The Ringer NFL Show - Assessing Players' Value in 2017 (Ep. 113)

Episode Date: June 29, 2017

The Ringer's Robert Mays and Kevin Clark return to evaluate the worth of the top quarterbacks in the NFL this upcoming season (03:45) and debate the five most valuable players at the position (06:00). Then, they delve into the most valuable non-quarterbacks (21:00) and rank the top five non-QBs, as well (28:45). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. My name is Robert Mays. I'm a writer at the ringer. Joining me on the other line. It's Kevin Clark. Kevin, we're back. We're back. How was your summer vacation, Robert?

It's been great. There are a few better places in the summer than Chicago. I've really enjoyed it. It's been a lot of outside drinking and outside grilling and lots of fun. How's yours been? It's been grinding tape. Yeah, that's what I figured. I assume that's what you do all day, every day, just locked in a dark room.

Just grinding, you know? I mean, the tape. The tape doesn't lie, and I don't deal in lies. So I've just been watching, you know, cutups. So we were gone for a little while since the draft. It was kind of a reset time for the ring around NFL show, figuring out how we kind of wanted to do things in year two. And from now on, we're going to be back pretty regularly.

We're going to be doing some bigger scope podcasts here on out from now until the training camp gets started as the offseason keeps going. So we're going to start with something that comes on the heel. of pretty much the biggest NFL news from last week, which was the record-setting deal that Derek Carr got from Oakland, five years, 125 million, 25 million annually, the biggest deal in NFL history. And kind of in that cloud and under that umbrella, we wanted to chat about just value in the NFL and in a vacuum, who the most valuable player in the NFL might be. And the way we're going to do that is with a hypothetical universe where every player in the NFL, you know, the way we're going to do that is with a

hypothetical universe where every player in the league is now a free agent. And if that were to happen and everyone got a one-year deal, who would get the single biggest contracts? Right. And so the way quarterback salaries work now is unfair to everybody. And if you try to understand it, you're just going to be more confused than you were at the beginning. Okay. Joe Flacco is going to be the highest paid quarterback this year. Carson Palmer, second, Kirk Cousins third. Obviously, no one thinks those are the three best quarterbacks in the NFL. But it's all about lever. It's all about timing, some of it is luck. I mean, Ryan Tannihill and Aaron Rogers will have the same cap hit this year.

Quarterback salaries do not make sense. So what we're trying to do is set up a scenario in which basically we figure out if everyone was set up in a fair system, what will these guys command on an open market? Now, there is a salary cap, same as the 2017 salary cap, which is $167 million. But this is, in a vacuum, what will these guys command on a hypothetical? open market. And you wrote about this last week for The Ringer, just the idea of quarterback salaries not being understood. It's a different conversation for quarterbacks and non-quarterbacks. So that's how we're going to break up the show. We're going to start with our top five

quarterbacks and a couple guys that just missed. And then we're going to do our top five non-quarterbacks. And just to be clear, this isn't who we think is necessarily the best quarterback in the league, the best quarterback going forward, especially. If we're doing this from more than one season, it'd be a different conversation. But these are the, this is the breakdown of the guys we think would get paid the most for a single season right now. That's important to keep in mind. This is not a pure ranking. We've had a lot of people in our mentions saying, are you guys can do the rankings like you did last summer? We're not, for a couple of reasons. Number one, it'll be repetitive. Number two is that I perfected the form by ranking Andy Dalton is a sixth

best quarterback. There's no reason to go back to those anymore. I'm like Daniel Day-Lewis. I'm stepping away because you cannot top whatever he's doing in the fall. He's retiring because he thinks he cannot top his next movie that comes out in the fall. You can't top Andy Dalton at number six last year, so I'm just stepping away from lists. That's totally understandable. All right, so let's get going with this. I want to start with my guys that didn't quite make my top five quarterbacks.

Phil Rivers is in that conversation, Ben Rothesberger, Matt Ryan, and the one that was hardest for me is Cam Newton. Newton is on my list. And we'll get to him. I have off my list, Rivers, Stafford, Breeze, Ropheasberger. Those guys are just outside the top five. Let's talk about Ropisberger for a second, Robert. I think he obviously would command 30, 35, maybe even 40 million if there was a crazy owner on the open market.

I think he's incredibly valuable. I just had a hard time separating him from his supporting cast when you just talk about pure value. He is in such a good spot. He basically has probably the best skill position players in the league at this point with Levyon Bell and Antonio Brown. He'll have Bryant back this year. He has a great infrastructure as far as coaching goes. I just said, if you're looking at this as far as what does he bring to a team, I think it's hard to divorce him from the guys around him,

and those guys wouldn't come in this sort of hypothetical open market scenario. It's two things with Rathustberger for me. One is the players around. him like you mentioned. Two is the continuity in Pittsburgh. This is going to be year six of of Todd Haley working with Ben Rathesberger. And you can just see how comfortable and lived in that offense is for him. And I feel like there's so many moments within that offense with him and Brown that it's more about familiarity than anything else. So if we're taking all of that away, if we're making him start over, to me, he's just not quite as valuable as some of these other guys.

