The Ringer NFL Show - ‘GM Street’ — The End of Eli (Ep. 158)

Episode Date: October 11, 2017

The Ringer's Michael Lombardi and Tate Frazier sit down to discuss the end of the Eli era in New York (02:30), the biggest problem most teams face on the field (07:45), the future for the Bears and Mitchell Trubisky (15:45), how Adrian Peterson will fit into the Arizona offense (22:30), and Gary Andersen's departure from Oregon State (26:30). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Bill Simmons. I want to tell you about the ringers gambling podcast. It is called Against All Odds with Cousin' Sal, and you're not going to believe this, but it's hosted by Cousin Sal. The biggest degenerate gambler that I know. He's such a degenerate. He has three other degenerates that he calls the degenerate trifecta. And they break down every conceivable gambling thing you would ever want to gamble on. They even take you to Captain Morgan's Make Belief Casino, where Sal makes up props on all kinds of things, sports, pop culture, you name it. you are going to want to get your gambling advice from these guys.

Cousin Sal, he's been a staple on the BS podcast for the last 10 years. So good that we gave him his own podcast. Check it out against all odds with Cousin Sal. Subscribe wherever you get your podcast. Welcome to GM Street. I'm Tate Frazier, and I'm sitting across Mr. Michael Lombardi on this beautiful Tuesday afternoon. How you doing? Beautiful at L.A.

You know, Tate, I've got to be honest, I'm not well. I've watched a lot of... What are you sick or something? No, I'm sick to my stomach. because I've watched a lot of Foltz's clips here in the first two games of the Sixers preseason or three games. I'm depressed. You should be. I'm really depressed.

Any player that comes out and says that he is mirroring his free throw shooting after Shaquille O'Neal, the Great Shaq, the Shacktis, the big Aristotle. That's probably calls for concern, I would say. What really upsets me besides the free throws is, like, he's the first pick in the draft, the first overall pick we traded assets. And he doesn't play above the rim. Like he doesn't play. Now, I know he's not, you know, 6-11 and all that, but, you know, we could have had Lonzo ball. I mean, come on, really, seriously. I'm depressed.

It's going to be a long winner. I really, now, I love Simmons. I love that, and Abed gets a new contract. I'm happy there. But, man, oh, Lord, I'm not happy about this. Fultz has one of the syndromes, what I call it, your fat, skinny. It's kind of what Carmelo Anthony is a little bit, Jabari Parker. I can see that.

They're guys that are, they play a lot of sports, so therefore they stay in shape. But if they weren't playing sports, they'd be a little chubby. and it's some people say it's round face, you know, but it's just, you know. I have a fat face. I'm not in shape. I was the same way. Like when I played sports, I was really in shape. And then now look at me.

I'm just slowly falling apart before your eyes. Let's talk football so I don't have to be depressed. Yeah, well, if you thought this was the ringer NBA show, you were wrong because this is GM Street. And we had some big developments last night. Monday night, football happens. That was a great game. We get tied at 17. Yeah, that was a little sarcasm, folks.

We're here to have fun. But 2017 win for the Vikings. We're going to get into the John Fox, Mitchell, Fibiski era a little bit later in the show. But let's start off with our favorite Bill Wash segment. If we're all thinking of like, no one is thinking. And first up, a lot of people are thinking the New York Giants. You know, everyone's trying to figure out what's next for those guys and what's next for

Eli. But you have some thoughts on them. Look, I think the Giants should. If you're John Mara and you're the Tisch family, I think you have a meeting now. And you basically say, look, we're 0 and 5. We need to get something out of the season. and the playoffs aren't realistic, right? So you're not going to go to the playoffs, you're not going to,

but you've got to find out some answers. And I would really start the rebuilding process. Now, they've got to take a motion out of the decision. I know they love Eli. I know Eli's been responsible for two Super Bowls victories for them in their trophy case. But I think the time is now to move forward, and they have to. I would trade Eli. Everybody's talking about trade them to Jacksonville.

