The Ringer NFL Show - Aaron Donald Retires at the End of a Wild Week in NFL Free Agency | Extra Point Taken

Episode Date: March 15, 2024

Sheil and Ben start the pod with the breaking news of Rams DT Aaron Donald’s retirement and the Vikings' acquisition of an additional first-round pick via a trade with the Texans. They then dive into, dissect, and debate all of the big NFL free agency buzz that went down over the past week, including Keenan Allen to the Bears, Marquise Brown joining Patrick Mahomes in KC, and much more! The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more, or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Sheil Kapadia and Ben Solak Associate Producer: Chris Sutton Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Social: Eduardo Ocampo and Kiera Givens Musical Elements: Devon Renaldo 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. Shield Capadia here with Ben Solac. We recorded an entire extra point taken. And what happens at the end? Solac checks Twitter, as he is known to do, and says, Sheal, Aaron Donald just retired. So we said back on the mics. Luckily, we got our boys, Christopher Sutton and Eduardo Compo available.

So Ben Solek, let's get to the breaking news. Aaron Donald turns 33 in May, 10-year career. there were some rumblings about this. This is why you always read the beat writer coverage. Jordan Rodriguez, the Athletic, why I always read on the ramp. She has been hinting like this is something that's in the air a little bit. And Aaron Donald announces his retirement somewhat surprisingly this offseason. What was your initial reaction?

Well, you know my initial reaction because you saw my face. What was your initial reaction when you saw this news? Yeah, I mean, I was shocked, right? I thought that the Aaron Donald retirement was something that loomed. But when he didn't retire after last season, come back this season, Rams have a surprisingly good season. They go to the postseason. They almost beat Detroit, right? Kobe Turner's playing next to Aaron Donald. He's playing well. Byron Young is playing next to Aaron Donald. He's playing well. I was like, hey, the vibes are good. Like, you know,

it's every, Aaron's going to hang out for a couple more years, make another run of this thing. Then when Stafford retires, maybe he'll retire and we kind of end the era. So I thought it was more so something that like to prepare for coming down the mountain, less there's something that like might happen on March 15th, right? Which like three, four days into free agency, legal tampering. Aaron, man, like, hopefully, hopefully the Rams knew. Some deems of tackles are up on the market. But in general, I think that this is like I, as much this was something that was

rumored, it is a surprise that it comes right now. I did not think on March 15th, 2074, we were going to get all of a sudden Aaron Donald tweeting, you know, I'm out. Like that's, that was a shockingly. Yeah, I feel the same. same way. It was like this time last year, remember, everybody in the Rams organization was rumored to maybe want to retire. They had a bad season. It was like, are they going to enter a new era? Is Sean McVeigh going to go into broadcasting? Is Aaron Donald want to retire?

Is Matthew Stafford going to be back? Then everyone comes back and they have a terrific season. I mean, they are a potential Super Bowl team next year. I don't know if it's going to happen, but they've got pieces in place where they can at least be in that conversation. But, you know, every person is different. You know, never know how a guy's feeling. He might look at it and say, this is how I want to go out after I had a very fun season and after how we played well. I don't want to wait for the horrible season to come and then call it quits then. And Aaron Donald was still bawling out last year. Like, I mean, he was, I think first team all pro still.

He was still playing at a very, very high level. Was it like peak Aaron Donald? No, of course not. Peak Aaron Donald was like, you know, the best defensive player. Maybe we've ever seen. But eight sacks, 23 quarterback hits again, was a first team. all pros. So he decides to retire here in the middle of March. I saw you were you were tweeting some stuff. Just what are your sort of recollections? You know, when you, when you hear Aaron Donald,

how will you remember him kind of going forward? When you tell, you know, little baby Solac, we'll get to later in this episode, you know, when you're telling her about the greatest football players you know you've ever seen, what will you tell her about Aaron Donald? But the thing about Donald is he's like the best player who like, I can remember his entire career. Like, I remember Donald at pit. I remember Donald getting drafted into 2014. That was when I first started like paying attention to the draft. It was like I was in high school.

And then I remember Donald being in the league and me being like, I think this guy's incredible. And then every single season, he was incredible. And I can, I can remember 2014 games. If him as a rookie, I can remember him in the super old Rams uniforms. And then I can remember him in the then middle Rams uniforms

change. And then also the later, Rams changed uniforms two times. Three total uniforms for Donald over the last decade. Like, I have memories. him like all of those, right? I have memories of him next like Chris Long in the old ones. I remember his like the 2018 season where he went and he had like 20 sacks, whatever it was. Like the him and JJ Watt debates and conversations like, you know, when people started saying he was going to be the goat defensive tackle, when people started saying he was the goat

defensive player, I feel like I have like a full scope on his career, which is cool for me. Because like for most of like the star like guys of this past generation who got drafted like early 2000s, I was just like I don't have like, I don't remember like their college careers and their entrance into league and stuff. Like, I only know about it through like, through hindsight and through reflection. And so Donald, when I go like think of like, right, like, like being like a kid, like a teenager watching football, not like like like a baby, but like texting my friends talking about the games on Monday in high school.

Like I'll think about Aaron Donald. And he's just going to be a defining character of that, of that era for me. He also like now like from a, you know, what we know about football perspective. I mean, Donald dramatically changed the position, right? hugely, he massively changed the position that he plays in terms of the sort of body types and skill sets that we started to prioritize on the defensive line, right? I think that like, defensive tackle was probably going to be a premium position regardless of, of like, how great Donald was, but in terms of like shorter guys, quicker guys, squadier guys playing under 300 pounds,

like Donald absolutely unequivocally is the herald of that era. We're now like, it is a very common thing for a team to have a defensive tackle plays at 300, at 295. Like, that without Donald, that does not come to pass nearly as fast, nearly as rapidly. It's not welcomed by the league nearly as quickly. But Donald fell to 13th, and then was all that in a bag of chips. And I think he was a watershed moment

in terms of how we think about the size of defensive players in the interior. And so truly, like, a league defining player, right? Always the classic Hall of Fame, like, qualify. Like how you think about the hall is, can you tell the story of the league without this player? Obviously not with Aaron Donald. And like, Aaron Donald's eight all pro,

first team all pros, we're going to get him into the Hall of Fame anyway. But that's always the question you like to ask, right? Like, is this player integral to the story of the league? And he absolutely is. Yeah, I like the point you made about the just, he looked different than what you typically would think up from an all-time great. Like, you know, just the way when he was drafted, he doesn't, you wouldn't go that low.

If he looked different and if there weren't questions about, you know, undersized, is this guy going to be good for every scheme? And then he comes into the league and just takes the league by storm. So one of the best, most dominant players of all time, that's not hyperbole. I remember 2021. I had to write a piece about the 25 most intriguing players in the NFL going into the season. And I started digging into where does like Aaron Donald rank here? Three-time defensive player of the year.

There are only two other people, Lawrence Taylor and JJ Watt. So I was thinking of going into that season, man, if he gets one more, he'll be the only one to be named defensive player of the year four times. He didn't get that, but he still obviously was playing at a very high level. You mentioned that 2018 season. I mean, just the pro football reference page on Aaron Donald that season. 20 and a half sacks, 41 quarterback hits, and 25 tackles for loss. Just absolutely absurd numbers for anybody, let alone a defensive tackle.

That's the year the Rams lost to the Patriots in the Super Bowl. Then the other one I remember, Solek, was when I went to Seattle to cover the Seahawks' first regular season game I covered in St. Louis. Edward Jones don't, I think it was. called. Seahawks are coming off a Super Bowl loss. They're playing a Rams team. Nick Foles is the starting quarterback and Aaron Donald in that game. Two sacks, three quarterback hits, three tackles for loss, nine tackles overall. They just could not block the man as the Rams pulled off the upset there. So it really stuck out to me at both my stop Seattle, Philadelphia, just the way he was talked about by his peers, by other defensive players, by offensive linemen,

coaches. It reached this level of reverence that even a lot of great players don't get to, where it's just like universally there's no one, you know, like no one ever had a first take. Well, I don't know if this is true. You can tell me if I'm wrong. I feel like there was never a first take segment that Aaron Donald is overrated, you know, like you reach this. Well, there was, there was the, there was something, right? He's a bad run defender summer. Yeah, yeah, from the exchange and stats, there's always something. That cut in my, I was saying it and then I'm like, Wait a minute. I remember some weird argument about him as a run defender or whatever, but that really sticks out. And then, of course, there's Super Bowl season, 2021. He makes the play

to end it. There's the famous NFL films clip, which I just watched where Sean McVeigh is saying before the play. He's going to make a play. He's going to make a play. And then Aaron Donald makes the play on Joe Burroughs. So I like seeing guys go out on their own terms. There's no big injury. There's no, you know, just like he felt like this was time. good for him. You got a lot of money. You've done a lot. You've got a lot of life to live. And so we'll see what he does next. All right. Did I miss anything? Anything else on Aaron Donald? Things I'm enjoying so far in the retirement is one, the very obvious and vocal relief from the rest of the division. Kyler Murray responded to Aaron Donald's tweet with like, thank God.

Esquivation, my exclamation point. Like, emoji. Everybody, everyone's like, he's gone. And like, finally, there's no varnish on it whatsoever. Like, oh, congrats. Go. It was just like, thank you, please leave, get out of the building as fast as you can. So I'm enjoying that. That's a good bit. I'm enjoying the fact that the two seasons that Aaron Donald was not first team all pro were his rookie season, where he was defensive rookie of the year. And then the 2020 season where he lost time due to injury. Every season where he played at least 12 games, again, say for his rookie season, just one of the two best defensive tackles in football, just continued and reliable dominance.

I'm enjoying Spotrack just tweeted out. Um, still trying to confirm a few items that appears as though the Rams are handing Aaron Donald a $13.8 million bonus on this way out. LA processed a full salary conversion this morning and will likely carry the contract into June before taking their dead hits. And so it, I'm not sure if this is a cap saving move, but it seems like they're giving Donald some salary money into guaranteed money. So like basically just, hey, thanks for all the years. Here's some cash, which Donald's probably fine for the cash, but still nice to see. Yeah, Lesneed said they did a press repress reprint for us to retire to less need said there will never be another. Donald, boy howdy, is he, is he right?

I'm watching this clip of him, Zach Burrow did. That's crazy. It's still crazy to watch him move until this day. There's the Gino, the clip of Gino yelling, right? Oh my God. Yeah, like NFL players are, they generally don't speak about like being fearful of other players, at least publicly.

But Aaron Donald was a guy that people will be like, oh man, we got to block, block this guy on Sunday. That's not going to be fun. even like great players talking that way. So definitely a one-of-a-kind athlete. Do you remember the one clip of Aaron Donald training with knives? Kind of. He was working, do you remember this?

Yes. He would, I sort of remember it, yeah. Yeah, his trainer was, he was working hand drill stuff, and his trainer was just holding knives. And there was no reason for it, and they weren't real knives,

but it just looked like a hundred times cooler than anything else that ever, any defensive line training drill. Yeah, Aaron Dahl knew how to do it, man. Got to train with knives. There you go. So congratulations, Aaron Donald on retirement. We'll see what he does next, whether he's still in the world of football,

or maybe he wants to do something completely different at some point. We'll obviously talk about the repercussions for the Rams and what that defense looks like without him, but we got plenty of time to do that. All right, so this was the intro. Now we're going to get to the rest of the show. Enjoy extra point take. Where are we at, we actually thought we had breaking news out of the top of that show, which was the Vikings, Texan straight, but that's no longer breaking news.

