The Ringer NFL Show - 10 Biggest Lessons from the 2022 Season and Aidan Hutchinson Recaps His Rookie Season

Episode Date: February 20, 2023

Ben and Steven go through what they’ve learned in the 2022-23 NFL Season. Ben and Lions DE Aidan Hutchinson talk about Dan Campbell and John Harbaugh and recap Hutchinson’s first season in the NFL. Host: Ben Solak and Steven Ruiz Guest: Aidan Hutchinson Associate Producer: Stefan Anderson Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Did your favorite NFL team win the Super Bowl? No? Then the NFL draft is your Super Bowl. I'm Danny Haifitz, and for now until the draft, we are turning our fantasy football show feed into the Ringer NFL draft show. Every Tuesday and Thursday, we talk about the top players and most important storylines for the NFL draft. So join us on the Ringer NFL show.

Hello and welcome to the Ringer NFL show. This is Monday, February 20th, and we are welcoming you into the offseason here. Now we're officially one week past the Super Bowl. Nobody cares. We're moving on. I am Ben. Soak joined by my good buddy, Stephen Ruiz.

Stephen, what's up? The only thing worse than answering the what's up question at the beginning of a podcast is having to do it twice. Because Ben forgot to record the last start.

I didn't forget to be on the scenes. I just had my volume set to zero so I wasn't picking anything up. It doesn't matter. We're professionals here. And we are doing, for this offseason pod, Steven,

lessons learned from the 2022 NFL season. I've got five. Steven's got five. We're trying to talk big picture things, we're trying to talk trends that we're seeing over the course the last couple of years. Big lessons specifically off of 2022. Stephen, I would like to start with the thing I feel like I've been radicalized on the most this season, which is head coaches should not call plays. If you can avoid, if you can do it, if you can pull it off, which is like a tricky, you know, kind of qualifier. But when you look at the, like, look at the issues that a guy like he had in Denver relative to the success a guy like Brian Dable has.

in New York. Gable comes in. I'm an offensive play caller. I was calling players with Josh Allen. But over the course of the offseason, he figures out, you know what, I'm going to give play calling to Mike Cofka, and I'm just going to be the CEO head coach. I'm going to be managing the game on the sideline. And the Giants were one of the best in-game decision-making teams in the league this year, aggressive on fourth downs, going for two, making the right calls. Versus a Nate Hackett who simply like, by week two, we could tell, okay, this guy does not have the bandwidth to call plays well for quarterback like Russell Wilson for all the issues the Denver had and also managed the game which like Hackett's a little bit of a easy guy to pick

on. It's not like he was calling plays in Green Bay and so he had a lot put on his plate. But a lot of these coaches who make really good in game decisions, Abel, Nick Seriani, he was calling plays in 2021 and then gave it up to Shane Steichen, didn't call plays for all of 2022, John Harbaugh, Mike Omlin, Vrabel, McDermott, like so many of these coaches that make really good in your decisions and they're aggressive on fourth downs and they just managed to gain well, their timeouts and their challenges. So many of these guys aren't spending any bandwidth on calling plays. And the value at, like the leverage you get,

we're still learning and realizing just how impactful making the right call on a fourth down can be, such that, again, like, if you can get away with it, if you can pull it off, having these guys in a position where they don't have to worry about either calling plays for the unit that's on the field or while their units on the sideline worrying a about adjustments and changes and talking to their players and talking to their assistant coaches. You can take that off of their plate. It allows them to, I think, much better call the game, much better manage the game from the head coaching spot. There's an obvious, you know, what is it?

Like, a opposite case, right? There's an opposite, a clear acceptance. And that's like the Shanahan McBay mold of guys where McBey-Shanahan, like they are such good play calls. Like, obviously they designed the offense really well. but so good at 1 p.m. on a Sunday, just scripting it up, calling excellent plays, adjusting to the defense are so, so good at it,

that even though they're like not great game managers, it kind of comes out in the wash because they're so much better than all the other playcullers than their contemporaries. But here's my question. Like you said, they're so good at scripting it. And at 1 p.m., like they're great play callers,

but that work isn't done at 1 p.m. They could still do that and set up a great script and a great play calling script for Sunday on Wednesday and Thursday. Like Bill Wash famously has said, it's better to make those decisions on a Thursday than on a Sunday in the middle of the game. And so I would even push back against the notion

that Sean McBey and Kyle Shanahan should be doing it because I think you're still getting the same effect without them necessarily being the guy that calls in the play on Sunday. Like the beauty of those two systems is the sequence play call it, which it's not like, oh, I can't believe he called stick on that second and eighth in the second quarter. No, it's like, oh, he set up this play in the second quarter with this design,

which I think you still get that benefit, even if Sean McBay isn't directly in the quarterback's year. And I think the problem is, when you have all this stuff on your plate, you have all these considerations, I'm Sean McBay, and I'm thinking about, oh, this is the structures we're seeing, this is the coverage we're seeing,

how are we going to beat that? Like, what have we set up? And then all of a sudden, this fourth down, and someone's like, coach, what do we do? if I'm in that situation, I default to the norm, which is punning. I'm just like, oh, just punning. Let me get back to this. And then, like, part of that is how we talk about these decisions.

And that's my first lesson that I took away. I don't know if we want to go on to it right now. No, solid transition. That was sick. Yeah, roll with that. And that's the fourth down debates. No more. Like, over.

No more. You don't get to quote tweet the idiot that's saying, like, oh, I can't believe they went forward on fourth. No more. We're not doing it anymore. Don't entertain them. It's over. and I think this year, especially like the Super Bowl.

And I know the Eagles lost, but the reason why the Eagles were ahead was because they were so aggressive on fourth down, not aggressive on fourth down necessarily, but aggressive on third down knowing that they were going to be able to call it a play on fourth down. And then on the other side of the ball, the Chiefs fell behind in part because Andy Reid took the best player in football, maybe the best player ever off the field on a fourth and three to take a field goal

and was immediately, immediately it backfired on him with Harrison Buck for missing. the kick. And I think that's something you've seen throughout the season, and I think you're starting to notice it more. I know, like, there's, when a fourth down decision happens and it works out for the team, there are a lot of, like, the nerds on Twitter are like, oh, you're not going to hear

about that this week. We're not going to have a bunch of debates about that this week. But I honestly think that's changing. I do think coaches are getting more criticized for being conservative. First thing, Nick Siriani got asked in his post-game press of the Super Bowl. was like, hey, why don't you go for it on fourth and three from your own 32?

People are asking. It's an insane question five years ago, but now it makes sense. So I think like the nature of the debate is really changing. And I think maybe not next year. I think if someone goes for it on fourth down and it backfires or goes for two for like a game winner and it backfires, they're going to get criticized. But I really think the momentum is changing. By the time that it's like 2024, I really don't think we're going to be having these

debates. And if anything, the nature of the debates are going to flip and it's going to be like, people asking Nick Siriani why he didn't go for it on his own side of the field. Yeah, I think that, right, I think this was the year in which it really started to feel like stuff was getting normalized in terms of fourth down decisions, right? I experienced this year, I think, less public pushback to clear fourth down decisions. Now, the issue that happened with that was that there were a couple of fourth down decisions really early in the season that were really, really, really.

impactful and ended up losing the game. Like Brandon Staley came under like tons of heavy fire for like his fourth down decisions that you know, oh, they weren't good and then they were good and he was kind of basalating back and forth. He'd be like aggressive in one week and then he'd be bad the next week. And that's where the issues of the

conversation, like that's where the nut of the conversation, the core of it gets exposed and why it's difficult to handle in sports media is because it's probabilistic. It's not it's not a determinist. It's not guaranteed. If you go for a fourth down, you win.

No, if you go for on a fourth down, you have a better chance to win. And one of the ways, one of the branches in which going for this fourth down might give you a better chance to win is because, like, if you don't get it, you'll have more information. You'll know that you have to be more aggressive, right?

