The Ringer NFL Show - Brendan Sorsby's NFL Future, Baker Mayfield’s New Contract, and More QB News

Episode Date: June 18, 2026

Steven Ruiz and the Ringer’s own Lindsay Jones get together to talk about some of the most newsworthy QB situations around the NFL, including Brendan Sorsby’s declaration for the supplemental draft and Baker Mayfield's contract negotiations with the Tampa Bay Bucs. Lindsay then details her experiences at Denver Broncos mini-camp earlier this week. QB news around the NFL(00:55) Quarterbacks in turmoil!(02:46) Brendan Sorsby declares for the supplemental draft(19:44) Baker Mayfield’s contract negotiations with the Bucs(27:47) The JJ McCarthy/Kyler Murray QB controversy in Minnesota(37:06) Bo Nix and Broncos mini-camp vibes(53:08) Drake Maye and and 3rd-year QBs under pressureThe Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available.Host: Steven RuizGuest: Lindsay JonesProducer: Chris SuttonVideo Editor: Stefano SanchezProduction Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to the Ringer NFL show. I am Stephen Ruiz filling in for Shield Capadia. Joining me soon will be the ringers, Lindsay Jones. And today we're going to be discussing quarterbacks in turmoil. We're going to be talking about Brendan Sorsby's application for the NFL supplemental draft. We're going to be checking in on Baker Mayfield's contract negotiations in Tampa Bay. We're going to be looking at the messiness that is the Kyler Murray, J.J. McCarthy, quarterback battle in Minnesota.

And we're going to get a vibe check from Denver. Lindsay was at mini camp for the Broncos OTAs, and she's going to give us an update on the Bo Nix, Sean Payton relationship. All that and more after the break. All right, welcome back. I am joined now by Lindsay Jones. And Lindsay, I was going to ask how you were enjoying your offseason or the dead period of the off season. But you were in the trenches this week.

You were at Broncos minicamp. How did you feel we're going to get into the Broncos and the Bo Nix and the Sean Payton of it all later? But how did it feel just to be back on the field and then seeing football players collide into each other. Yeah, well, no collisions, fortunately, off-season practices, no contact, no contact, but yeah,

I mean, there were referees, they were throwing some flags, the energy level was pretty good. I'll say it was a little different. Last time I was out there, it was the dead of winter, right before the AFC championship game, vibes were super weird because they were introducing Jared

Stidham as their new starting quarterback. So yeah, it was nice to be out on a football field. It was really hot. Everybody was getting sunburned. And yeah, we'll talk about it in a minute. But yeah, got to see Bo Nix and Jalen Waddle running around on the field together, which was kind of fun. I had totally forgotten about the Jared Stidham.

Like, is hype the right word? Because I feel like for that week, Sean Payton really was feeling himself there. And I thought he thought that Stim was going to perform. And we saw what happened when the game started. He was trying to sell it really hard. I will say, you know, there was one moment in the practice. I think it was like a full team, you know, an 11 on 11. and Jared Stenham got some pressure,

kind of like right up the middle coming pretty quick. And to his credit, he did not flip the ball backwards. So that was a little different than what we saw. Someone was working on his game during the offseason. Okay. That's tangible improvement. We did actually get some news this week.

It's been what? Two months since draft season, but it's like we got a little mini draft season going on. Brendan Soresby, the Texas Tech quarterback who never played a game for Texas Tech, filed or applied for the supplemental draft after it was about three months or so of turmoil, I would say, is what I would call it,

where we didn't know if he was going to play. We didn't know how many games he was going to play. He filed for an injunction to get his eligibility back because there was an investigation into his gambling habits. I don't know how to put it, his gambling addiction. He ended up going to rehab for that. But I guess after a while, he just decided like enough of this, don't want to go through all these hoops with the NCAA because there was going to be,

I think there was going to be another update to the legal status of him after the judge did grant his injunction. But he did apply for the supplemental draft, which would be scheduled for around July 16th. I think the NFL would have to decide on that. What was your first reaction? I know we were talking before this and you were looking at that story kind of as a college football story and we're obviously focused on the NFL. But now that it is on our doorstep as NFL analysts, what was your first, where does your mind go first when you think about this?

Yeah, well, first is like content creators. Like, great. Bring it something from mid-June to talk about, to get excited about. We love talking about quarterbacks here at the Ringer and on the Ringer NFL show. So it does give, you know, a little juice to this offseason that has kind of been kind of boring. No, it has been. There hasn't been a ton of like, you know, controversy or, you know, we get some exciting. look, we got the big Miles Garrett trade a couple weeks ago, which was really exciting. But yeah, but when it comes to like quarterback movement and stuff, I mean, kind of the biggest

stuff that's happened has been like, oh, Patrick Mahomes got extended. Great. You know, that kind of stuff. So would you get kind of a little juicy story in terms of like, this is something that's relevant to talk about? And it's not just us talking about it. Probably not all 32 teams, but there's a bunch of teams that are now considering, do we want to get in on this guy?

are we, you know, do we want to pay attention to a supplemental draft where, you know, usually the supplemental draft honestly doesn't even happen. They only hold it if there are players who are eligible and who have, who have applied and have been approved. And, you know, it's been a really long time since there's been like a quality player, you know, like this and certainly a quarterback. You know, Dane Bruegler from The Athletic, who's like kind of their draft guru, you know, said that this is the best quarterback prospect who's ever been in the supplemental draft. So, you know, this is, it's like an intriguing situation. But yeah, I mean, I spent the last couple of months certainly thinking, okay, this is a college football story because it's really, you know, it's impacting a lot of eligibility stuff.

And there's NIL stuff at play and how much money he's been paid. And, you know, he's transferred a few times. And, you know, it was pretty wild when they, the judge allowed, it was going to allow him to play. And all the rest of the big 12 schools were like, uh, uh, we're not going to play Texas Tech. Like it was just a really, really, really messy situation and really setting kind of a dangerous precedent, I think, for college sports. If that had continued, and that might honestly still kind of be out there.

But now all of a sudden this is an NFL story because a lot of NFL teams, you know, including some who really need quarterbacks, are going to have to figure out, one, who is Brendan Sorsby? What sort of quarterback is he? And what is all of this baggage that is kind of attached to him? and is the supplemental draft something that they want to do? And they're going to have to do it on a really compressed timeline. Look, we're sitting here June 17th. Potentially that draft is about a month away. He's going to have a pro day, I guess, on July 10th.

So that doesn't give evaluators a really long time to do their due diligence into studying who he is, figuring out kind of what sort of quarterback he is, and then figuring out if they wanted to draft him, what is the compensation? there, how high would you want to do them? Steven, do you kind of want to explain a little bit about what the supplemental draft is? Because it's not exactly the same as the regular draft. And honestly, not really even close. No, and the draft order is not the same.