That's right. Busy Friday. We'll get to it all. All right, everyone, thanks for listening. Welcome to Extra Point Ticket. Shield Capati here, joined by Ben Solac minutes before we're on the air. We got a draft trade. It gave the show a little bit more juice. Benny Souls, we got a lot to get to. A lot of moves that happened this week. And of course, we will start with the draft trade between the Minnesota Vikings and the Houston Texans. How are we doing?

You never know when that late March draft trade is going to come, right? There's always one that happens like a month out, three weeks out, early April before the draft. You just know it's going to come at an inconvenient time for content. That's the only rule. Other than that, you never know when it's going to hit you. Hit us fast right after Free agency this year. Did you say an inconvenient time for content or a convenient time for content? Inconvenient time for content.

This is literally seconds before we came on. This is great for content. I'm talking about for me because I had a muck draft that was done, you know, bow tied on time. T's crossed, crossed, eyes dotted. I got to get back in there this morning and figure out how to make it work again. All right.

And you made it work. Everyone's fine. All right. So we're going to do a similar structure to what we did earlier in the week where we picked out what we think the biggest moves were this week since we last recorded on Monday night. And we're just going to go through them.

Here's this. Here's what we thought. Here's what we thought. And then don't forget, we come back to you on Monday. So if you're thinking, we want some big picture stuff. Who's free agency do you like?

who's off season do you like, who's don't you like. We'll hit on the big picture stuff next week, but there's just been so many individual signings, trades, head scratchers, whatever this week that we felt like we wanted to hit on them individually.

All right. So I started us off earlier this week. Solax can start us off today with the draft trade. Benny Souls, get us going. Yeah, so details for you here.

The Minnesota Vikings traded back up into the first round. They already had the first round pick at 11 overall. They've acquired another one now, 23 overall from the Houston Texans. The Texans, leaving the first round now, get a second round pick this year. It's the one of the Vikings had. They also get a future second round pick, and then the team's also swapped late rounders. So functionally, the Vikings got 23, the Texans got 42 and an extra second round pick. Move for the Texans is pretty clear. They probably don't like the class after like 15 people, after 20 people. They're kind of doing the usual, you know, we don't,

And this isn't really the first round. Let's trade back. Let's be smart. Let's recoup some value. Future picks, whatever, whatever. It's obviously, I think a more impactful move for the Vikings who are pretty obviously

looking for a quarterback trade-up opportunity. You now sit in the draft of 11 and 23. So you have two first-round picks this year that you can subsequently put on the table for a team like the Patriots at three, the Cardinals of four, Chargers at five, Titans at seven. There's a lot of teams in the top 10 that I think you can call about a trade back. So that way you can get up into the top five, top 10.

and draft the quarterback. I would have thought Houston could have got a little bit more for moving from 23 to 42. Like, it's pretty substantial move back. It's plus value on, like, most of the quick charts that you look at, right,

the Jimmy Johnson and the Rich Hill and all that. But usually moves that imply quarterback acquisition come within a premium cost. And I think that you can kind of read those tea leaves from Minnesota. So I do think they didn't get terribly much for this move. Houston did. I don't think it's bad business. I just think I'm surprised to see this get done on March 15th. If this offer on my table on March 15th, I would be like, okay, call me back in a week and like add something to it.

Like, you know, I don't feel the urgency to get this done. Maybe Houston knows that Minnesota was calling a ton of teams in the 20s to get this second first round pick. For Minnesota, yeah, I mean, like this is, the Minnesota's quickly positioned themselves to be one of the stronger teams that might move up. Minnesota's there at 11. The Broncos are at 12. The Raiders at 13. I think all those teams would like to move up for a quarterback. now only one of one of those three teams has two first round picks this year.

And that's the Minnesota Viking. So this trade benefits them for that reason. You've seen a couple of the smart teams do this. When they want to move up, they do it in pieces, right? They don't do it in one fell swoop, right? Like when the Eagles moved up for when. So I remember in 2016, they went like from 15 to 8 and then 8 to 2. It was like 13 to 8 and then 8 to 2 or something like that.

Sometimes these moves can come kind of more in more like discreet jumps. I think it makes like the overall cost feel a little bit, not as, big. We're seeing teams do this now. Anyway, I think it makes sense for the Vikings. It makes sense for the Texans. I think it's very clear for the Vikings what their plan is moving forward. The big question for them is who's the trade-up team in the top 10? That's right. So that's what I want to drill down on a little bit more from you, since you are the draft man who has been thinking about these scenarios for what, six, seven months already while I'm just jumping into it. Now, so the Vikings now have picks number 23 and 11. So 11 and 23. Now you get this pick,

Now, where do you want to end up? Who is the guy you're targeting? What scenario are you worried about that made you think, you know what? We want to get that extra first round pick to be aggressive. So I guess the first one we have to think about here so like. I mean, one is Chicago. Caleb, we all think Caleb Williams, right? And then two Washington commanders.

You would expect them to draft whichever quarterback they like the best, whether it's Drake May or Jade and Daniels. Do you have a strong opinion on that right now, Drake May? or Jaden Daniels? I like Drake a lot better than Jaden. No, but in terms of what, do you think Washington likes him? You feel strongly or no? So there's been reporting that, I can't remember who did the reporting now. Somebody asked five Jams who Washington likes it too.

And four of the five said Jane Daniels, but the one five who didn't was like, I know Adam Peters very well and he loves Drake May. And so there's a little bit of like, you know, who's just reading tea leaves here, who's just murmuring, who actually knows what's going on. I think here's what I believe to be true. The commanders are not said it to yet. I believe that to be true. I don't think the commanders know internally who they're taking it to yet.

That's number one. Number two. I think QB1 for every team is Caleb Williams. I think QBs two, three, and four between Drake, May, Jane Daniels, and JJ McCarthy is a different ranking across most teams. I think that there's different rankings all over there, right? And I think a lot of the rankings are split pretty fine. I think it's not like, you know, like, I think some teams have like a real battle at QB3.

They have real battle with QB2. They don't know exactly who they have there. So right now, I think we're in a mess at the top. they are. All right. I'm watching the JJ McCarthy film this weekend. I need to get a firm opinion on what is happening. Have you have you watched any of the quarterbacks yet? I did

Caleb Williams, yep. I did Caleb Williams. Talk to me. You want a little detour? The upside is so obvious. I mean, you see him make all the 1% throws that you look at a quarterback who's capable of elevating the floor and the ceiling of his team. So I like that. Obviously, the stuff out of structure, he can create. He can make those plays that not a lot of quarterbacks can make.

And then I really like his short, intermediate accuracy. Like he makes those easy throws consistently over and over and over again. So that's like a very nice base that I'm working with in addition to the physical tool. So I would take him, number one, and feel good about it. Now, having said that, it's also I can see the way in which he fails. And that's his, he just tries to make something on every single play. And you watch his negative plays.

Oh, why did you do that? Get those out of your system. because you can't do that in college. Those are on his college film where he's just trying to save every play and I don't know if it's Hero Ball or whatever. And you're like, oh, why did you do that? So if you're doing that in college,

if there are going to be some of that in the NFL, you would think yes. But I think overall you look at it and you say, all right, well, it wasn't a great situation for him last year. There were fewer of those plays on film the year before and I feel good about it. So I'm on board with Caleb Williams. Like, I'm not like, this is the most surefire prospect

that I've ever seen and I'm 100% short. it's going to work. But if I were the Bears, I would feel great about having the first pick this year because it's all about upside with quarterback. I want the guy who is just going to have me in the mix for years to come, not like the safe guy. So if you miss,

it sucks, but I love the upside with him. So that is my, what did I miss? What do you think? No, I think that was very good. I think a big thing about Caleb that people miss and forget is that,

like, when he has progression stuff, he will throw the check down and he'll throw it on time early. Like, if he has like a concert that reads deep to shallow, and the defense is giving him shallow. He will just take it in rhythm, which a lot of the,

you know, knuckle-led quarterbacks try to do too much guys. They never show that they can do it, right? Jane and Daniels, never. Caleb shows you that he can do it, which means that you as a head coach in NFL team, you just got to convince the guy,

hey, we've got a running game, we've got a defense, we've got good receivers. Like, you don't need to have the world on your shoulders. You ain't Atlas anymore. Right? And if you do, like, he has shown you that he is willing to just execute.

And that's an enormous deal to me. So I think that at that point is an important one. The period in time, which I've watched the top guys and you haven't, is the most agonizing period of the time of it. Because I just want to talk about them with you so much. I want to hear what you say. And you haven't watched them. Yeah.

I'm just a happier on him. I'm a free agency man. So like you got to zag when everyone's talking. You got to find your little niche. Yeah. And at some point in my career, I said, my little niche, let's do a little free agency. All right. Can you do more free agency?

Yes. Can you do? And then you end up writing about free agency every year. So that's where I am. All right. So two, we don't, I don't think the commanders are going to trade. number two. Do you think the commanders like, I guess if they have both those guys graded very closely, but that seems very unlikely. It seems like they will like one guy more than the other and they'll

stick it to. So I think the big thing here to keep an eye on is the New England Patriots at number three. When you're trying to get two first round picks and potentially make a big move, you reminded me before we came on, the San Francisco 49ers, 2021, they move up from 12 to 3. So again, very similar to where you would think that the Vikings would potentially have. have to go. We're talking about 11 to 3 here. The 49ers gave up 12 to future first and a future third. So by that you would say

the Vikings would have to give up 11 to they would have to give up 11. Their second first round pick that they just got, 23, maybe next year's first and maybe a third to get up there to three. It's weird to me because like to get up to three, like now you're getting the third best quarterback on the board.

Do you think that's why the Vikings made this move? Do you think they're like, We have a guy who we believe in so much that we want to take a huge swing. Or do you think this is more about, hey, let's get some assets and let's make sure. Maybe they love Drake May. Let's say that, right? Maybe they love Drake May. And they're like, hey, if Drake May falls to three, we want to be ready to go ahead and pounce.

But the Patriots need a quarterback too. So that's what I'm trying to figure out here. Like, where are they trying to get to with this additional first round pick? To make this move early, like, you know, you have to have some sense that they're ready to take a big swing here. I think they'd like to be able to draft the third quarterback off the board. If the Patriots don't give them the option to do that, i.e. the Patriots stay and take a quarterback. I think they are going to be okay with taking the fourth quarterback off the board. And QB3 and QB4 sound like scary.

We have to remember that they aren't, right? Justin Herbert was QB3 in his class. Josh Allen was QB3 in his class. Jordan Love was QB4 in his class. And don't get me twisted. It's way better to have the first overall pick. And like obviously when you mess up it's more embarrassing. It's definitely better to have QB1 and have control of the bull.

Just there are recent worlds and a lot of worlds where QB3, QB4, these are good players. And so if you've done the class and you have a good grade on Jaden, you have a good grade on J.G and you have a good grade on May, you should feel confident in March getting the capital in position, such that you will be the team that makes the most compelling offer quickest to go get that QB3, QB4. The Vikings, again, like, when we came off the combine, one of the first things that I said on the show is like, all right, Vikings are getting J.J. Like, you usually listen to the GM and the head coach talk. They are in on a young guy.

They are in on development. The Kirk thing was fun. But man, like, they've got two starting tackles. They've got two starting wide receivers. They've got a receiving tight end. Kevin O'Connell is a good offensive coach. If I were a rookie quarterback, I would want to land in Minnesota, man. And Minnesota has also shown you, right?

