The Ringer NFL Show - Our Final QB Rankings, First-Round WR Locks, and Belichick Doesn’t Drink Coffee

Episode Date: April 18, 2024

LIVE SHOW in Detroit on April 24: Click below for tickets! PANDA WATCH: QB charting edition (4:00)! Next, the guys highlight which players are first-round locks, as well as a few fringe guys who could sneak in at the end of the round (38:43). “You guys want to do some emails?” (57:12) Tickets: http://bit.ly/ringerdraft24 Check out our 2024 Ringer NFL Draft Guide here! 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, Craig Horlbeck, Danny Kelly, and Ben Solak Social: Kiera Givens and Jack Sanders Producer: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Brian Curtis from The Ringer, and I want to tell you about the Press Box podcast. The Press Box is a podcast for anybody who likes news, whether it's about sports or politics or pop culture, and wants to understand how that news really gets made. We have new shows every Monday and Thursday. We have long interviews with everyone from John Crackauer to Joe Buck. Your social media feeds are bursting with information every day. Let us help you sort it out. join us on the press box.

My name is Danny, how you, Fitz, I am. Join my Danny, Kelly, Ben, Slocke, and Craig Boralbeck. And today, we're going through Mr. Ben Solac has charted every throw from every important quarterback in this draft at NFLDraft.3.com. We're to go through all, like, what you learn? And then also just Deacon Salk are just going to tell us where we stand with all these quarterbacks. We are seven days, or, yeah, when you're listening, seven days out from the NFL

draft. Thank God. seriously. We have other things coming. We're going to go through the invites, people who are attending the draft, and we're going to go through mistakes. And also, who would you bet your life on? Athletes who are attending, not just like people.

Oh, yeah. Well, we are attending the draft, too. Yes, true. Yes, we have a live show on Wednesday, the 24th in Detroit. Yep. Yeah. There are still a few tickets available. So check the description of this episode, and you can buy a ticket.

It's only $200. Link in bio. Yeah. A couple hundred bucks. Come see us. Not that expensive, Craig. Everybody who opens the links can like, wow, what a deal. That's my point.

That's what I was. And then I thought it would be. And then they buy it. And that's a flash sale. It's only 25 bucks. There's an 80% discount right now if you click now. And only right now. Not later.

Just now. Well, that's how they used to do commercials. It was like, if you call right now, you'll get it 70% off. I'm like, this is BS. Four easy payments of 1999. One other programming note, though, the draft is coming up, as we know in a week. But this podcast is not going away. for those who have been listening to us for a long time,

know that after the draft ends, we switch our feed back to the Ringer fantasy football show. So the week after the draft, we are not going anywhere. We will be doing rankings looking ahead to the 2024 season. But yeah, like I said, there will be no dark weeks for us. We will be with you at least once a week,

starting right after the draft all the way through kickoff in 2024. So we are not going anywhere. We never ask for you to follow or subscribe. We're not like, oh, like or subscribe. Literally, unless we change the name, of the podcast feed. That's the only time because I don't want you get confused and then you can't find us.

So just like hit follow on Spotify, hit subscribe and then give us them stars too while you're at it. Those stars. If you like it and also if you just started listening for the draft and you're like, oh, these guys don't suck. We'll still be doing emails, Baywatch, all that jazz.

And also sometimes we get players right in August for fantasy football. But So like, you know, he'll be having a kid. Well, he won't, but he'll be there. but. Technically speaking. Technicality. He's not having the child. I don't know.

We were at our Dula session yesterday and I was practicing the positions, man. This is a good time. Doing some stretches. It was fun. Is that the name of the class that they're always in like a movie or something when stuff like. That's a little. The Lama's. Dula is like a midwife.

She's somebody who's like really good at birthing. She has a new album coming out next month. Yeah. Yeah. Time person of the year. That was a dad joke, Craig. It was a good one. I got my dad jokes mug.

A little East Craig for the YouTube people. Ready to go. So, oh, wow. This is the first time ever. We're going to be going to Mr. Ben Solac for America's new favorite segment. Panda Watch! I need a little more growling. Panda Watch.

I got a little more. The tone is very different. Panda Watch. Yeah, you got to really rattle the throat. Yeah, so that's a little more. raspy for sure. It's like aggressive. Panda watch. I feel like I'm like imitating a war veteran in a movie.

Oh, Panda Watch. If you're also just joining us who's no idea what's happening, the draft is just Panda Watch from Anchorman where we're just like, what's up with these guys? And nothing's changed because they haven't played football since. But so like you did go through in chart literally every quarterback in this draft, the ones that matter and every throw they've had. Every throw. I feel like we can't gloss over that. You've watched every throw these quarterbacks.

From their final season, so long as I have the film. and I don't grade like, you know, Caleb Williams versus Texas Word Incarnate. I don't. Like, when I looked back at old data and it was just, it was so jacking the numbers that I was like, I'm not doing any of these games anymore. Like, I will do if they play group of five. I won't do anything lower than that. How did Caleb Williams do against Texas Word Incarnate though?

Pretty good. All right. Turns out. Yeah. So all those throws and like, you're looking just for like a big sample because I'm trying to come up with metrics like how generally. accurate were they to the deep area of the field and outside the numbers. And those can be small samples.

And so you need to get like a big sample of a lot of games. They'll also see like a variety of coverages, right? Like if you have a PAC 12 guy and you're just charting all their PAC 12 games, they're getting so much off cover. And then Caleb Williams plays against Notre Dame. And it's like, oh, like there's some press. Like he doesn't see a lot of this when he's in the pack 12. And so yeah, you got to get a big sample on things.

So look, I'm going to kind of pick out a sentence or two from your assessments that stood out. Caleb, obviously he's expected to go number one of the bears. You have the numbers for Caleb, his accuracy on pressure dropbacks are some of the best I've ever collected, both reps when he's getting hit and reps when he skates the pressure and resets. All this with a totally average rate of interceptable passes, Lizaan Al-Gaiy. Yeah. The fact that, like, when you really watch Caleb and you get through all the, all the throws

and you get some of the numbers, you start to realize that, like, if you pass over him, like, you know, cursory, like, if you just do a quick glance, It looks like there's some plays where he's like super casual and laissez-faire. Like, oh, he just allows pressure to come and he throws in this bad platform because he's just like overreacting to pressure. Once you get to the nitty-gritty, you realize, no, like he just is so fluid and free as an athlete that he can just be like backpedaling, you know, bad throwing platform, bad arm angle because there's pressure coming in his lap. But he's still like processing and making accurate throws and making the right decisions. It's just that he moves so freely. It looks like he doesn't care.

But really like it's just, no, he has. like there's more colors of the rainbow for Caleb Williams. Like he says he has things in his bag that quarterbacks don't have. The Newtonian laws of physics don't apply to the dude. And so I really enjoyed watching Caleb long term because he's a much better processor and much better against pressure and much more responsible than people realize. It's just when you like, oh, like watch, you know, Notre Dame and Utah and Oregon, and like some of these games that he's lost.

Like, oh, like, you know, he was bad on the clutch and like he had knucklehead interceptions. Yeah, when you watch the full breadth of his work, this is like, It's myestro level stuff, dude. He really is. It's fun to see. Ben, I have one quick follow-up for you. I feel like there have been three can't miss quarterbacks in like the last 10, 12 years. Luck, Lawrence, and Burrow. And none of them missed. Do you think Caleb Williams is in that camp where you would truly be shocked if he was not at least a competent starting quarterback for a long time in the NFL? Yes. The highest graded quarterback that I've ever had was Trevor. Second is Caleb. And I have Caleb right in that team. where I don't think he's better than Trevor like I wasn't doing law I wasn't I was in high school

and lucky enough but yeah yeah he's he's very different than Trevor in terms of how they played but in terms of caliber of quarterback prospect yeah like you can't watch Caleb Williams and pretend that you don't see any Mahomes anybody who does is lying to themselves so they're like oh no like I would never compliment to Mahomes

dude like you when you just watch the way he moves again it's the freedom of movement it's the strength from weird platforms it's the accuracy from weird platforms it's the accuracy from weird platforms, it's the creativity. Like the age of quarterbacking that Mahomes heralded, that he helped introduce to the league, Caleb is both a direct product of that.

He clearly watched it and been inspired by it. And he's also a continuation of it. Because he accesses areas of the field that humans don't get to. Like he makes things possible that aren't possible with other top quarterback prospects. Absolutely. I think Caleb's going to be a multiple-time all-pro. I think he's going to win an MVP.