It's not the same draft order. Basically, it's based on a lottery, the draft order. And you have three different groups. I think it's teams that won six games or fewer and didn't make the playoffs, obviously. And how it works is like the Raiders were the worst team in the league. So they'll get 32, I guess, lottery balls. I don't know what the units of measurement are there. And then it goes obviously down from there

through the 10 teams are all the way through the 32. And then the next group in there is the eight teams that won at least seven games didn't make the playoffs. And then there are obviously the group three is every team that made the playoffs. So if we're looking at teams that would be interested in drafting a quarterback, I would put the Cardinals, the Jets, and the Browns in there.

Those are all group one team. So they would have first dibs. I had teams like the Dolphins who would be in that second group. and then the Steelers are another team you could throw in there. They would be in that third group because they made the playoffs. But essentially, it's a bidding process. So the NFL goes to every team, the team is like, I'll use a second round pick on him. And if the Raiders do that, or not the Raiders, if the Jets do that and they have first dibs on them.

But the dolphins come in and say, I would give up a first round pick for it. He would go to the Dolphins. The issue there for the dolphins would be they would lose their first round pick in the next draft. So basically you're borrowing from next year's draft to draft this guy, which brings in another interesting layer about value because we've seen how teams overvalue quarterbacks. You could say overvalue. Maybe they don't value enough in the last couple of drafts

where we've seen quarterbacks we didn't expect to go in the first round, go in the first round, like a Michael Pennick. So even though Bo Nix, who ended up, I think he's providing good value for Denver at this point. But we mentioned how the offseason was kind of boring. I would say draft season was kind of boring. And this is like the most interesting draft subplot, even though it's not part of that, just because of all of those factors that you've kind of mentioned

that I just mentioned with the value. And we know NFL teams like to overthink the draft. So the fact that they're on this compressed timeline to decide what they, what type of pick they should give up, what type of capital they should give up, for Soresby just fascinates me, especially when you think about the problems

that led to this ordeal where he, He was betting on a lot of, like, this wasn't a guy that, like, placed like four bets. Like, he didn't have his cousin place a parlay for him one random Saturday. It was like $100,000 with the bets or something like that. Like, a lot of bets and on teams that he was playing for. And we've seen players fall in the draft for just little stuff, like smoking weed out of a gas max bong if you're a Larry Meade Tunsell.

I'm very interested to see how teams. treat this and how they view it in comparison to some of the more like nefarious stuff that prospects have gotten into and have led to slides but not slides that like the Mike Green situation with the Ravens, even the Jalen Carter situation with the Eagles, which kind of, I hate the discourse

around the Jalen Carter, the pick because everyone's like, oh, the Eagles got their guy, you know, they got their value pick, but it's like, okay, say why they got their value pick. They got their value pick because the guy was part of a fatal car accident. But how do you think NFL teams they're going to look at this because it is kind of unprecedented.

We have seen similar situations. Terrell Pryor had a five-game suspension for selling merchandise, which sounds ridiculous at this point. And that got upheld by Roger Goodell. Do you think that the lingering effects will affect him when he gets to the NFL, suspension-wise? Yeah. I mean, I think that's the really big, kind of like the biggest question or the cloud

goes kind of hanging over all of this. Like, it's easy for us to like, okay, we're going to go back and we're going to watch his tape from Cincinnati. And we can do the traditional quarterback evaluation stuff and make the comps and try to project what sort of quarterback he would be, where he would rank in a regular draft class, those sorts of things. But we can't ignore why he's eligible for the supplemental draft and why this has become such a big deal. And like you said, this wasn't like a, honestly, this isn't even like some of the other

gambling suspensions that we've seen in the league. Yeah, some of those where it was like, yeah, he was betting from the team facility or he was betting on college football. He's an NFL player, you know, or he was betting. Literally, they're just not allowed to place bets when you're on the facility. So like even if he was betting on, you know, college, yeah, like it was college football and you're just like doing it from your NFL locker. That is a violation. Certainly you're, you know, placing bets on your own team is kind of like a different level. I believe that was like the Isaiah Rogers when he was suspended from the Colts a couple years ago.

but this is like a pretty significant level. And the NFL is trying to take this gambling stuff really, really seriously. And they're trying to figure out how they walk this tightrope of being so heavily sponsored by gambling sites, how they are integrating betting lines and win probabilities and all that stuff into their broadcasts and into their like official NFL platforms while also trying to maintain the integrity of the game. And, you know, Brendan Sorsby is coming in with, like, you know, admitting to a lot of baggage. He's, you know, admitting that he has dealt with a lot of mental health struggles,

addiction to gambling. He has sought treatment. Texas Tech has been pretty vocal about, even though he has now declared for the supplemental draft that they're going to keep providing him counseling resources and, you know, just tried to, like, get him healthy and whole and all of those sorts of things. So, you know, this isn't just a straightforward football about. So I think whatever teams are considering at this point, like do we draft him, how highly do they draft him? I think they also need to be considering what is our environment?

How set up are we to kind of bring in a guy who is coming into the NFL with just a lot of stuff going on and a lot of, you know, a lot of stuff that you're going to have to be really, really careful about. And I don't know if that's everybody. I don't know if that's every team, you know, buddy on that team that you listed, Cardinals, Jets, Browns. There's a reason these teams are kind of constantly cycling. through quarterbacks and are at the bottom of the league. What sort of infrastructure do they have there to kind of support a quarterback like this or any player who's kind of going through

a lot of the off-the-field struggles that Brennan Soresby clearly has been. And then I think you're right that the question of punishment is just really ambiguous at this point and the NFL hasn't come out and said anything. So we're really having to just kind of lean on history. But the Torell prior suspension in 2011, that was Roger Goodell.

And at the time, Goodell's kind of reasoning for why he was suspending Torell Pryor five games is because that was what the NCAA had imposed on Pryor. And the NFL and Gadell thought that Torel Pryor was basically trying to avoid getting punished by, you know, leaving school and declaring for the NFL. He had eligibility remaining. And so Gadell was pretty like, he said, you're not going to avoid the punishment just by just because you're coming to the NFL. FL. The flip side of it, the other precedent that we're kind of looking at is Kayshan Booty, the Patriots wide receiver, who after he was drafted by the Patriots, he was arrested for underage gambling for bets that he was making. Kind of similar. I think it was like almost 9,000 bets that he placed while he was a college student at LSU. Ultimately, the charges were dropped.