Ownership has shown you. They will give you a runway, right? Rick Spielman just hung around for a long time, just trying to figure out quarterback, right? Mike Zimmer was there for a long time. Questie and Kevin aren't getting randomly fired tomorrow, right? They will give you a runway, Minnesota. Kirk was there for multiple contracts, right? They will give you a runway.

So that's that is a good incubator for rookie quarterback. So they're ready to plug a young guy in there. And I think that there are a little desperate. And I think everybody knows this. And so I do think that like, you know, they're tipping their hand a little bit. But they have the best draft package right now. The Broncos sent picks for Sean Payton, right? They don't have as much draft capital hanging in the back as other teams do.

I think the Raiders are pretty much recovered from the Devante trade. I think they have like the standard amount of draft capital. But in general, the Vikings have the best capital right now. They can make the best offer. So I don't mind that they're tipping their hand. When you're in pole position, so let everybody know that you're leading the clubhouse. So, yeah, I think that they are going to be prepared to make an offer for three

if the Patriots are going to put that on the table. If not, then they're going to, you know, have been talking with the Cardinals at four and the charges at five. Chargers at five would not surprise me if that's the spot, right? Chargers really make sense as a tradeback team. In my most recent mock, I'll be NFL draftofferpringer.com. I have them traded for seven, 10 Tennessee Titans. I think Titans are the absolute floor in terms of the tradeback teams that you would be

talking to, right? So once you start to get to like 7, 8, 9, 10, now the Broncos of the Raiders can more easily jump you. So defensively, you want to be moving up even earlier than that to make it hard for the Broncos of the Raiders to get ahead of you. Those are the teams that I look for. Seven for J.J. McCarthy? Is that what you had? Trade up to seven and Jeff's Jay,

seven for JJ. But again, like. And is Jaden Daniels off the board in that mom? Yeah. Well, everyone would read the whole thing, but just the quarterbacks. Yeah. Jaden goes to the commanders. Great goes three to the Patriots. Okay.

Which right now in Fandall Sportsbook Shield, that is the favorite. Right now, Jay Daniels is the favorite to go to overall over Drake May. Small favorite, but he crossed him this week. But haven't we learned for years that the sports books are all over the place with these odds or no? Yes? So, so with the draft odds?

Yes and no. Yes and no. Okay. The thing is is that like the sportsbook world moves a lot more and a lot faster than people realize. And so people see on like the Wednesday before the draft day a graphic on Instagram of like, Draft Kings now has CJ Stroud the favorite to go first. We're all over Bryce Young.

and then they think that like that's static. That happens like 45 minutes. And then big money comes in and corrects it and then all since price again. And so like these markets are way more fluid. And according to like super juice, like they're not good markets to buy into unless you have information. They're a lot more fluid than I think like a lot of people realize. And so like yeah, like Jaden right now is the favorite to be second overall.

If I would be stunned if he remains at this price for more than like a week, right? Like it's going to move. It's going to change as money comes in and his news comes in. Altogether though, yeah, like I, I don't think the Vikings are moving up thinking we're for sure getting McCarthy. I think they're moving up thinking we're getting someone between QB3 and QB4. And right now,

they have at least two of the last three quarterbacks that they like. So they feel like they're going to be able to get one of those guys. They read to me like a McCarthy team for sure. And then between Drake and Jaden, I would say they read like a Drake team. But the Jaden thing is like, it's tricky. Because any team could be a Jaden Daniels team.

Because Jaden is like a Lamar Jackson sort of runner, right? He's a unique sort of player. And so any team could just decide all of a sudden like, all right, we're going in on 120 quarterback carries this year. And it's like, okay. Like, that's a hard thing to anticipate. You know what I'm saying?

Last thing I'll say about Questi, just when you hear him talk, is that like this could be a move. Hey, we want this in our pocket in case we want to make a move. And if that move doesn't present itself, we can then adjust and trade one of our first round things and regain some of that draft capital.

You know, so I think that's like it adds a layer of flexibility. And I'm sure there's a move they want to make. make, but I don't think, you know, just, just again, hearing him in interviews and stuff, I think it'll be like, all right, well, if it's not there, then let's pivot and move to something else. So that's something we'll talk about a lot here in the weeks and months ahead. And Questi can say that, and Questus is a good talker, and there's some wisdom to that. They walk into May with Sam Donald's quarterback won.

That's going to be a failure for the last two months. They can spin it however way they like. If they walk into May with Sam Donald's QB1, they didn't get what they wanted. Yeah, I agree with that. All right. Next move, we had a trade Thursday evening, the Chargers trade. Keenan Allen to the Chicago Bears for a fourth round pick number 110 overall. Last year, Keenan Allen had 108 catches for 1243 yards, like a career year for Keenan Allen. Yards per route run, he was 12 out of 117 to our very efficient season two.

He wasn't just a volume guy. So I like this from the bear. perspective. Okay. So the reporting is that the charges ask Keenan Allen to take a pay cut. He was like, no thank you. And then they trade him. So good for him. I mean, why take a pay cut? You could get paid a certain amount and they want you to pay to take a lower amount. And another team's going to will pay you the first amount. Then go ahead and take the first amount. No, you know, Keenan Allen, CTC. So I like this for the bears. Now, there is some risk to this. I feel like the way this is being discussed is that this, oh, home, wrong.

Why would the, Keenan Allen is entering his age 32 season and he costs $23 million next season. Now, I know everyone is tired of me talking about like these aging curves with cornerbacks and wide receivers. But last five years, there have been two wide receivers who have had a thousand yards at age 32 or older. Julian Edelman in 2019 and Adam Thielen, Soak, last year, Adam Thieland on the Carolina Panthers. So Keenan Allen looked great last year. I think he can be the exception, but just generally when wide receivers reach this age, you know, the cliff comes pretty quickly. Now from a bear's perspective, now you have DJ Moore.

Now you have Keenan Allen, who is just professional route runner, knows how to get open, catches the foot like, I like it. Help your rookie quarterback out. This is a smart way to spend your money for the Chicago Bears and spend your resources if you're the Chicago Bears. And then if you're the Chargers, like they were just basically going up to every veteran saying, do you want to take a pay cut? And Joey Bosa and Khalil Mack both said yes.

So those guys are both saying. They release Mike Williams. They trade Keenan Allen. Their wide receiver room is horrendous right now. One of the worst in the NFL. But maybe they're viewing this is like... Darius Davis Slander. No respect for Alex Erickson.

Where is the Josh Palmer love shield? I think isn't Alex Erickson a free agent? I feel like he was on one-year special team or 100%. All right. We're not talking about him. anymore. All due respect, Alex, if you're listening, Michael Vanby.

Rate review and subscribe. Is this like a take your medicine? I'm trying to figure it out for the charges. What do you think? Is this like a take your medicine? We got to get out of this cap situation, move on from veterans type situation. But then I would think, well, wouldn't they go a little further?

And maybe you get rid of Bosa or Mac and say, let's go a little bit further in that direction. Are they more in the competitive rebuild stage where they're like, hey, we still want to win some games next year and be solid. but we know we're probably not going to be competing for a Super Bowl right away because this roster needs a lot of work. How do you view this from a Chargers perspective? Well, let me take you, Sheel, Free Agency Expert, to March 4th, 2025.

And Keenan Allen just came off his first year with the Chargers. He had an average Kenan Allen season, right? The season you would expect. With the Bears. No, no, no, with the Chargers. Oh, with the Chargers. Oh, he stays on the Chargers. Yeah.

Okay, okay. Right. He's on the Chargers. He has the average season that you would expect him to have with Greg Roman, you know, whatever, like, you know, whatever your median outcome is, let it be in your mind. He's 33 years old. He's hitting free agency.

What do you recommend in the, the charges sign him to? Right. Like, what sort of deal do you think that they're going to give them, right? It's not going to, I mean, 33 year old wide receivers do not get paid a lot of money. Yeah. And so if they're not, if it's like, it's not a huge deal. Like, if he doesn't have a ton of value for them after the following year, it's not like he's going to sign somewhere else for a big compick return, right?

And while you might return Keenan Allen next year in free agency, because, oh, hometown guy and we know he works with Herbert and whatever. Like he's not going to be the focal point of your past the game anymore. You're going to be trying to cycle in young receivers to kind of take that mantle over. So the Bears call you and they say, hey, you want 110? And you sit down and you go, I mean, like, we're probably never going to get better than 110 for Keenan. And I'm not sure Keenan's going to be on the team in 2025.

And so I think for the charges, it was just like a, hey, like, this is like a known commodity. We can get a near top 100 pick for a guy that we might not employ next season. And hey, we don't really want to give him 18.1 anyway. his cat pay was 23 or whatever it was. We don't want to give him all this money because we know we're not competing this year regardless. We're going to be in it. We're in a tear down the Telesco stuff and rebuild it up this season.

So to me, I think it was just like, okay, we know we're getting like a semi-decent deal in Keenan Allen. Like, yes, you just had a great season. Sure, we'd love to keep them. But you know what? Like, we got to rip some Band-Aids off here. So to me, like, that's how I read it. Yeah, I'm actually surprised that they even got that. Like, typically when a veteran at this age and everyone knows, like, the team kind of wants to get off the money,

that player oftentimes just ends up being released and then signed elsewhere. So yeah, if you're a charger spin and looking for the silver lining, you know, that's not a bad job of GMing to get a fourth round pick for him. And that's the thing that interests me, if the Bears had not sent a fourth for Keenan and instead had signed Mike Williams and free agency because Mike Williams just got cut by the Chargers, which doesn't cost a fourth round pick, by the way, we'd probably come in and talk about it in not exactly the same way.

I think Keenan is definitely a better fit with DJ Moore and is a better player. Gives them a little bit more what you want in terms like security underneath routes instead of Mike Williams, like a jumpball guy down the field. But we'd kind of talk about it in the same way where we'd be like, this is a talented receiver. They needed to add a wide receiver too. So for the Bears to spend a fourth to go get Keenan

and it's kind of like, wow, they really believe like this is the sort of player that they want and they believe that he has the legs, which I get. Again, he came off of an excellent season. Real quickly, my favorite Kenan Allen stacks. I think it's just so cool. Adam Harsad, who's a fantasy football writer, but excellent writer and a smart cookie.

Last year when the Chargers were playing, I think it was the Ravens, yeah, they were playing the Ravens. And this was like one of those games where Keenan had like 16 targets, 14 catches, like one of these games. Yeah, he tweeted, tonight is Keenan's Allen 12th game with 12 plus catches with sets a new NFL record. The previous record was held by Keenan Allen with 11 such games. Prior to that, the record holder was Keenan Allen with 10 such games.

He's now logged his eighth game of 13 plus catches, which breaks the NFL record of seven previously held by Keenan Allen. Prior to that, the NFL record was six games with 13 catches held by Keenan Allen. There is nobody in the NFL history who takes high volume at the wide receiver position in a game like Keenan Allen does. And that is why, like, I think for the Bears, like this particular player makes sense for their wider receiver two spot where I wanted them to improve. They've been mocked, you know, rookie receivers at nine overall. Marquis Brown is available. Curtis Hamilsman available from Mike Williams available. Why Keenan Allen? Because you can run the offense from. You know that you can run the passing game through him.