I agree. And there's the issue of age. And that's the reason rivers and breeze are off the list for me, I mean, it just makes sense that the older you get, the likelier it is that you get hurt. I mean, Philip Rivers, I wish he was significantly higher on this list. There is a scenario in which she was drafted by a different team or had a different GM for most of his career, and we're looking at them much differently. Greg Rosenthal had an amazing stat a couple weeks ago. We said that, according to pro football focus, Philip Rivers hasn't had one season of above-average pass protection in the last decade.

That's ridiculous. I mean, if he had the infrastructure of a Rathesburg, we're looking at it differently. But for those guys, I'm just saying if they hit the open market right now, I think GMs would look at them maybe a notch below the guys in my top five list just because of the age factor and the fact that at some point they're going to get so banged up, they're no longer themselves. All right. So let's do your top five. Why don't you go in a reverse order for me? Okay. Number five for me is Cam Newton.

Number four for me is Matt Ryan. Number three, Russell Wilson. Number two, Tom Brady. And he could have been number one, by the way. Number one is Aaron Rogers. So let's talk about Cam Newton for a bit because he's. not on my list. I will say that he easily could have been. My number five guy is Andrew Luck. My number four guy is Wilson, Breeze, Brady, Rogers.

So we're really just disagreeing about the bottom section of that and then Breeze. So with me and Newton, it's just so hard to divorce what he's been from what that offense looks like. It's almost hard to imagine how he would play in a different style of offense. I don't think he's an inaccurate quarterback. You know, that 53 completion percentage last year is more a product of who he's throwing to and what the style of the offense is. 10.76 average depth of target last year, which was number one in the league. They're really slinging it deep and to guys who can't catch a football. So I don't look at the numbers and say he was markedly worse.

I think that he would be great in a lot of different offenses. He just isn't quite there with, for me, with those other five guys. It's very close, but he barely misses the cut. You know, the NFL does this thing every summer where they rank the top 100 players. And all it does doesn't give me much insight. It just makes me angry. Like Adrian Peterson is not in the 90s among players. And if he was, if there was a number three running back on the Saints is not 100 best players in the league.

He would not have waited so long to get a contract and he would not have visited the smart teams like the Patriots and then not had an offer. That probably wouldn't be happening. He dropped from number one last year, his Cam Newton, to number 44. this year. Yeah, that doesn't make any sense. I just think it's a ludicrous drop. I think we saw, the entire country saw in the opening game of the season

on that Thursday night, we saw him get the crap beat out of him by the Broncos. And, you know, it actually led to a wave of takes of, you know, how they can't, how the NFL can't protect quarterbacks and how gruesome it was that the Broncos were able to tee off on him as far

as helmet to helmet stuff. And really, I mean, it was, it was vaguely depressing to watch. He did not have the offensive line he should have. He did not have the skill position players he should have. I mean, I just, I think you have to sort of give him a Mulligan last year because it started off bad and it got worse. The defense

had some growing pains. That affected, you know, that affects the entire team. They have Christian McCaffrey this year, which I think will help immensely. But, I mean, just everything going on around him last year was the perfect storm of crap. And I don't blame the dip in production. Outside of last year,

he's been a remarkably consistent guy. And I think the guy you saw in the, you know, the first five years of his career is the guy he is and not last year. I also think he was a better player in 2015. I mean, he was really good. He got better in that MVP year than he had ever been. So I think he's closer to that guy than he was the person we saw last year. Who was still a pretty good quarterback. I mean, it was everything else around him is what was bad.

I think the biggest thing for me when I looked at it, he rushed two and a half times less per game last year than he has for most of his career. That's a huge number. over a season. And when you don't have the legs, when you don't have, you know, he is great at finding the open guy downfield. But when he doesn't, he can run 12 yards better than anybody and get that first down. And so to not have that weapon, to have, you know, to use your legs less, that's really important. And I think we have to look at that. And I think as long as the offensive line is at least decent this year, as long as the skill players are able to make their moves, I think you're going to see him being back to Cam Newton this year. So the other guy that you

didn't have on your list that I had a mine. You didn't have him barely missing your list is Andrew Luck. I understand your concerns about that. He still hasn't thrown since having surgery on his shoulder in January. And that's obviously a concern. But in this exercise, we're trying to figure out which five guys would get the most money for this season. And if I went to every general manager in the league and I said, he will play for you in week one, it's hard for me to imagine five guys getting paid more money than Andrew Luck this year. I love Andrew Luck. He's been on this pod three times. He's been on this podd more than... I've potted with Andrew Luck more than I've potted with you in the last couple of months. When I look at Andrew Luck, first of all, I think the fact that he's not

throwing right now in late June, early July is a big deal. And I don't think it's the exercise that we're doing in which you can ensure that he will play week one. I think you have to take everything into account. If we were to say that health is going to be a certainty for everybody, then I probably would have ranked Drew Brees, Philip Rivers, and Ben. I'm not talking about Health over 17 games. I'm just saying that the way that it's being talked about, I read something in the Indianapolis Star that Zach Kiefer wrote last week where a bunch of medical professionals said they aren't worried yet.