He didn't, you know, face any legal punishment there. But because he was arrested for it after he was in the NFL, it kind of came to light this massive gambling problem that he had in college. And the NFL did not do anything retroactively. They weren't going to, they didn't go back and say, okay, you clearly were doing, you know, things that were illegal while you were underage while you were in college. It has to do with gambling. So we're going to make sure that you are following, you know, we're going to put that under our gambling policy. So there's, you can kind of look at it as like, okay, well, these are pretty similar violations, right, in terms of like the gambling that you did in college. The big difference is, you know,

that Kisham Booty was never, like, punished by the NCAA. He was never punished by LSU. He was never, like, he wasn't trying to come to the NFL to avoid some sort of punishment that was happening while he was in college. So it's not exactly apples to apples in either of these cases. I don't think Sorsby's entering the supplemental draft to try to avoid the punishment that was coming in college football. I think it was like, I mean, up until a couple days ago, he was trying really, yeah.

really, yeah, I mean, like, he was trying really, really hard to stay in college football, but I think the timeline of everything, it kind of just got to the point that either, like, you had to declare for the supplemental draft or that deadline was going to pass. So they kind of ultimately are here, and now the NFL's going to have to figure out what to do with it. Yeah, yeah, I think the one, like, connection between this and the prior thing. Like, I don't think there's, like, a booty connection, even though it was like a similar, quote-unquote crime. I think is that Goodell saw that. as an opportunity to make an example and be like,

because that was his concern was like, you were trying to skirt around eligibility rules, our eligibility rules, like not even necessarily NCAA ones. And we don't want to be seen as like a safe haven for people that violate NCAA rules and get kicked out of college football. So I could see that happening because this is a big transition

for the NFL where they didn't want anything to do with gambling a couple years ago. And now they're just, you know, diving in, head first with these partnerships because there's money in it. So I could see him using Soresby as kind of to make an example out of him and just be like, hey, if you're going to do this stuff and get kicked out of college and try to come running to us,

you're going to have to sit out five games or something like that. But that's the only thing. And I don't think you really care if you're a team about that part of it because I think he is seen as a project player. And who cares if he misses five games? We're drafting them for the next 10 years in theory. And I do view him as that type of player. Like, I don't think he's going to walk.

walk into a starry line. Even if he goes to the Cardinals who are getting held hostage by Jacoby Percent right now. And Carson Beck, if you've ever seen Carson Beck play, they would be held hostage by him later on. But I definitely see, like, I ran through a couple of his games on tape yesterday. And to me, I've heard like first round prospect, but I think that's like draft hyperbole. Like Davis Webb got that too, his style calling plays for the Broncos. Will Howard got first round buzz a couple years ago and like ended up going on day three. That's the type of

prospect. I see, I see like a Zach Wilson type player where the arm looks elastic and like he could do a good Mahomes impression, but the arm talent isn't where it is with those guys with like the Mahomes and the Allen's, where if he does have to drive the football and throw hard,

he doesn't have the accuracy he does when he is able to loft it or just throw it like a flip out a sidearm pass on an RPO. So I think there are going to be question marks about him there, more so than even all this gambling and off the field stuff. Yeah. Yeah. And I think, you know, I would imagine if you're an NFL team. And look, I did, when I was at Broncos minicamp yesterday, I did ask Sean Payton kind of just about,

look, I don't think the Broncos would be a team that are considering using a supplemental draft pick and the supplemental draft on Brennan's Sorsby. But I did ask Sean Payton, like, how does the league evaluate a quarterback right now who's entering the supplemental draft? You only have a couple weeks. And he's coming in with a lot of the baggage. And, you know, I think Sean, to his credit, he kind of said that, you know, you have to take all of it in consideration. And he's like, you know, you got to study the player. You got to have a vision for him. You've got to see how he would fit in your team. But then you really have to like do what he kind of did this. He goes, all the other stuff. I'm going to wave in my hands here. Like they can't be ignorant to all of the other stuff. So I think it all has to be part of this calculus, right? If you're wondering, hopefully Roger Goodell would give the team some sort of indication before July 16th or whenever the supplemental draft is like, yeah, this guy will not be eligible to play in 20, 26,

or he will, eight games or 10 games or whatever it might be, because that would impact, I think, the type of compensation that you would be willing, you know, that you would be willing to give up. Because, yeah, this is not a guy who you're expecting who is going to come in week one as a starter, but probably not even week 15 as a starter. But you might want to add to your room

because he does have some good upside. Yeah, he's a mobile guy, you know, has a lot of Jackson Darty. kind of comps and that kind of stuff. So definitely something we'll be watching over the next couple of weeks and some fun fodder for us to talk about here when there's not a ton else going on in the NFL. Yeah, that's going to be fascinating to watch play out.

Over the next couple of weeks, Pro Day again, is on July 10th, and the draft is kind of scheduled for July 16. It could be July 15th. It's happening before camp. Let's take a break and then come back and we'll talk about another interesting quarterback in Tampa Bay. All right, we are back. And the other news of substance from this past week is the Baker-Mayfield-Bucks contract negotiations where we have both sides are very public about this.

They're in mini-camp. So GM, Jason Lick is talking. Todd Bowles is talking. Baker-Mayfield, of course, is talking as he's wont to do. But Mayfield, in his own words, said they are nowhere close on a deal. And it's not hard to read between the lines on where the point of contention is in this negotiation. I think all parties want Baker to be there. And I think all parties even probably agree on a dollar amount.

I think he's going to get somewhere in the range of 50 million to 60 million per year. But length of contract seems to be the big sticking point, especially for Mayfield. Mayfield said he wants to be in Tampa Bay. His family has laid down roots in Tampa Bay. But they are nowhere close to terms on a deal. And then you hear liked and you hear Bowles talk and they are without, saying it directly, they are espousing concerns about

Baker Mayfield's ability to stay healthy. And I think it harkens back to his style of play. And what really makes Baker Mayfield Baker Mayfield? Like the signature play in my mind from last year, especially when his MVP campaign was at his highest, was that scramble against, I think it was

the 49ers, where he like breaks like three tackles and gets a first down on it's a third down play. But we saw the downside to that. I have a trivia question for you. And the context of this conversation is probably going to give away the answer. Do you know who led the NFL and EPA gained on scrambles last year? I mean, it's got to be Baker.

It was Baker-Mayfield, and it was 40 expected points added total, which is a lot. And when you look at his total from all of his dropbacks, it was 36 EPA. And you don't need to be like a mathematician to realize that if you take away those scrambles, the rest of his dropbacks actually lost about five EPA. So I think the big question for the Bucks is, if Baker-Mayfield, we don't want Baker-Makefield to scramble. If he's not scrambling, is he still a quarterback worth this much money? So I think this is a little more complicated than you would think,

especially like go back to last October when he's in the MVP discussion. When you think about a Baker-Mayfield deal, do you think it's one of those things where it's like a no-brainer for the Bucks, or do you think it's something that they should be taking their time with? Yeah, it's really tough because, like, I think at the ringer, we were always a little more cautious about the Baker-Mayfield MVP campaign than some other sites were. And, you know, maybe we were a little Debbie Downer, both on the podcast.