You had DJ more. You'd prefer to run the passing offense through DJ more. But DJ is going to be an explosive play guy for you. He's going to be a downfield route guy for you. If you need to run a game where the past direction is suffering, and you're trying to simplify the offense for Caleb Williams, and you're just going to try to dink and dunk on some half field separation routes. Like Caden has shown you for a decade that he can be that guy for you at a very, very, very high level.

And you don't need to ask him to do anything more. You need to ask him to do yards after the catch, ask him to do downfield routes. You have DJ for that. So I do think the fit is really nice. Kenan, man. what he does well, he does better than pretty much anybody in NFL history. It's impressive.

QB friendly. Yeah, I think everything you described as QB friendly as you can find, and that's great for by the way, bears could still take a wide receiver at 9. I mean, you add one of those stud wide receivers and now it's that guy, DJ Moore, and Keenan Allen with Caleb Williams. All right, now we're getting pretty interesting there in Chicago. All right, let's take a break. We'll come back. We've got a lot more moves

to get to. All right. We are back on extra point taken. So that's our next headline. The next one is Chief Signing Marquis Brown. Markis Brown, who was the receiver with the Baltimore Ravens. He was traded to the Arizona Cardinals for a first round pick. He was expected going to be the wide receiver one there in Arizona.

Never really got off the ground. He hits free agency, bops around for a little bit. One year deal with Kansas City reportedly up to $11 million. We haven't seen, correct me if I'm wrong. I haven't found what this actually is. Guy Nerseney had it. Yep, seven million, one year. seven million up to 11 million up to 11 yeah so one year seven million is i think kind of telling you

where the league views marquise brown right now that's pretty much expected money for like a speedster field stretcher downfield threat for us plus maybe you can be a little bit more uh at that figure the one year deal the incentive laid contract obviously marquis brown we've seen him be like a higher volume receiver be him to be a three level receiver i think it makes sense for brown to say hey i'm to play one year with Patrick Mahomes. There's a lot of targets to go around. My numbers are going to look a lot better. My production's going to look a lot better.

Maybe I hit some of those incentives. And I can hit free agency again still next season. Marquis Brown at that time will still be a younger player. He'll hit free agency at 27 years old. Maybe there's a chance that he gets a nice second contract coming off the production with Mahomes. For the Chiefs, obviously, it makes sense. Marquez Vall de Scanling was their expected guy to be their downfield option,

really inconsistent hands, really a ball tracking wasn't good. They couldn't stretch the field with him. Marky Sprout is going to step into that role. right, where he's going to play a majority of the snaps. He's mostly going to get his targets downfield, be able to stretch the field for you and take advantage of Mahomes' arm. Brown's certainly a better player than Baldess Scanling. People have listened to the show and listen to my work.

No, never been a huge Markies Brown fan, but he's definitely a better player than MVS. I think you can fill a good role for them. And price tag-wise, I think this is, you know, right on the nose. Like, this is, when you're spending less than, we're spending like $7 million on a starting receiver, I think that that's good business, giving the way the cap's going up in today's NFL.

And so I don't have, towering expectations for Brown in this offense. And I know like, if people are back to being a thousand yard receiver, Bill Barnwell posted, you know, last time Brown was healthy and his starting quarterback was healthy. And they were in a past first offense. He was on pace for like 1,300 yards. I just think that like there's too many ifs in that.

I don't hold up Brown in that esteem anymore. I don't think he can be that high volume guy. I think still the passing offense is going to run through Rishie Rice in terms to the wide receivers. But Brown's definitely going to play a valuable role for them. He's going to have those peak weeks that look really good. And so good fit for kids. Kansas City. This was a player team pairing that always made sense. I think the money's right.

So overall, box checks all around. B B Plus is all around. I think this is a square deal. I go A. This is one of the best values in free agency, even if you don't love Marquis Brought. I mean, one year, $7 million in a world where Calvin Ridley is getting $23 million per year. And Gabe Davis is getting $13 million per year. And you're plugging him in. And I just like that. Again, I'm with you. I'm not like he's going to have, you know, a monster season. I do think I We'll still believe that there's some untapped upside there with Marquis Brown in a situation like this, where I trust the coach to know how to use him, where I obviously trust the quarterback, and there are other pieces on the field.

So now you go in to the draft with Marquis Brown, Rishie Rice, and Travis Kelsey. You can exhale a little bit. It doesn't mean you're finished. It means you can still draft a quarterback. You can still add another offensive weapon, but you set the floor. And that's always what you want to do. If the Chiefs had to play a game on Sunday, they are better. equipped offensively than they were in the Super Bowl. And so I like that a lot. I mean,

Marquis-Sprout, I understand the knocks on Marquis-Brown, and we don't have to go from you. You articulated them, I think, on our last podcast, 31st among wide receivers in yards over the past three seasons. Like, he has been productive. He hasn't been a monster. He hasn't been, like, an all-pro, obviously, hasn't been one of the best wide receivers in the league. But he has been productive enough where I feel good about this one. And I just feel like when I was watching him on film, doing my free agency rankings, I'm like, he can still. He'll run and stack receivers where I want to see what the downfield ability looks like with a quarterback who can get him the football consistently. And I think that's going to be the case here with Patrick Mahom.

So I like this move quite a bit for Kansas City. Again, I'm sure there were other things they were exploring. There were other avenues. They could have gone to get him for this value and what you need him to do. I mean, that is absolutely a monster win for the chiefs in free agency. So, yeah, again, if I were naming like my best, I haven't done this exercise yet, but if I was just looking at value in terms of positional value, age, upside, all those things, to get him at one year $7 million is a huge victory.

And you laid it out well for Brown. I mean, if I'm an agent and I have a free agent wide receiver who's not getting the bites you want and free, hey, hey, Andy, you want this guy? Like, yeah, he'll play with Mahomes for one year and then we'll reenter the market next season when maybe our value is a little bit inflated and we just put up big number. So I think that's absolutely a win for the Kansas City Chiefs. All right. Marquis Brown since 2019, eighth in targets of 20 plus air yards among receivers in the league

overall. He's 23rd reception, 26th in receiving yards. He is 415th in receiving a percentage, which there's no like minimum. And so like that number is super low. But in general, like in terms of returning value on downfield targets, I think that he's a lot, shakier than I think folks realize. This, like, I am as excited for him downfield, like, I think he's going to be better than

MBS, which is what they need. Well, I'm as excited for him downfield as I am, like, the underneath stuff and the behind line of scrimmage, the design's touch stuff is going to be fun. Brown's not a great tackle breaker because he just lacks the size, but a lot of the stuff that they used to do with Tyreek, right? Like, Tyreek in Kansas City was just notorious for like never running into contact, right?

He would just take all these screens and all these jet touches, and then he would just, you know, slip out of bounds, six yards down the field. But it was such a nice way to get Tyreek involved in the game. It was a nice way to stay ahead of the sticks for them. So a lot of like the design touch underneath stuff, they're going to be able to dust off some of the 2020-2019 Tyreek playbook and get some of those touches to Marquis Brown underneath.

I think that's going to be where like Brown's stock improves and his stats improve, potentially more so than like some of the downfield stuff. I know you are anti-past drawing pass interference penalties, but he did draw 257 yards of past interference penalties, which is second among wide. receivers in the past three seasons. So add those to the downfield stuff. I've been thinking about like what projects am I going to work on during

paternity leave? I'm not going to have anything to do. I'm just going to be sent around super bored. Oh, my God. Oh, please play this back in a few months. Somebody clip this, use it as blackmail to Solex wife. I keep doing this bit with Merr. It's very funny.

She's enjoying it a lot. And I think I might solve NFL refereeing. I think I just might come out. come out of the summer show in August. Here's the change that need to be made. All right. And one of them will be about DPI. That is the peak Solek moment right there.

Since I won't have anything to do with my newborn child, I will solve NFL refereeing. I mean, that is too long for a T-Shed. The baby sleeps all the time. I would wear it on a T-shirt. You just got to fill in time somehow. I can't.

I think I'm excited about, as excited about this as you are, as your family is. This is going to be great for team content for me. here in the months and years ahead as you know I can just say well yeah okay all right next one who's up I'm up seehawks trade for sam howl who thought this move would have so much juice I mean the reverberations around the NFL with this move are so exciting so seahawks are giving up a third and a fifth they get back a fourth and a sixth I'm sorry I can't remember who said it was it

bill barnwell maybe I said it's the equivalent of like a fourth round pick they basically you do the math you look at the charts it's around a fourth round pick that they're giving up for Sam Hal. Now, this one created some buzz because I think it was the Adam Schaefter tweet, which got you very upset, said that, you know, Sam Hal goes to Seattle to compete with Gino Smith. So then John Schneider has to go on Seattle radio and say, no, no, no, no, Gino Smith is a starter. Sam Hal is the backup.

But then John Schneider, who he's not new around here, John Schneider's been around the block. How do I change the storyline from Drew Locke, Gino Smith quarterback, competition to something else. He just offers a good. Such a good, such a good move. John Schneider, come on the pod. You understand team content. So he offers up this nugget that, well, yeah, we wanted Drew Locke back.

But Drew Locke signed with the Giants because the Giants told him he can compete for the starting job there. He's viewing that as like a Baker-Mayfield Bucks type situation, you know, resurrect your career with which, wait a minute. The Giants are paying Daniel Jones like $40 million per year this season. So Drew Locke's going to go there and compete. Now, I've been reading up on some Giants coverage and there's kind of conflicting reports about whether they told him that, whether that's true or not, but very interesting nonetheless.

So there are like 400 angles to tackle. Let's start with the Giants. Honestly, they're not even involved in the trade, but that's the juiciest angle here. So I want to start with them. Then we'll get to the Seahawks. Then we'll get to the commanders. So here's the deal. I actually believe that there is probably some truth to this.

If you look at it, per over the cap, here's the key number, $23 million. Okay, that is Daniel Jones, $2025 salary, $23 million is guaranteed for injury only. What does that mean? That means it's not fully guaranteed. They don't have to pay him that money unless he gets injured. And if he gets injured, he's covered. That becomes guaranteed. We saw a similar situation like this with the Denver Broncos.

this last season, where if you don't really want the quarterback beyond the year, it becomes risky to play the quarterback. Because if the quarterback gets injured, all of a sudden, you have to pay him this big amount of money and it's on your cap and all this scenario you don't want to play out, plays out. So there's a scenario. Look, if Daniel Jones is playing and it's week seven and you're two and four or whatever, and he's not playing well, and you have Drew Locke on the roster and you're like, all right, we don't want Jones on this roster beyond week seven. It could be later in the season. Then you say, let's make the smart move. We'll see. Sit down, Daniel Jones, we'll protect ourselves from that number becoming guaranteed,

and we will go with another player. So that's why I found the Drew Locke thing very interesting. Now, I think Daniel Jones is definitely better than Drew Locke. Other people might disagree with that, but Daniel Jones has had some pretty serious injuries here. You know, the Giants committed to him for two years, which was a mistake. We called it out on this podcast. We said, this is what the franchise tag is for. They disagreed.

But that's why, to me, the Giants aspect of this is most interesting. What do you think, So, like, what did you make of that whole thing? I just, I really liked to go and read all the reporting of the Drew Locke signing before any of this came out. Because none of it. Not one. Are they like, maybe this implies the Drew Lock. Because it's one year, five million. It looks so non-discreet, right?

Like usually when a guy like, oh, you might compete. It's like a regular backup quarterback contract. Yeah. Right. Usually the money, like when Taylor Heineke signed for his deal with the Falcons, you were like, Ben, that's big money. Like, you know, like they're going to yank Desmond Ritter quick. And what do they do? Yank Desmond Ritter quick, right?