So I think that the timeline is still possible for him to be ready week one. So I'm not assuming health all season. I'm just saying if we can ensure he'll be on the field when it starts, it's just really difficult for me to imagine him not commanding money in the top five of this list. Well, I'm having a tough time buying that he'll be healthier than most guys. over 17 games because, A, he has a shoulder injury. He's had kidney injuries. I mean, this is a guy who's been banged up.

He likes being hit. He sometimes leaves the pocket when he shouldn't, and he gets the crap knocked out of him. He's too tough for his own good. His style of play is sometimes not as smart as it should be, even though he's obviously, basically a genius level. He's definitely the smartest person who's ever been on the ring or NFL show. And so, when I look at Andrew Luck, I just worry that his style of play leads to injuries because we've seen a lot of him over the past couple of years.

That's fair. All those points are valid. The one thing I would want to say about luck before we move on, this isn't a, Andrew Luck was the greatest quarterback prospect in so-and-so years ranking. I think the guy I saw last year was the best version of him I've seen as a pro. And he did that with a torn labrum and with not as much help as a lot of other quarterbacks in the league. He threw 17 interceptable passes last year, according to the pre-snapreads quarterback catalog, the key and Faye puts together. It's very useful. That's so much less than he would have in previous season. He was better. He was more accurate down the field.

He's taking care of the ball better. The health stuff concerns me. But as a quarterback, I think he is close to the guy we thought he was going to be. And in my mind, that makes him worthy of this conversation. He's in the conversation. I just wouldn't have him above the guys who I either ranked or have them on the cusp. I just, I have him a half notch below those guys. So the other two guys that we disagree on are Breeze and Matt Ryan.

Yeah. I think I understand your Breeze point. you just kind of mentioned it. Health, age. I get that. I mean, he's been healthy. I'm shorting him. Drew Brees has had five seasons of 5,000 yards in his career. He's led the NFL in passing yards five times since 2011.

He, as a specimen, is incredible. I just think at 38 years old, we saw this with Peyton Manning. You know, they're amazing until they're not. At some point, the bottom falls out. I'm not saying it's going to be this year. I'm saying if I were a general manager and I had to bid, on these guys in the open market, I'd rather have Matt Ryan. Now, your point about Matt Ryan, we've talked off the air many times about this,

I think Matt Ryan is an incredibly valuable quarterback. Now, before I get into my Matt Ryan rant, you go ahead and say why you had Breeze and not Matt Ryan. Here's the thing. Let's start with Breeze. My point about Breeze is that I know he's 38. That's a concern. But if it's just for one season, these are, we have to consider this in a event. We have to consider this as this is the first guy you're building your team around.

So which guy has the most translatable skills no matter what you end up putting around him? And I think when I look at Drew Breeze, even though he's been with Sean Peyton for so long, I still think that accuracy, being able to push the ball down the field, being able to actively make his past protection better, he does all of those things. So that's why I feel like he doesn't get knocked as much for me as a guy like Rathusberger for having the same coordinator, for being familiar with the system, because I just think he's a quarterback purely. And that's why I have him on my list, because I don't think what is going on around Drew Breeze would matter that much. The opposite is true for Matt Ryan. I thought Matt Ryan

was the MVP of the league last year. There's no denying, you know, the best, most efficient passing seasons ever. The voters agreed. Look at what that offense looked like. Those guys are running wide open down the field constantly. And you need a certain level of quarterback to take advantage of that, but I still don't think that makes Matt Ryan a guy who deserves more money in this hypothetical world than Russell Wilson or Drew Brees. It's just, I don't think that if we're starting over and paying a guy something without a uniform, without a helmet, without a coaching staff that Matt Ryan is on the level that these guys are.

I have Russell Wilson getting more money than Matt Ryan for the record. Having said that, I think the game is changing. I talked a lot last year about essentially how NFL offenses have become basketball. What I mean by that is it's five targets against five defensive backs or six defensive backs. And the point of the basketball offense is to find the open guy. You're basically a point guard. That's what quarterbacks are now. No one is a better point guard with a high-octane offense than Matt Ryan right now.