Not Cousin Sal. Cousin Sal was killing me on the gambling pod. Cousin Sal was all over. That's true. That's true. And I always wanted to be like, I'm an MVP voter. And he's like not, I mean, we're even in the middle of October. And I was like, I don't know if he's.

top three on my ballot in the middle of October. But it's a really tricky situation because, like, I think he very clearly has found a home there. He's been a great quarterback for the bucks. I think I totally see his reasoning there where he's a guy. He did have to sign a couple of these one year proven deals. $4 million. $4 million.

Yeah. And when he's done that, yeah, I mean, yeah, that is wild. Like, that is wild. especially since in Arizona, he's trying to hold out for, what, like 20 million or something right now? And Baker signed for four, a couple million dollars a couple of years ago.

So I totally understand where he's like, I've been through hell. Like I have been put through the freaking ringer in the NFL going from, you know, getting royally screwed in Cleveland, which I think we all can admit that the Browns screwed him pretty bad, I think, with the way that they kind of tossed him aside

for Deshawn Watson. And then, you know, he really had to bounce around a lot. And not, I mean, it's not like he played great all the time and stuff. And he probably deserved some of those, you know, times that he got cut and had to move. But when he's been down and has been asked to prove himself, he has gone through and proved himself. The tricky part right now is that the quarterback market is just so insane where, you know, you're looking at all of these guys now that are, gosh, there's a dozen guys who are making more than $50 million this year. and a couple guys who are over $60 million right now.

And every time a new guy signs, it just kind of pushes everything up. So is Baker the guy who you're going to pay $55 million a year? And that's kind of what we're talking about. I think Tampa Bay would say yes, though. Like, I think they would say yes, but I don't want to do it for five years. Yes.

And that's what Baker wants. And I think that's really tricky because in that case, I think you've got to just find somewhere that's in the middle. and I'm sure that's easier, you know, easier said than done because I really like Baker and I really like Baker specifically in Tampa and he's been able to make it work with multiple coordinators.

And it's just like it seems like so really good fit. But man, it's tough. The quarterback market is just really, yeah, it's just really tricky. I think you got to pay him, but I think if you're Baker, maybe you try to get as much, as many years as you can and some protections. Yeah. that if you have some room to restructure at some point.

But yeah, I mean, the other guys, I mean, if you, look, Jared Goff is making 53. Tewa was making 50 last year. That's wild. Brock Purdy is making 53. Jalen Hertz is making 51. Like, I think you would put Baker Mayfield right. He's at least in that group. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, he's absolutely in that group. And is it worth, like, going through a protracted battle, especially with a guy who he's not just going to, like, sit there? and quietly, quietly take it. So I'm very curious to see the timing of this and if this is something that the Bucks let drag out

or if by the time we get to training camp when camps open at the end of July, if they figured it out and found a way to make everybody happy. Yeah, and I think the thing that complicates this is, so Baker Mayfield's cap it for this year is $39 million. And the way they restructured his deal,

I think it was last offseason and they added some void years to it. So now if the Bucks let this contract kind of play out and those void years kick in, they're going to be on the hook for a $30 million debt cap hit. So essentially, if they do let him walk after this year, which I don't think is going to happen, you would have paid Baker Mayfield for this year,

that $39 million cap hit plus another $30 next year, which is $69 million for one more season of Baker Mayfield. So I think financially, Baker has some leverage here, but I think the Bucks, I think the Bucks front office thinks that Baker is a competitor. He wants to win. even if he's mad about his contract, that might be a good thing if Baker's mad at us.

Because we've seen, like you said, when he has something to prove, that's when he's kind of been at his best. It's when people start believing in him. That's when we see like the worst of Baker-Macon. It's true. Yeah, he should be the last guy who wants an MVP campaign. Yeah, yeah, he should not want that.

He wants to be slept on. He's like the one player that you could tell how he's going to negotiate contracts based on his film, like based on how he plays football. He just doesn't take note for an answer. He plays with a chip on his shoulder. think he's going into these negotiations with one, but I think it would be in his best interest to kind of dial back the demands for the long-term deal and just play it out. Like if he puts up

two more seasons like he had, not this last year, because last year was kind of a regression from the year before, but he threw 41 touchdowns and threw 4,500 yards and had a 70% completion percentage in his final year with Liam Cohen. If you put up another one of those seasons or one or two of those, I think he's going to have no problem getting a long-term deal or that security that he's looking for. So it's going to be interesting to see how that plays out because I think Mayfield has the leverage

but the bucks are kind of in the right. I think they have the right thinking about it. Yeah. I would say awkward situation. This might be the most awkward situation in all of the NFL right now. The Vikings have a quarterback competition. I'm putting that in air quotes if you're listening

on the audio only. A quarterback competition between Kyler Murray and J.J. McCarthy, which I think three weeks ago, two weeks ago, felt pretty cut and dry. But after this past me, maybe the door has been open for McCarthy

to actually compete for this job. I think it was the first week of minicamp by all reports that Kyler was having a better time on the field. He looked like a clear front runner in this race. But then last week, Murray had a rough week of practices and I think McCarthy looked a lot better

and then Murray was kind of asked about his struggles. And then this is when things start to get awkward because the first time Murray was at asked about the competition aspect of this all. He was diplomatic about it. He was like, you know, we're pushing each other, we're helping each other get better and all that. And it was J.J. McCarthy that was kind of, you know,

complaining about the situation. He seemed to be very mad about the fact that he had to compete for this job. But then last week, Murray said that he was frustrated with the lack of first team reps and now he has to split him with McCarthy. And that is halting his progress in picking up the offense. It's a very complicated offense to learn. and that may have led to some of his struggles. And I think the people that were on Murray's side

and were like, oh, yeah, he's being a professional about this while JJ still looks immature about it. I think they're kind of back in the middle, back on the fence. So do you consider this an actual competition, or do you think that this is Murray's job to win and all this is just going to be stuff we forget about in August and September? I do think it's a competition.

I still think Kyler Murray's got to be kind of the front-runner. here and is really going to have to, like, lose it at this point. But look, if there's anybody you could probably go out and lose the competition, it's a guy who's maybe not known for his, like, study habits and, you know, putting in the extra work it takes. I think a new Call of Duty game comes out in a month or two, too. So that's something you have to factor in to the equation. I mean, and I don't think, I mean, somebody can correct me if I'm wrong here.