I think he's going to win a Super Bowl. Wow. D.K. Yeah. Coming off that. Do you think there's anything? Do you think there's anything that another team could do could offer to the Bears to get them off their first back?

Do you think there's anything, Washington, who has the second pick and is in the same city where Caleb Williams is from, could offer anything to Chicago to get them to swap picks with them? I mean, I think there's always a price for everything, right? Like if they offered two first round picks to move up one spot or something like that, and I think you have to think about it, but I think if I'm Chicago, the way that it's set up and the way that they've played this whole thing out to land Caleb Williams, I feel like they've played it so perfectly, it would just be getting cute at this point to move back and not take him.

You know what I mean? Like at some point you got to start doing something instead of continually trading back and everything. I don't know. I wouldn't do it personally. I really like Drake May. He worries me more than than Caleb Williams in terms of just like some of the inaccuracies and things like that, like that people are talking about. To me, Caleb Williams has incredible, incredible, just control of the football at all times. Like the way he can throw, the way he can vary everything, the way he can move around.

He's just in control. When are we recording Take Perge? Is it? We're doing it on Friday. We're recording this on Wednesday. We are recording our Take Perch on Friday. All right. I will have an opinion on Caleb Williams on Take Purge.

That is to D.K.'s point. I will not say it on this podcast because it would count if I gave it on this podcast. Later, yeah, yeah, I will. But I just did a play sheet on Caleb Williams. The videos up on Ring on YouTube. we are forgetting just how specialists guys. We've done so much Jaden Daniels talk and so much J.J. talk and so much Drake May talk.

We debated QB 2, 3 and 4. And everybody's like, oh yeah, Caleb at 1 to the bear, sure, great. No, like, you could fusion dance the best of May, the best of McCarthy, the best of Jane and Daniels, and you would not get a quarterback close to going one with Caleb in this class. This is what happened with Lawrence.

We like didn't talk about Lawrence pretty much the entire off season because there was... Yeah, and then they were in a piece where they were like, this guy is interested in other hobbies. We were like, wait, he's he bad? And like, it's the same thing with Caleb, where it's like, wait, he painted his fingernails? Is he not good?

And it's like, no. Like, stop creating things to talk about just because the on-field product is so good. He's like, Lesnar Gai, man. This is the one we've been waiting for. The chosen one. What does it mean? The promised one?

It's the voice from outer worlds. I read the book or whatever. Who, wait, who wrote? I did not read the books. Does anyone want to do the plot of Dune 2 in 10s? It could do that in 40 seconds? No. I haven't seen it yet, so.

Pink Alaskan bull worm. Yeah. I still haven't seen it. I saw somebody recently posted it to Twitter. And that being the entire Dune 2 movies, so maybe I'll just watch it on X. Don't you dare. It's on Twitter.

Yeah, I love what that happens. It kills me. Just rotate your phone. Yeah, yeah. It absolutely kills me that people just post full movies to X now because you can't. It's unbelievable. Anyone but you just like randomly popped on X like a couple months ago. I love it.

Stop calling it X. Are we calling it X? In the context of you can, the site is so broken, Dune 2 can be published on it. I will call it X. That's fair. You know, it does suck that like our children will grow up calling it X, and then I'm going to be the old fart to be like,

it used to be called Twitter, you know, and they're going to be like, who cares, dude? What are they going to call tweets? Posts? You know that meme of the, like, the girl ushering, like, the old lady on the walker? And it's like, Clay Thompson used to be like, you know, a surgeon in end-of-game scenarios.

Like, he was actually one of the best closures of all time. And it's like, yeah, sure. Oh, for 10 against the Kings last night. Yeah. We used to deliver internet to people's homes. The internet came on a CD. The internet. Always, dude, every time.

Next thing we have Drake May, the quarterback from UNC. You mentioned this. I want to read what Soleg said. I want to throw it to Deke actually. I like that Hyphen's put him second, even though he's probably not going to get drafted second. I just let you know where Hyvitz's his mind is out. Well, D.K. brought him up.

So, Solek, you wrote, May is inaccurate, but with a pinpoint score of 58%, he's not prohibitively inaccurate. Wait, so wait, wait, you said May is inaccurate, but not prohibitively inaccurate? Yeah.

So is May inaccurate or not? What is pinpoint accurate? Or is he just a little inaccurate? Yes, like May is less accurate by my charting than Jay Jim McCarthy and J.G. McCarthy and Jaden Daniels and Caleb Williams and Bonex, right? Like he scored worse in terms of pinpoint percentage,

which is like migrating accuracy, not just for like, was this catchable? But like, did it protect your receiver from throwing into a hit unnecessarily? Did it, you know, pull him up field? did it allow him to get more yards after the catch? It's like, you know, kind of hyper-specific accuracy.

So he charted below those guys. But it's not like a terrible number. Like Michael Pennix's number was way worse. There's quarterbacks in previous classes. Like, like Zach Wilson's number was worse. Malik Wilson's number was worse. Like there's guys who have been like talked about as early players who had worse numbers. So there's that.

And then also when you start to look at the context of accuracy, because like, of course, Bonex was very accurate. He threw behind a line of scrimmage all the time. He threw beyond his first read rarely. and into tight windows rarely. Drake May is one of the highest tight window throws in this class, one of the highest rates of going beyond his first reading the class, he's one of the highest depths of target in this class.

And in those contexts, when he's throwing beyond his first three, when he's throwing downfield, when he's throwing into tight windows, he's one of the most accurate quarterbacks in this class. So it's not that May was super inaccurate. It's that May was playing on hard mode. And so while he looks inaccurate, it's not prohibitive. It's not like, oh, no, like this guy can't make NFL throws. So he absolutely can.

So he can make NFL throws, but he's bad at the easy stuff. Like when he tries the hard stuff, he's good at it. But he slips up. with easier throws. Yeah. So, like, when he's doing a lot of, like, his, like, quick game stuff, he'll have accuracy drain because his lower half mechanics aren't that great. It's too easy.

She's too easy for me. Yeah. The other thing that makes grading accuracy really hard is that a lot of it is conditional on wide receiver play, right? Like, there are throws of May where, like, May misses a receiver by, like, five yards. And you watch it and you go, okay, well, like, if that receiver was running a seam, that would have been a perfect throw. But the receiver ran, like, a bender.

Like, he curled the wrist. route. And so he missed. Then you have to watch the body language of May, watch the body language of the receiver, try to figure out who was the idiot, right? Like, do the receiver get this wrong? Like, is this really an inaccurate pass? Or did the receiver just breaking away? It's incorrect.

May's receivers, I thought, were really bad at working in zone coverage. And a lot of times they would run themselves back into coverage and make throws harder for May. I think that there's a lot of worlds in which May walks into league and just looks more accurate because his receivers are a lot more quarterback friendly. Even like the good, like, oh, Tess Walker is going to be an NFL or top receiver for UNC. You could say Tess is an NFLer.

You cannot say he was QB friendly. He drops everything. He snaps off routes at the wrong depth. He doesn't work back to the football. Like May did not like, May's tight end was like QB friendly. He would like get open and like adjust to the football. Everybody else was May's greatest enemy.

These guys, they're just short, small, fast guys who don't know their landmarks. And it was very frustrating to watch. So, Dika, do you agree with that? And like, do you agree that Drake May was not accurate, but it's not his fault? I think I don't remember exactly what I wrote in my article, yes, I think his accuracy was a little bit scattershot. I think there were times, too, where you see it, it looks like he's been accurate, but he's kind of just,

it's almost like a de facto throwaway. Like there was a lot of times where he like would shoot for a, you know, the honeyhole between the safety and the corner and the, oh, yeah, like deep. And he would just kind of throw it out of bounds because he knew that it wasn't there. And that kind of can reflect your accuracy as well. So I thought, you know, his footwork was erratic at times and his accuracy was erratic at times. So yes, I agree with that.

That being said, everything that Soak said rung true to me, he's a big play hunter. He's a very aggressive thrower. He was kind of doing the thing that Caleb Williams did a lot, which was try to put the team on his back. And sometimes that led to, you know, bad plays or bad throws, inaccurate throws. At the same time, though, he had like a really low turnover-worthy throw rate. It wasn't like he was turning the ball over a lot. It was just the ball wasn't necessarily pinpoint accurate every time. But the way we're talking about Drake May.

feels like we're talking about a boom-bust quarterback who could hit big or miss big. So, D.K., why are, like, you mentioned that you wouldn't want to do a Caleb trade because if you're the bears for almost any price, obviously there's always a price. But because the other quarterbacks of downsides, like, like Drake May sounds like someone who, if he doesn't hit, could suck. But we're not really talking about him, like a risky prospect. I don't really feel that way about Drake May. I think I'm just very convicted on Caleb Williams' skill set.