A lot of, like, one of the one line zingers of, you know, the analytics community is like, if you're going to, like, lose now or lose neither, it doesn't matter. You're losing. So you might as well get all the information you can early. So go for a two-point conversion,

know if you need two scores or one, scores. And in our narrative construction of games, where we want these final moments, go down field and tie and force overtime and have these beautiful, like these legendary games and these beautiful performances, that doesn't register to us. Like, why would it be valuable to put my team down to scores earlier than otherwise? I want there to be a two-point conversion with three seconds left that decides the game. And nerds are saying, no, like, don't, it's better to have a twin conversion at five minutes left that lets you know what you need later. In sports movies, in sports movies, they don't go for two when they're down by 14 and they score.

Exactly. So that's the thing is like it becomes difficult to square. But I do think, yeah, I think that pendulum is moving. I don't think it'll ever secure itself. Like you said by 2024, that's going to be the norm. I don't think so. I think it'll be like still more and more years down the road until we see going for on fourth down and be like the norm of coaching decisions. Yeah, yeah. I think like all opinions are held.

So it's never going to go completely out of style with these debates. But I do think we're at the point. It's kind of like the QB wins debate, which was like the fourth down debate 10 years ago, where I think we've all accepted that QB wins are anything, but we kind of haven't. Right. We say it without saying it. We talk around it. Yeah, we talk around it instead of saying, well, QB wins.

All right. My number two. This is the second thing on which I've been radicalized. These are the two easiest things for me to get down. we are still undervaluing quarterback mobility. I think we thought in like the Cam Newton, Colin Kaepernick era that we were getting it. We were like, how we got it, guys, we figured it out.

We drafted RG3 early, drafted Cam first. Kaepernick came in and took over a team. We know it, baby. In 2013, four quarterbacks had at least 500 rushing yards. There was Cap Newton, Thorel prior. Whoa, would not have guessed. and Russell Wilson, right? That was the four quarterbacks in 2013.

And that was one of two seasons in which at least four quarterbacks had had at least 500 rushing yards in the season. The other season being 2020, which was like a weird year because the COVID year and everything was kind of a mess.

That was Lamar, Kyler, Cam Noon, and Russ. This season, for the first time in league history, five quarterbacks, at least 500 rushing yards. And the names are really important. Josh Allen, you know, very high pick. Justin Fields.

Still a very high pick, but, like, you know, went behind Zach Wilson behind, you know, Trey Lance was a player that, like, there was a lot of question about his evaluation. But all of a sudden in this year, when he starts running the football, you go, that's like St. Juan Barclay right there. Like, that dude's 240 can fly. Like, holy smokes. Jalen Hertz, the second round pick, wasn't a good enough passer to stick in the league. Lamar Jackson, 32 overall, went after a lot of quarterbacks, right?

Fifth guy taken. And a lot of the issue was, okay, is he developed. as a pastor, is he good enough as a pastor. And then Daniel Jones. Jones is the one who I think like really ties this whole conversation together. They told us Daniel Jones was a manning. They told us he was coached by Dave Cutcliffe and he was going to be a manning and he was going to dice him up from the pocket.

And then he was this tall, statueous, beautiful pocket passer. And for three years, it just, three years, it just never happened. It was a total fabrication. And that whole time, that whole like 2019 to 2021, anytime Daniel Jones would run, every film guy was like Dan Jones bigger and faster than you think Daniels could go a little bit Daniels got a little bit of a run to him

and then in 2022 Brian Daebel went wait a minute let's just have him do this all the time let's just use him to use Josh Allen right that continued acceptance of quarterback mobility I think has two sources

that are really important to talk about to identify the first I wrote about this year by expected points added which is just a general measure of like how efficient and effective a play is. A quarterback scramble was twice as valuable as a play, twice as valuable as a play of an attempted pass by a quarterback over league average. That's bananas. Like you can hear that.

I don't know what that means. Quarterback drops back and throws the football two times. Quarterback drops back and then decides to hold the football and run past the line of scrimmage once. Those are equally good. That's insane. And one of the reasons is because quarterback scramble has done a lot more on third downs and four downs.

It's going to jack up EPA and everything. But in general, the ability to play 11 on 11 football outside of structure in the second reaction, right, in the second half of the play, make turn a turn up pressure not into a sack or to a positive gain. This is an enormous value at. Think about how, like, sacks end 33% of the drives in which they happen or something like that. Like, sacks are killer plays.

and the ability to turn a sack into a not just like a throwaway second in 10, but into a scramble second and five, that's enormously valuable for an offense. So for one, like data is really letting us turn to capsule. Holy smokes quarterback run is incredibly valuable. The second source is that the legend of mobile quarterbacks being hurt more is being debunked. The quarterbacks who get hurt most often are the quarterbacks who are unable to save themselves from hits, who are unable to fall athletically.

Talking about the two are talking about a lower conversation. They don't know how to fall. They don't know how to be tackles. They haven't run the ball that much. They haven't played that aspect of the game. The quarterback actually aren't able to save themselves. You don't really see a lot of like, you know, he was trying to cut and there was an ACL injury.

Like that doesn't happen that much in the quarterback position, right? Like, there's examples, but it really isn't as as common as we think. When you go and you look at injuries per snap, the most commonplace quarterback is injured is in the pocket getting sacked. And these guys are the guys who are able to avoid it. Or at the very least, they get sacked like running the football, actively protecting themselves, knowing that they're going to get hit. When you know you're going to get hit, you have a better chance to protect yourself. And so mobile quarterback injury myths are getting debunked.

And data is really showing us how much quarterback run matters. That's how you see guys like Daniel Jones get the season that they did, turn their career around. It'll be a $40 million quarterback. Jalen Hurts second an MVP voting. This is, that's the golden goose right there, is how much quarterbacks scramble. Yeah, I definitely agree. with that. No more immobile quarterbacks in the first round.

No more. No more statues? I can't believe Matt Jones was a first round prospect. I don't understand it. Like it just went against the last 10 years, the previous 10 years of draft history where these guys just don't work. I wrote something before the Mac Jones draft and I looked at how much yards, and this is a very clued way of looking at it, but how much rushing yards,

quarterbacks averaged per game in conference. college. And like if you were under 20 yards per game, the best case scenario was Jared thought. And the rest of the list was just the worst draft bust you've ever heard of. And everyone above them, like not everyone, because there are, there have been some mobile guys that didn't work out, but there were a lot of very, very, very good quarterbacks above that. But this also brings me to my next lesson. And I didn't know how to frame this, but you kind of gave me a good framework for it. And that's that when we evaluate quarterback, we have to pay more attention to defensive structures

and what kind of coverages and what kind of fronts they're seeing because I think that's how you get fooled into buying into a player like Baker Mayfield or Jared Gough who are in offenses that go out of their way to create the perfect environment for passing the football. Like you're playing base defense, three linebackers with a neck roll on the field. They're playing basic cover three, spot drop cover three,

so they're not doing anything too crazy. they're not disguising stuff. Like, you know the coverage. You have advantages all over the field. You're running play action. And it's easy to complete passes at that point. And I don't think we pay attention to that. We just see a quarterback went 21 for 25,

he threw for 300 yards and three touchdowns. They were like, oh, great, you did great. And then you look at another quarterback, do the same thing. And maybe they, maybe it's Patrick Mahomes. And he was going up against like a dime defense every single drive or every single play. He was going up against a disguise coverage, every single play. They were blitz and stuff. They were doing simulated pressures.

They were doing all this stuff. stuff. That production is way more impressive than whatever production you're getting out of one of these like play action quarterbacks like Jimmy Garaplo. And I think one of the best illustrations came this year. And that was with Kirk Cousin. I don't know your opinion on Kirk Cousin season this year, but I thought it was the best version of Kirk Cousins I have ever seen. Yeah. And if you look at the stats, it's one of his worst season since like the beginning in Washington. He was like a below league average quarterback.