This Drew Lach, one year, five million. This is very innocent up here, right? This is, you know, who little me, Drew Locke, I'm just making $5 million. I 100% believe that the Giants presented Drew Locke with the idea that you can win the job. They have been, like, one of the number one things coming out of the Combine was that the Giants

might take a quarterback at 6. They're trying to figure out the quarterback market. Like the J.J. McCarthy favored team, all of a sudden it became the Giants had a nowhere during Combine Week. Matt Miller of ESPN, who's very plugged in NFL draft guy, had the Giants taking a quarterback at six in his mock draft coming off the combine. Like, there was enough smoke there for me to believe that there was at least fire theory.

There was some theory of fire behind. And that, of course, there's going to be. Daniel Jones was not great in 2023. And then you went down and they won games with Tommy DeVito. Like, once you see that, you can't, you don't get out of your head, right? Now, it's not real. It's Tommy DeVito. But once that happens to you viscerally, like it is hard to move on from it.

So absolutely, I buy that. Absolutely 100% unequivocally. What quarterback would they bring into it? Of course, Drew Locks. It's the dumbest thing in the entire world. It's ludicrous. Drew Lock has played one good drive in the last two years. It was the drive to beat the Eagles on Monday Night Football,

which, by the way, sent me into an existential spiral. That's what I knew the Eagles season was dead. It was once they lost to Drew Locke on Monday Night Football. 92 yards, I believe. After giving the defense of playing calling over to Matt Patricia, once Matt Patricia loses to Drew Locke in the final, seconds, your series, season is over. Okay, it's done.

So, right, that one Drewlock drive is going to trick the Giants into thinking that this guy has starting potential. When Drewlock couldn't beat out Gino Smith for the starting job in Seattle a couple years ago, the Giants should know about Gino Smith when its caliber of play is. Like, the fact that it's Drew Locke makes it 10 times funnier, which makes it 100% true. It just, it reaches a point of critical master. I'm like, I just, I desperately need this to be true because of how hilarious it is. So yes, I buy the Drew Locke might win the starting job.

I still think the Giants might be in the quarterback market, right? Probably not top 10 now, but Michael Pennix, Bo Nix, you know, kind of. Oh, I don't think this prevents them at all from drafting a quarterback at 6 signing, Drew Locke. I think they absolutely could still do that. I think six is a little bit less likely. And that's some Drew Locke. That's also some like the Vikings and their potential move up and like some of that drama zone and so forth.

I think that the Giants have always made more sense to me as like a Michael Pennix, Benix, Spencer Rattler, second round, third round, sort of a team. So that's more so where I think they're going to go for quarterback. On the Seahawks side of things, I don't know, like, the radio thing was masterfully done by John Schneider. But I don't know if just like Schneider doesn't talk to the national guys as much. Or like if other people from Seattle do, like maybe you know from your time there. Somebody needs to get a little bit more vocal with the Seahawks beat, not even the Seahawks beat, with the national beat about the fact that Gino Smith is the starter. because it is damaging to your team

that once every four weeks you have to do this every time they restructure Gino's deal there's a, do the Seahawks want Gino to be the starter? No, they're just moving the money around. They trade for Sam Howell. Of course this is going to bring up Gino questions. Like, get ahead of it. Like, this is not,

Gino is like very online. Okay, I know this because he quote tweets clips of himself playing on all 22 with like comments and stuff. Like, you don't want your starting quarterback to feel like he's constantly losing his job in the national media. So they got like,

they're going to make silly little Sam Howell trades somebody in that room has got to get better and convincing Schefter that nothing's going on. I disagree. Gino is a grown-up. Gino has seen everything in the NFL, and I like that they know it doesn't really matter. He's getting paid. Gino is going to go into every practice,

every camp, knowing that nothing's going to be handed to him at this point in his career. So I think it's good for content, and I suggest that the Seahawks continue to do it this way. All right, let's look at it from a Seahawks perspective here. You know what I thought about when I was preparing for this podcast? So I think Sam Howell is to shield as Desmond Ritter is to Ben Sola.

I think I'm not going to give up completely on Sam Hal. Now, maybe it's because I saw him completely... Both of our boys have new landing spots now. They both have new landing spots. Listen, there's a lot to not like about Sam Hal, okay? 27th out of 32 in success rate last season, 28th and EPA per pass play. Got sacked on nearly 10% of his dropbacks, high turnover worthy play rate, 21 interceptions. I don't like any of those things.

I will say this about saying Sam Hal is talented. Sam Hal can make big boy throws. I have seen those with my very eyes on film. He absolutely can make those. All right. Solac shaking his head. I'm going to, when he's bored with his baby, I'm just going to randomly send him clips of Sam Hal making good throws. So I don't mind this from Seattle. Here's the thing. Sam Hal is making no money. Okay. He's under contract for the next two seasons on his rookie deal at about $1 million per year. So he's very cheap. If he's very cheap, if he's If he's just your backup, guess what? That is a great value for a backup quarterback. And if he has to start a little bit, like, if he had to start three games for the Seahawks next year, they're not sunk. Sam Hal can sling it a little bit. He can make some plays there. So now he might throw a bunch of interceptions. Yes, he might take a bunch of sacks, yes.

So I actually like this from the Seahawks perspective. I don't have an issue with it giving up the equivalent of a fourth round pay. From a commander's perspective, I actually don't like what they did at that. quarterback. So they go out and they sign Marcus Marioada one year, $6 million. Now, you have heard me rail on Marcus Marioada in the past. You know I am not a fan. I would 100% rather have Sam Hal. Listen, I would rather have Sam Hal with you on that. I'm with you on that. Forget the salaries. It could be the same salary. I'd rather have Sam Hal. But now you're telling me Sam Hal for two years at $1 million per year, or Markets Marioada, one year, six

million, where then I have to figure it out again next season. I'm taking Sam Hal every single time. So I don't like this from the commanders. I like it from the Seahawks. And the Giants nonsense makes me very happy because it's good for podcasting. All right, what did I miss? I know you disagree on my Sam Howells and Eric Behanie Merchant. Give anybody 85 attempts a game and occasionally he's going to make a good throw. This is large sample bias. All right? No, I agree with you. Like, Howells got throws in his back. He absolutely does. I don't like, it's sort of Drew Locke. Like, it's the same concept where it's like, okay. I disagree. I have seen more from Sam than I have ever seen in Drewlock.

I will just say that. That's just how I feel. I think I agree with that too. But I'm saying the concept, which is that, man, if you watch this guy spin it, like yeah,

I've seen 19,000, man, if you watch this guy spin it's come in and out of the league. You have to have a baseline level of like risk management. I love how you speak like you're a 67-year-old bat. I don't want to. This is how I think about the world. I think about the world in terms of who can spin it.

And Sam Howell can spin it. But like, so could Drew Locke and show could Jared Stedham and so could just like a myriad of other guys. And it's just like, all right, like, you have to have baseline level of pocket management, risk management, processing speed. And just like, there's so much that goes into quarterback. And the ability to rides the ups and the downs.

So just Howell, like, when Howell starts to play poorly, he just disintegrates so fast. He's just a walking train wreck. Like, it's hard for me to get like the Giants film out of my head. Like, Wink just had no respect for him. Like, I just like, I can see Howell being a thing in a few years. And so, like, maybe like long term development wise, sure. But I think he's like, he has so many reps over his time. one year there with Washington. He had so

many developmental moments, and he didn't really get better over the course of the year. So I'm kind of worried he's limited and he is what he is. If you were asking me to invest in a backup quarterback, and Desmond Ritter was available for trade, and Sam Howell was available for trade, I would have taken Desmond Ritter. Disagree. Or disagree. Okay,

we'll say, Sam Howell's going to have a moment at some point in his crew. That's all I'll say. When he does, hopefully we'll slowly... We have next on the show list, Eric Armstead and Calvin Ridley, two massive for agent deals, and we are burning their clock to debate Desperman versus Sam Howell. All right, let's take a break.

That was a good tease by Solek. We'll pick up the pace a little bit. But listen, I had to get off some Sam Halth take. So what do you want for me? All right, we'll be right back. All right, we're back on extra point taken. All right, Solnick, give us the next one. Yeah, the Jacksonville Jaguars signing a deal,

a bit of, not like Dark Horse, but a big splash for them. They sign Eric Armstead, the 49ers defensive linemen, three years, a deal up to $51 million. That would be $17 million per year. Eric Armstead was making a little bit more than that with the San Francisco 49ers over the course of his most recent extension. The 49ers approached him about a pay cut. He had a big final year left on his deal, big base salary. They couldn't get close in terms of what a pay cut might look like, what would keep Armstead in San Francisco. We learned after he signed with the Jaguars, they talked about trading him.

There was a trade discussed between Armstead and the Texans with Malik Collins going back to San Francisco. That kind of fell through. Armstead hit free agency. there was expectation that he would potentially be a bill. I know Dana Rasini had reporting that, oh, he's going to be a bill. Oh, no, actually the bills thought they had to deal with him and then the Jaguars got it, whatever. Like the Armstead services were kind of like a big market

over the last 48 hours, and he does officially land in Jacksonville. Now, let's call Spade a Spade. Why did Jacksonville have $51 million over three years to give Eric Armstead? Because they kind of had some money earmarked for Calvin Ridley. I would say roughly, I don't know, $17 million per year over three years, that they did not get, to end up paying Calvin Ridley,

which is the next movie that we'll talk about. But for Jacksonville, it's a little bit falling bass backwards, I think, into a really good spot, right? Like, they desperately needed improved defensive tackle play. I think that was the weakest spot left on the roster,

certainly after a lot of their free agency spending. They had a big run of free agents in 2020 to 2021, I want to say, where they signed Foli Fauti Kossi, they signed Roy Robertson Harris. They drafted Devon Hamilton. Folli Fon Tocati, and they moved on from this off season,

haven't necessarily got from him what they wanted. Devon Hamilton has been like a good nose for them, but he dealt with off-field health issues last year that really affected his availability. And then Roy Robertson Harris has kind of become like a fine rotation player, but really not like a high-impact starter. Armstead walks in and becomes the best interior rusher on that team immediately. This is like a high-impact three-down player.

Armstead with his length can be like an inside, outside player. He can be a good run defender as well. This is a complete player. And he's probably a little bit past his prime. He's not going to be like, you know, oh, top five, top eight defensive tackle anymore, but they're paying him like fringe top 10, and I think he is fringe top 10. So I think the price tag is good in free agency, which rare to get a deal like that done with a player who had this big of a market, this late in the season. Usually you have to

overpay in a big way. I think they give him a little bit more than like he's probably worth, but still, like, I don't turn my eyebrows up at the deal like at all. I think the value is good. And I think that he'll, he can have a good force multiplying effect on Trayvone Walker and a good force multiplying effect on Josh Allen, be the best interior rush that those guys have played with over their time in Jacksonville. So I really, really think Jacksonville, Calvin Ridley shenanigans aside, stumbled into quite a nice one here with Eric Armstead. This is a good deal.