I mean, I think he was the most efficient player in the NFL with five wides last year. His red zone efficiency, I mean, when you just look at the fact they scored 540 points, which is 70 points more than any other team in the NFL, that's incredible. But then beyond that, I mean, they had eight players with 30 targets. And I understand the space that Julio Jones creates and all that. But to make temporary stars out of Taylor Gabriel and Aldrich Robinson in some cases, you know, even Kevin Coleman as a receiver, I was just really impressed with his ability to do it. Because if you put a lot of guys at the helm of that offense,

I understand the offensive line was improved. Kyle Shanahan is a great coordinator. I get all that. But I think there are a lot of quarterbacks who would have screwed that up. And I love what Matt Ryan brought to the table. There are plenty of quarterbacks that would have screwed it up, but there were at least five quarterbacks who could have done it as well or better than Matt Ryan. That's my point.

I mean, I just haven't seen it. Because we haven't seen that offense. I understand that. I understand that. But, I mean, we're not, you know, you cannot, if you've seen it, you've proved you can do it. In this hypothetical scenario, I'm going to take the guy I've seen do it instead of guessing that someone else can do it. But we've seen Matt Ryan in like 10 other scenarios where he hasn't been as good as those guys. That's what I'm saying.

I mean, we're taking one season. Matt Ryan never sucked. Okay. Matt Ryan was really good. He was always pretty good. I mean, he almost got to the Super Bowl twice. He was always pretty good. Matt Ryan is a pretty good quarterback.

He is one of the 10 best quarterbacks in the league. That's fair. He is not the fourth best. He is not the fourth most valuable. We're not doing the best quarterback rank. We're doing the most valuable. That's why I just pivoted to it. What these guys are going to command on the open market.

You think Matt Ryan would get paid more this year than Drew Breeze? I'm saying I would pay more for Matt Ryan than Drew Breeze. That's crazy. Okay. I mean, I don't understand why you would not take into account just what we saw from him last year. Because I watched the offense that he was in. That's why I'm not taking into account. He ran the most important thing.

He ran the offense. He wasn't a bystander. He was the guy that made the offense go. Did you, did you forget that Matt Ryan was the quarterback? I think the guy calling the plays was the guys who made the offense go. Oh, so Kyle Shanahan is the guy who made the offense go. He was more important to that offense than Matt Ryan, yes. Okay.

Wait until you see what goes on in San Francisco this year and we'll find out how valuable Matt Ryan was. That's completely different conversation. There's Julio Jones. There's a very good offensive line. I think so many quarterbacks who could have made that offense as good or better. That's all I'm saying. I think the fact, if we're just saying, if we're saying they're equal,

and I'm saying they're vaguely similar, Breeze and Ryan, and I touched that earlier, the fact that Matt Ryan is six years younger, I mean, it's just common sense. The older you get, the likely you already get injured. Again, I'm saying that this is a one-year hypothetical scenario, and I would take the guy who I know is going to play 16 games. Last year, Matt Ryan wasn't one of your top 10 quarterbacks. Now he's the third most valuable. No.

and he's not one of my top five now. Well, he got almost won the Super Bowl. I understand that. That's not the most important thing. You were sitting next to me at the game. That's all I'm saying. This is all I'm saying. Last year, he wasn't one of your top 10. Now he's more valuable than Camdenew. You just said he was the MVP of the league and he wasn't one of your top 10.

In this scenario, he's like the seventh guy on my list. He's barely in the top 10. He's not in the top three like he is for you. That's all I'm saying. Okay, I'm going to run my team and I'll have Matt Ryan and I will win the Super Bowl, and that's what I'll do. If you can also have Julio Jones and that entire offense from last year, you very well might. All right, let's get to our other two times you guys.

It's not like Drew Breeze is playing with Devin Funchis or something. That's he, he's not. But Drew Breeze has been really good for a long time, no matter who he's throwing to. Matt Ryan has had over 4,500 yards in the last five years. That's pretty good. Matt Ryan is a very good quarterback. This is not the cover. All right, let's move on because we're going to just argue about this forever and not

actually finish the show. Yeah, no, we can only move on. because I won the argument. Our top two guys are Brady and Rogers. I mean, it's a matter of opinion. It's a matter of what you value. I think that Rogers is the best quarterback. That's always what I said.

I think he'd get the most money. I don't think Brady is a product of continuity and situation by any means. He was an underrated thrower in my mind last year. I mean, the way that he's able to shape some of those balls all over the field, I think is totally underrated, considering he's almost 40 years old. It's really which guy do you like better and I like Rogers better? I think that I've said that in the past and nothing about that has changed. I feel like you could absolutely argue about giving him a deal somewhere in the 45 to 50 million range for one season.

Yes. You could do the same with Brady and that's literally the number I have for both, $45 to $50 million with $167 million cap. Again, my tiebreakers age. I know that we disagree on that. I think your tiebreaker is you think Rogers is a lot better. or not, excuse me, not a lot better, but you just would take Rogers. I think he just do more with less. No, I got to.