Like, this is not a guy who's, like, really been in, like, a quarterback competition. Never, never, no. He walked right into the starting lineup as a rookie, yeah. So, yeah, certainly not in the NFL. I'm trying to remember back during his college at Oklahoma. That's how to say to him. He did have, like, but he was a freshman, and I think it was Kyle Allen, the Panthers quarterback from a couple of years ago.

They had a competition when they were both, I think they were both highly touted freshman and Murray ended up winning. But since then, I think he's just, you know, had whatever job. He's kind of, yeah. I mean, so this is a very unfamiliar situation for him to be like, one, you know, he got cut. But he signed with the team where he thought he probably had the clearest path to winning a job and being the starter and maybe having kind of like a fake quarterback competition.

I am looking at this. Well, one, this is the team that I wish was on Hardknacks. I had to go back and just look up and see who is it. It's the Seahawks, which I guess we haven't. I don't want that. We haven't had like the reigning Super Bowl champions on Hard Knocks. And it's very, very, very, very, very. Might have been the first one.

It might have been the Ravens. Yeah, that's what I was thinking since like the very, very beginning. But with all apologies to our, you know, Seahawks friends and fellow fans here, or our fans here at the Ringer, they're boring, man. I could not be

less interested in a season or three-season Seahawks. They're fun on the field, okay? Fun is hell to watch. But yeah, like, I mean, I guess like, yeah, we'll find some, maybe some personalities there, but this is the one I want to watch. Look, if this is, if summer is about, like,

juicy reality television, like give me Love Island and give me hard knocks Minnesota Vikings because I would love to be in those rooms and actually seeing the dynamics between these two guys because they clearly are not like becoming friends. I don't think they have any interest in like forming a cohesive quarterback room that is going to, you know, the starter is going to be helping develop the backup and the backup is going to really be helping prep the starter. It just does not seem like it's going to be that type of situation. And the thing that I just think is so interesting about this is kind of the Kevin O'Connell of

a couple years ago he was like the kind of the no-brainer pick to be NFL's coach of the year. This quarterback guru was, you know, loving up on every quarterback who is on the field, the opposing quarterback is talking about, you know. He can save them all too. Yeah. Yeah. And like, you know, they're not treating you right. And the, you know, the quarterback development model and the NFL is all wrong and we're going to be this team that's going to fix it.

and he chose this. And that's what, you know, it's not like the Vikings have like ended up some, like, how did we end up in this situation? Well, you know how you ended up in the situation. You decided not to resign Sam Darnold. You traded, you know, you invested a lot in J.J. McCarthy, decided he was your guy, didn't bring back Daniel Jones when he was in your room as your backup, and decided to bring in Kyler Murray. So like you've walked into this situation that is now really, really awkward and

it's going to be a really big test for like the Kevin O'Connell experience and like kind of who is he not like, look, we know who he is as like a schemer and a play caller. And I don't think there's really any questioning of those credentials at this point. But we're going to learn a lot about like who he is as a CEO and like the guy who is completely in charge of a franchise and managing his roster. And I'm very, very interested and I'm very mad that we are not going to have full-time cameras inside. So if anybody in NFL films can like pull a little switcheroo and make that happen by August,

that would be great. Our Netflix, like Netflix, you still have, there's still time. You still have a month to get in on that. But I do think the Kevin O'Connell part is interesting because I do think he has this reputation, which I, he cultivated himself, you know, becoming like the quarterback reclamation guy, the guy that said that, what was his line?

It was like young quarterbacks don't fail, NFL teams fail young quarterback, something along those lines. It's easy to say that and then you have to coach JJ McCarthy and all that talk goes out the window. But I do think he wants to maintain that, which is why we're getting this, which I think it's a farce of a quarterback competition.

Like when you think about, say what you want about Kyler Murray and like the Offerfield stuff and whether he studies or not, he has been a top 10 quarterback. this league at one time. Like, 2021, start 8-0, he was like the leading MVP candidate at the time. He was a first round, he was a first overall pick. And I don't think anyone would have called him a bust before things went bad in Arizona.

Whereas J.J. McCarthy has never looked like a competent NFL quarterback. Like, if you take away the fact that the Vikings had invested so much in the JJ McCarthy, this isn't a quarterback competition on paper. Like if they had signed Kyler this offseason, even to the prove-it deal, and they had this, let's say J.J. McCarthy was a third-round pick who looked like a disaster on the field. Like a Max Brosmer-type level player, no one would be thinking, oh, we need a quarterback competition here. But I think the Vikings and Kevin O'Connell, who's kind of the face of that organization now that Quesey is gone, I think he wants to be like, look, we don't abandon quarterbacks.

So let's pretend like we're giving them a chance. And I'm kind of on Kyler's side here with the split of the reps. Like, we know Kyler's going to be your starting quarterback. We know it. Why are we pretending like it's not going to happen? And why are we not dedicating all of our time to getting the best possible version of him, even if it's in the offseason? Like, this stuff kind of trickles down.

It has a trickle down effect where if you fall behind in the off season, then you're kind of catching up in preseason and you're not your best when September rolls around. So I'm kind of with Kyler on this one. I'm team Kyler, which I don't think is a surprise to anyone. I always had a soft spot. I agree about the rep split. Like, I mean, there's a time during OTAs and, you know, in June where, you know, you can get your backup some work.

But that can only, that can't last that long. If you're installing a new offense, if you're trying to, you know, get some chemistry between the guy who's presumably going to be your starter and, you know, say the best wide receiver in football, like you probably want them having a lot of time together. So I think it'll behoove Kevin O'Connell to not let them. this drag out a long time into July and August. If we're sitting here at August 15th, and we're a couple preseason games in, and they're still bucking around with the quarterback reps and trying to drag this out

and giving JJ McCarthy a lot more run here, I think the Viking, that's going to say that the Vikings are in a pretty bad spot. Yeah, I hope that doesn't happen. I think it will be sorted out by week two at the preseason, which even then is still a little too late, but at least they'll have a resolution. We have another potentially awkward quarterback coach relationship.

We're going to get into Denver. Let's take a break first and then come back and talk about Lindsay's experience at Broncos minicamp. All right, welcome back. Once again, Lindsay was out at Broncos mini camp yesterday. And the Broncos obviously came off a dream season up until the end. But there was a little awkwardness there at the end with Bo Nix's ankle injury and some comments Sean Payton made and some comments to those comments that Nick's kind of pushed back against.