Like, I think his skill set is so special. that I'm just like I would want to bet on that over anything else. I don't think, I don't know if boom or bust is the right term for Drake May. I think that maybe he's more in the category of like, we need to develop him a little bit. You know what he kind of reminds me of, honestly, is Jordan Love. Jordan Love coming out of college was wildly erratic, like especially his last year. And that was one of the big kind of hangups with him. Obviously, Jordan Love got a really rare, rare opportunity to develop.

and I would not, I mean, does anyone think he's inaccurate now? Like, I think people generally speaking think he's very accurate and precise in that offense that they run. And the love comparison also is helpful because they're aggressive, right? And again, this provides context for the inaccuracy. Like, May is trying so many downfield throws that he kind of needed to try at UNC because like that's how they were going to win games. They didn't have a great running game.

They did not have a good defense. That in the league, part of his growing. process and this was absolutely true of Jordan Love. Go watch the early season Jordan Lovers Lacey's in Jordan Love is just learning when to take your medicine and get the second and six, right? It's just like, dude, like we cannot be trying to move the ball down the field in four plays like it's Madden on every single drive. And that's going to be something that may has to learn. The boom bust construction is like fine for me. I understand that construction. If we, if we clarify that like the boom is worth the bust, right?

I think like, Jade and Daniels. Hi Fitz and Craig just smiling. Get your minds are the gutters. Yeah. I think Jade and Daniels is very boom bust, but I think like there's an argument that like, dude, you introduced this construction. You started this.

Just saying the boom is worth the bus is funny. It's objectively funny. That's funny. I'm with you. I'm in there. Now I have to try to do the rest of this, this monologue. I'm trying to say bust as many times

as many ways that will get. high fit's going. When Drake May hits, we're talking like top 10 quarterback. We're talking like a Trevor Lawrence, Justin Herbert, sort of a player. Even in the worlds where Drake May misses, he misses by like being too aggressive, attacking too difficult to throws. Like his bust is still going to work in the league. And so it's just going to be like erratic and high, like, you know, high variance, high ceiling, low floor. It's going to be frustrating. But you can smooth that out over time. Like you really, really can. And so to me like the risk is very much worth the reward when it comes to Drake Mae. Toolset, skill set, overall talent. I'm still really wanting to bet on Drake May.

Intangibles. Everybody, he's like the best leader. Everybody loves him in a locker room. All the vibes are really good about Drake May, just like as a dude. I don't know. I still really love May. I want to bet on him. I think at the end of the day, like, the short way of the TLDR version of everything that we just said is like, landing spot is going to make a difference in terms of like how quickly it all comes together for him, I think. Next up with Jade and Daniels, quarterback at LSU. I mean, again, won the Heisman trophy and kind of wasn't weirdly kind of Joe Burrow-ish and that wasn't super on the radar necessarily as a top draft pick and then has one insane offensive record-breaking season in LSU and then now is like in this conversation. So like you wrote, in all my time charting, I don't think I've seen anything quite like Daniels pressure response numbers.

He stood in the face, Jen Daniels, stood in the face of pressure and delivered a pass and just over one out of every three dropbacks. That's an absurd number. He took a sack on almost a quarter of the dropbacks. he so if if jaden daniels was pressured right and this is in the pocket his guard lost or he was in the pocket for too long and a guy inevitably won or there was a blitz and there was a free rusher he was out of the pocket by design and a guy came and rushed him if he if he got any sort of pressure in his vicinity he was remarkably more likely to either scramble or take a sack than he was to just stand and deliver the ball which is just not acceptable it's not penable it it it denies the structure of the offense.

It denies opportunities for the receivers to make plays, for the tight ends to make plays, for the offensive line to make plays. It is just, it is, Jane and Daniels so quickly and like, concerningly, runs towards backyard football, pursues backyard football.

It will make decisions to get away from college football and NFL football and real football, design football in the playbook, to just return to the safety of backyard football. It's terrifying. It's so concerning. If it works is going to be the biggest headache to defend in the league. Like he's going to be such a challenge to defend because every time he gets outside of the pocket, it's just do-do.

Sirens going off. He's breaking tackles. He's drop-kicking safeties. He's running circles around linebackers. Like he's such a good athlete. But it's just we have seen so many quarterbacks in the league fail because their response to pressure breaks the offense. Right. It's just like, all right.

Like if you can keep them clean, keep them on schedule, it's great. But the second they start to get a grain of sands and the cogs of their system, they short circuit. And that's absolutely the case right now with Jaden. It's, I've never chartered a quarterback who stands and delivers the ball less in the face of pressure

than I have with Jane Daniels. Is there a worry that this is just another version of Justin Fields? He sounds like skinny Justin Fields, to be honest. I don't release my rankings and my comments like DK does on the board, but like I'll tweet him out. My comp is stick figure Justin Fields.

For Jaden Daniels, yeah. Yeah. He doesn't throw over the middle of the field. He goes deep. He scrambles too quickly, and he's really fast. He has multiple first round receivers. But he's,

He's probably not as slow a processor. I think is like maybe the hope that that gives you hope about Jane Daniels. Probably. But also I'm Justin. Justin Fields didn't look like a slow processor at Ohio State. He had two top 20 picks of wide receiver. And that's what I've got with Jane Daniels, right? But he has, I think the difference though is that Jane Daniels like improved each year of college.

And like it's weird because he's old. And on one hand, it's like, okay, it's bad that he took that loan to dominate college. But at the same time, there is a trend of progression. I'm not convinced he improved each year of college. I think he got good in his. final season when he had two top 50, 20, fix the receivers and, yeah, and a great offensive line. Like, that's the thing is,

is you say improved every year, I say late breakout. Justin Fields least was doing it when he was 20, right? That, to me, was more interesting. So, D.K., what is, you said he had, uh, Jen Daniels, has shades of Robert Griffin the third. What did Archer? Because no one had issues with Robert Griffin the third being the second pick in the draft. Yeah, but

I bet wasn't that because he was the first of his kind and people were enamored by such a skill set and we hadn't seen much of it now. Now we have a track record of all these guys. Yeah, but also I would say it's more normalized now to have a quarterback who can run more to be like, yeah, that'll work. I would say, like, but what did RG3 have that Jaden Daniels doesn't have

that prevents you from wanting to pull trigger on Jayden Daniels? I mean, I don't know if I really look that deeply into it's like, I don't think he's exactly RG3. I just think stylistically this is a dual threat guy who's skinny. My take, my, my, my comp was like, essentially like, this is a highly

athletic guy that loves to attack down the field and can do a ton of things with his legs, but is skinny and there's worries about injury. Like, that was my, that was my cop. I don't think they're necessarily the same player.

Let's say it the only way that matters then. Let's say the draft goes Caleb Williams to the Bears. And let's say Washington takes Drake May with the second pick. New England is on the horn with a third pick.

You have, you could take Jaden Daniels at LSU or Jiji McCarthy. The Raiders are on the phone and they're offering you like, you know, because Antonio Pierce was Jim Daniels, like he coached at Arizona State,

he recruited him. The Raiders are on the phone. They want Jane Daniels. You know, let's say the package is fair. It's not like way, you know, it's like your first, the next year first. It's like a normal. Are you like, yes, let's do it because I don't believe that Jane Daniels is like the quarterback for this team.

Like, like, it's not like just this chicken and the egg. Like, oh, like, oh, is it better? Like, is he good enough to build your team around? Yes or no. I think I lean towards tradeback because I'm not, I don't have enough conviction that he is. The guy, I would say, I put it this way. I am worried enough about all the things that we've talked about with with him. him all along that I probably would just be like, let someone else take him.

That being said, I think there is a world, there is a realistic version of Jane Daniels, where he is, comes in and just lights the NFL on fire. But I have enough legitimate concerns about some of the pressure to stack numbers, some of the scramble rate numbers, all the things that we've been talking about, all this whole process, that it's just like in the back of my mind and it worries me. And I probably would be like, I'm going to take the huge, huge package that we're getting to trade back and just figure it out later. I don't really get what's going on with Jaden Daniels.