Yeah, I like Armstead. I think Armstead is pretty much universally like, like you mentioned, not only among analysts and media, but in the NFL. The concern here would be he's 30 years old and he's played 21 games the past two seasons. So that age, durability thing always comes into play when you're talking

about where do you spend your resources. So they're taking a bit of a gamble, but I understand it. He's a good player. He's a good fit. It's a need there. I do wonder what Josh Allen, you know, Jaguars, Josh Allen sees this and it's like, I can't get a deal here. Like, I'm in my prime. I had 17 and a half sacks last season. And we're going out and we're signing a free agent who's 30 and it's had durability issues, you know, 17 million per year. We're going out. We're signing other guys. We're signing Gabe Davis. I just wonder about the resource allocation, the plan in Jacksonville, which is a good way to get to

our next one. See, you know, we're keeping the pace moving here. The Titans signed count. Calvin Ridley, four years, $92 million, $23 million for year for Calvin Ridley trying to make a run at all first team CTC. And he's on his way right there. $50 million guaranteed he is being paid as the 10th highest paid wide receiver in the NFL if those numbers hold up. guarantees second to Tyreek Hill, 50 million guaranteed second to only Tyreek Hill. You are getting, if you're Tennessee, his age 29, 30, and 31 seasons. I thought, and I think you might disagree with me on this, I thought this was one of the most reckless, nonsensical moves in the entire free agency periods.

I mean, what do you do in tennis? There's another scenario where we come on here and you tell me those. exact same contract terms, and I say, I get it. If it's a team that is competing for a Super Bowl next year and they need a wide receiver and they're saying, we're going for it. Let's bring in Calvin Ridley. We have a great quarterback. We have a system. We know how to use them. I would have said, all right, it's a little rich, but I understand what they're doing? What are you doing, Tennessee? You are in rebuilding mode this season with very little chance to compete. Best case scenario, maybe you're playing for something in 2024 when Calvin Ridley is 30 years old. It is just a

wild number. I know they had cap space. Don't tell me, oh, they got to spend it. You don't have to spend it recklessly when you have cap space. So like they spent on Lloyd Cushenberry, right, who is a center. They're paying him like a top five center. That was an eyebrow razor for me. But you know what? He's what, 26 years old. It's a neat position. And you have Bill Callahan. If you're like, hey, this guy is going to be a lot better than he's been so far and he's been okay. He's been an okay starter so far. You want to be aggressive there? I'm all right with that. A center can play into is, you know, he can be someone for you for a long time. That's not going to be the case for Calvin Ridley.

Do not fall in love. Shield Capati's first rule of free agency and the draft. The Titans, you fell in love. You signed Calvin Ridley to an absurd contract. Where does it get you? And don't tell me all you need to put pieces around Will Levis for Navas. Like you have DeAndre Hopkins. You have Trailing Berks.

You have Tony. Like, there's enough there where I'm going to be able to figure out. I'm not saying it's a great cast, but like, I don't know, I'm not, I don't need to spend $23 million a year. to get an evaluation on Will Levis. You can sign, I mean, the chief we just said signed Markey's Brown for $7 million. Okay, so there are other ways to do it

other than then being this aggressive and this reckless. I don't know what the Titans are doing, quite honestly, with their free agency and we'll get to, again, into more big picture stuff next week. But this was one that I did not understand at all. What do you think? Agree or disagree.

I disagree a bit. I got to do the you thing there. I paused first. Oh, it's going to happen. Yeah, I thought you were doing weird. first you were shaking your head, then you were nodding. I'm like, which way is he going with this? I was like, you were cooking.

I enjoy watching you cook. You were living. So first thing I'll say to be this. Right now by caps space estimations, which are far from an accurate science at this age of free agency, top 51 estimations, because you don't know who's going to stay in the roster. The Titans right now are a second 2024 cap space with $55 million.

I know, like, they've got room is not a sufficient reason to spend money, but objectively they have room, right? And so, like, they don't need to be coloring around the margins here. I do think that there is more credence to. Let's figure out what we got with Will Levis than you allowed for right there, right? Like you said you have DeAndre Hopkins, you have Traylin Berks. As the world's foremost Traylin Berks fan, we cannot be relying on Traylin Berks anymore. He's been way too banged up, multiple seasons, cannot stay on the field, cannot be reliable.

Better now they have like old DeAndre Hopkins, and they already saw what that looked like last season. This team really, really struggled with the past protect. I thought they were going to do a lot more along the offensive line. Exactly. How about that? Spending the $23 million there. Man, is this how it feels when I interrupt you in an argument about something? Like, let me cook.

Right. I thought they'd be more aggressive spending along the offensive line. It feels like what they're doing is instead like building out the sort of past catchers in a running back room and like the weapons room where they can have Levice get rid of the ball very quickly, which is very interesting to me because Brian Callahan with Joe Burrow was like, man, this guy's like Peyton Manning, man, like he figures stuff out pre-snap and post-snap, he sees the rotations, and he gets the ball to the right guy quickly and he can be aggressive. And when the Titans hired Callahan, I was kind of like, man, I don't know if that Joe Burrow

offense is going to work for Will Levis. Like, Will Levis is a very different quarterback to stylistically skill position. I wear their bread is butter, like how they play. Callahan right now feels like he's trying to build a little bit more of like what Cincinnati had. Like, let's get these two good outside receivers and let's get rid of the ball quickly. And like, let's get a back, you can catch out of the backfield. and it's kind of like, dude, like, I don't know if this works for Will. Like, I, I, without a good offensive line, man, like,

Levis does not get rid of the ball the way Joe does, right? He doesn't come off his hand as fast. He's not willing to take the hits, but he's not going to like, you know, throw the accurate pass downfield 20 yards, we'll take in the hit. Like, the, I don't mind them spending the money. I don't mind them doing what's necessary to figure out what you have with Will Levis. You have, like, let's say, like, all right, Levis is, is clearly bad. You walk in an extra year and you need a new quarterback.

You're going to be able to walk around and say, well, we've got Calvin really, right? Hopkins isn't going to be there for very long, contract-wise. We have a wide receiver one in Calvin Ridley. We have a running back one. Like, I don't mind building the bedrock. I think it's okay. I do think the way- Is Ridley a wide receiver one, though?

I mean, I would take issue with that. I don't think he's a great one, but I think that's the argument that you can make. And I mean, you're banking on the same thing the Jaguars banked on when they sent a third, as we would subsequently discover, two third round picks for Calvin Ridley, is that he can be a wide receiver one.

Now, it didn't work super well in Jacksonville, right? And so it introduces some doubt there. I will say a part of this transaction, action that I think is a feather in the Titans cap is the fact that the Jaguars could have extended Calvin Ridley, very clearly wanted to extend Calvin Ridley, let him get to free agency, because by doing so, they only sent a third round pick back to the Falcons, not a second round pick. That was the conditions on the deal when they traded for him. The Jaguars very clearly thought on Wednesday at 3.30 p.m. that they were getting Calvin

Ridley back, right? We're going to sign him. The second free agency opens, right? We got it. No problem. And then the Titans came in at the 11th hour and nuked the market. And that's part of the reason why it's 23 million. Because they wanted to put this somewhere where Jacksonville couldn't go get it. That is very funny to me. Okay. That's firstly hilarious. Secondly, Jacksonville's wide receiver room right now is Gabe Davis, Zay Jones, or Christian Kirk, right? They objectively hurt a division rival. And I think that's worth something. I'm not sure how much it's worth.

It mostly entertains me, but it is worth something to screw over a team that you have to play twice a year. That is funny and it's good. I completely reject that notion at all level. when teams think that way. I thought you would like that. I thought you would enjoy that part of it. So the team that has way more information than now, in this case, it might be true because I don't know that the Jaguars know what they're doing. But in general, the team that has way more information than you on the player, you know, has a certain price for the player and you go above and beyond for him and you think you're smarter and you think you're hurting them. That generally is not the way it works out. So we'll say. It's bad for both teams, in my opinion. I disagree.

If I've got $23 million, which is chump change in the NFL, and I can spend it to put the Jaguars wide receiver room in an even worse spot than it was previously last year when it wasn't good enough? Like 100%, dude. Especially with like the way that bulky tried to game the system to like not spend the pick for the Falcons, absolutely. Punish that. Punish that every day of the week. This is a zero-sum game. Well, not objectively zero-sum between the times of the Jaguars. But still, Jaguars losing helps you out.

It helps you out in the division. I think that there is good credence to that. Listen, when you and I are talking about Doug Peterson's been fired, the Jaguars looking for a new head coach, Tren Bulki somehow State as a general manager eight, 10 months from now, I'm bringing back up the Calvin Ridley thing, man. And the Titans will be three and 14.

Okay, like they have, you looked at their roster? They have 4,000 things to think about before, how do we hurt the Jacksonville Jaguars? That should not even be in their thinking. The goal this year is to figure out what Will Levis is, and they spent more money than I thought they would do. achieve that and they spent it at different places

than I thought they would to achieve that, but I do think they have achieved that. And I think that that's a, that's a good sign for Callahan and for Cartham. All right, what do you got? What's next on here? Talking about weird wide receiver movements for not exactly wide receiver ones and what stage of team building are you at and what is going on. The Pittsburgh Steelers

have traded receiver Deonti Johnson. This was something that was rumored. Potentially move on from Deontate could be frustrated. Steelers are taking calls. We saw reporting about this. Deonti Johnson, handy little player. going to return something good for you and trade, right? Wrong. Deonti Johnson goes to the Carolina Panthers,

along with a seventh round pick. The Steelers receive a sixth round pick. Wow, pretty good. And corner Dante Jackson, which, yes, this is a trade of Deontay Johnson for Dante Jackson, which I will mess up at some point describing this. Cornerback Dante Jackson, who was the corner two for the Panthers last year, who, like, would occasionally be, well, not occasionally.

He would have to be Corner one because J.C. Horn was hurt. but it is like, no, make no bones about it. A cornerback too, a player who was a cut candidate for the Panthers, a player that the local beat believes the Panthers would straight up cut if they did not find a trade for him. He goes back for Deonti Johnson. The Steelers moved their wide receiver one for the Panthers Corner 2, who's probably going to be a veteran cut.

Not great business, in my opinion. The Steelers also make the move. Kenny Pickettas are starting quarterback. They signed Russell Wilson for. the veteran minimum. They're going to try to go really cheap at the quarterback position, right? Russ costs them nothing, picket cost them nothing. They're trying to build an offense out of that.

That is not typically the team that moves on from their starting wide receiver. Right now, the Steelers wide receiver room is George Pickens, Calvin Austin. It is not. They cut Alan Robinson. Denzel Mims is wide receiver three in Pittsburgh right now. And they needed a corner. They absolutely needed a corner. Dante Jackson, I think when they field Dante Jackson next year, you know what the team's going to say?

Man, we need a corner. Like, I'm not even sure they eliminated the need. And it cost them Deontay Johnson to do it, which I wouldn't be surprised if it was behind the scene stuff. Like, Deontay was really frustrated and he wasn't going to play well. And he's negatively affecting the locker room. He's a bad leader. And like, you know, like we saw Tomlin, Ben's chooks a quarter four. And then a quarter four goes to New England and free agency.

We saw them, you know, trade Kevin Dotson for peanuts. And like, I think like Tomlin has been moving on from cats, man. There is a real frustration with the way that some of these guys are in the locker and especially offensively, which goes back to the Matt Canada hire, goes back to the who employed Matt Canada, who kept him around things, so on and so forth. But man, this is not good return. This is not good return for the Steelers at all. Now, for the Panthers, good business, right?

Absolutely. This is a good player for very little. Well done. In classic Panthers fashion, did they get like a Tier 1 player, Tier 2 player? Probably not, right? I think Dante Johnson is more like your tier 3 of receivers. I think that he is a fringe wide receiver one, wide receiver two, but it is definitely better than what they had in the building.