I just wanted to ask, what are the vibes, especially between the coach and the quarterback out there? Yeah, so the reason I wanted to go out to the first day minicamp because it was Bo Nex's first time back on a football field

since the end of the divisional round playoff game when he led the Broncos back in that overtime win against the bills. And then we found out about an hour later that right there at the end of overtime, he broke his ankle and was not going to be able to play in the AFC championship game. So he's now back on the field.

He's not been cleared for full work. So kind of the drama has been one. He had the surgery pretty quickly after the initial injury in January. And the team came out right away and said, surgery went great. He's going to be cleared and full go in time for the offseason program. That was even still the plan as of late March when we were at the owner's meetings. And Sean Payton was meeting reporters there saying, you know, everything was going well. And then very quickly after that, it turns out that Bo Nix had a secondary procedure on the same ankle.

It was kind of like a cleanup procedure. And we got to get them on the record this week to say like, well, what exactly happened here? Because clearly there was some misalignment about what was going on with this injury. Sean Payton, I think, has probably said too much along the way more than Bo Nex has wanted to be out there about his ankle. I think the thing that really kind of got under the quarterback skin was that Sean Payton put it out there that Bo Nex was predisposed to ankle injuries. He has had a history of ankle fractures. He broke his ankle when he was at Oregon. He also had one when he was in high school. So this is stuff that has kind of happened along the way. And it's just been like, it's just been

kind of weird. Like there's been all these like pictures that have been zoomed in on Bo Nex's ankles when he's been walking or he's been out doing some like rehab. Yeah, we really are. And it's like, is his ankle bending weird? Like you look like it's like at a fun house mirror. and trying to figure out, like, is this dude okay? Like, there's just been a lot of kind of weird stuff going on. So this was the first chance for Bo Nix to be back on the field in a helmet with his teammates. And then trying to, you know, look, the vibes were really good around the Broncos late last season, certainly into the playoffs coming off of that Buffalo game.

And then it all fell apart with the Jared Stidham snow game in the AFC championship game against the Patriots. And we kind of talked, we joked about it a little bit off the top. But yeah, being out there with a lot of. It was a pretty big group of reporters. And I still think there's a lot of like what ifs going on with the Broncos and the people around that team of like, you know, what if Jared's didn't just didn't have that one massive brain part? Because like he played fine outside of the one really, really, really brutal mistake because it's not like the Patriots are playing great. I mean, Drake May was awful for the duration of the playoffs. But he was really bad in that game.

He was really bad in the Super Bowl. really kind of won the game for the Patriots with a couple late scrambles when it was really, really snowy there in the second half of that game. So there's a lot of like what ifs going on. And I think now that Beau is back, not cleared for full participation yet, he only did

individual drills. And I believe that's going to be the case through the duration of this mini camp this week is not going to be participating in seven on sevens and eleven on 11, that kind of stuff. He's not like sprinting. He wasn't doing a lot of like lateral movement. It was really like kind of get back

out here, you know, throw on air, do the individual work, that kind of stuff, start actually getting to throw with Jalen Waddle, their big off-season pickup. And, you know, I think there's like, this is a team that's really confident and really, like, they believe in their heart of hearts that they were a Super Bowl caliber team last year. And if one or two breaks had gone a different way, obviously the literal break with Bo Nix's ankle. And then the other break being literally the only only Only like four hours of legitimate snow we got in Denver the entire winter happened on live television during the AFC championship game. It was the driest, warmest winter. I think any of us have experienced in a really long time. And the four hours of snow happened to be during the AFC championship game.

So there's a lot of like, what if, you know, that. So I think this is a team that is feeling really confident, really likes their quarterback, some changes going on. Sean Payton has given up play calling duties. So it'll be some just really interesting dynamics, I think, going on with this team. But yeah, they're feeling good. They're feeling themselves, I think. How do you think that relationship between Peyton and Nix is progressing? Last offseason, he couldn't shut up about his quarterback. I think he at one point said he's going to be a top five quarterback in the NFL the following season or something along those lines.

But we had this little back and forth during the off season where, like you said, Peyton said he was predisposed to ankle. injuries. And then Bo Nix was like, I'm not predisposed to anything. My ankles were feeling great for this. And then we have seen them kind of butt heads on the sidelines a couple times last year. Do you think it's still as strong as it was last year? Or do you think there is a little bit of tension there. And all tension isn't bad tension, especially in football, I would say. Yeah. I mean, I do think when we go back to last seat, like last, this time last year and then certainly like last August during the training camp tour when Sean Payton loves to sit down with anybody with a microphone who loves to come through town and, you know, the NFL network and the K Adams and that whole,

kind of like that rotation, he loves that. He loves to like talk about his quarterback. I think he actually said the top five quarterback thing. Was that to, that was either to Yahoo Sports or USA today. I'm trying to remember which of his 16 sit downs that he did over the course of like the first, the first week of August. I always felt during that time where it was what he was saying about Bo, but then also what he was talking about the whole team, believing that this was. was a Super Bowl team. He knows what a Super Bowl team looks like, all of that kind of stuff.

I felt like that was a little bit more about like message setting and like to his team. Like that wasn't so much like him saying like go bet on us. Like we're going to win the Super Bowl. I think it was like him projecting to his locker room. These are the expectations that we have. A year ago, this was a team for 2024. This was a team that was just trying to get out of the Russell Wilson mess that, you know, be competitive in the AFC West. and that the expectations had shifted. He was dialing it up a little bit. And so a lot of this messaging was,

we're rallying around Bo Nix. Like, we are in on Bo Nix as a group. I'm going to put it out there publicly. You guys are going to follow me. This is our guy. We're going to, like, talk him up. Even if maybe if you gave him truth serum, you know, like the Drew Brees comparisons

maybe a little, like maybe he was going a little bit too far. And it was funny, he actually got asked about that on Tuesday. He's one of the columnists here in Denver asked him. You know, basically this time last year, you're saying he was a top five quarterback, given what has happened since, do you still feel that way? And he kind of, Sean Payton kind of said, like, look, that was, I did say that, like, last August. And, you know, he's kind of trying to come back from some stuff now.

And, you know, I think the questions now are, what is the new offense going to look like with Davis Webb calling plays? With Sean Payton kind of out of that play-to-play mix, he's not going to be the guy directly in Bo Nix's ear during games. I think that's probably better for their relationship. Yeah, yeah, that's probably... So a lot of the conflict was happening was actually in the function of getting the plays called. And then...

So I think that's certainly part of it. And then, yeah, I mean, they're just these, like, fiery kind of guys. And, you know, look, I've kind of gotten a reputation locally here in Denver when I do radio hits. and on Twitter and stuff of being a little bit of like a Debbie Downer when it comes to... I've been there before.