And the reason why is teams stopped respecting Minnesota's run game. They stopped seeing base cover three. Like Kirk Cousin saw that more than anybody over the last couple of years. This year, it was all quarters. He was seeing a lot more nickel because they didn't have the tight ends. That's why they, that's one of the reasons they made that trade for Hawkinson in the middle of the year. And it just changed things.

It's harder to play football. And I think it comes down to one like really simple concept that I think a lot of people would accept. Some defensive play calls are more geared up to stop the pass. Some defensive play calls are more geared up to stop the run. So when you get those plays that are geared up to stop the run, it becomes easier to pass and vice versa. And I feel like that's the one thing that even like the analytics community, which goes out of their way to, I think, add context and to make sure they're not getting bad data. I think that's something that they even ignore. That's why you might look at Jimmy Garoppolo if you're like a stats guy and be like,

He's second in EPA per play since 2018, right behind Mahomes. How is he not good? Like, he's one of the best quarterbacks in the league. Does that say it? That's why, because he needs those, needs to see those structures from the defense. He needs to see base cover three to be that productive. And he doesn't create that on his own. And I think that's connected to the mobile quarterback thing.

The value of a mobile quarterback is they create those play calls from the defense just by being in the backfield. Like Lamar Jackson sees different defenses on third down than Patrick Mahomes. He's on third down. And that in there is a value. I'm not trying to take anything away from him or Jalen Hertz. That's them providing that value. And I think that's one of the reasons why Jalen Hertz was a little underrated coming into the year. Now, I've flipped.

Like I've gone from, oh, Jalen Hertz is the underrated. Now, I'm the guy that's apparently I think he's overrated compared to how everyone else is talking to him are talking about him. But the one thing I will say about the supporting cast argument is he creates, he makes their job easy to. He makes AJ Brown's job. Right. Because AJ Brown would not be getting as much single coverage as he does if Jalen Hertz wasn't in the backfield. Yeah. I think that I remember when like the analytics drive was first coming into football.

And there was a lot of conversation about like, well, you can't do the baseball stuff because you can't isolate an individual as easily in football. as you can in baseball. You can't do the basketball stuff, because you can't isolate a football, a player in football, as easy as you can in basketball. Football is a team game. And we kind of said, like, yeah,

and then we just did it. We were just like, here we go. Like, this is what we got. And in general, like, expected points out of for a quarterback is so much better than, like, quarterback rating. And, like, even, like,

adjust the net yards per attempt. Like, it just helps capture how well the quarterback is playing better than I think any other, other one individual metric does in a vacuum. Now, now, if you're like really trying to piece together who a quarterback is, you're going to look at a ton of different stuff. They go, EPA good, quarterback good.

Like, you're going to look at everything. But in general, like, as a one-off, like, let's tag the fact that this guy played well. EPA is great. It absolutely is beneficial. But once we start talking about who's legitimately good and who's playing their role in a good system, who is a good hog and a wheel and an overall, like, you know, a good machine, that's where, like, you have to watch

because so much of football is a team game. And because it's a team game, a lot of what gets folded into a guy's production is the way that the other players on his team, either like push responsibility to him or pull responsibility from him, the way the coach is on his sideline and on the other side line,

either push responsibility to him or pull responsibility from him. There's so much chess in football that it is incorrect to assume every quarterback is being played the same way. Yeah, and I, like, I would bring up Jalen Hertz in the Super Bowl. There was a lot of talk about, like, the running game. The running game didn't work. Everyone, like, you look at the EPA, the running backs,

the running back runs were not productive at all. And people would be like, oh, he didn't have a running game, and he was, like, really the only one that showed up, like, he was carrying the team. No, the Chiefs were defending them in a way to take away the run. Like, the Chiefs made a decision where not, going to let the run game beat us. We're going to sell out to stop the run game. And they were playing a lot of unsound coverages behind their fronts because of that. They were playing a lot of like four deep or two deep four under, which is not, there's a lot of error in that

coverage. It's easier to complete passes from that. So I like everything is connected. I think that's the point I want to get across. Like I've seen so many tweets this season where it's like one in particular, it was I think it was the Lions Carolina game where Jerkoff had a pretty good game, but the Lions run game was shut down. And like the talk after that was, oh my God, like Derek Gough did his part, where was the running game? Carolina sold out to stop the run. And they were like, Jared Gough, you could beat us if you want.

Like you can try throw it deep if you want. Right. And that's like, everything is connected. That's why it's so hard to be like, this is Jared Goss. No, it's not Derek Gosson's EPA. It's the Detroit Lions offensive. Yeah. It blows down to like there's no substitution to watching the film.

And whenever you see, say that people are like oh well like watching the film is hard and like how do you know the calls and like this and everything if you watch enough football you watch enough film it becomes evident without understanding calls and how's this structure work and what's this play called and this and everything it becomes evident what defenses are trying to take away where are the bodies where are the bodies pre-stained where where are they sticking dudes right i go back and watch uh chargers dolphins game and just watch their where are the charges put in the body where are they putting players on defense?

What are they afraid of? Not the running game. We are going to take away the middle of the field. We have everybody there. And that aspect, I think, just doing that process, I think illustrates, okay, when we talk about football players, when we talk about offenses and we talk about production in the quarterback position, one of the fundamental questions we have to ask,

what does this guy do well? What does he not do well? One of the fundamental questions we have to ask is, what is the defense afraid of with this guy? And what are they not afraid of? and how does he respond? All right. I'm now, I'm not doing a quarterback thing.

I want to do a, actually, no, I'm going to switch my order because this is also connected. The McVeigh offense is dead. Long live the McVeigh offense. What is dead may never die. But the McVeigh offense is dead, right? Like, in 2017, 2018, John McVeigh and Calis-Manningham were like, yo, we just run wide zone and then play action off the wide zone.

Like, no one will stop us forever. And they were right for a little bit, right? Like that was the Jared Gough resurgence. That was the Jimmy Gropolo trade. And that was the immediate, boom, explosion of this offense. And then what happens next? Kevin Stefanski, Minnesota. Holy smokes.

This guy can love this offense. Put him in there. Boom. Oh, Minnesota office is good. It works for cousins. Boom. Hire him and get him to Cleveland. And now, boom, Baker Mayfield works.

Wide zone play action. Wide zone play action. Zach Taylor. Get Zach Taylor to Cincinnati. We're going to get Joe Burrow. We're going to go wide zone plaques. It'd be great. Matt LaFlor, let's get Matt LaFlor to Tennessee.

He's going to make Marcus Mariotta good. and let's get him to Green Bay, and he's going to get the offense going for Aaron Rogers, and it could be wide zone play action, wide zone play action, wide zone play action. And it was for a second there. Like, if you knew Sean, you were getting hired and you were running the offense.

And it worked. Those hires kind of worked. It 100% worked. I can't even like, I don't know a good life metaphor for how easily and quickly one thing solved every problem. It's incredible, right?

It's like, you walk around the house and like, all right, I got a vacuum befores and I got to, you know, clean the tidy up this room and I got to clean the kitchen. It's if you just had like one button, you can press on one robot. Like I got a little four room button. So there's one robot with one button that was like, fix this. And then it just knew how to clean everything. It's steroids. That's what it is.

It's like MLB steroid era. You're a bad player. Then you took steroids. And now you made $20 million a year. That's what it is. is a panacea. Well, when you go qualitatively and look across the offenses in the league, and this started last season when Sean McBae got rid of Jared Gough

and brought in Matthew Stafford. And then after Bromackett, Matthew Stafford, Bruno, Del Beck & Jr. And that offense changed its identity. It changed how it appeared. This started last off season when Kyle Shanhan tried to get Matthew Stafford, couldn't get Matthew Stafford, and instead went and traded up for Trey Lance. We've never seen Trey Lance in the field,

but Lance, for his size of his mobility, was a clear, hey, this guy doesn't need this offense. This guy's not the sort of prototype that works well in his office. He's not a pocket passer, perfect feet, nice accuracy for over the middle of the field guy. He's totally different. This started last off the time. But you've now seen, like, the Matliflor offense in Green Bay does not look at all like that 2017 as Bay offense did. If you watch year over year, you can see the evolution.