I really don't. It feels like almost everybody in the media agrees that he should not be the second pick and that Drake May is better. I would say that's the overwhelming majority is that people like Drake May. There's a couple like big media guys who have him super high, right? Like I know like Orlovsky's got Jaden Daniels ranked super high. And so there are some dudes who are like really, really big on him that I think has created a public perception that like, you know,

like Jaden should be up there, which is not to levy a criticism of Roloski. It's just I think probably more people listen to Roloski to listen to us, if I'm being honest. So that's why you get that sort of influence, you know? I just feel like all the people I'm reading online are like, Drake May is a better quarterback. Jaden Daniels is way too big of a risk, all this stuff. And I don't understand why he is such a lock for Washington to take him at number two.

I don't understand why the Washington front office is so convinced of this player when it seems like nobody else is. Why is it just them? I don't think he's a lock, but I think that Jaden Daniels fits a lot better what Cliff Kingsbury wants to do with the offense and I just think he fits that better. But also he might not be the pick for Washington though. Which I do hear like I do think Jaden fits well for Washington.

I also like Drake May played in the air raid. Drake May 22 was Phil Longo with his O.C was Phil Longo. It is as air raid as you can get. Like yeah, the I agree that Jaden fits. Whenever people are like, oh, Drake May is now what Washington's looking for. I'm like, what are they looking for? This is this guy ran the system. I just think this is weird.

I'm saying like I think Cliff Kingsbury has the Lincoln Riley in him where they're, what's the word, hot. They're hot men who seem to be able to, like, probably recruit and identify talent more than necessarily, like a stickler for details. And I think Cliff, like, Kyle Shanahan wants a quarterback to be his, like, controller and he's just playing mad through him. I think Cliff Kingsbury is like, Lincoln Riley at USC,

he's coached Caleb Williams, who's like, yeah, you know, Caleb, this is the play, but, you know, just go make something happen, man. Like, it's kind of like an L-I-V-I-N, like, and I think that the idea that Jane Daniels can come in and just like, yeah, play didn't work, but yeah, yeah, Jane just made it happen. Good job. De-work right there. You know what I mean?

Like, I think that there's an element of bailing your ass out that Jaden Daniels kind of brings. I will say that like on the Jane and Daniels lock for two thing. So much of it right now, everybody who's reporting Jane Daniels at two makes it very clear that they are reporting that because the rest of the league things that are going to. And that's what Zach Wilson was to the Jets where we just were like, oh, this is going to happen. So then we kind of move on. And so whether it's a good idea. So right now on Fandle, Jane Daniels minus 300 to go to overall. That is the biggest favorite he has been.

it's the biggest favorite we've had for that pick in months. And so, like, that's the expectation. We are going to be all together in Detroit, literally like a week from right now talking about all the, like, you know, the top five picks, top ten picks, what to expect. First day is tomorrow. I would not be surprised if our opening thing on the show is about how the Jaden Daniels thing was not true. And it's Jason McCarthy or it's Drake May. Just because, like, the way this is being reported and intimated is, like, putting the tea leaves together,

we think it's going to be Jaden Daniels. But if somebody gets good sourcing on the commanders and says, hey, like, it's J.J. I'm ready to change my perspective on two overall pretty quick. It's interesting, too, because I think, Craig, for most of the college season, at least from my perspective, maybe I just didn't see this. But it was it was Caleb Williams and Drake May, clear cut number one and number two. Yes. And then Jane Daniels kind of swooped in as not, he didn't even, he didn't even swoop in initially as. as like the number two pick.

All of a sudden, people are talking about Jane Daniels as a first round pick. Like, oh, maybe he's going to sneak into the first round, you know? And then gradually, as this process is gone along, we're talking about him as the like probable number two pick. You know what I mean? Instead of being like, oh, this guy has the talent to be in the first round. This guy, you know, everything he's done this year has been so amazing.

He could be a first round pick. Now it's like, oh, he's better than Drake May. Drake May is the, you know, QB5 or six or whatever on some people's boards. And so it's just this is, to me, this is, the perfect example of just the draft, you know, draft industrial complex that we just talk ourselves in circles for months

and decide things, even though these guys haven't played or done anything. This is like my rant against the pro days. Like, they're not playing football. Nothing is happening. Catch. They're playing catch.

They're playing catch. No one has played football since freaking January or whatever. You know, so it's like, it's just kind of ludicrous. I don't know. I love that. That's the process. That's how it goes.

That D.K. Breakout's my favorite. They're going out there. and they're playing catch. Do you hear Dan Quinn? By the way, someone was interviewing Dan Quinn the other day and he was like, let's be honest. I mean, at these pro days,

they're just going out there and playing against dare. Like, why are we talking about it so much? Yeah, we gotta get Dan Quinn and D. Dan Quinn knows ball. Dan Quinn, come on the take purge. Just DK and Dan Quinn hanging out in the backyard,

grilling off some burgers, complaining about the HOA and the fact that they're not even doing anything of pro days. They're playing catch, complaining about how pro days are going. This is our pro day. We're doing the same thing.

This is our pro day. Dan Quinn comes out of the take purge. He's like, I didn't even want this job. Dude, if I go out there and play catch, I could be accurate on a couple throws. Get me at a pro day, you know? Oh, yeah. I'm so excited for the take perch. Anyway.

But wait, we're on this. D.K., you just said about how much of this is us talking about ourselves in circles. You texted us over the weekend about how much of J.J. McCarthy's game is the lack of reps. letting people fill the imagination for whatever they want to see. Well, I think this is something I've been trying to, like, say myself this whole time. And I haven't really been able to enunciate it. So I found somebody who tweeted this out.

Hold on. I'm going to pull up the tweet real quick. And this is from Max Tuscano. And he basically said, so much about McCarthy is imaginary. It's projected onto him and allowed to exist because the insulation and lack of volume creates so many gaps. You can fill it with whatever you want. Mystery box.

To me, it's just like, this is what I was trying to get to with like, oh, he doesn't ever play in the second half. He has like X amount of past times in the fourth quarter. He didn't play in like seven or eight fourth quarters because they were just always kicking everyone's asses. And therefore, and so people, I think, can just fill that lack of actual game reps where they're trying to come from behind or whatever with whatever they want. And they project what he can be based on some of the plays that he made in the first half.

And I'm not even saying J.J. McCarthy is bad or is, going to be bad. I am open to the idea that McCarthy kicks ass in the NFL. My main point is just like, I don't feel like we've seen him throw enough passes literally to figure out whether he's going to be like this elite passer in the NFL. Some people, I think, maybe are just more convicted in their projection of what he can be in the NFL based on what he's done so far. But I'm just like, to me, he just feels more like a mystery box than anything. Ben, how much of J.J. McCarthy, in your opinion, is, look, it's a small sample size. but there are moments that showed that he did what we expect him to do in the NFL,

or is that we actually haven't seen this really yet. This is all just a projection based on traits. Oh, yeah. I think that a lot of, I think, I think that most of it is a projection based on traits. Now, what I do want to say is that the, like, we got to see him when he's down thing. Like, you know, like, you know, leading to the comeback, whatever. I do think that is generally overrated. And so accordingly, like the opposite, which is like, well, he's leading all the time.

And so we haven't seen him to do this. Like, I think that also, like, can be overrated, right? Like, we've obviously, it's necessary context. But like, for example, Caleb in a lot of close games this year where they were down in the fourth quarter, or even like when they were down multiple scores, Caleb made a lot of mistakes this year. We don't really talk about that because, like, we just don't care. Like, Caleb's good enough. And so with JJ, it's a little bit like because we don't have other stuff to talk about.

We talk about this. So there's some ways to overrate it, which I think we've done a really good job on this show talking about it and putting it in context. But with McCarthy, like, you can see why he got recruited. You can see why he's the starting quarterback at Michigan. You can see some of the peak throws. And you can be like, yeah, like, this guy's an NFL future. Beyond that, like, the idea of being like, well, I like him more than Drake May. Like, that's ludicrous to me. Like, I watched Drake May for two seasons do like huge pro quarterback things in terms of the throws and the context and the guys he was playing with and the system he was playing and like they have to deal with these problems

and that problems and create this and grow in this way. And it just, just, Jay J, Jee, just kind of like a static point. He's like, he is what he has been. Which is just like, he's quick and he's got like a good arm and he's flexible and like, you know, you can create a little bit. There it is. Like there's not much of an arc with JJ. He just walked in and just like, all right, we were in games here, right?