You? No. Never. But I'm like, I like... I was counting yesterday. This is my 19th. This is like my 19th year out at Broncos minicamp. Like I've seen some shit.

Right, right. You know, I've seen some stuff with this team. I've seen some really good quarterback play. I've seen some really, really, really bad quarterback play. and you know, I don't think why, like, I saw Paxton Lynch throw the ball into the wall of the field house, leaving a dent, which I think is still there. It's like the Paxton Lynch Memorial.

Yeah, I lived through the summer of Trevor Simeon versus Mark Sanchez, lived through the Chad Kelly of it all. Look, it's been a time here in Denver, Colorado. I think my like football evaluations of Bonix kind of still stand. And I think you and I are fairly aligned with like, maybe where his floor is, but then also maybe where his ceiling is, some concerns about how he handles himself in the pocket, the happy feat that he gets. But that he, like, the thing that has changed, I think, though, is like,

as I've learned a little bit more about his personality. And I think the thing that I've come to really like about him is that, like, look, Sean, Sean Payton can be a lot. He can be, I don't think many people would like to have him. as your boss. I think you would all go probably a little bit crazy if you had to work for Sean Payton. And Bo Nix gives it back to him.

Like he can kind of rise to that level. He's not afraid to like kind of be a jerk back to him, to stark back at him, to raise his voice, to like be a little fiery. And that's one of the things that I like about him. And I kind of like that Bo has not, from this like whole rehab part with his ankle,

hasn't necessarily been like, I'm just going to be quiet about it, let my coach say some stuff that's not true. I'm going to talk about where I'm at, what I think I'm capable of. And, you know, so I think, are they, are they going to be like, is this going to be a Patrick Mahomes, Andy Reid, where like best friends or like a- Matthew Stafford, Sean McVeigh going hot tubbing together in Cabo? Probably not.

It's probably not ever going to be that relationship. But I think it's showing that they can like exist on a good like back-and-forth kind of plane. I think Sean Payton needs a quarterback that he's not just going to be able to like kind of push around. Right. They want a guy who's going to give him some feedback. So yeah, I don't look, I don't think they're going to be like best friends. But I hope this is going to get them to a place where they can kind of have like a respectful and productive professional relationship. Yeah, it's a big year for Bowdox too.

He's going into his third year. And I think he started, he's already starting to get some contract questions from the press. next off season, the first year, he's eligible to sign an extension. Next year, next off season, it's also the time when the Broncos have to decide whether or not to pick up his fifth year option, which would guarantee him around like $30 million salary in 2028. Yeah.

Obviously, like, if he has a big year, they're going to give him whatever he wants. They're going to reset the market for him. But I'm wondering if, let's say it's a mediocre year. From your perspective, in Denver, where do you think the blame goes for that? Because I think we saw last year when the offense was struggling at times

when they would get it going in the fourth quarter, I don't know, maybe I'm just, my algorithms aren't in the right place, but I would hear from Broncos fans being like, why don't we, you know, hurry up the tempo and do what we do in the fourth quarter in quarters one through three. So it kind of sounded like they were putting

some of the blame for both struggles in those early quarters on Sean Payton. Now that he's kind of handed off the play calling, if there is a mediocre year, a step back, and Bo maybe puts up the same numbers, there's no progress there. Who do you think gets the blame there? And how do you think that might affect?

Davis Webb, probably. Davis Webb, yeah, for sure. I think I was on a pod with Shield like a month or two ago, and I was like, at what point does Sean Payton, is he setting up Davis Webb to be the fall guy so he can be the hero that takes back play calling duties and leads the Broncos on a run? But do you think that that will shield Peyton from any

criticism if it does go wrong and he doesn't ever take back to play call? Look, I would be shocked if he doesn't take by playcalling it sometime this year. I just, like, this is not a guy who's just like going to relinquish control of anything. So I wouldn't, I wouldn't be surprised if at some point, like, look, I like, I like, I liked I mean, all of my like personal interactions of the Davis Wadbe had become away being really impressed as like really, really sharp guy. I mean, people have been talking him up since he was playing, like, since he was kind of bouncing around as a backup quarterback as like, like,

this is a, this is a, this is going to be the new, the new guy, the next like, you know, backup quarterback turned play caller turned head coach. Um, he's certainly been on that trajectory for quite a while now. For a guy who's really young, I mean, he's, he's only in his early 30s. I don't think Sean was like turning over play calling because he just wants to be like altruistic and like, you know, really cares like a ton about Davis Webb's development and like trying to get him a head coaching job. I mean, I think it'll look good for Sean Payton if he does, right?

Like, he doesn't have like this huge coaching tree. He doesn't have this like huge body of work of like all of the guy, the play callers who have come up under him, who have gone on to become, you know, head coaches or play callers elsewhere. So this would kind of be a little feather in his cap if, if Davis Webb turns out to be a really good play caller and followed, you know, kind of this Sean Peyton becomes like a real branch off of the Sean Payton offensive tree.

But yeah, I mean, I would just say like when we talk about. about blame. Like Bo Nix got like none of it. Like you see that in Twitter mentions if you are not like a bow lever. It's on shirts and everything and signs. Like if you're not all in on Bo, you're considered like kind of like traitorous around here. And that's just like that's what the city is. It's just like this is a quarterback town. And it's been like that for my entire lifetime. Yeah. You know, that's what happens when John always the quarterback here for a really long time and then somehow you luck into Peyton Manning for

four or five really, really good years. It's just... It's always going to be like that, right? It's always going to be like that. I remember the Drewlock offseason. I got a lot of shit for that because I was not a Drewlock believer. Yeah, that was a tough time. Although I do, I will say there were like, there were some Broncos fans, I think, who were really happy to see him get a ring

with the Seahawks. There was still a lot of like, kind of like wistfulness of like, maybe if things had gone a little different, if the coaching situation had been better, the receiver group or whatever had been better. But, yeah, I mean, I don't think the blame is going to go on Bo. I think it's going to go much more heavily on the coaching staff if this doesn't go well.

The tricky part is that Sean Payton just got extended. So Sean Payton is here long term. He just got a five-year extension. George Payton, the general manager, he's recently got an extension. So the brain trust is in place. And then now really it's on Bo to, raise his game, elevate the rest of the offense.

The pieces are in place around him. He's got one of the best offensive lines in the league. They went out and traded a first round pick for Jalen Waddle. So there's not a lot of excuses left for this offense not to take a big step forward and not just be like an offense that can make, you know, play well in the fourth quarter or have these like splashy plays here and there. This needs to become an offense that can be functional and efficient from down to down from the first quarter to the fourth quarter.