You go, oh, I can see how it's similar. I can see what's similar. I can see a part of the kettle of part they didn't. But if you took the 2017 McVeigh offense right now and then put the 22 Aaron Rogers, Matt LaFlor offense next to it, it'd be hard to figure out the connection. It'd be hard to figure out the exact steps. It's true of Kevin Cepansky and Cleveland. I think it's also true of just they run so much more power. Same thing is true of Kyle Shanahan in San Francisco. They run some power.

They're not running zone. They're running gap schemes. Defenses are giving them fronts that take away the zone. And when you have fronts to take away zone runs, they give up against power runs. So these teams have become power rushing teams. Bay is just more traditional dropback, right? Think about that Stafford offensive with Odell and four receivers out into the concept and just dropping back in the pocket with five in protection.

It looks nothing like those offenses. You brought up Kirk. The Minnesota offense by Kevin O'Connell, who's off the McVeigh tree. Like, I remember talking with you in the office and being like, dude, they're going to just run the 2017 McVeigh stuff. They're running the 2021 Safret stuff. For Kirk, they're running the new iteration of the offense. I don't know what this.

means fully. To me, the most misunderstood thing about the Shanahan-M-McVey offense is that it raises the floor of quarterbacking. It takes middle-tier quarterbacks in terms of talent and gets great passing offenses out of them. But it does so much raise the ceiling on guys. So after a few years of like Kurt in this offense, Jared golf in this offense, even when the Niners had to play Jimmy Garoppel this year, you saw them play in different offenses

because the years in the OG, the McVay offense 1.0, the years that they got, the experience that they got, just helped them become better quarterbacks, right? They played for a lot. They got more talented. They could see blitz is better. Like, golf sees blitz is better now. Way better than he used to in 2017. Like, any time you blitzed him, he just, like, lost his mind.

Such that now you can run a little bit more mature offenses with him. But that process of, like, saving a middle tier quarterback and making them seem functional for a little bit, it's not as, as, it doesn't build a contender. You still need to do some better, right? Like, that's, that's why Cleveland made the decision that they made. And so the McVeigh offense, 1.0. dead. The many iterations of it, and what that means about football, still

active, still present, so very interesting. But that 2017 system where we were all like, this is going to take over the league. It did. And now it's gone. I mean, that's what happens. And I would go a step further. I don't think the offense, the main thing that people don't get is that it elevates the floor for a quarterback.

I think it goes back to my last lesson that it just makes quarterback play easier. Because you see certain coverages that you wouldn't see you're in a full drop back to the offense. The reason why I like that that framework, though, it elevates the floor is because I think that when you say, like, makes quarterback easier, people then think, oh, so, like,

Aaron Rogers in this offense can become better than regular Aaron Rogers. And no, he can't. Right? Like, regular, like, Aaron Rogers, like, in the Green Bay offense, right? Like, his ceiling is already so high that, like, this offense can't lift the ceiling any further. For a guy like Baker Mayfield,

this, like, his range of, outcome is quite low, put him in this offense, and boom, it's just, like I said, it's a panacea. Like you said, it's steroids. It's just now a functional passing offense. Bank, there it is. And unless he's in it, he doesn't really have that functional passing offense to it. Yeah. And I, one point that I think is kind of overlooked is that this system, like you could, you can include all of the coaches, Shanahan and McBay, has never really developed a quarterback. And I think that's just, I don't think, I think that's a feature, not a buff, because like we said, it makes playing quarterback so easy that I don't

know, you don't get those reps that kind of make you into a better quarterback. Like, I think if you put Josh Allen in a McBay offense, he would have had more success early on, but I don't know if he necessarily becomes this guy because you're not throwing him into the fire, the drop back passing

fire where you're asking him to do that. It just protects you so much that there's not a room for growth. And I think that coincides with this theory that there is an expiration date. When you're propping up a quarterback with scheme, there's an expiration date. We saw, we see this all the time. We saw, which I think Jared Goff's the best

example. That offense was great until it wasn't in 2019. And Sean McBey had no idea how to adjust within the confines of an offense that has to elevate its quarterback. That's why he went out and got Stafford because he was like, all right, we're not going to be able to major

in this stuff. I mean, we could still do it on early downs, but if the team sells out to take it away, we have to have a plan B. And I like, I feel like everything, every lesson we've listed so far has kind of been interrelated and kind of goes back to that point about quarterbacks. But I feel like that was the big lesson.

The big takeaway from the season is that having a quarterback that allows you to do more is so valuable. Yeah. It's kind of, it's, I was going to push back on your point that it's never developed with quarterbacks. I do think, golf's gotten better,

Perk has gotten better, Jimmy's gotten better. But I think a lot of that is just the experience, seeing enough things like over, over three years, over four years of playing, that they get enough volume that they get better. When you talk about developing a quarterback,

he wants to be faster than that. And I agree. If you'd put a Josh Allen in this offense, then you get more early returns, but like the actual root structure isn't there for him to really explode into being a great quarterback. Quarterback development's like bamboo.

Like in the first year, it's all roots. None matter, it's not growing yet. You don't see it yet. It's all just like build a foundation. It's all just set it up there. And then if you build the roots the right way, if you give them a good base, actually take a full on,

and it's a quarterback, capital Q, capital B, big boy stuff. After a year, after a year and a half, a light bulb clicks on, right? An inflection point is hit, and then boom, there comes the growth. And you don't really get that out of this offense because it just keeps baby gloves on you. It doesn't force you to grow those deep roots. It just gives you the training wheels and tries to keep you a float. So that point about them not developing quarterback is interesting.

Yeah, so I'll go on to my next lesson, and that's defensive line over secondary. There was a big debate about this two years, two years ago, about. And the nerds, they presented their data and they presented an argument that was very compelling and one that I brought at the time, that secondary is more important than defensive line play in terms of defensive and team success. But, I mean, I just don't buy it anymore.

I think football, it's the foundation of the sport, the trench play. I know it's like old school to the point where you sound like kind of an idiot when you talk about it like that. But I really think this year showed that if you could dominate in the trenches, your floor as a team is just going to be so much higher than a team that maybe has skill players around the trenches instead. They're built differently. And specifically on defense, I want to focus on defenses.

I don't want to get into the offensive line aspect. I mean, I don't know about you, but just from watching film and maybe this is a flawed way of looking at it, when you have a defensive line, it just allows you to do more stuff on the back end. And I think doing more on the back end makes it harder for opposing offenses. whereas I think doing more stuff on the front end like you're calling blitzes because you don't have a good four-man pass rush so kind of have to game it to get pressure

leaves you so vulnerable on the back end and it makes it easier to exploit those teams especially against the best quarterbacks in the league. You wrote the piece early last season. NFL defenses aren't blitzing elite quarterbacks anymore and I think that's why the Peyton Manning, Drew Brees,

Philip Rivers, Tom Brady era, I think was the pivotal moment in this when quarterbacks became smart because when I was growing up I don't remember like celebrating the the coach on the field quarterback

I don't remember like pre-snap audibles being a big thing that people cared about and then Peyton started doing and Tom Brady started doing it. West Coast Revolution yeah.

And then Philip Rivers started doing Drew Breeze and I think it's changed football and I think quarterbacks are just too good to have to play unsound defense and the only way to play a sound defense and the only way to play a sound.

brand of defense is to have that defensive line. Now, I still think you have to blitz at times. I still think you have to play, like, you can't just drop three like your Lou Anarumo when you're playing Patrick Holmes every time. You have to do other stuff. But having a defensive line makes it easier to do more stuff on defense. And I think that's the key to playing the defense. All right.