And I think that he can at the very least be for them what Adam Thielen was last year in terms of that target hog, that underneath player, that guy they funneled the offense through with him and Thelan potentially get more out of him and get more explosives on Deonti. It is a great business move for them. I don't think that Deonti has as big of an effect on improving the offense as like a DJ Moore would to pull a random wide receiver one name out of a hat for Carolina. I don't think he's that caliber of player, but he's objectively a good player, and they got him on a great deal.

And so good business overall. The Panthers could still, though, like, they could still get T. Higgins on this team, and it would make sense. They could still get Brian and I. You could still go get like a star wide receiver and get him here, and it would totally, there's still room for that. Yeah, for the Panthers, I like the move. I mean, I've ripped the Panthers pretty, you know, pretty often on this podcast

in recent days, weeks, months, years, whatever. This is, I mean, this is nothing, one year, $10 million, compared to what we just talked about with Calvin Ridley for a guy who is entering his age 28 season. He had 717 yards and 13 games last year without great quarterback play. I also like the style. Like he is someone who separates, who gets open,

gives Bryce Young somebody to throw the football too often. So lots of more work to do, but this is a nice start to trying to put Bryce Young in position to succeed. So nice job by the Carolina Panthers, especially like you mentioned, if they were just going to release Dante Jackson anyway, and you throw them into this trade.

Nice job. From a Steelers perspective, this is a like, what am I missing type situation? You know, you may- gotta be something. What don't we know? There has my,

and typically I would not give the team the benefit of the doubt. With Mike Tomlin, it's a little bit different. Okay, so if there's something there that he knows, again, like you mentioned, whether it's effort,

lock, or whatever. There's something going on, in my opinion, there has to be behind the scenes. Because otherwise, there's no reason to make this trade. Again, 28 years old, productive number two receiver, maybe he has more upside if you have better quarterback play.

And so I think there's got to be something there. Now, Mike Garifolo, NFL Network, reported that the chiefs had interest in Deontay Johnson and the Steelers didn't want to trade him to a contender, which I always think like if you're worried about what that guy's going to do for the other team, then why are you trading this guy for nothing? You know what I mean? Like, I always wonder about that. I always feel like there's a like, if we trade him to a contender and then the contender is

good and he's good for the contender, we're going to look dumb. And it's like, buddy, we can make you look dumb five minutes after this deal. For example, if you train him for Dante Jackson and a six, like that would look dumb. Like, it's kind of like the, like, because for NFL teams, it's always like, oh, no one will know if this is dumb or not until like we see the product on the field. Like that's always how they approach things. Buddy, Ben, Ben, Sahlick and Shepapapati action point taken, we will call you dumb far before we see anything on the field and we currently are.

You're creating a weakness on the roster, like you said. It's if they had a player behind him who they saw and we've seen a little bit of and you say, all right, this guy can come in and replace him. That will be one thing. I mean, they got nothing. What did George Pickens goes down? Think about it, what that looks like this year. And you have a veteran defense.

I just don't, I don't understand this move. Again, maybe there will be more reporting. I will understand exactly what was going on there. But I like it for the Panthers. I do not get it at all for the Steelers. All right, try to go quickly here for the last few that we've got. Stick it with the Steelers. They signed Patrick Queen.

Three years, $41 million, $13.7 per season. 13.8 guaranteed. Two things I really like about Patrick Queen. One, he's only 25 years old. Reason to believe. You know, he can still be an ascending player at this stage of his career. Two, one of the most durable defensive players in the NFL. I mean, he started 67 straight games since entering the league.

So I always think about that with free agency. Like, if the guy can just be on the field for you and be like average, then that lowers the risk in a big way. Now, it doesn't mean he's going to stay healthy, but he has shown he's a very durable player. So we know he's got upside. He showed it last year next to Roquan Smith in that defense. It is your job as a staff to get that out of him.

Now, is there potential for him to totally drop off without Roquant Smith in another defense? Yes, absolutely. The Ravenson didn't pick up his 50-year option. It isn't somebody they believed in a year ago. So I have no issue at this price. I thought there might be a team that comes in and pays like the Tremaine-Edman's deal, which was around $17 million per year. for Patrick Queen. That's not what the Steelers did.

13.7 for Patrick Queen. That's reasonable. Guy with upside, positional need, and you'll see, and with that guaranteed money, you can really get out of this deal after a year if you want to. So I have no issue with the flyer. What do you think? I feel like you've talked a lot about Patrick Queen

over our extra point-taking careers here. Yeah, so I like it for the Steelers because they desperately need an improved linebacker play. He's going to give them that. It's funny. Like, once he was on the Steelers, I was like, Patrick Queen is like a Steeler. Like I get this.

Like the love of the game, the intensity, the physicality. Like that fits. It makes sense. Remember when we talked about that in season, the clip of Patrick Queen, we're calling the story of Mike Tomlin telling him on the sideline, you are not a raven, right? Which at the time, we were like, dude, that cuts deep. Like that is an insult.

And what are you doing? Now we know it's because Tomlin knew in the back of his head. Long game. Years in the future. You're a stealer, young man. You're supposed to be here. So I love that. I'm very excited for whatever insane.

hardcore platitude comes out of either Patrick Queen or Mike Tomlin's mouth at the introductory presser when they go and address that moment going to be very funny. So I like it for Pittsburgh. One of the things that I asked after the Russell Wilson signing, because you and I both don't really like, you know, Russ is a starting quarterback. We're kind of worried about what that means for Pittsburgh. It's like, okay, if you're going to save all this money at quarterback,

what are you going to do with it, right? And it appears that the sue is their big thing was, listen, if we can insert PQ at linebacker, They clearly like Dante Jackson as a starting corner opposite JPJ. My makeup comes back from injury. They probably need like another decent linebacker, another decent safety, like one more mid-level dude. Once you get that, like they clearly feel like defensively they can be like a top unit, right,

with kind of plugging in those last couple of gaps. And that's a reasonable belief. And then, you know, they're going to try to be mid enough on offense. And that seems to be what they always aspire for is just being mid enough on offense. And so I get it. Like I see the vision of Patrick Queen into Rokwon Smith. the Dante Jackson, Johnson move, I think was a complete miss,

but again, like, there's got to be something that I'm missing here. So I see the vision, I see the line that they took to get to the build they wanted to. I'm just really worried about that offense being, like, you know, prohibitively bad. Yeah, I like the defense. I mean, like, you met Watt, Hayward,

Highsmith, Queen, Joey Porter, make a fit. Like, there are players. I don't know if you just rank the talent on every defense. They're definitely top 10. They might be higher than top 10. So I like them there, but, man, I just wish you had a little bit more.

your offense is going to, you know, your offense really could be worse next season. So we'll see what happens there. All right. What's the next one? What do you got? Oh, they got Deshawn Elliott. When I said, I was like, I feel like they got that safety. They added Deshaun Elliott, too, which like Sean was like a solid starter for the dolphins

and safe for last year. On a good deal, I think. Yeah. So they, it's right now it's figuring out off its line. They got like Nate Herberg starting at center and Dan Moore starting at left tackle. If you can figure out the line and then you kind of just live with freaking whatever you're doing a wide receiver. I don't know.

I, I, I can see. see it, but I don't like it. I don't like what I'm seeing, but I can see it, but I don't like what I'm seeing. Check back with us in August. Yeah, let's see how it plays out. Next one, the Houston Texan signed DeNeil Hunter off the edge. Little John Grenard, Daniel Hunter, DeNehunter, Denial Hunter, the Texas Russia goes to the Vikings, you know, Hunter, the longtime Viking goes to the Texans. The deal here, Sheel, hilarious, this DeNeil Hunter contract, two years, $49 million. Technically, it's max value of 51 with not like to be earned incentives.

But two years, $49 million. $48 million guaranteed. Elite. 10 out of 10. Just, just, just, oh, an extra million if you make the pro bowl,

brother. And that's it. That's it. You get all of it and just let's see if you make the pro bowl for an extra one. This is the funniest contract structure I've ever seen. 90, what is it? 97.5, 97.8% guaranteed. Great bit,

Bonick Casario. I think that, right, for an older final product player and letting Gernard go and then bringing in Daniel Hunter. They pay a little bit more per year than what Gernard is going to get.

They obviously pay a little bit less overall, right? It's a smaller deal for Hunter. They have void years on it, which the Texans aren't huge void years guys. And so that kind of indicates, hey, like, De Niel, if you're 31, you're still playing well.

Like, we will put more years on this deal for you. Like, we will keep you around. And so they give a two-year deal and it's heavily guaranteed. They're going to ride with Daniel Hunter. And then if he's still playing at a high level. and they can keep him in the building. And that's an important thing to note.

Like, DeNeil Hunter is probably the best edge rusher that doesn't get talked about with the top edge rushers. Just in terms of like your tier one guys, like everybody talks about your Watts and your Garrets and your boasts and your so on and so forth. The Nile Hunter was 16 and a half sacks last six and a half sacks in the season. 10 and a half sacks in the last five years. The only year in which he didn't was a year in which he got hurt. The high caliber wins, right? Like the explosive outside wins. Like he can win one-on-ones.

he can beat double teams. He can compete at a high level. He's been their leading Russia there for a long time. It became the Russia one over Zadaria Smith. Didn't play on a great defensive line, didn't play with elite defensive tackles and was still producing. This is a true, like tier two player, great starter at his position. I was looking across the league, man.

Like Will Anderson plus Daniel Hunter, I think it's probably a top five edge duo in the league. If the Eagles move on from Josh Sweat or Hassan Redick, right, then you've got Michael Parsons. into Marcus Lawrence, you got Miles Garrett, Zadaria Smith. You've got T.J. Juan and Alex Highsmith. Bosa and Mack still in like that doesn't move me with the Chargers. Like I think both those guys are, yeah, old or whatever. I brought up the Eagles duo.

I'm positive. There's another one I'm forgetting. That's infuriating people. My bad. But in general, like, I think that that Texans duo is probably a top five duo in the league. And like they, they, they, they, they know, Anderson hits, get to Neil in the building. They added to Nico Autry as well. The Texans are building the pass-fresh, man.

They understand where they're going to want to succeed. And so I like it. 24 million guaranteed both years, fully guaranteed deal. Daniel Hunter's going to be 30, right? It's pricey, but I do think that Hunter is that caliber player. And so while I, you know, while it is a big fat deal and obviously a ton of guarantees and it feels a little bit big, you remember that Calvin Ridley is making 23 per year and you can't feel too

too bad to deal Hunter making 24. I'm going to zag a little bit here. on this one. I don't love how the Texas handled this. I like Grinard. Listen, Hunter is a lock for 10 sacks

whenever he's healthy. I would have rather just kept the guy the younger ascending player in Jonathan Granard. He's younger by a few years than Daniel Hunter. He's cheaper. He was, I think,

around 18 or 19 million per year and Hunter is at $24 million per year. Like, that's a big... That's not nothing. I mean, you were talking about $5 or $6 million per year, Grinard got less guarantees in his contract than Daniel Hunter. So, like, he is less expensive. He's younger.

And I think there's a chance, like a decent chance that Grinard plays better than Daniel Hunter over the next two seasons. And it shows you, you know, you show the locker room, hey, you produce here. We're keeping our guys. We're rewarding our own guys now. I will say the Texans know more about Grenard and injury stuff and all, like, all the intangibles that we are at a little bit of a deficit with. Like, they know that better.