And that's not what we saw last year. Right. But the potential, I think. is there and that's what we really need to see now. So just putting it in terms of the third year quarterbacks, we have Caleb Williams, Jaden Daniels, Drake May, Michael Panics Jr. and J.J. McCarthy are in their own separate thing, but I put Bo Nix. I would elevate him,

even though he was drafted after McCarthy and Pennix, I would elevate him into that top three discussion. Do you think he has the most pressure on him going into this? It's not a contract year, but it's kind of like a quasi-contract year. Or is there another quarterback in that group that you think maybe has more pressure on? Yeah, I don't think it's Caleb Williams right now. I mean, I just, I think we all kind of came away, like, just really enchanted by Caleb Williams after last season, especially the way that he played in some of those big games. Obviously, wasn't able to quite get over the hump in that Rams game.

And that was the division around. Yeah, that's the division around, right? But, like, you know, he was doing the shit that we just were waiting for him to do. That we knew that he was possible. He's just kind of this athlete on a whole different level and seemed, Ben Johnson seemed to have unlocked something. So it's not Caleb Williams. I think in terms of something to prove, I'm just really excited to see what year two

with the Ben Johnson experience is going to look like. I'm personally very interested in the Drake May, 2026, what that is going to look like. Our friend Deonté Lee, he and I have been talking about this a lot. He's not worried about Drake May at all. I feel very worried about Drake May. And if I'm like, if I were a Patriots fan, I would be really nervous coming off of the post season

that I had. And maybe this is one of my just like blind spots or whatever as a football reporter, the way that I look at the league. I have a really hard time shaking the most recent stuff that we saw. And, you know, I know you can go back and when we're pulling, this is the time of year where we like to go back and really do a deep dive into what happened in the previous season and going

back through and like looking at all of the advanced metrics from the entire season. And so much of that stuff is really positive for Drake May. And there was a reason. that he finished second in MVP voting because the advanced numbers are great, the efficiency metrics were great, the eye test a lot of the time during the season was really good. I just can't shake

the way that that offense played and him specifically down the stretch in the postseason. And the fact that they were kind of able to go on that run to the Super Bowl when he was playing so poorly. Like, look, you and me, we were sitting next to each other in the press box and Levi's Stadium with all sorts of true media searches

going on, like, really historically bad quarterback performance. territory until garbage time in that game. And he's a really young quarterback. And I watched him really closely. I was the pool reporter for the AFC during Super Bowl week. So I watched every minute of Patriots practice at Stanford that week. And he was a guy, and I was in the Patriots locker room after that Super Bowl where

52 guys in that locker room, I don't want to say that they weren't disappointed because I think they all were like, you know, you want to win the Super Bowl. and it's a bummer to not win the Super Bowl. But most of the guys there were like, yeah, we got our asses kicked and like, that sucks. But like, we'll get them, you know, hopefully we'll be back. Drake felt, watching Drake in that locker room

seemed like this is a guy who was pretty devastated. And he was wound really tight the entire week. He had that shoulder that he was dealing with. But the way that he played was like kind of even worth, It was really hard to watch. And the fact that, like, they got him AJ Brown. I love it. I love that they made a move to get, like, an actual, legit number one ride receiver.

Will Campbell is still that left tackle. And that makes me really nervous. And I hope for Drake May's sake that, like, he has that, like, toughness element to him that is going to take the adversity from January and February and turn that into, like, a big chip on a that's going to make him play really well, that him and Josh McDaniels are going to figure some stuff out this offseason. Game planning-wise, things, maybe some easy buttons for him that they weren't able to pull or push in the postseason.

But I just hope that that run and the way that he played specifically down the stretch and in that Super Bowl isn't going to do irreparable harm. No, I think it does matter because it happened. Like, it's not theoretical and it's the last memory you have of his season. and if he struggles again this year, we're not going to be thinking about how great he was last year. We're going to be thinking about what we saw of him in the postseason. And then if they make it back to the postseason,

he has another playoff, like another stinker. We've seen how that sticks with quarterbacks and how that kind of, like Lamar Jackson seemed to have trouble getting a contract every time he wants one, even though he wins MVP's because of the playoff struggle. So I'm kind of with you there. I think there is a lot of pressure on him. I think Caleb has just won over Bears fans

who had a very low bar and he's jumped over it. Jaden Daniels, for me, it just comes down to, does he stay healthy? Because if he stays healthy, I think Washington has the same view of him as Chicago has of Caleb Williams. And I would say that I don't think Bo Nix has a lot of on-field pressure just because that defense is going to be awesome again. You have Sean Payton designing the offense.

The offense is even more talented this time around. The offensive line is still very good. So I think Bo Nix could turn in mediocre performances and still be on a winning team. Whereas the Patriots, things are going to be harder this year, even though I think the roster around May has gotten better, but the schedule is going to be a lot harder. And then that was kind of the narrative last year

as he beat up on an easy schedule. Let's see him play playoff teams, and then he stinks it up in the playoffs. So, like, narratively speaking, I think there is a lot of pressure on Drake May, even though I have a lot of confidence in what I've seen of him on film. Yeah, like, I feel like I need to go back

and like watch the middle of the season. Right, right, yeah. go refresh so I could kind of get the stink of those last couple playoff games out of my mind because like he was so freaking good for most of the year. Like he deserved like he wasn't he was not my MVP pick. He was on my MVP ballot. He wasn't my first place vote getter there. But like there was a reason that so many people did vote for him for MVP.

He deserved all of those accolades that he got. But I would say if I'm like one, who's the guy who's probably under the most pressure out of his class? I would say it's him. And then if we were going to say, like, who's the most likely guy from that crew from the 2024 draft class to actually win MVP, who's the first guy is going to get it? He's probably not my first pick. He wouldn't be? Who would be your...

I really can't look at Caleb Williams. You don't even have to go back and watch Drake May from last year because we were getting so close to football. You were already back on the practice field. And we're just like a month and a half away from training camp. We have a supplemental draft to look forward to you now. It's going to be fun to break all the. that down over the next few weeks. But that's going to do it for this week. Thanks, as always,

for listening. Thanks to Christopher Sutton for producing. Thanks to Stefano Sanchez on video. And thanks to Arjuna Ramkopol and Connor Nevins for additional production supervision. This has been the ringer NFL show. Thanks for listening. 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky or Wyoming. Gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler or 1-800. My Reset, call 1-888-7-8-9-77-7 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit MD gambling help.gamblinghelp.m.m.m.m.m.m.m.m.m.m.m. Hope is here. Visit gambling helpline-m-m-m-m-a-7-50. for 24-7-7-4-7-4-N-Y or text Hope N.Y in New York. For Louisiana, call 1-7777-7-8-67.