And they were like, yeah. He was like, how much times I'd have to throw it? And they were like 13. And that was just for two years. That's all J.J. did. So he's a little bit like of a fixed point. And so when teams go to, I think, prognosticate his, his arc, like how he was going to grow in the league.

They're inherently very rosy because, like, You haven't really seen him encounter a lot of downs yet. And he's a great, like, guy. Like, he's a good leader and, like, people like him. And so it's like, oh, he's going to, he's absolutely 100% going to get better. So he's young. He's inexperienced. He's got a good head and his shoulder.

So he's going to improve for sure. And it's like, man, it'd be nice if it was that simple, isn't it? But it rarely is. It's also a Tom Brady generation. It's a kid who went to Michigan, but, like, very much obviously has, like, grown up in the shadow of Tom Brady and all the leadership. And it's just kind of dripping out of the whole situation, honestly. D.K., does the fact that Jim Harbaugh calls him the Iceman

change your opinion about him? Is that what he calls him? Yeah. Oh, man. I try not to take anything that Jim Harbaugh says to heart. Wow, I see, I'm the opposite. I take everything Jim Harbaugh says to heart. You're going to spit off of this planet, Jim.

I love it. Keep at it. J.J. McCarthy, you know his name is John James McCarthy? Hmm. Yeah, it's just a classic name. Does that change anything? John James, Jingle. high immersion.

I was just, I was reading about McCarthy more because he's just an interesting guy. He like told all his teammates coming to Michigan that like, if you're here to party and chase girls, like this is not the team for you. The yoga,

the meditation, ice man, cool under pressure. You know he like apparently could have gone pro and hockey. He was like an amazing hockey player growing up. I don't know. You know who is it a,

you know who is a phenom tennis player growing up? Drew Brees. Josh Rose. Really? Oh, man, the Josh Rosen thing. I just, I mean, I think it is cool that he played hockey, though. Was Drew Brees also a good tennis player? He was.

I think we talked to ourselves since I, I at least put some stock into the fact that Josh Rosa was like this prodigy tennis player going up. I'm like, oh yeah, competitiveness. To me, tennis doesn't translate to football as much as hockey does. It's like precision. It's precision. It's repetitive motion and dedicated. to the art, dedication to the craft,

athleticism, change the direction. They're also odd ducks, though. Tennis players are like, it's one of like two sports that you can actually be the like win a tournament with it. Everyone in the world, 16. So you can put these academies right after you turn puberty with your friends, but they're also your

lifelong career. Rivals. And so every, all you do is play tennis all day at a fake school versus people that you will be competing against for your hopes and dreams all day and they're all a little odd. It's like the old aristocracy. All the kings and kisers and. and SARS were all related.

Oh, yeah. World War I was just a family argument between second cousins. I mean, look, tennis is a sport where you wear shorts and you don't have any teammates. Like, it's like a feet. It's like a pro day.

You were not allowed to talk to anyone. You were not allowed to talk to a coach for a long time. You're playing just Dave and Craig just had. They just say Craig was like, you wear shorts and don't have teammates. Oh, absolutely not. They're not even catching it. They're just hitting it.

That doesn't, it's palm. I actually love tennis personally. It's like one of my favorite sports to play. Like, to me, that, like, tennis to football pipeline, not as strong to me as like hockey. Like, team sports, super physical. You got to, like, learn how to be a team player. I like that a little bit more. Email us at Ringer Fantasy Football, Gmail.com.

We just triggered you about either tennis or hockey. I know people who are still furious right now. I love, I love tennis for what it's worth. I play it. I like tennis, too. Multiple times a month. Dude, I'm a big Rafa guy. Well, I won't miss a major.

My brother and I texting constantly. Oh, nice. Yeah, yeah. Love tennis. With that said, don't want a tennis player to be my quarterback. Well, now you tell me. Why did I like Rosen, then?

Yeah, listen, you're talking to Rosen QB1 God over here. I love that young man. Al Carrez is awesome. Man, I have so many things that want to ask you. Al Caraz is doing some stuff on the clay that I've never seen before.

He had one play a month ago. Totally. Should you do a French Open pod? Sure. But not a different feed. This feed, we changed it to French Open art for a week. And then we come back, NFL feed.

Yep. Well, we have the little orange in the green. We just flip it to like orange, like all orange for the clay. Yeah. That's good. We can do a live show at Wimbledon. Yeah, probably. I have a lot of tennis and hockey questions about you guys, but we should probably keep going.

You would have a lot of tennis and hockey questions. Just in the holster, ready to go at all times. They sent the invites to the players who will be attending the draft in Detroit. And a reminder, we have a few tickets left for our live show, episode description. Check it out, it's Wednesday before the draft. And next week. But they set out the invites for all the players. Every year, I really want them to consult us and who we think should be invited.

But I want to go through the list. So there's only 13 players who are attending. That is shocking to me. 13 players are attending the draft? It is certainly the lowest in a while. I don't know if we have like the Elias Sports Bureau on the all-time numbers. Just how bad the Will Levis shots were last year. The amount of people attending has been halved, dude.

It's unbelievable. But wasn't Will Levis at home? No, he was at the green room with his girlfriend. Yeah, he was there. And then didn't she break up with him shortly afterward? Yes. Because of all the sad camera shots. Tough scene.

Tough scene. Look at him now, though. You know what I mean? Look at them now. Vascular. Billy Jeeds. Now they're building a team around him. Well, I believe for the next guy.

They're not building a team. They're a placeholder. They're really going for it. They are. I got to say that. I'm going to read the list. And I want you guys to tell me who is the most likely person on this list to be the Will Levis Award for like, oh, man, that camera's been a while.

We have Caleb Williams in the USC. Obviously, he'll be the first. May he'll be fine jaden daniels he'll be fine marvin harrison jrador maliq neighbors these are the people attending the draft they're all these guys are accepted invitations to be close not invites these are rsvp yes rsvp yes malik neighbors at lsu romed newsley at a washington brian thomas junior also at of ls u s u s ujc lathen that of albamaama the only offensive lineman going that's probably the all-time low outside of literally the coven drafts one lineman is shocking uh quinyon Mitchell out of Toledo cornerback to Ryan Arnold out of Alabama layatu lot to I can never get this

right lay out to latu at UCLA Dallas turn Alabama Darius Robinson Missouri Darius Robinson's the guy right like he's going to be there for a long time he'll be there for like hours right I mean I think that because he's going around one but of the 13 12 of the guys are like top 20 maybe top 15 like everybody these are the dudes this is it absolutely 100 percent and And then there's just Darius Robinson. Maybe Darius Robinson just like really thinks it's cool. And he's a Detroit guy if everybody serves, right? He's like a local dude.

He's from Eastern Michigan. And so he like, he wants to go and like a huge for a family. Great. Like awesome. But Robinson is 100% like you go through the list and you're like, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. What? He's the, he's the question mark. I would put, I think Leatu Latu is the scary one.

Are you worried about Latsu on this list? Why? Because he retired due to a neck issue? Truly, like this is one of my favorite. players in the draft. I think I have him six or seventh overall. So obviously I love his game. But yeah, he retired from football because of a neck injury. Like that is a very huge factor here. It literally is the meme of just one problem, Billy. Right. His neck bite. He, this is like 95% of the reason that we see guys fall surprisingly. It's because of a medical red flag. Teams have taken

them off their boards. They're worried about one thing or the other, whether it's like, you know, degenerative knee issue, like arthritis in the knee or something. And we see this every year where guys like, oh, my God, he lasted to the second round. And then all of a sudden, he's like a fourth rounder. And it's because teams are just so worried about the health thing. And there's been some talk over the last couple of days. You know, I don't really know if anyone's officially reported it or not, but there is some worry. I think that teams are a little more worried about the injury than we've heard over the last

couple of months. So I'm a little worried lot to might not be a first round day. I just can't believe that the draft is this big deal. It's this massive television event and pretty much a third of the players that will be drafted in the first round will only will be there to tap up Roger Cadell. It's the NFL's own fault, dude.

Like it really, like I joke, but like, you, an agent sees the Will Levis thing and it's much more, is much less likely to recommend for his guy to go if his guy is anywhere fringe top 20, right? Like it's just like, you just don't want to have that fall and have it just be the thing that everybody he cuts to, right? They came back from every commercial

with British eyes and being like, and here's Will Levis. Look at him. He's so Will, how are you feeling right now? Will, too, right. And they have the Sarah McLaughlin song playing. It would be like easier on the player if you went and interviewed him. They don't go. They just show him sitting on his phone. And like, he's

not even sad. It's just when you, when something sad is happening to somebody and then you look at them living their daily life, they look extremely depressed. Also, it's a tough look. Could anything have been funnier if we had captured him on his phone and what he was looking at was memes of himself on his phone. If we had got that would have been the greatest.