So if we're starting over, that's why. I got to saw what Rogers can do more or less on his own. That's something we don't even have to imagine. I see them as sort of one A and one B. And the only reason I would say Rogers maybe gets a million or two more is because he's not 40 years old like Brady. That's it. All right. So let's move on to the non-quarterbacks.

The first question I wanted to ask you in regard to these guys, if you're building a list of quarterbacks and just, you know, we can see. the quarterbacks are more valuable. How many quarterbacks do you think you'd list off before you got to a non-quarterback? Yeah, we talked about this. I mean, 10, maybe? I don't know. I mean, before. What do you think the breaking point is?

Like, which quarterback to you, who's the worst quarterback you'd rather have than we'll get to it, but the first guy on your list? You know, so the first guy on my list is Kalil Mack, and again, he's sort of tied with Vaughn Miller. Yeah. So that superstar pass rusher, who's the first quarterback? I'm having a tough time. Would you rather have Matthew Stafford or those guys?

I probably say Matthew Stafford. I agree. I agree. Because you know you're going to be relevant with Matt's. You're at least going to win like seven games. And then the supporting cast delivers you more, basically. Matthew Stafford's a good cutoff point to me. I mean,

it's probably that like 14th to 15th best quarterback in the league range, which I think that's about where Stafford is. Maybe a little higher than that. But I mean, even we didn't say Derek Carr. You know, Derek Carr is somebody I'd easily rather have than Khalil Mack, his teammate. So I feel like that's why we're separating these two. That's really the point we're trying to make is that you wouldn't say that Colio, I mean, Colomack is a better football player than Matthew Stafford.

But in terms of what they command for one year, the quarterbacks just blow everyone else away. Yeah. No, I mean, it's, when I did that story last week, I took a tour through basically the history of positional salaries. And I couldn't believe, you know, passing explode in this league around 2011 when it was sort of the perfect storm of rule changes, amazing quarterbacks who were. That Patriots team was ridiculous. It gets lost in the shuffle. Even your boy, Drew Brees. I mean, he changed the game in 2011.

And that's how old he is. I mean, God, he's really old. I wouldn't pay $40 million for him if the guy who's good in 2011. Anyway. He was pretty damn good last year, too, if you were curious. Yeah, and he's 38 years old. That's great. He was pretty damn good at 37, too.

That's my point. It's the 39, who knows? You know, not as good as Matt Ryan. 5,200 yards and 37 touchdowns at 37. Matt Ryan got to Super Bowl. He pleaded 70% of his passes. Matt Ryan got the Super Bowl. So we're doing wins now?

We want to talk about that? We're only doing QB wins. Okay, all right, good. Sean King on the Bucks is the best player of all time. Yep, okay. So, no, so I was shocked at how underpaid quarterbacks were, and the market is basically corrected itself now. Even though quarterbacks would demand way more money on the open market,

We're going to see that, by the way, when Kirk Cousins becomes a free agent and he gets like $32 million a year, whatever the hell he gets. But, I mean, like, Patrick Willis was a top five paid player five years ago. I mean, that would never happen. You know, Luke Keeckley is the 47th biggest cat pit this year because he's an inside linebacker. It's incredible how quickly it's changed that quarterbacks are the only guys to get paid. And I think generally that's a reflection of how much the game has changed and quarterback value. So let's start with our guys that just missed that top five. And I'm going to go with Kikli, as the first guy I mentioned, just because I think that's an interesting conversation to have about positional value.

You know, him having the 47th highest cap hit in the league as an inside linebacker speaks to what people think about inside off-ball linebackers. And that spot is usually considered somebody that is limited how much he can affect the game. I think that Kikli is an exception to that rule. And I feel like if we were just throwing out value and what you'd get paid for what you could bring, to a team, he deserves to be mentioned with anybody else because of how central he is to a defense's success. He's the most important player on Carolina's defense. And it's hard to do that as an offball inside linebacker. He's just off my list. I think he's great. And JJ Watson on my list, either, nor is Chris Harris. So I think he's incredibly valuable. I just have a real problem.

Even though I know you say he's the exception to the inside linebacker rule, I just have a lot of problems with paying someone like that. In this scenario, these people would maybe command, what, 25 million, something like that. I'd maybe pay Keekely a little less than that. He'd be down the list for me, you know, if we're going to give the best guys the 25. He's probably up there and more than 15, certainly more than he makes now, I guess is what I'm saying. Chris Harris just missed my list. He's another good guy to mention. I just feel like corners don't have the mystique they used to have. Derell Revis in 2009 would be like number one on this list and he would make more than most of the quarterbacks. But like that's not, there's no true shutdown cornerback at this

moment. The reason that Chris Harris is the cornerback that I would throw out there is because we're seeing this all the time with teams trying to use their receivers, their best receivers in so many ways. You look at what Julio did against Seattle in that divisional game. What I think that, what I think makes Chris Harris great and maybe the best cornerback. in the league for the last few years, is he can go inside and out with no problems whatsoever. He's comfortable at every single spot on the field. And I think now more than ever, as slot receivers become stars and everything else, having a guy who can do that is hugely valuable.