So I still think if you gave me a choice of an 100th percentile, defensive line, 100th percentile secondary. I think I'd take the secondary. just because I think like the what's one step below a silver bullet

the bronze bullet is having a defensive line that can rush with porn can win all the time but I still think the silver bullet is being able to play man against anybody I don't know if that secondary actually exists

is the tricky thing right even if it does exist even if it does exist you're playing the Philadelphia Eagles how much is that secondary helping you at all I think quite a bit. Like I'm saying like successfully play man coverage. If you have a guy who can hassle Aegee Brown

and win at the catch point, you guys can stick with Devante Smith. And then you have a safe you can roll down on a Dallas spot. If you have the true ability to play man coverage across the board, you have two outside guys, you have a safe you can handle big tight ends, you have a small guy who can handle slot receivers, you have depth.

I think like the ability to play man, almost like independent of the opponent, independent of their route structure, independent of how they built the receiver room. that still to me is the silver bullet as opposed to having a front that can always win on the pass rush. Just because quarterbacks are so good, like,

think about the Mahomes thing, quarterbacks are so good at negating pass rush. But you can't negate coverage as a quarterback. You can't negate tight coverage. No, but you can't as a play caller. Go back to the 2020 Packers Rams playoff game. A game I bring up a lot. Too much. Some might you say.

Jaylen Ramsey, they were able to get Devon DeVande Adams open against Jalen Ramsey with scheme, free-sat motion, stacks. You could do stuff to beat man coverage. You can't do stuff

to beat a good four-man pass rush. Outside of keeping guys into block and help. And guess what that makes, guess whose job that makes easier? The secondary.

I run and play action. Just have a good running game. Take the wind out of the sails in the pass rush. I absolutely think stuff you can do schematically. That doesn't necessarily keeping like seven guys

in the block. That takes the win out of the pastoral. For sure. Move the quarterback's launch point. Change where he's wrong. from. I disagree. I think you can, you can absolutely negate a bad scheme. But now your play calling is strip dependent because you can only do that stuff on first and second down. Oh, and it wasn't

when you were in motions, bunches and stacks? You could run motion on third down. I'm pretty sure that Jalen ran, the, the Devante Adams touchdown was on. No, I know, I'm sure you can't. I'm just saying if like that also puts you in a limited house of things of what you can run. If you're, if you have to constantly be motioning bunches, right? What if you have Aaron Rogers? What if you have deck Prescott? What if they don't like preset motion? What if it confuses them? Okay. You just haven't learned the lesson yet. You'll learn it next year.

Okay. We'll circle back for this pod next year and we'll see where I'm at. All right. Number four for me. I looked a long time at the whole like wide receiver movement thing. So I think that that Vante gets traded and Perry Hill gets traded and AJ Brown gets traded and it's like, all right. Wide receiver is a premium position. I don't think we learned that in 2022. I think we knew that.

I do think that we learned just how much teams are willing to spend and trade and give up for a star receiver, right, for a true number one. And star receiver, true number one, these are nebulous terms. Let's make it concrete. This season, 11 players, 11 wide receivers had a target percentage of at least 26%. They got at least 26% of their team's targets. Two of them, Devonte Smith and A.J. Brown, the top 10 pick, and then a guy they traded the first round pick for, from the same team.

other than that you have Devante Adams is at 32.3%. Tyree kills at 30%. Drake London, Justin Jefferson, C.D. Lambs, DeJ. Moore, Deontay Johnson, and Marty Cooper. The only guys on that list who the team that acquired them didn't spend like a substantial amount on them are DJ Moore, Deontay Johnson and Marty Cooper, who Moore and Deontay Johnson were drafted and then elevated to the level of wide receiver ones. And then Amari Cooper, which is a whole like, you know, weird Cowboys contract trade situation. just below them, Amon Ross St. Brown became at Cap Garrett Wilson.

So 11 players of at least 26% target distribution. Last year it was 7, the year before it was 4, the year before that was 5. In 2018, it was 10, but three of those guys were tight ends, which Travis Kelsey did not make this list this year. He was 15 in terms of target densities. The Chiefs spread the ball out a lot more. And I think that's what you saw this season.

You see the teams that have star wide receiver builds, hyper, you know, like, like, like, centered around one dude. I'm thinking about like gaming discourse and I'm thinking about like different strategies and like video games, how you can have a team that's meant to be balanced and have a team that can win a variety of ways, but also teams that are centered on one idea,

one concept, activating one guy. You see that split in wide receiver rooms where the teams that, you know, like the chiefs just kind of had a bunch of players, traded away Tyree Kill, spread the football out. Teams like the Pack,

traded them up to Adams away, had a bunch of players, spread the football out. They run their offense that way. try to go cheap at receiver because they have a lead quarterback because they have quarterbacks which should be able to sustain that style of play. On the star wide receiver list, let's now name the quarterbacks throwing to these guys. Derek Carr, to a tangle by Loa, Marcus Mariotta, Jalen Hertz, Kurt Cousins,

Jack for Scott, Josh Allen, whoever Carolina had out there, right? A couple guys. Sam plus Baker plus PJ plus whatever. Kenny Pickett. and then Jacobi Berset into Deshaun Watson in Cleveland. If you have a quarterback who's not one of the elites, he's not one of the best of the best, you have the ability to get a star receiver and say,

we're now going to dominate through him. We're going to give him the ball at a high density, at record levels of density. We are going to funnel targets to our star, star guys, and in that way we will be able to lift and sustain our quarterback who's good, but not necessarily on that elite tier, right? You heard guys like Derek R and Jalen Hertz and Dak Press.

Scott, players who like, you know, Kirk Cousins who like somewhere quarterback two tier, quarterback three tier in terms like how we tier but are not on that one tier. So to me, that's what I learned from the wide receiver movement. I learned to either have a star quarterback and spread and shred and go cheap a quarterback at wide receiver or don't have a star quarterback, but go for a star wide receiver and then funnel to that player. And he will be a return on the investment in your passing game more than if you were like in traditional West Coast approach.

where's my third reading of progression. Let me make sure I get the ball to Kwez Watkins. You know, like that's not the way to do it anymore. No, and I think one of the reasons why teams are not only more willing to pay receivers, a little more like a star receiver, but more willing to succeed in doing so is because there's, there's just more ways to get the receiver the ball now, which you were getting at.

Like, you can put them in the slot. You can put them in the backfield. You can run them on Jet Motion. You can hand them the ball. You can run a tunnel screw. And like all these these concepts aren't new necessarily, but I think they have become a bigger part of the base offense for the typical NFL. And just one more thing.

Like what like how did we get the most out of a star receiver back in the day? Like the star receivers are always the X receiver, the prototypical number one receiver, the TOs, the Randy Mosses. And what you used to do is you just lined them up out wide on the line of scrimmage. And you're just like, go in a route. Just run down field, then we'll check it to you. And now you don't do that. So I think back in the day, it was a little harder to get the most out of a receiver because if they were taking him away, you couldn't get him the ball.

But now I can guarantee that Devante Adams is getting eight touches based on my play script alone, my opening script alone. And that's the thing is like there's the let's motion Devante Adams, let's item, let's use them to stack in a bunch. There's the moving of the star receiver. But I think there's also an improved understanding from the offensive side of the football. as to, okay, if we do X, the defense is going to check for Y. And so it used to be like, all right, we're going to put, you know, DeVontz here and put our guy at the X receiver. He's going to be our isolated dude.

And, you know, they might run this and they might run that. And if they run man coverage, then we want to take that matchup. And then you would line up and you'd see what they were in. And you'd like, all right, they're in zone. We're throwing the ball to the play side. And over time, coaches started to intuitively realize, hey, like, we say if they run zone, we're just going to throw it to the strong side. but those plays are never as good as the Devante plays.

And if we just line up like this, we put all four dudes to the other side, we force them to be man coverage backside. There's a better understanding of coaches saying like, oh, you know, if we get up to line and we have man coverage, then we'll throw this. No, no, no, no. I'm going to get up to the line.