If Jacksonville will trade for him, I mean, I would do something. I would trade every player on my roster right now before the day. deadline to get an asset back, whether the asset is cap room in Eli's case, or whether it's just a later pick, so that I could start rebuilding this team for the future. Now you say, well, maybe Jerry Reese won't be there. I don't really care who's there. I know we need to start this because here's what's going to happen. You can't use the next 11 games. We've got to go into Denver. All right. If we're going to lose in Denver, probably, I would suspect they play good at home. It's going to be hard to throw the ball, hard to block them. You know, the team tends to lose

its focus, the coaches, you know, in the hot seat. You need to stand in there. Remember this, Tate. Fear does the work of reason. And if there's no fear in the players, you can't reason with them. And the only way you're going to bring fear in them now is by changing the roster. And when you look at that roster, you were talking about a trade. Obviously, the NFL is not known for making many mid-season major moves or blockbuster moves by any case. But I try to find teams and fits for guys that really need a veteran quarterback that have a defense. And one of those teams we watched last night, and that's the Minnesota Vikings, a team that Sam Bradford does not look like he's going to be the guy, even though early against the

Saints he did. Case Keenham, you know, he's competent. He can make it competent. He's better, one of the better backups in the league. When you look at, when you watch Matt Castle play, you think, God, if we'd have had Case Keenum, we could be a lot better because Matt Batt Castle's a bad backup. Absolutely. But let's talk about a guy like, it's a starter. We talk about Eli Manning. And a team that's done this before, we saw the Vikings make the Brett Farv run when, you know, 2008, 2009 range. What if they were to say, hey, we have the defense in place to win titles, to win a championship. Why don't we trade a guy like a Riley Rife who is an offensive lineman we just brought

in to New York who gets a now a left tackle for a young guy like Davis. That would be way too much to pay for Eli. They would never trade Reef. It would cost too much to do that because the reality of it is they just sign them and the acceleration of the cap and the signing bonus. That would be too hard to do. Let's face it, anybody who takes Eli off your hands is doing you a favor because you're taking away the cap room, okay?

So you're taking away the cap room. but taking away the cat hit and you get it accelerated in this year's. If the Giants, I mean, it goes down to Kerry Wynne, who's not going to be on the team next year. Shane Vareen, trade him. To me, I'm going to be a player at the trade deadline if I'm the Giants, and I'll trade them anywhere. The Vikings, I don't think it's a good fit because Bridgewater eventually will come back. I don't think he's going to come back very soon, but he could come back. He comes off PUP.

Case Keenham's actually playing better than Eli Manning. So why would I trade for Eli if Case Keenom's playing better for him? And then you've got to deal with the Sam Bradford. which to me, San Bradford is a little bit like, unless he's perfect, don't play him. Yeah. It's one of those weird things where I'm just trying to find it home for Eli. I just want Eli to go somewhere where he can actually have a chance to do something.

I want him to be the new FAR, is what I'm saying. You know, look, really, I mean, I don't know how long Mario is going to be out, or there's a lot of places he could go to fill the role. The Giants just have to stop being so emotionally in their decision-making. They have to realize where they are. are right now. They're 0 and 5. The New York Jets are 3 and 2. If you would have played that parlay, you wouldn't have to work anymore, right? I wouldn't be here right now if I did that, yes. No, you wouldn't be. You would be with your Quentin Coppels jersey somewhere else. But the fact

remains is, look, you have to start the rebuilding, and the sooner you do it. And your neighbors in New York, the Jets, waited a year too long to do it. They won 10 games two years ago, and they thought they were really close and all of a sudden they're not. Now they're rebuilding and they're 3 and 2. Good move, right? So, you can do it during the season. It's hard to do, but why not take the approach that baseball does and just let's just start this thing over and then put the onus on the coach. Hey, look, I don't know if you're going to be here, but we're going to evaluate how you coach

for the next 11 games. And if you can do something good, and it doesn't have to be translated into wins, if you can keep the team together and we can get some focus and we can basically recreate this team, then we could move forward. But to me, you can't let these 11 games go and Davis Webb sitting on the bench and you don't know whether you have a quarterback or not. You've got to play them. Like you've got to play them.

Yeah, you hear that Rooney Marr, get in there, tell your granddad, tell them that you need Davis Webb to get there and start playing. But they need to find out about play. The one thing you don't want to do is go in the off season,

not sure. Do we have a player or do we not? Because look, a lot of teams need quarterbacks. And that's right. And that's a lot of people right now are thinking that there's only a few teams, like four or five teams that need quarterbacks.

And we're not thinking that way, Lombardy. On this show on GM Street, you're thinking that there are at least what, you're saying 12, 13 teams that still need to quarterback? I think that, you know, and I didn't count Cincinnati because Andy Dalton is survived by the fact that he's just good enough that they can't replace him. A.J. McCarrant, look, if you're the Cincinnati Bengals and you have A.J. McCarrant and you know there's 14 teams that need quarterbacks next year, you better hold on to him. You're the same thing with the Patriots. Everybody's talking about Jimmy Garoppola. Why wouldn't they trade him?