Wish I wasn't wearing this fucking shirt. Oh, is she here? Are they looking at me right now? I wonder the other people you'd bet your life on that would go in the first round. I'd think Brock Bowers, I'd bet my life will go in the first round. But I feel like, he doesn't speak. I get him not wanting attention. A month ago, we did the whole like, what if Brock Bowers falls?

Dude, there's so much reporting that like the jets are taking him at 10. Like, the Titans might take him if they trade back. Like, Brock's going top 15. Let's go, baby. We're back. We never left. But even if we did leave, we'd be back. Yeah.

So J.J. McCarthy, not going. He's a coward. Scared to compete. He's like, it's the fourth quarter. Why am I here? You know? Nervous bird. Nervous bird.

The best one ever was Joe Thomas, who just went fishing with his dad on a boat in international waters and just like, didn't have a phone. Maritime law. It just came back and was like, yeah. Dude, it didn't happen out there. Dude. That's crazy that JJ's not going.

That's kind of a flag. Is he afraid of his girlfriend dumping him? his high school girlfriend. Is he afraid if he doesn't go first round? A little bit of a draft ick that JJ's not going if I'm a team. Bet on yourself. Bet on yourself. Who's that NBA player who just got suspended?

Johntee Porter. Jontaine Porter? Bet on yourself, JJ. Not literally. I also want to do the Kai Award for these guys. So I don't know if you guys, this is a real deep cut if you guys remember this. But last year, so Craig got married, DK and I, we had a great time of Craig's winning. Kai, who had been producing the show for like, I don't know, five months was like, why

you invite me, Craig? And he still gives him, he gives him shit about it still. In honor of, uh, of Kai, who is the player who did not get invited to the first round who's like, what, what, what, what, not me, what is it Bo Nix? Like, who is the guy who's just like, absolutely incredulous that he get invited? They're like, dude, you're. Well, do they, do they, I'm sure they invite anyone they, who, who's willing to come, right? No, no, they do not just, no, they do not think they throw them out.

They throw them around. I think it's like generally guys that they're really strongly believable. Isn't it a better product if there's a bunch of people there who didn't get drafted and they can cut away to a lot of sad players? Imagine there were like 40 other. Imagine it was actually every player. I'll never, you know, but again, like Craig, talking about draft X. I remember when Brian Branch went to the draft and didn't go round one.

And there were a few other players who went and didn't go round one. And all of those guys went home and they didn't go back for round two. They didn't go back to the green room. They're like, are you, you know, I'll get drafted from home, whatever. Branch went back. I ain't leaving. on day two. He didn't bring another suit, right?

So he had to go to, like, freaking Coles or something because he didn't bring enough clothes. Yeah, so he went, but if he went back out and he got his walk, he got his shot on the camera going to say howdy Godell. And now Brian Branch is good,

and that's on purpose. That's why that happened. The first year we did this, Malik Willis and Nikobi Dean went on day three and they went all three days. But yeah, shout out. Otherwise, are there any other fringe guys? I'm curious that aren't going

that you think could be round. I think divisive guys. So I'm just going to throw out a bunch. Hit me if there's someone that you think like passionally, either should or should not be around. Michael Pennix Jr. at Washington, I know it's very divisive. I mean, no, that's two on the fence.

Xavier worthy receiver at Texas. Do you really get to just be a first-run pick if you run a four-two, 140-yard dash? I feel like he's not a first-run player. I feel like, yeah, the NFL is that that's the type of league this is. Yeah, if you run a, if you run a 4-2-wide, you're going to be first-old. Mark Davis is still employed, so yeah. Does he have a job or he just owns the thing?

I guess he doesn't, is that it not a job? He just owns it? Is it a job if you earn something? That's a good question. It's his passion. It's his passion. It's a vocation, really. You own your cat.

Is that your job? I don't know. Depends he asks. Oh, no. Dogs are a job. Cats, no, no, no. Cats are easy. Yes, that's correct.

A.D. Mitchell, Troy Franklin, Ladd. McConkey, Ricky Piersall. I think A.D. Mitchell is going to be a first rounder. Okay. First off, should we establish who we're very sure? going to go and then talk about the guys who we think are going to go? Or how do you want to do this? I want to know about the fringe guys who everybody's on the fence on right now and who you feel confident in that is on the fence. Yeah. A fringe guy you want to invite to the party.

For better or worse, I think Adi Mitchell is going to go on the first round. I think Byron Murphy's going to go on the first round, the defensive tackle out of Texas. Johnny Newton Illinois is going to be a first round pick. Ben, what do you think of that? He's tricky. So Newton, like, I have money on Newton to go top 32. I've spoken to people in the league who really like him and think he's going to go in the first round round. He's minus two 30 to go in the first round now in Fandul. His line for over under

opened at 18 and a half on Circa the other day and then flew up and eventually hit 32. Oh really? If you go and you look at if you look at some really really like if you look at some of the plugged in guys like Zerline Lain Zerlain of NFL did not have him going first round at his most recent lock. Daniel Jeremiah

did not have him going first round at his most recent lock maybe that changes over the course of the week but new in I think goes round one. However there's like there's a decent amount of smoke that he's not going to make the cut. Marius Mims. First round? Pretty strong lock there, right?

Is he on the fence? Is he considered on the fence? Well, he started eight games ever. I don't know. Maybe not. Yeah, and he's a little bit hurt. Mims, yeah. Mims was minus 2000 to go round one.

Oh, okay. Yeah, I do think that he goes, though. It's, how many did Trey Lans play 12? What about Ladd-McConkey? Yeah, I think he is, like, legitimately the 32nd player. Like, he's so, he is the guy. between the first and second round where it would not surprise me whatsoever if Ladd-McCocky goes in the first round.

I know there's been some guys and some reports linking the 49ers to him. He's been mocked a million times to the chiefs at 32. So I think both of those teams make sense. It would not be too surprising to see him go somewhere in the late 20s either. So I would lean first round, but again, it wouldn't be that surprising if he fell into the early second. Yeah. McConkey right now, plus 150 on Fanball to go in the first round.

I think that there's too many receivers with too much insert some sort of juice here for McConkey to make it, right? Where it's like Xavier Worthy with the speed, Troy Franklin with the speed, Keon Coleman with the size, right? Like, I just think there's too many, like, there's so many good wide receivers. And like a lot of them have a thing. And Lanham O'Conkie's thing is just like, I'm rock solid. And like in round one, I think that the high tail guys are going to go.

But, dude, the more, the more this draft shakes out, the more, like, If I had a pick between like 40 and 60, I love some of the receivers. Like it looks like Coleman might fall to me there. Land McConkey might fall to me there. Xavier Legat might fall to me there. These are all dudes that I would much rather buy than like these fringe first rounders and Xavier Worthy and Troy Franklin. The Panthers who right now don't have their first round pick but have two second round

picks in the first half of the second round, take two receivers. Take two and fix the offense and save Bryce. Like they're in such a nice spot. Is Brian Thomas the only receiver outside of the big three that you feel confident will go in the first round? Him and A.D. Mitchell, I think, are the two I, would luck. Thomas and Ad. Mitchell actually have very similar over unders right now for

draft position. There's a little bit of smoke that there's some teams that prefer AD Mitchell-Obrine Thomas. I still think Thomas is and should be wide receiver four, but AD Mitchell, wide receiver four on draft day is now at the stage where it would really surprise me, but it wouldn't flabbergast me. It wouldn't shock me.

Okay. So we will have the take purge coming at you hot next week. And I could not be more excited. And again, we'll be covering we'll have another episode before the draft. We'll have live show Wednesday. We'll have coverage of the whole

the whole shebang. It's going to be great. But a couple things, we have a couple important things we've got to hit before we get out of here. Number one, I don't know what you guys want to talk about, but there's two things with Bill Belichick today.

One, massive story in ESPN by incredible reporting by Seth Wicker Sham, Donovan out of junior, Jeremy Fowler, about why Bill Belichick didn't get hired by a team. And then also, Bill Belichick went on Pat McAfee today and said he has never drank coffee. My king.