I'm going to make them play man coverage over there. I'm going to move dudes and run route concepts and line up into the boundary and do a bunch of stuff formationally such that I dictate your checks. And now I can force, forced myself to be in a position where the ball should go to Devante Adams by structure. And this goes back to the structure conversation.

Like, I feel like offenses and the beauty of the McVeigh-Shannahan offenses, they are so good at dictating the coverage. They get you in a coverage, and then they have a perfect play to beat the coverage. And like everything, I feel like everything, every lesson we've listed so far

is kind of interconnected. We're like the Sean McVeigh and Tile Shanahan podcast. This is serious. Illusion of complexity, baby. Illusion of complexity. We've made the same point over and over again. for 40 minutes and you guys don't even realize it. Well, I mean, I think people are realizing it.

We're bringing up the same name. We're fraud. A lot of Jared Gough. Okay. You have two left. I have one left, right? Yeah. Is it my turn?

No more small quarterbacks. This was the year that did it for me. I'm done. No more small quarterbacks. If you're under 6-2, and really I'm thinking about raising it to 6-3, but if you're 6-2 and under, that's what I'll say. You may not ride-to-ride. No, I'm done.

There should be one of those signs to ask. the combine every year that has like I'll be the picture and I'll be holding my hand up and if you're not higher than that line you're not getting drafted buddy good luck in the C the XFL but I mean it matters I know we there was a like a time when we pushed back against this because we saw Drew Breeze be a hall of famer we saw Russell Wilson be one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL as short guys and then we saw Baker Mayfield get drafted first overall and do pretty well on his rookie contract I would say. But we're never going to get around the fact that offensive linemen are tall and it's hard to see over them. And it's like, I don't know if that's the reason why they have a

hard time seeing the field, but that seems to be the case. And that makes the most logical sense to me. And the only one that's been the exception to the rule is Drew Brees, who was like standing on his tippy toes and like stretching his neck out to the point where I, I feared for his health in order to see over the line. And if he's the one person you can point to as a guy that became a good dropback passer. I'm not saying a good quarterback because Russell Wilson was a very good quarterback, a great quarterback even. But he was never a great dropback passer.

He was never a great dropback passer. Drew Breeze is the only one that I've ever seen do it at that height. And like, I'm not drafting based off of a guy that got drafted in 2000 and became this player. And I think the tipping point for me was Kyra. I loved

Kyler coming out of college. I still think he's a great player. I still think you could you could put together like a 10-minute cut-up that would convince you that he's one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL, but man, he's hurt every year. His body falls apart at the same time every year, and at a certain point, you can't ignore that.

And he has all the issues that all the other short quarterbacks have when it comes to seeing the field. And I don't even think he's a quarterback who's like not poised in the pocket, like a Russell Wilson. He's comfortable in the pocket. He just can't see. So I don't know. I'm done with him.

And I bring that up because, Bryce Young is about to get drafted. He's probably going to go first overall. And I would not want to be the team that drafts him. Jalen Hertz, 6-1. MVP runner-up, Super Bowl quarterback. Okay, let's see how long that lasts. Like, Jalen Hertz is a very good quarterback.

I would put him in the same category that I just put Russell Wilson in. He is not a great drop-back passer. And I don't care what stats you give me. Watch the games. Are you aware that Patrick Mahomes is six-plus? two. Okay, he's he, I mean, he counts. Six to two and up. Okay, six two and up. I wasn't, I wasn't sure on the hot. Aaron Rogers also six two. So I got, I think six two is our, is our, is our line here. This is the, the holy line of demarcation. And also, also Jalen Hertz and

Patrick Mahomes, those are two thick boys. Yes. And that is, that's the, I'll take the big boy. Like every 20, every 15 pounds you pack on, you're allowed to drop an inch. Yeah. We got, we literally, we did that almost that exact question on the NFL draft show where it was if you could choose Bryce Young to add two inches of height or 20 pounds of weight, what would you add? I was like 20 pounds of weight man. Get some body armor. Two inches ain't helping me. Bryce going from 5 foot

10 to 6 foot. Same problem. I need the body armor. I need the density. Survive the head. We're using BMI during the draft in 2023. Big BMI hours. A little draft eugenics. We're kind of like, you know. Listen, don't

don't we this. This was you. You came here and said no more shorts. All right. That's all of you, brother. Okay. My last one is this. And honestly, it serves as a nice button. I think everything we've been talking about here. We did a little bit on defense, right? Coverage versus pass rush. But in general, like, this has been an offense-driven show. I talk a lot about quarterback. We've talked about wide receivers. We've talked about play calling systems. My final lesson from 2022 is the gap between offense and defense is still enormous. It's still terrifying. It's still growing. There was a great moment. Remember that moment,

like four or five weeks into the season where people are like, yo, parody, here we go. Like, this is it. We were, we're, pendulum is swinging back, baby. Nope. No, it did not. The,

one of the best defenses I've seen in the last few years was the 2022 San Francisco defense, which got 44 points hung on it by Patrick Holmes and the Kansas City Chiefs, the eventual Super Bowl champions. And then in that game against the Eagles, they had no quarterback on the other side. And they held their water for a half. But then by the second half, it's just, offense is too much. The talent is skewed towards offense.

That's where all the high school athletes go and the college athletes go. The rules are skewed towards offense. And the league is skewed towards offense because points are excited. Coaching. Watch the games. Yeah. Coaching is too. Yeah.

It is an offense-driven league. And when you go and you look at guys who defensively actually have solutions, most of them are dudes who've just been around forever. Which is to say, one, they have a ton of, like, data at their hands. Bill Belichick, Mike Omlin's team. Lou Aniruma, who was in the league, like, over a decade before it became a defensive coordinator. Even, like, the Ravens don't really qualify for this because they have the first time DC. But, like, John Harbauch has been around.

And, like, the change he made from Wink Martindale to Mike McDonald was, like, indicative of where the defensive tides are turning, right? And so I think, like, it's the guys who just been around who have a ton of answers. But it's also the guys who've been around a ton because they're the acceptance to prove the rule, right? We all wanted Brandon Staley to be the dude. And then he got to it with the Chargers. and like every so often he's the dude. But like, you know, a one-off great game plan.

But to this point, the defense, how dare you? It's, it's every week. It's every week. It doesn't have the horses. Okay.

No, but your point is valid. I think it's about having the tools. That's what defense is, about having more tools. Right. Good defenses nowadays are either just like, you're coached by Bill Belichick or you have an insane amount of town.

Like, that's, like, you just have so much talent that you're, able to withstand and put an offense with very least dictating, right, and get the game on your terms. Think about, like, the games which the Jets defense was successful, right? It's just like, all right, right? And then when they would run into, like, a really good quarterback, they can have some numbers. Eagles defense is the same way. We're overwhelming with talent.

And they've run a patch from the Holmes, and Mahomes doesn't have to punt, right? It's just, it is, offense is still king. Defense is still second fiddle. Guys are fighting. They absolutely are. And the defensive adjustments you're seeing made are crazy, right you put on film of like the charges defense the raven's defense and you say you go back time 10 years and you show coaches that they'd like those guys are nuts like what are you talking about guys are fighting they're searching they're they're hunting they're they're looking for solutions and they're finding them but it is at a slower pace and with a slower return on investment then you get on the offensive side of the ball offense is still king and that's why like when we talk about league parity we talk about like surprising outcomes it's because at any time the panthers offense just be good for three weeks right like Like Sam Donald was like second league in EPA for like a stretch. It's because like offense is so valuable, so dynamic and so easy to achieve and so dangerous when it's. Then at any time the Panthers can start scoring points,

anybody can score points because the offense is just that much better than defense. Yeah, yeah, I would agree. I think defense now is just about surviving. Yeah. There are always going to be dominant defenses like the 49ers this year, like the Eagles this year at times. But like you said, when they go up against an equally talented unit, the offense has the advantage.