Agree. You know, the offenses are so diverse now they're able to do so many different things. To have a guy you can put anywhere, it's really, you know, everyone talks about, oh, the modern quarterback, the modern receiver, and no one ever talks about the modern cornerback. Chris Harris is a modern cornerback. That's a great way to put it. A guy who barely missed my top five, and it was hard not to put him in there.

Again, he could sneak in if we ran the simulation a dozen times is Earl Thomas. And safety, it's a kind of contradiction between safety and corner. Corner used to be the spot. But then you look at what happened when you took away Earl Thomas last year, and the Seahawks just completely fell apart. I just feel like a guy who can affect every bit of the field as a defender is hugely valuable in the way the league currently works now spread out of it. everything is, and he's the best guy at it.

I mean, no one does it in a way that he does. He's on my list, and let me explain why briefly. The Seahawks lost him and then forgot how to play football. That's fair. They didn't know how to play football. It was like they were all the kid at the end of rookie of the year. They were just like, what the hell is this? And so one of the great quotes I saw last year was from Pete Carroll,

and he was talking about Earl Thomas, and he was talking about Bill Russell, actually. and he was saying the thing about a guy like Earl Thomas is that when he's on the field, guys see him everywhere. Even he might be 15 yards away, you know, on the other sideline, but guys are going to imagine that he's right there to make the play. And that's what happened with Bill Russell, and that's what Carol says happened with Earl Thomas. He is so effective and so efficient that he affects everybody

from the pass rush on down. He's number four for me, and I just, I think the world of them. He easily could have made mine. I mean, he's just off in comparison to the other guys. Sure. And I feel like what you said about Matt Ryan and just the idea of spreading out and basketball on grass and everything else, I think that's why safeties and corners are getting closer

together in value. Just because a corner can only do so much on one side of the field where Earl Thomas, like you said, even if he physically isn't affecting the game in some way he quietly is. And I think that just the structure of offenses is what's led to that. Let me be clear. Earl Thomas makes a hell. of a lot of plays. It's not just a mental thing that, you know, he's gotten inside the heads of guys. It's the fact that he's made so many plays that the play that Earl Thomas is about to make

is assumed by the receiver or the quarterback. That's a really good skill to have to be in every player in the league's head. That's good. So you need to be on the field for that. So let's do our list. Yeah. So you let me give me your top five first. Okay. Five Antonio Brown. I mean, I was looking at the numbers a couple days ago. It was incredible. Brown on a go route, Ben Rothesberger's quarterback rating is 40 points above the average in the NFL, on an in-rout, 42 points above average, and on a crossing route, 52 points above the average quarterback rating. I mean, just incredible when he's being thrown to. Four is Earl Thomas, as we said.

Odell Beckham is number three for me. Von Miller's number two, Colomax, number one. So let's talk about the receivers first. Julio's number five for me. Beckham's a really good one, too. I mean, I probably just wasn't thinking about him in the way that I should. He deserves mention. You think that Beckham is the most valuable in a vacuum receiver.

He would deserve the most because he could give any offense no matter what it was the most. You think that's true. Yeah. And I think that, you know, Eli Manning. Yeah, that's Julio to me is what I'm saying. Okay. I think that Eli, I think, I mean, I think the Matt Ryan is a hell of a lot better than Eli Manning. That's totally.

That's very fair. Sure. Okay. So the NFL average for a route per run is 1.66. is from Pro Football Focus. Odell Beckham is 2.43 in routes, and, excuse me, yards per route. Yards per route, which is a very good efficiency metric.

It's like one of my favorite ones. On a go route, there are very few players that would take on a go route than Odell Beckham. And his ability to just, you know, who's more dangerous on a slant pass in O'Dell Beckham? There are very few guys in this league who can just take a five-yard slant pass and score a touchdown on it.

And he can do everything that's asked of him, a lot of times last year, that Giants team was really good. And I think that because they laid an egg at Lambo, and maybe part of that was inflicted by Odell, who the hell knows? But, I mean, for me, because we forget how buzzy they were in December. People were talking about them as a Super Bowl team. A lot of the offense was just Odell Beckham taking the ball and just running down the field and scoring.

I mean, he was a one-man offense at some points during the 2016 season. Yeah, and that's a really good way to think about what we're trying to do here. So you've actually kind of swayed me. I feel like I probably should have had him hired. That's a really good point. I think Julio could be that. I don't think Julio should be knocked because he played in a really good offense. When that offense sputtered and wasn't very good two years ago, he had 1871 yards. I mean, it's not as if that's all he needed. Matt Ryan is a better quarterback, but I still feel like you'd be able to put Julio in relatively any situation and see one of the most six or seven best non-quarterbacks in the league, most effective. I agree with that.