So if that's the reason, then fine. But on paper, I was like, I don't know if I would have made this swap for the older, more expensive player. Here's the other thing. When I was doing the free agency rankings and watching all of DeNeil Hunter's like hits and sacks, it's an inflated number, 16 and a half. Oh, wait. A forest defense is always going to be inflated.

We've got enough of Hunter to know that he's a quality player. The first defense is always going to generate like, you know, free rushes for you. He's got 19 guys in line of scrimmage. But there were a lot. So I went to Brandon Thorne, who does this like, sack score metric, which I really like. And out of 16 and a half sacks, 13, he had charted as low quality coverage or cleanup sacks. Like, that's a high number. I understand every player gets some of those. There's no doubt about it. But if you just look at it and I encourage everyone to

check out that trench warfare substack, it backed up what I thought I was seeing where it's like he's not just consistently beating tackles 101. Now, can he do that? Yes, you're right. We have a larger body of work. We've seen he can do that. His sack numbers over the course of his career are very high, but at the age he's at versus Grenard, I would have rather personally gone less expensive, younger player in Granard. So Hunter will be fine. Hunter will be productive for them. As long as he's healthy, he's going to be a good player for them alongside Willie Anderson. Like you mentioned, he might be a better match also. Like those are two very different players. So maybe that's something they were going for. But I looked at this and thought, all right,

I don't know that this is the move I would have made. So there you go. There's a little zag on Daniel Hunter. So I don't mind that this was the direction that they went, right, where I think that Hunter is a, I think that Grenard's ceiling is below, like what Hunters is. I think the Hunter is just going to give you more pass-off troops in general.

And he's like, you know, the older player is the more established player. Like, I don't mind that they went this way. If you flipped it and you told me the Texan signed Grenard to that deal and the Vikings kept Hunter on that deal, I also be like, yeah, I get that. Like, that makes sense. Like, to me, like, this is like, there's a good Venn diagram overlap of like both these guys are good players.

Hunter signed the deal you'd expect the older, more established player to sign. Grenard signed the deal you'd expect the younger, still ascending player to sign. I think it makes, I think it, I don't mind that the Vikings got younger and a little bit like, you know, better run defender at the position. I don't mind that the Texans got a more established guy and like a better passports or start the position. I don't mind the deals that either guy signed for. So to me, like if you flip off them, I'd be like, yeah, it's good business.

And right now, looking at these two deals for both things, I'm like, yeah, it's good business. These are two good players who signed for market value. It doesn't hassle me either way. Maybe I'm just trying to establish my love for Grenard. You know, sometimes when you like a guy, you got to go over the top to make, because there might be other people who like the guy, and you need to know, no, I was making wild claims on this guy. Then you can point to those. I was like, I was like big on Grenard, like coming out. And so if you, if you 11th hour on Granard, he goes to Minnesota, he dominates. And all of a sudden, you become the Grinard guy in this pot. I'm going to be pissed. It's already happened.

I'll just, I'll just refer to this conversation. All right, last two here. quickly. Raven signed Derek Henry, which we talked about this one and now were free agency fits. It seemed like everyone was like, oh, this would be a lot of fun. And it's great. Two year, $16 million, $9 million guaranteed. We'll remind everyone Derek Henry last year, eighth in yards after contact per rush last season. He's not in his prime. I generally would not say pay a 30-year-old running back. Guess what? I can't wait to watch it. It makes sense to me. It's going to be a lot of fun, Derek Henry and Lamar Jackson in the same backfield. That's going to be awesome next season. I don't know if you have anything big to add to that one or if you want to just move to the next one.

I'm so excited to see Derek Henry stand next to Lamar Jackson. That's what I'm looking for. I'm looking forward to just. Stand next to him. Okay. The Lamar, just is like 6.3, 215. Derek Henry, 6,2.50. I just want to see them next to each other in in the backfield. That's all I want in the entire world. When I first started going to training games, that was really one of the most, that's one of the most fun things of going to football practices in person. Like I saw King Dunlap,

who was 6 foot 9 tackle for the Philadelphia Eagles. And it might have been Chad Hall, like standing next to one of these. I don't think it was Darren Sprouls at that time, but he stands next to a guy who's like 5 foot 8, and you're just like, these two people play the same sport. Like, all right, that's a nice thing about football.

You're not going to see it everywhere. It's so easy to sit behind your screen and listen to these GMs, these head coach's quotes about like the way he hits, the contact, the size, the frame. What do you do? Like, watch the film. Like, look at the numbers. This is such a dumb way of scouting.

And then you go to a training camp and you see an NFL, a big NFL player. And you're like, oh, yeah, no, no, I'm so there. I went to Lions training camp year one. And I looked at Aiden Hutchinson. And I said, no, not for me. And then he had like, you know, nice working season. And then year two, year two, I saw eight Hutchinson in camp. I was like, oh, Hodgson is going off this year.

I just to build, just the, just the, where he's carrying his weight, just the way he was moving. I was like, yep, no, he's good now. It's so real. The visceral experience of it, it's so real. Nothing more fun than making grand proclamations off like one or two. That's really why I got in this business. One or two practices. The build.

I know everything I need to know about this player. I've got the eye, baby. Go search my training camp takeaways of the Lions. What I say, I said, they're going to throw the ball to Sam Lapporte on nine times a game. I watched him play against the twos. I watched Nate Sunfeld throw to him and I was like, yeah, it's the goat right there. Don't worry about it.

Of course, so Alex's follow up is, you know, he points out the one that he, I'll go back in those archives. There's got to be some misses in there. I said Derek Fornes was going to be a key player for them. He had an interception to be the Buccaneers the individual round. Check me. Speaking of the Lions. Don't worry, baby, Solac. I'll tell you about the things

your dad got wrong. Speaking of the Lions, last one for me is they add defensive tackle DJ Reader from the Cincinnati Bengals. This is reportedly a two-year $27.25 million deal with over $9 million guaranteed,

which is an important number here because DJ Reader is coming off of his second quad injury. This is a critical player for the Bengals last year. He's the unsung, here of that defense. He's the run plugger. He's truly like,

you hear a lot of defensive tackles. Like, he's like a run stuffer. DJ Reader's the prototype, dude. Like this is like, what it's supposed to look like is the way that DJ Reader plays. He regularly takes two for one. He regularly erases multiple gaps.

He makes the numbers, right? This is just a yeoman tough work in the trenches player. Obviously, I think that that fits with the Dan Campbell defense. In week 15, he tore his quad. This is the second time that he's injured this quad. Quad quad is a big muscle, is a big injury. It is tough to come back to. He said to Lions Media this week that he expects to be back out there following his injury.

He's been through this rehab before. So Reader's a little bit older. He's coming off from major injury. And I think that this deal, we haven't seen the official structure of it yet. I imagine it will look a lot more like a one-year deal with a second-year option, right? That, like, you know, a lot of base salary, a lot of unguaranteed money for the Lions because you want to see him come back. You want to see him look healthy and be healthy and play at a high level. I like the addition for the Lions because it's a good player

and I think you get a decent value on it because of the injury. I will say that the issue with the Lions last season was not run defense at the defensive tackle position. This is one of the best defense in the league in terms of run defense in terms of yards allowed before contact per carry. They were winning up at the line of scrimmage. This team's issue fundamentally was not the play of the interior

defensive line. And Reader fits nicely with Aline McNeil and they've been trying to get like nose tackle right for a while. They took the Western Kentucky kid. Last year, Broderick Martin. You know, like, this was a position where, like, they wanted to get better. This is a little bit of an indulgence. I think this, like, when the Lions lose games next year,

they're going to lose them the same way to lost them last year. DJ Reader's not solving that problem for you. They're going to lose that in the passing game. They're going to lose that because they have no second edge rush on the outside. Right. They make the Marcus Davenport acquisition. They make the Carlton Davis acquisition. They're clearly trying to get more better and more established higher floor on defense.

I just still think the weakness of the team is the same weaknesses. Reader is a little bit making a strength of strength. That's not a problem. them, it's just something to acknowledge. And so if Reader comes back, man, I mean, they're going to have a mean Joe Green defensive tackle duo in terms of a Reeder and Aline McNeil. They're going to be fun to watch some big

squatty boys moving people in the interior. But it is a strength, the strength thing right now. Lions saw have work to do, I think, at some of other positions. I thought I was going to have to bring up that take. I'm surprised that you, you know, just... No, no, because, listen, I know DJ Reader is like

a very good football player and you like very good football players. I thought you're just Like, love it. DJ Rader, come in. The first part you said, I didn't know that you were going to get to the second part of it, which I think is a great point. They were first in DVOA against the rush last season.

Like, is this the best, you can make the art, you can question, is this the best use of resources, given kind of where your roster is, that you need to be spending this type of money on a nose tackle to improve your run defense, when your run defense was already fantastic.

Now, I like the idea of DJ Rader next to a leave, McNeil like you do. That's going to be fun. Everyone likes DJ Reed. Defensive coordinators, people, everybody loves DJ Reader has been perennially an underrated player that like offensive coordinators always talk about. But it just surprised me. I would not have guessed that this was going to be his landing spot. If you ask me, hey, where is he going to go at the beginning of free agency. So yeah, that's the only thing I wonder about. And to your point,

coming off a quad injury, 30 years old. And this is where you're kind of spending your money. Now, it's not the only place they're spending their money. they've added up to other parts of the roster. I really, there are other moves. I've been, and I'm sure we'll talk about this next week, but I really like what they've done for the most part. This was the one where I just said, all right, you know, let me think about that.

I think they did it after the Davenport deal and after the Carlton Davis deal, and a lot of the chips have fallen and they're like, all right, well, we really like DJ Reader. He's still around. They've probably been talking to him all week and been like, what's your figure, what's our figure? I can see if we can make this happen. And then, yeah, like, they're going to absolutely punk some teams

because they can't run on them, right? And like, if I lived in a division with Green Bay, right, with like how much the floor likes to be able to, like, use the running game to set up the RPO game instead of the flashed past game, I wouldn't mind having a really good run defense. I think you can make Green Bay a little one-dimensional, and that's good. And he still got to be able to cover the guys. And so we got to see what Carlton has and they're talking to other corners and whatever.

The suggestion that I would ever be intellectually dishonest in my take, ludicrous. I don't know where- intellectually, I don't know where- I don't know where- I will always present, I'll always present the full argument with holistically. I will never be, I'll never get a hundred- I just didn't know that you think of it, you know?

I have no idea what previous takes could possibly lead to this accusation. Not intellectually dishonest. I just didn't know if you'd get there. You know, sometimes you go a little caveman. Here you go, good football player. Stop run. Like move. Good ball player, baby.

Play a little ball. Come on. And then I have to come in, you know, and bring it up a notch, you know, the conversation. All right. That will do it for this episode of Extra Boy. A long one, but listen, you got a lot of time this weekend. You're going to be driving around. I don't know.

What do people do? People do some like garden work. Isn't that a thing that some people do? I know some places you're probably shoving. I'm doing it right now. Yeah, do some dishes, whatever. Just keep those, you know, keep the earbuds in and listen to the podcast. And then Soak and I will be back on Monday.

We're going to come at you with some bigger picture stuff on the NFL off season. And for agency so far, maybe look ahead a little bit. Or who knows, maybe there will be big moves. weekend that we will get to in that show. So thank you to Sola. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for producing. Thank you to Eddie Ocampo for the video production. Additional production to provision by Connor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgapal. We'll talk to everyone on Monday.

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