And that's always going to be the case going forward because that's, one, that's how the league wants it. And then two, just the nature of how the sport has evolved. It's kind of been offense makes a move, defense counters. Offense makes move defense. It's never the other way around. Like the defense doesn't come up with the defensive equivalent of the RPO. And the offense has the final answer.

It's always the other way around. So offense is always going to be on the front foot. And like I push back against the notion that, like teams should only hire offensive head coaches because like the theory is that you're always going to lose your OC if your offense is good because it's going to get a head coaching job and that's going to mess up with the continuity of the offense. But I don't agree with that.

I think as long as you have the quarterback, you're going to be fine. Like it doesn't matter who's calling plays in Kansas City or who's the offensive coordinator as we've seen. Patrick Holmes is going to be fine. He's going to make it work. I think that you should hire any coach with any background. But if I'm hiring a defensive guy, I'm looking for the guys you're talking about.

The guys with like the big bag of coverage tools, our pressures, they could put together a bespoke game plan each and every week rather than a Dan Quinn, for instance, who came from the Seattle system. The Seattle system was... Love a Dan Quinn. We play cover three.

We rush four. We play sound. We do the same things over and over again. I mean, Dan Quinn has kind of evolved since. then. But Robert Sala, I think, is a good example. It goes over to the Jets, tries to install the same defense, tries to build the same kind of roster, and it's hit or miss.

Like, the Jets defense was very good this year, but it had the same issues as all these other defenses with less talent. That sometimes you come across a good offense that knows how to beat you. And I think that's why it's hard to use stats to really judge what the defensive coordinator is doing

because of that, because defense is about surviving more than dominating at this point. Because I look at Brandon State, and like they've had bad defenses by stats over like the last two years. But nobody has played Patrick Mahomes better than the chart. Even when Patrick Mahomes goes off in those games, like it's hard. Like Patrick Mahomes has to be the best version of itself to do that. Nobody had as much success against the Dolphins with that little talent as Brandon Staley did.

And I think that's the value of having one of these coaches is like when you get into the playoffs and you need a game plan. You need two weeks to game plan for Jalen Hertz and the Eagles offense. and you have Steve Spagnolo over, I'd rather have Steve Spagnolo over Robert Sala, no matter what the results say. Because I know Steve Spagnolo is going to come with a game plan Taylor made to stop this offense, whereas those other coaches are just going to line up and try to play.

Yeah, it's just, I think like the defensive coaches who go, like, let's beat them. Like you just can't. The defensive coaches who go, let's get two stops. Let's get one short field, which you can only do if you have a great offense, right? Like, that's the problem. It's a select group because you need to have the offense

who can sustain this. Like Robert Sala had to be like, we need to beat them. We need to dominate. We need to sack constantly. Generate turnover. Generate short fields. We have to win every single possession on defense because offensively they couldn't

sustain like a 30 point game. But for those coaches who have a defense that can do that for them. It's like, yeah, do the game plan thing, right? Like do the bespoke thing. Generate one stop here. Generate one third and long. Get yourself to a punt situation and just get a couple more possessions for your offense. That's why like the Staley Chargers thing is still so tempting.

because Staley's really good at the bespoke game plan. He's really good to get in the one stop, winning the third down, right, covering up a common concept and forcing a punt. And then offensively, you just wanted them to be like, all right, and now let Justin Herbert win this game, and they never would. Think about how many leads they had that they couldn't sustain, right?

So that's why, like, one of the reasons why I think you and I both always get tempted into the charges every year and almost certainly we'll get tempted into the charges again this offseason is because of this sensation we're talking about. And that's why we love Big Lou. And that's why Bill Belichick is so good. I think Bill Belichick is the coach that understands that you need to be both. You can't just be a game playing defense.

You can't just be a defense that relies on like doing the same things over and over again and having great fundamentals. I think Bill Belichickick is able to do both. And that's why he's the greatest defensive coach ever. And I think Domeco Ryan's is another example of a coach that does that. I would not put D'Mico in the same classes I would put Robert Sala. Because I've seen Domeco put together game plans to take away certain things. That Packers playoff game last year, that was a clinic and taking away Devonte Adams. The stuff that D'emico does in terms of what's back to do you just nuts.

Also, D'Amico is Fred Warner. So the things he can try, nobody else in the league even gets to try. But yeah, to me, like, Belichick and Lou in Cincinnati are the two where, like, if you put my backup to a wall, like, obviously you take Belichick. But, like, second on that list to me is Anirumo. We're like, nobody gets as consistently good defensive game plans out of facing Patrick Palms than Lou Anerumbo does. and he does it with no all pros. Zero. None.

That Fawn Bell got like six votes. That's their most all pro. It's, but I bet if you ask, I bet if you ask Lou about his talent, he'd be like, what are you talking about? I have talent all over the place because he sees,

he has that Belichick ability where he sees the best in someone. Like, Belichick sees a player like, uh, I'm forgetting his name now. Lawrence Guy. I think most of the people, around the week. A lot of analysts would be like

Lawrence guy, like that's a C player. It's like a 70 overall Madden probably. I don't know. I think Belichick sees him and goes, holy shit. What do I got on my hands here? I got a stud. DJ Reader in Cincinnati, right? Very similar thing. Trey Henderson. We're like, Henderson is so fast off the ball.

That's what Lou needs. He sees the guy who's sprinting off ball. Cam Taylor Britt, man, fifth round corner who's just like facing the fan, angry son of a gun. It's exactly what they need. There, yeah. Cincinnati's got a good, this in their defensively. Even Lou this year was a that was Robin, man. This turned into a big Lou podcast at the end. All pods are big Lou Pots. We should have

known. Yeah. All right. Bring us home. Last one for you. No, this is kind of related to my last one. I'm canceling another genre of quarterback. No more Stopgap veterans. If Matt Ryan doesn't work, nobody works. And like I feel like the Colts have been the post-trial for this. I feel like the Panthers have

also kind of tried to play this game. No more. And what I consider a stopgat veteran because you could be like, oh, what about Tom Brady, you won a Super Bowl, is ask yourself the question when you're acquiring this guy, do I see this team winning a Super Bowl as it's currently constructed with his player? And I think if you go back through history, the answer is always no with the guys that fail. Like Washington, trading for Carson Wentz, like, why? What was the upside? What is the upside?

Getting blown out in the wild card round? What was the, in retrospect, what was the hindsight of adding Matt Ryan? You were going to beat Patrick Mahomes and Josh Allen with Matt Ryan with 38-year-old. Matt Ryan. So just no more of this. Like the team that signs Derek Carr, I guarantee you, you are going to regret it. Whatever team you are, the poor team that does it. You are going to regret it. I don't care what team does. I mean, if it's the New Orleans saying it's the easiest call in history. Like the team that deludes themselves into thinking they're always contending, plus the quarterback who has long been like the example of if you're below this line, you're probably not

contending. It's a match made in heaven. Yeah, it's going to happen. It's going to ruin their cap for five years. They don't care and they're going to absolutely hate the guy by next year, by this time next year, but they're going to do it because they're the saints and they're, like you said, they have the rational confidence. So if no more smalls and no more

stopgaps and also no more Big Bay robots, how would you build if you're running a team right now, you're running your Panthers, how are you approaching quarterback? And don't give me like names. Like I'm going to go draft CJ's drought. Tell me what you're doing year over year. I am either getting a undervalued mobile quarterback that I can get for very cheap. Like, I'm calling the Titans about Malik Willis.

I know you told me not to name names, but don't tell me what to do. As good as an example, that's helpful. Yeah, I am trading for Malik Willis. And then the whole time, I am constantly trying to get one of these superhuman quarterbacks, no matter how I have to do it. I am not drafting a quarterback this year. I'm waiting until next year and drafting either Caleb Williams or Drake May if I'm the Panthers. That's my goal.

