood. There's like sentences put together. Oh, a man, a plan, a canal, Panama. Boob is a palindrome. Well done. Yeah. You ever flip the calculator upside down in math classes do that? Boobless.

These kids, those were the whole side is coming apart. That was a big part of my life. Can you believe it went from like people doing that? Now they're just actually Googling boobs in class and not writing it out on that fucking. Right. They're having AI. Just make boobs for them.

Look, there's like six on it. Go. Oh, this is another one. Go hang. Go hang a salami, I'm a lasagna hog. I remember that from childhood. DK loves, D.K.'s a little too sad. Go hang a salami, comma, I'm a lasagna hog.

I don't know D.K. Lose palindrops. I remember, like, reading these back in the day. He knows more palindrums for DK. I want to read these to DK. All right. I'll stop Googling them then. Yeah. Palantrums are fun.

So like AI sentences. Like I'm looking at one cigar, toss it in a can. It's so tragic. That doesn't make any sense. Mounder. That's like something Canada Mendoza would say. Yeah. Yo, banana boy.

Come on. That's good. No lemon, no melon. I very much just remember a man, a plan, a canal, Panama. Anyway, what were you talking about? Oh, yeah. Is that the only email that you had? I had more.

We could get out of air. Okay. Next episode. Cobb Buck blew my mind. Cub buck. Is this last name BUC though? No, but don't fucking ruin it.

You need a good thing going. Sorry. Be cool, man. All right. Let's get out of here. Thank you, D.K. Thank you, Craig. Thank you.

Awesome. Thank you, K. Thank you, Kallels. Thank you, everyone for listening. Watching. Set the reminder of Netflix or follow us in Spotify or wherever you get your pods. Watch, listen, whatever.

Instagram, TikTok, Discord, to the episode description. Thank you, everyone. Thank you to Steve Bichotty, Ravens owner for doing that while we were recording. That was actually super convenient. But of course, thank you, Lord. Lord. Thank you, Teddy Swims.

I know one song by him. Oh, I thought that was a palindrome. I just assumed, but it's not. What's the song you know? Wait, Teddy Swims. What's insurance? Handle? What?

What's someone else? A man of pan. I'm a lasagna hog. No way. I'm a bolognaug. Ed Sharon is Teddy's photos? Teddy's photos. I thought that's what Teddy Swims is.

I'm vaguely familiar with Teddy Swims. I don't know anything about him. How did his name pop into your head? Just, you know, I know that song. Lose Control? Oh, that guy. That song's great. Well.

Well, let me reframe. That song's super stuck in my head. How's it go, D.G.? No, I'm not going to. I'm gonna try it. I think it's like a harder. Zing control. Whoa, whoa.

Wow. Yeah, it's not like you can just say it, Craig. I don't know how to explain it, but I don't like songs like that. You know. You just can't explain your taste for things. That's just a pop song, but there are certain songs that are like that and I don't like them.

And I don't know how to describe them. And I'm trying to think of other songs that are like that. Like, like, um. Like, do you like, like, The famous Benson Boone song, don't like it. You don't like Flippy Boy? I don't like a little flippy boy. I got to, I'm embarrassed to say the control that it's funny.

I call it the control song. Beautiful things. It's cool. I don't like when, yeah, lose control. I guess that the, I'm embarrassed to say that if that song's on like a Starbucks or something and I'm talking to someone, I actually would like in my head. I wish you would stop talking so I could listen to this controls. Yeah. I know you, I totally know what you're getting at though, Craig.

I don't know. I don't describe it. Yeah. cheap. Yeah, maybe it's like something that are designed to be earworms, but isn't it, I feel like most pop songs are like,

I feel like I'm being hat. But I like that song. Yeah, I don't know. But if you saw him do it at the Grammys and I was like, I think this guy, he's kind of losing control.

Is it like, is it sort of like songs that are designed to show off how you can sing? Maybe. That's really good. Your range. Because beautiful things, He screams it.

Yeah. Maybe. Maybe that's it. You're like, okay. Is there a difference for you when men or women do it? Like if there's like a like a Celine Dion song, like I assume heart will go on like or like songs. No, no, no. Because like.

Adele, I'm not like mad at Adele singing, you know, whatever. Park and bark legend. Hello. So I don't know. I don't know what it is. Email us if you do music and you know what we're talking about. Please. The only other song I can think of right now is.

Benson Boone's beautiful things. That's like kind of the same type of song to me. But I don't, I don't know if it's like a ballad or what, or what, I don't know. Someone's going to know. Email us if you know why Craig hates lose control by Teddy Swips. We're going to get that question. Yeah. All right.

Goodbye, everyone.