Culeo is really good. He just happens to be helped by an incredibly valuable player like Matt Ryan. So I think this is going to be our defensive version or non-quarterback version of the Matt Ryan argument. J.J. Watt is nowhere on your list. Is this just like 100% about health? Yes. It's just the, it's just the Andrew Luck thing. If I were guaranteed, if I were guaranteed that he was going to play 17 games and play week one and all that, I would. Well, that's not really in doubt. He's going to play week one. It's a matter of how concerned are you about the back? Those are two connected things. Is he going to play week one?

Yes. Is he going to play 17 games? I don't know. It's not the Matt Ryan argument. It's the non-quarterback version of the Andrew Luck argument. And if I were divvying out money right now, I would pay $25 million for Antonio Brown and a little bit less for J.J. O'Watt, because I just don't know what's up with the back. So here's, you obviously have to keep that into account.

Back injuries for big men. There's no understanding how important those can be. Back injuries for anybody. And that's true. Back and games for basketball players, back innings for Mays and Clark on the golf course. Yeah, that's why I don't do any physical activity anymore, as Lou Williams pointed out to me earlier. What about that? Isn't that the Donald Trump thing? Don't do physical activity because you only have a finite amount of energy?

Yeah, that's so true. Yeah, I'm very Trumpian way of thinking. So what the gap between healthy watt and the watt in question for me is the difference between one and four. That's why he's not number one with the board on my list. If we did this last year, I think it's a lot different. Yes. To me, he was the most valuable non-quarterback in the league pre-entry. I don't think that was really an argument. You watch what he did every single play.

So that's for me, that's what knocks him down the three spots. It's also part of just me hoping he's going to be okay. Like, I want to see the guy we used to see because watching him play football is really fun. And I feel like he is that good. He's a all-time great talent. So this is really me convincing myself. going to be close to what he was before. Sure.

So give you a list. So the other guy I had that you didn't is Aaron Donald. Yeah. And I actually, for me, him and Von Miller are closer than it would seem based on the positions they play. And I wrote about this last week in relation to what Aaron Donald would command on the open market and why he isn't likely to get it. And if you look at the contracts that are being given to interior defenders, your sue deals,

Fletcher Cox. These are still deals that are in the $17, $18 million a year range, but they're considerably less than the Justin Houston contract. They, Don Miller contract, and we assume the Kaleo-Mack contract will eventually be. But the reason I think that Donald is as valuable as those guys is that the way he rushes the passer and how much he affects the game in that regard really overlaps with the impact that edge defender can have. He's the best interior rusher by far. So usually what would hold back a defensive tackle or somebody working inside the tackles doesn't hold him back. He was third in the league in pressures last year as a defensive tackle. That shouldn't be possible.

So I just think that he's an exception to the rule in considering what sort of overall value an interior defensive player can have. Yeah, he's just off my list. I would pay him a hell of a lot of money. I'm curious if he were on the open market, you would pay him what? If Mack and Miller are worth like $25, $27 million a year. I'd give them a little more. But maybe, yeah, like 27, maybe. And again, this is everyone in the NFL is a free agent.

I think Donald is right there. Okay. I really do. I think he's just off that pace. He's number three for me. Yeah. I mean, that's exactly why he's number. But it's closer than you would normally think when considering their positions.

And I just feel like if you had a guy watch him, if you were explaining football and salaries to someone and you had them watch a football game and they watched Kahl Mack, Von Miller, and Aaron Donald. they wouldn't say, oh, God, that third guy is clearly less valuable than those other two. I think it colors our opinion of it because of what we come to understand of edge value versus interior value. Overall, the wreckage and just the overall carnage that is caused, he's right there with anybody else. If you were to, in that scenario as you laid out, explain football and salaries to someone right now,

what would it be like to then explain to them that Kirk Cousins is going to be the highest paid player in the NFL? So it's a really good point. It'd be so fun to just have a blank slate of explaining football too. I do that with babies sometimes when I'm at like a family gathering. Like Thanksgiving, I'll just talk to the baby about football because I don't know how else to speak to it. So that's really, I have had that before.

It just doesn't really understand. How do the babies talk? No, but I just don't know how else to talk to them except like people. So I describe line play to them. Okay. You don't know how to respond to them. Yeah, no, I'm just going to move on.