I'm setting every move I make from here until next year is to draft Caleb Williams or Drake May. And there's no in between. But and then in the meantime, give me a mobile quarterback that I could make like the Giants offense out of. And then we'll be straight. Are you, are you prescribing to the Kevin Clark drafted quarterback every year picks, as he said on the island last week? Sure. I don't know. Like if you don't have, if you don't have the guy in, in my.

definition of the guy is not like Kirk Cousins. My definition of the guy is a top five quarterback who can compete with Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes if I have the bodies around him. And until I find that guy, I'm always looking for a quarterback. He just won't be smaller or old.

Now, if you ever get put in a front office, your opponents in your division are going to go back to this podcast. We know what he's doing. We're ready for. We know what his exact quarterback board is going to be. Who are the fast guys who are also tall? just find me that Trevor Lawrence is and the Justin Herbert is in the world

that's who Stephen Ruiz is drafted Of course And they can draft their Mac Joneses And see how that works after them I would love to see you on a podium In March Just after a division arrival took a Mac Jones Trying to behave yourself

Oh if I was on the Raven staff In the Steelers drafted Kenny Pickett I would have called a press conference To discuss their drafts Just cold calling journalists I got a call for you I would hang a banner in the stadium. Our divisional rival drafted Kenny Pickett.

That's going to do it for me and Stephen on the 10 lessons we learned from the 2022 NFL season. Before we go, bonus Super Bowl content for the people, because I got to sit down with Lions rookie pass rusher Aidan at the Super Bowl. And we have that audio here tagged on the end of the pod for you. This is me and Aiden. All right. We're here from Radio Row live with Lions rookie Aidan Hutchinson. Aidan, thanks for swinging through.

What's up, man. How are we doing? We're doing well. It was a fun first season with the Detroit Lions. I'm hoping. What was the most different thing from expectation? What was the thing about your rookie season, first year in the NFL? It was most different than you thought it would be coming in.

He's thinking. I would say it's a mental grind. I didn't think it'd be as a mental grind as it was. But the rookie year, it's long. You go from Combine training to Combine to Draft to Draft to visit. teams, dude, you're all over the place. So it was a long year. So I think that was, I thought it'd be less, but it was definitely, as you got week 14, 15, 16.

You know, it wasn't the easiest, you know, mentally. So you have that moment. You're sitting in some hotel room somewhere on a road trip, and you're just kind of sitting on the bed staring up the wall like, oh, buddy. It's a long season. We've got a whole month left. I wouldn't even say the hotel. When you get to Friday, Saturday, you're good.

But it's the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, where you're like, damn, this is long. Yeah. I want to ask you that end of the season, obviously, you guys had that tricky spot in week 18. Game gets scheduled for Sunday night football. Now, you know, we're going to know whether or not we have a playoff chance to play for or not. What was the vibe like leading up into that week? What was kind of the messaging you were getting? What were the guys saying? And then when the chips fell as they did and you know, okay, we're playing to knock out the Packers. That's our situation. How did that feel for you? What was that like? I mean, we knew we could like half control our destiny at the moment because obviously we needed Seattle to lose one. more game. And so it was kind of, it was definitely different vibes because no one knew this could be our last. This could not be our last. It's one of those weird spots. But as we got to the game,

though, I mean, I was refreshing my phone the whole pregame. Right. And then they went to overtime and then all this stuff happened and they ended up the Seattle one. And then I'm sitting there and I was just like, well, it's my rookie year. It was the last game. Might as well sell out. Yeah, right. I got. I got nothing else to play for at this point. You know, we're just playing to knock Aaron Rogers out. So that was the mentality. What was Campbell's message going into that game? How did he kind of get you guys jacked up?

Because you came out and were intense. Like the lines were all over it. You would have thought they were fighting for their lives. No, no. What was Campbell's message? The same message I kind of just said. And also, Aaron had a lot of sound bites that whole year kind of nipping at the lines a little bit and taking a little shot.

So I think we were all very intrinsically. motivated. We didn't really need the playoffs to motivate us. Right. You had a couple years under Harbaugh in Michigan and then you have now this year you have under Dan Campbell. These are two from the outside, some of the most entertaining and fun coaches. What's the biggest similarities? What's the biggest differences? And by the end of your career, who do you think you'll have better stories on? Harbaugh or Campbell? Honestly, I heard better Harbaugh stories when for the guys that were leaving when I was a freshman. I think he kind of showed out. Oh yeah? But when he first got to Michigan, you know, he was

full Harbaugh-esque. What were some of these stories? I don't know if I can, I can tell the information. He's doing the filter and say, can I say this one? Can I not say this one? However, they are similar. Dan and Harbaugh are similar in their intensity.

But they're just different coaching styles, different people, but that same like fire at the same fire from both coaches, which I appreciate. Nice. You spend your rookie season, and a lot of training camp going up against Penne Sewell and that line's offensive line.

No, no. What's that like? What's like going up against a guy like Penet? Dude, that whole offensive line, like my whole training camp I was going up against them. Week one, I went up against Philly, who arguably has the best O line in the league. They're still playing. They're pretty good. I had a lot of big tests early in my career, which I think helped me a lot going down the road and playing other guys. I think it helped me a ton.

And guys like Pene, Decker, I mean, that whole offensive line, they're so talented, man. Lions are a super young team, right? You guys have just been bringing in a lot of youth for a long time and changing stuff up. This really feels like it was one of the first seasons for lines in quite some time where it feels like it's starting to coales, it's starting to come together, right? So what's left for you guys? What's the agenda for the next step?

How do you guys get over that hump and go from being like, oh, they're young, they're plucky, they're the lions, they're fighting Dan Campbell's. How do you get over the hump? I think it's consistency, and that's the only thing. It's something that I think we lacked last year. You know, obviously starting one in six. Yep. It's hard to make the playoffs when you put yourself in that position.

So I think if we just do it the whole year, like we did it, the back half of the year, the back end of the year, I think I think we'll make the playoffs and ultimately, you know, win the dance. So this is an official 8 and Hudson prediction, Lions 2023. That's no prediction, no prediction. But I think we got a really good chance if we string it all together. All right. I was told to, I was told by a buddy that you go everywhere with a gallon water jug. And you show up here.

I don't see a gallon water jug. I was expecting to see you logging it around. What's this? That's, it's my brand. It's what I do. It's me. It's very authentic. But dude, you travel.

You know, I, I, it's hard to find gallons of water. That was going to be my next question. How are you getting through an airport? You put an empty gallon through security, going through the TSA thing? I know. Well, the thing is when I'm traveling for games, dude, you can bring water. You can bring a whole bunch of food, water on the plane with you. They don't care.

So that's why people always see me with gallons of water when I'm traveling for games. But when I'm traveling in commercial flights, you know, wherever it's got to go. No water, no gallon of water for me. So do we need to find you a gallon water like jug, like an actual we need to get some? Maybe I need like a reusable kind of deal. That's what I'm saying. Save the environment. Save the environment, too.

Save the turtles, first of all. The turtles need you to have a reusable gallon water drug. That's what I'm hearing. I feel that. Aidan, tell us what you're doing with courtyard Marriott. So I'm here behalf of behalf courtyard by Marriott, the official hotel of the NFL, and they are showcasing the courtyard Super Bowl sleepover suite in the stadium where one lucky fan gets to sleep in the suite and wake up on Super Bowl Sunday and be the first fan of the stadium. That's sick.

Does this have something to do with your commercial we've been seeing get teased? You and Cameron Hayward? Possibly. Possibly a chance. Housekeeping, you know, something like that. We got to find out. Aidan, thanks for joining us, man. Appreciate it. Thanks.

That is going to do it for us here on the Ringer NFL show. These have been lessons learned from the 2022 NFL season. Thank you, Stephen for out on the show with me. Thank you to Stefan Anderson for producing the episode. And of course, thank you to Connor and Evans and Arjuna Ramgapal for their production supervision off-season pods the rest of the week here on the Ringer. And then next week, you'll get some live pods from the Combine. NFL Combine starts up in just a week.

So make sure you subscribe to the Ringer, called Draft Show as well. We'll be there on site, doing those compound pots. Thank you so much for listening. We'll talk again soon.