Well, now it comes out. Tom Brady played last week with a bad shoulder. He looked hurt last week against the bucks. He really did. In the first quarter, I thought he hurt his shoulder. He looked like this not the same. guy. Now he'd miss practice today, getting ready for the game. So, you know, you've got to worry about that. They got McCarron there. I mean, the teams that have two quarterbacks, Kansas City has two quarterbacks. Here's Alex Smith. Alex Smith's going to make a fortune. Kirk Cousins, what do you think he's going to make next offseason with all these teams? He's already making a fortune, unfortunately. The 49ers, the Giants, the Cardinals, the Saints. That's the other team. The Cardinals should stop doing everything in their power to think they're going to be in this thing,

and they should start rebuilding for next year. But there's so many teams. The Browns, I tweeted this out today. This is remarkable. The Browns, the two picks that Carson Wentz went for and Sean Watson, those picks were originally from the Cleveland Browns. Think about that. The Wentz pick was a Brown's original pick. The 12th pick of the draft, Cleveland traded for Houston.

So you're looking for a quarterback, and you traded two of the guys who were in the top five of QBR this year right now. That's a weird place to be in if you're a Cleveland Browns fan. I mean, we're just going to keep bringing this up. And that doesn't count Trubisky. That doesn't count. And you know who's number two? Who's that? Dak Prescott, who you picked Cody Kessler for.

Okay? So like to me, this is like the problem. So all these teams need quarterbacks. We didn't talk about the chargers. They need a quarter. All these team needs, there's not enough quarterbacks to go around. Like if I'm the Bengals, AJ McCarran's, you're probably going to get a one for AJ McCarran.

You're going to get more than, because these teams can't satisfy their needs. But is that a trade? Are we going to start seeing? those trades start happening in the league right now? I mean, are there going to be teams that look at an A.J. McCarran or look at a Derek Anderson in Carolina or look at Jimmy Garapolo and say, hey, we need to get this guy now. We need to make a play now for an actually content. Well, everybody wants Garoppolo and I don't think they'll trade them.

But, I mean, it's going to make Alex Smith's market. Look, right now he's the MVP in the league. His market's going to go through the roof. So there's a lot of give and take here in terms of where it's going to go. But so many teams need quarterbacks and there's really nobody that can fill these needs. And I think that's the biggest problem in the league. We talk about parody in the league. No, the biggest problem in the league is bad quarterbacking,

and it's led by some of these older guys. We even talk about Pittsburgh. I mean, Big Ben, if Big Ben was a baseball player, he would have thrown, in his heyday, he would have thrown 100-mile-an-hour fastball. Now he's throwing about a 90, no, no, no, no, taste. Let's say 88, 89. No, let's say about 84.

Okay, oof. He can't zip the ball. He can't drive it with his lower body. Does he have anything else? Does he have a sinker? Does he have a curve? You know, he used to be able to get away with being able to move around the pocket, at the loose plays, the scramble plays that Carson Wince is doing now, that Big Ben used to be it,

but he can't do that anymore. I mean, he's not really doing that anymore. So he's not there. He had no offseason. I mean, his offseason workout chart looks like mine at the gym. A lot of days missed, okay? A lot of days missed, all right? So it's like, you know, I mean, that was Big Ben.

He's playing golf somewhere probably. Who knows? But the point here is when there's so much competition for quarterbacks, where are you going to solve the problem? And where does that problem start? I mean, before we move on, I just want to say, you know, quarterbacks are always, they've always been into premium and obviously even more so now with the running back, you know, sort of devolving into a position where you can rotate guys in and out. It seems like the spread system in college, a lot of people want to blame that, like guys aren't ready to be pro-style quarterbacks.

But then the NFL game is changing to a more spread system with guys in the slot anyway. So what's going on? What's the problem with being able to develop guys and get them to the league? Well, because guys are in the spread are really just reading, they're reading too. It's really an easy spread offense. So it's not like a pro offense. where, like last night, if you saw Trubisky play, he was not really comfortable when he had a drop back and play in a drop back game. He needed to be on the move and moving around because

he's more comfortable reading high, low. And I think when you look at the college game now, guys are staring at receivers. I mean, even on Sunday when you watch the RAM game, I mean, Earl Thomas was great in that game because really, Goff stares down, it's what he's trained to do. He's trained to look at it. They're trying to make them play faster, but it's hard to do. and he doesn't play faster. And I think that's one of the advantages that the Eagles got with Carson Wentz because at North Dakota State,

he played under center. He had some play. So he was used to doing that. It's a much difficult transition for these guys to get under center and play. And the NFL, you've got to be under center some to play. You know Goff has the same stare.