You know, when we talk, it's really funny. The Cousin's thing leads me to just the fact that everyone has lost their minds over quarterback salaries. You know, the LA Times had a story the other day that made me laugh so hard. And it was about how all of the exploding salaries for quarterbacks are going to help Jared golf in four years. The requisites for having a contract extension are being a quarterback and having a pulse. Yeah, I think there's a barrier for entry into this $20 million dollar club.

and I don't think Jared Gough is going to hit it. Like, there's not, the money's not for you, Jared. It's for freaking Marcus Marriota and James Winston. If you can be a historically bad quarterback and still have people thinking that you deserve $20 million in a few years, we definitely pick the wrong career trajectory. God, Jesus, I can't talk. I think you picked the right career trajectory

because you explain line play to babies. That's exactly right. And I'm not totally, you know, it may make sense that I do it, not to other people, but to me. Did other people at Thanksgiving know you do this? Yeah, they're just kind of sitting there. They think it's funny because I'm bad with babies, so I just talk to them like people. I don't know how to talk to children.

It's very strange. So we're watching football. It's like, here's what's happening, baby. Okay. Yeah. All right. Well, that's you do you, as you like to say. All right, buddy.

Is there anything else that you want to knock you out before we get out of here? Well, we need to do. Really quickly, we talked about this. The five-year deals, if we're looking at. at the younger quarterbacks. No, we're assuming luck, Carr, and Wilson, who I love. And, you know, there's a long discussion about Wilson that won't be happening today. If we're assuming those three are the most valuable young quarterbacks to get long-term extensions,

who are your next three in line? I mean, Carr just got his. Sure. These are just all the young guys are available for long-term deals. In our hypothetical scenario, we laid out earlier. but it's not one-year deals, it's five-year deals. I feel like Winston and Marriota are going to get them based on what we've seen so far. Yeah.

I think this could be a really good season for Mariotta. I'm excited to see what he can do with what they've added to that offense. Just a couple more pass catchers, Decker, that line. I honestly think this is a year he could take a big step forward. And Winston now is Deshaun and Mike Evans. I feel like they're both going to warrant that type of look. Outside of those guys, I'm not sure who it would be. I mean, Stafford is not a young guy, but he's going to get his.

Dak Prescott. That's the other one. That's a good point. But one year in, you know, like, that's hard. And he also was in the best situation. One of the best situations for rookie quarterback in the history of the NFL. If you could have Marioator or Prescott for the next five years, who would it be? I would choose Prescott right now.

I would park him. I would pick Mario, I just, Marietta can't finish the season. That's a solid point. That really weighs on me. Yeah. I, you know, I think he makes a lot of mistakes. I mean, Prescott, not only was he a great rookie quarterback, not only did he have, you know, show incredible talent,

he also just showed a lot of games where he didn't make mistakes. And Marriota still has a little bit of a penchant for maybe late game blunders. And then that worries me a little bit. I think Winston, in this scenario, if we're just doing Winston Prescott, Marriota, I would rank them Winston Prescott and the Mariotta. Winston... Winston would be third for you behind Mariotta.

Yeah, I'd rather have Mario than Winston. I think it will bear out this season that Winston is a cut above those guys. That would be my guess. Interesting. I kind of feel like it's going to be Marioita in that conversation. I think Winston's going to have a much better year, but I think that Marioita could be the guy that separates himself this season. I just want to see from Prescott one year where his offense,

independent of him, is not a mindless yards eating machine. I just want one thing to go wrong. But we may not ever. The thing is it's almost like Rothesberger. We might not ever see that. Like Rathesburgh came into the league. They went 15 and 1 because of the people around them. And then they just kept being.

Well, Rathusberger's offensive line was a disaster for years. No, I know. But he's at least had a good infrastructure. He's at least had decent skill position players around him. I mean, I just not, we haven't seen. I mean, the great thing we've seen with Aaron Rogers now is we've seen him when he has Thai Montgomery playing running back, you know, after learning the position 10 days earlier. It's a great thing about Aaron Rogers.

I'm sure Aaron doesn't feel that way. He most certainly doesn't, sources say. But I'm just saying as far as putting him in a situation where he's the only guy, we've seen that from him. It'll be a long time until we see that from Prescott, because that offensive line's not going away. But that's what I'm saying. Last year, Tyrant Smith misses a couple games.

This year, they're going to be worse. I mean, no matter where they play certain guys, losing Leary, having to figure out what's going to happen with Collins, I think the offensive line is going to be a step down. And if you lose, I don't want to mention a name because I don't want to put that dark magic on them. but one of those guys for six games, which they've never done before, I want to see how he reacts. I want to see what type of quarterback he is when the circumstances are not next to perfect.

Because inevitably, there is going to be a moment where they're not. Yeah. No, I look. I am intrigued to see what happens to Dak Prescott this year. I think he's one of the five most fascinating guys to watch the season. All right, buddy. We will be back next week with a new show that is going to be the schedule going from here on out until we really get ramped up into the football.

football season. Is there anything you're working on that you want to deploy before we get out of here? Yeah, I got something on how the NFL can take back July. Maybe the NBA is getting a little too big for its britches. Maybe the NFL needs to swat it down by getting some attention. I'll probably outline how they could do that this week on the ringer.com. Sounds good. Everybody check that out, please. And as always, we really appreciate you guys listening. Thanks, guys.