Craig does not drink coffee. Craig proudly says coffee is for the unmotivated. Naturally unmotivated. I wake up, big glass of water, start my day. Similarly, if we, God forbid, because you're in a fake time zone, we ever have to do anything at like 8 in the morning Pacific. I'm in a fake time zone? Yeah, I am.

No, you are. God damn it. But you wake up, your hair's not done and 8 in the morning. Your hair's not done. And you're like, yeah, man, it's just like, I don't know. it's just these early. I'm like, yeah, get that's what the fucking coffee's for. But I don't, I don't, I've never complained about that.

I've never been like, oh, man, I wish I had some special elixir to wake me up. No, I don't know what I'm missing, which is great. I've literally, I don't know the feeling of having a cup of coffee and it energizing me. I've had like two times in my life where I've tried like cold brew and I've basically had like a panic attack and I was like, why? I don't want this. And so I don't drink in it. It's crazy to me not wanting a panic attack.

That's how I want my day to feel. I just want to be like, oh, like if I don't nail it. this, like everything, I'm dying. Like that, that's the house of cards. And shout out free ads. Also, wait, speaking,

which definitely not right now, select, but you need to send me your dress because shout out to a guy named Corey who works at counterculture coffee, great coffee, and wanted to send us some coffee because he heard that you like me

have an espresso machine and wanted, I'll be honest, I'll be honest. The only reason I got into this field was to get free coffee from somebody. That's my end game right there. I can't.

done. I can't do the art. I just kind of make a dick in Jackie's coffee each morning out of the Okay, let's let you switch to latte art way too fast with way too little context. I can't do anything else. You draw a penis in her coffee every morning? Yeah. I can't

do anything else but draw the penis. That's tough. I'm sorry for you. I do want to learn other shapes. You're literally Evan from Superbad. You just yeah, it's basically. You know what latte art are shaped like dick's the best ones? Look, you know what's funny about my opinions on coffees? I actually think it tastes good.

Like, I like the taste and smell of coffee. That's what I was going to ask, Craig, because, like, I certainly will drink coffee for the caffeine of it, but, like, I love an after-dinner coffee. Like, I just think it tastes so good. Like, I love the taste of coffee. It's a ritual. Yeah.

I have had decaf coffee often, and I enjoy it. So if counter, Corey, if you want to send me decaf, I'll accept it. So what, um, whose dog is barking? Is that? Who do you think it is? Oh, right. Sorry. It's the great enemy of the pod.

Nugget, come on, Nugget. I appreciate those of you who emailed. Many people emailed and said that like it's Nugget probably reacting to the pregnancy despite the fact that she isn't reacting in other ways. And that was very helpful. So thank you. That's awesome. Yeah, actually, we got an email from Robert, who I'm going to call Rob or Bobby.

Bobby. He said, our dog did the same thing when my wife got pregnant. Went for the ideal dog to a barky, protected asshole. Didn't kick in around the fifth month of pregnancy. Good news. Great with the kid. Good luck. That's amazing.

Yeah. Dogs are pretty incredible creatures. That's awesome. And like, that's great. I think that Nugget will be really good with the kid. I just, it's so frustrating because I'll be honest, I talked to big game about how well I trained this dog to a lot of people. And then I was like, she down Bart and she was good and she walked in and everything.

And then recently she turned into the biggest A-hole in the world. He's protecting your wife. Yeah, which, you know, I got that handled. You gotta flip it. You gotta act like you trained the dog to protect your wife. You got to be like, yeah. From all the enemies that walk on our street. Nuggett is challenging your masculinity, Ben.

and winning, let's be honest, because I tell her stop and she doesn't listen. She wins every time. I kind of have never seen Belichick earnestly trying to be like on and animated for the cameras. Personable, yeah, yeah, yeah. He was like earnestly trying to be like, I'm good on camera, like I'm good on Mike.

Like, I can be fun. I'm one of the guys. I'm dipped. When Belichick, when Belichick was the defensive coordinator, it didn't even come up, but he was the defense coordinator for the Giants for the one two super bowl is Lawrence Taylor. And Bill Parcells nicknamed him Doom.

And Belichick apparently loved the nickname Doom because he thought it was an excuse. He didn't have to be nice to anybody. Because when you're Nick, so Belichick apparently loved it because then the bar for being nice is so low when your name's Doom. And that's what I was thinking of Craig, which is that he has this reputation purposely

of being such a dick that when players actually got to meet him, like, he's not that bad. And that was doing it to us on purpose. Like, you know those photos of Tim Robinson where it looks like he's like faking a smile every time he's on the red carpet? That's how Bill Belichick looked to me on McAfee. Like he had never smiled before on camera. And like, like Ricky Bobby with his hands, he's like, I don't know what to do with my mouth

and my cheeks when I'm not giving a post game interview. Like, I don't know how to handle that. It's just feel like it'd be weird to go through life and just treat people like that all the time forever. It's just bizarre. me. Treat people like what? Like a condescending dick? I don't know. Oh, yeah, yeah. That.

Oh, that, oh, that, oh, like that. Oh, okay. Okay. I mean, it might, did I miss read Belichick this, the last 20 years? No, I was sure. I feel like, not knowing with your hands or being a dick. I wasn't. No, just like having that general attitude towards everyone all the time. It's just like, I don't know. Do you think he's just tired and need some coffee? Probably. Dude, can you imagine? Yeah, I just have some coffee. He has one cup of coffee and he's like the nicest guy in the world. Totally normal. Craig, my dad talks about this all the time. He had sleep

apnea for like 20 years. And then he got his sleep apnea machine. And he became, his personality legitimately changed. Wow. We got to get Belichick one of those one of those like white women Etsy bugs that's like, don't talk to me until I've had my coffee. We get back for Belichick. But he just never drinks coffee. So it's just don't talk to me. He's the nicest guy in the world. And he can't put together a game plan anymore. That's. Oh my God. Yeah. Maybe we could actually won 10 more Super Bowls if you had just fucking just drink some coffee. Yeah. All right. Let's do some emails. Emails.

A lot of emails on Baywatch. Oh my God. I mean, that makes sense considering a billion people on the earth watched it. So odd, odd, is that true? Like, I thought about that more. It does not seem possible. I looked into it. It was an estimate, a very, like a well-researched estimate by professors at a college,

having said that, bullshit. Like, I, it's on Wikipedia. Bullshit. It's the same study as it has been, like, I'm sure it was a lot. However, a billion the more is literally 20% of, of the world at that time. That seems impossible. If it was a well-researched study by professionals,

don't you think they would have thought the exact same thing you thought? Like, no fucking way we're going to write down that one-fifth of the world watch this. Nobody will believe us. They clearly were compelled by this data. Maybe they, like, accidentally just added a decimal or two. It's true. A hundred millions is a lot

of people. I don't think, I don't think, I just think we have trouble grasping what the monoculture was like. Yeah, maybe. So, a lot of emails of this, one of them. Well, let's start with John. Johnny. John. Don't forget, there's a whole subplot in the movie Borat that once

he's in America, she's an episode of Baywatch on TV in his hotel and decides to track Pamela Anderson down and then briefly kidnaps her. Forget about that. Did you see Pamela Anderson was cast in the new Naked Gun remake with Liam Neeson? No. Nice. Yeah. That's great casting. That's fun. So

we got a lot. Oh, God, there's... Okay. So also, well, naked gun was O. O.J. Simpson, right? And we were talking on Baywatcher OJ Simpson. Okay, here's a weird thing that happened. Again, last episode we were talking about Baywatch, OJ Simpson. Got an email from Raythin. Raythin. Raythin.

David Hasselhoff's music career, while large in Germany, was not very big in America. Right. So to boost David Hasselhoff's domestic appeal, David Hasselhoff was scheduled to perform a nationally broadcasted concert in Atlantic City that would be on. TV everywhere. One problem. The concert was on June 17th,

1994, which is the day of the O.J. Simpson car chase. And the ratings were horrible. Oh, my God. They lost one and a half million dollars on the broadcast. So if O.J. Simpson never got in a car chase that day, David Hasselhoff could have been the biggest DJ in America or the biggest. Even one day later, he might have had a completely different career. Yeah.

Wow. Why was he so famous in Germany? How does one... Is he German? How does he acquire German fame? So Hasselhoff was born in Baltimore. He has German, English, and Irish descent. I mean, he did his great-great-grandmother emigrated from Germany in 1865.