You remember Mike Singletary back in the day when they'd always saw the shot of him as a linebacker and he just had that blink stare where he was just staring at the quarterback. Goff is the opposite of that. I wish we could do a shot where we have Singletary on one side and Goff on the other side

because he has just this blink dead stare that he just, like if Cup is running down the field, Gough's just staring at him, he doesn't blink and he's just like, that's exactly who I'm going to throw the ball too. Yeah, because he's very good at, I mean, look, he's very good at a 7-on-7 game. Unfortunately, football's fast and it moves around and the things get

in your way, like the interception, but you know, I'm not picking on golf here. I'm saying that there's I mean, golf is exactly the worst place to be, I mean, do you have a quarterback? Is he a quarterback of the future? All the people, the Rams seem to think so. But based on the list, the Rams wouldn't be a team that needs a quarterback, right?

And half the league almost needs quarterbacks. And some of the ones that have quarterbacks, whether it's Andy Dalton or Jared Gough, they really do need one. They just don't, they can't replace the one they have with someone better. Yeah, and Andy Dalton's basically in the Mets shop situation right now where you're going to keep riding this thing out to eventually it gets so bad that we really do. You know, that's an interesting thing because if I'm the Bengals and you really think A.J. McCarron's good, maybe you could trade Andy Dalton. I know where you could trade Andy Dalton. Where's that? You could trade Andy Dalton, the Jay Gruden at the Washington Redskins.

Once they lose Kirk Cousins, you lose Kirk Cousins, right? Which they're going to lose. They can't give them 144% increase over this year's salary. So he's gone, right? So he'll end up going to San Francisco and reunite and feel so good with Kyle, which would leave the Redskins without a quarterback, right? Well, Andy Dalton's sitting there and Jay's coached him, he knows them well. I'm sure the redhead would be perfect in Washington with those helmets.

It would be ideal. Maybe they change the Washington Redheads. That would be perfect. That would make a lot of people happy with that idea. So to me, if the Bengals really feel good about AJ McCarran and they think that he's worth something but they can't get what he's worth because they know he's better than what he is, then maybe the guy to trade is Dalton,

and they could get something for Dalton from the Redskins. Because look, the Redskins is going to be one of the most desperate teams in the quarterback market this offseason. And they have so much competition, whether it's the Bills, the Ravens, the Jets, the Jaguars, the Steelers, all these teams, the Chargers, the Broncos, the Bengals, once they make that move, I mean, think about it. And if they could get something substantial for Dalton, they should do it.

And we're thinking way into the future here, but if the 49ers do get cousins, which a lot of people are speculating that he will, then they have a top pick, a one, two, three pick where there's going to be a quarterback that wants to be taken, there's going to be a lot of teams trying to call to get that pick. All these 11, 12 teams are going to get it. It's a double-heder win for the 49ers. If they can find a way to get cousins and not have to pick a quarterback, now you say, well, because anyone they pick, here's the thing that makes it so.

maddening, no matter who they pick, whether it's Josh Rosen from UCLA, Sam Darno won't come out, but whomever they might pick, he's going to have deficiency in his game too. So you're not taking the perfect player. That's what's maddening about the Browns. Bill Walsh always said the search for the perfect player never ends. Well, I don't know where the Browns are looking at their analytics, because at some point, don't you just have to say, we can live with that? We just got to take them. Yeah, absolutely. We're actually been doing a little bit of insulting here already, but we're going to do it for real now. Not for nothing. We got to talk about John Fox and Mitchell Tribusky in the future of the Bears because we saw it on full display last night on Monday Night

football. And let's just say it didn't look great. Yeah, I mean, I don't know what, you know, John has been blessed in his career. He's been a head coach three times in the National Football League, which is remarkable. Not very many guys get three chances, right? He gets fired in Carolina, you know, it goes to Denver, and then Denver basically fires him when they bring in anybody, but he won in Denver, he had Peyton Manning. And Prime, this is Peyton Manning, you know, when they go to 2014, they go to that Super Bowl, the 2013 season. That was the top of his career. I mean, 13, you know, when Peyton's hurt, but he's back, then he finds a way to still play. So they win there. And then he goes, now he's in Chicago, which was an interesting hire, because if you're the Chicago Bears