I googled David Hasselhoff. That's like every American. I'm like, my great-great-grandmother came from Italy. That doesn't mean anything. Right. Like, I just like, how do you break into the German pop scene as David Hasselhoff, the guy on Baywatch? And he's singing in German. Wait, he performed at the Berlin Wall in 1989.

You know, he was the coach of the German dodgeball team in the movie Dodgeball? Yeah, High Fitz was referencing this on the last show. Loses! So random. I would just love to know, like, how you get into that niche of pop stardom. And on that note, apparently a lot of people, like so many I decided I had to talk about it, emailed us about Baywatch nights, which I guess is David Hassoff trying to spin off Baywatch to do actual crime solving at night.

And then it didn't work because there were no lifeguards running into the ocean. So then they had a pivot for season two. And they had to make Baywatch nights like they were like, we had to do something. So they tried to make it psychedelic like it was Twilight Zone where he could like dream and see the crimes as they were happening. And that also did not work. It's like minority report. He's like a preco. Yeah.

And that didn't work either. So then they canceled it. He went back to Baywatch. It's hard to believe those shows didn't work. I just love the way that decisions were made before we had like all this data when it was just like crap, but we don't have any lifeguards running into the water. This show's tanking. What should we do?

And there's like eight white guys in an office at the 43rd floor and they're like, what if we make them psychic? And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's good. says they had their third martini over lunch oh my god also people love the song the song was great song that was an incredible song um yeah Baywatch Kai played a lot of it and I'm like okay we could

get sued Guy maybe only 20 30 seconds like two full minutes too much too much guy too much a little too much Kai Kai got a little cocky you know flying too close to the sun really do lock it up lock it Kyris?

You just couldn't turn it off. It was too good, you know? Like the song just bangs, just slaps. I can't, I can't stop with the Baywatch stuff. I want to know more. I'm telling you, Baywatch is endlessly fascinating. Everything about it. There's a Pamela Anderson email I will save for the take perch.

Oh, okay. But for now, I actually have, this is big. We have a Hall of Fame email that I'm about to. Okay. Hall of Fame. It's from Mark. Mark. Mark.

Marko. The subject line is vasectomy. Okay. What is this apropos of? Have we talked about fesectomies? No, no, we have not. All right.

As I'm sure you can imagine, I love it. Yeah. As I'm sure you can imagine, there's quite a bit of anxiety, quite a bit of anxiety and stress leading up to a vasectomy. So I planned ahead,

and I saved your show from Wednesday to listen to while waiting for my appointment. And I ended up listening to the show for the duration of the vasectomy procedure. How long is that to me? Although I missed some of the Shrek discussion. I would recommend this to anyone having a vasectomy. What other podcast could make this claim?

Okay. I got questions. One, aren't you under for a vasectomy? You're not under? No. You're just... You're just chilling. It's like brain surgery.

You got to stay awake. I'd like to be put under. It's too dangerous for you under when you're operating on the balls. you know why did he miss some of the shrek discussion he had to take an airpot out so what happened to him sorry doctor I want to hear about how it went but first these guys are discussing how long Shrek's arms might be vast Shrekkerins I don't know

is it is it so getting a vasectomy is like going to the dentist now where they're like you can just toss on headphones and like kind of check out I think they just put up a sheet and you just there's like pressure it's what they say it's just like because A lot of guys get the vasectomy during March Madness, right? Right. That's what they say. No, it's like, yeah, because then you can stay at home and ice your balls for a couple days.

Yeah, guys, it's an excuse for to ice your balls to do it. I've never heard that. I've never heard of it. All weekend. I like an excuse to ice your balls that people are preventing you from icing your balls now. You need to find a way around it. If anyone else, one, if anyone is getting a vasectomy is listening to the show and you listen to us, please. Describe it in detail.

We should have a phectomy Hall of Fame for people listen to. to our show during their vasectomy. That feels like a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode where Larry really wants to watch March Madness, but his wife won't let him, so he gets a vasectomy just so he can watch March Madness. Yeah. That is right up Curbs Alley.

All right. That's all we got. Thank you, D.K., thank you, Craig. Thank you, Caj. Thank you, Kai. Lock it up, Guy. Lock it up. Thank you.

Lock it up. Thank you, everyone behind the scenes. Thank you, Connor. Thank you, Jack. Thank you, everyone. I'm forgetting people. Thank you, Dan Comer for research help. Thank you, Kira.

thank you Mark for trusting us during frankly one of the most vulnerable moments of your entire existence on this earth you were hopefully in multiple sets of good hands thank you Lorne Lord Lord Lord Thank you Motley crew Nice oh yeah speaking of do you understand the connection No Pamela Anderson Yeah oh that guy was in that

Tommy Lee right yeah yeah Tommy Lee right yeah Is that what he was from I started to realize now why the Pamela Anderson Tommy Lee stuff was such a big deal where I don't realize why it was such a big deal until I realized how big Baywatch was and that all makes more sense of how crazy that was. And you mean like the sex tape, the whole thing? Yeah, I see how that was a larger deal now that Pamela Anderson was actually the most famous woman in the world at a point or whatever. That makes sense. Those guys were crazy. Nikki Six and Tommy Lee. Anyway, no one has thought. I honestly don't know a lot about Motley.

Don't remember, yeah. I mean, we had people email in and be like, yeah, that was like the first woman I saw naked. And I'm like, yeah, I guess this is at, you know, the dawn of like, you go from watching porn magazines in the woods to like, watch it. Watching porn magazines in the woods. You'll see how that she's imprints in your 13-year-old cerebellum. They used to just try to make a flip book really quickly. By the way, I get tagged on Twitter like once a month because someone's talking about porn in the woods like somewhere on Twitter and it's just like that's.

Is that a big thing for you, D.K.? I don't know. In my day and age. Gather around children. Gather around children. I'm familiar with the concept. I didn't know people linked it to D.K. So much.

That's just because I talked about it on a show like a couple of years ago where in my generation, there was not, well, there was the internet, but it was like very early stages. So when I was growing up. It was on DVDs. That's not what AOL was sitting in there.

No, it was not on TVDs. It was on tape cassettes, which, you know, you had to like rip pornos onto tapes or whatever. It's like, yeah,

that whole whole thing. Anyway, the way, the way that, boys of my generation now you just toss on the Apple Pro and disappear you know

AppleVision you gotta be careful with the whole Bluetooth like what you're connected to you know when you're watching it anyway in my day

yeah there was like porn stashes in the woods that people it was like a library it was like a porn library in the woods and that's where you get

your pornography or you steal it from your dad or whatever but now it's just so easy kids don't even have to fucking try this this new generation's soft They don't have to even try to find porn.

Do you think that's where Woody came from? The term? Woody and erection? Maybe. Maybe. I think trees are straight. Now the Tiger Woods picture shaking hands with the tree. It looks real different.

Yeah. God, the memes for that were amazing. Dude, the best of someone's like Tiger meets Woods. Yeah. Shake. I like there was like one about Tiger Woods takes up for, like, takes up recycling, just shaking hands with a tree. Tiger Woods like apologizes to the tree. Craig doesn't believe in recycling though, so they didn't work on him.

What are you talking about? Don't you put that on me? He drinks. Craig hates recycling. I believe in the, in the idea of it and that it's good for the environment. I just believe that a lot of the places where you throw trash away and claim to be recycling are not actually recycling of materials. They're lying to you. Yeah, this is my conspiracy.

But I believe in the practice and idea of recycling. We should be doing that. So like, just so you know, when DK first talked about the Port of the Woods thing, I was like, what the fuck you're talking about? Solock, I cannot tell you how many men over like 40 years old emailed us to be like, he was there, I was there, it happened. Like everyone was suddenly like, that was my life. DK.

Dude, the world before the internet was the Wild West. That's wild. I love that. Were people acting upon not in the woods? Well, just reading it. I think that's a very, very small majority people, maybe, but no, not in my experience. It was like... You said small majority.

I don't think that's... Small minority, sorry. Okay. The majority were just reading the... You're looking at it together with friends and then going back and doing whatever you do. Right. Or it's like, you know, you check out the magazine and you bring it back later. Kind of deal.

It's a library system. Right. It's your scouter system. Yes. I don't think there was very much, you know, circle jerking happening. or whatever you want us to call it. Although that is a term, so it certainly has probably happened

in the world at some point. Sure. Should we go? Should we go? What's this circle jerk you guys have talked about? Sounds wild. Bye. Must be 21 plus and present in select states.

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