and you want to rebuild your franchise, I don't think John Fox is a rebuilder. I think he's a veteran. Like, he's like the guy who in baseball. He needs a veteran team around them. He's not going to play the young, you know, it's going to be hard. But, I mean, look, I think the one thing Bear fans know, and I think most of the National Football League know, the Bears are going to have an opening at the end of the year. I mean, John Fox is going to be their coach next year. I think that's pretty clear. And so, you know, they're rebuilding their team this year. And last night's performance, I think, really shows that there's a thing, there's a system in a way to where Trubisky has to be handled, and they better get to it pretty quickly. And let's talk about one situation from last night.

There's a fourth and two. Tribisky has the ball and everyone in the, all the Bears fans, this is in Chicago last night. They're all getting excited because John Fox has decided to leave the offense to go forward on fourth and two. And then he runs out the punt team and then he pulls him back off the field. And then it ends up being a delay of game penalty that comes out of the whole situation, which was inexcusable. And I think they called a timeout. They called a time out, yes. I mean, it was like, whoa, this is really bad.

And it was sort of a weird thing. Fox is sort of an old school coach. I mean, you know he wasn't going to put. You know he wasn't going to go for it. He was never going to go for it. It's not in his DNA to do it, right? Absolutely not, but this is one of those times where Fox is trying to almost send a message and try to mess with the defense or something like that to mess with Zimmer.

It's like an old school coaching trick. He's like laughing on the sideline. But they kept cutting the shot of Trubisky looking at the sideline. Like I'm confused. Why are we not going for this for real? Why are we? That's a total disconnect there between a quarterback and a coach. And you can just, it seems like that's not going to be the future setup for the Bears.

Well, what you're trying to do there is you're trying to, what happens is in this is a situation you have to practice. which you're trying to leave your offense on the field, really close to the, right around 15 seconds, they sprint off the field and the punt team comes on. And so maybe you can catch the Vikings trying to put their punt team on the field. But once you leave your offense on the field, most special teams coaches will just call safe.

They'll leave the defense out there. Don't make the substitute and just play safe and let the ball get kicked. And they'll just do a punt safe zone. Safety will go back deeper or whatever it is. Nobody will even touch the ball. They'll go back. But if you can catch them switching, then maybe you, You can snap it and get 12 men on the field.

And that's kind of what the thinking is. But again, it has to be rehearsed. It has to be tightly practiced. And when you watch the Bears, rehearsed and tightly practiced aren't two words that come to mind when you watch them play. Offense, defense or the kicking game. And it just doesn't seem like they were all together last time. I mean, that bears. After 10 days, I mean, they had a Thursday night against Green Bay and they had that.

Look, I think the one thing about Trubisky that was clear is he is really athletic. He can throw the ball well on the move. I don't think you can overload Trubisky. with a lot of offense. Like, I don't think Trubisky could come in and run an offense that's going to be,

I think you could see why he didn't play right away at North Carolina, took him some time. They ran about eight plays last night out of the same format. Different formations, they ran about eight plays.

He's going to be a play action, move the pocket guy. He's not going to be comfortable. I mean, the interception they throw the loss to game for him, he came out of the pocket like that. He's not going to be. That's not who he's going to be.

I'm not saying he's not a good player. Not at all. I'm not judging him after one game. What I'm saying is, he needs to be in a threaten the defense on the edge move the pocket, move the launch point,

get him on the move where he can be really, really good. He can also, he's going to make mistakes. I mean, look, his touchdown pass should have been under 70. He's going to take some chances, which is a good thing. It's like centerfielders in baseball that don't get errors. They're probably not really good center fielders

because they're not getting to a lot of balls. So you've got to have guys that can make some plays. I think Tribisky, I still don't think he's the best quarterback in the draft class. I still think it's Watson. Yeah, and I will say I covered Mitch when he was at North Carolina. This is before he was Mitchell.

Are you allowed to call him Mitch? I call him Mitch. I don't call him Mitchell. I don't know that guy. But Marquise Williams played ahead of him. So there is somebody you call by their first name. Yes. Okay, that's good to know.

I like that. I like to know that. Lombardy just feels good. It feels like I'm in a football life. But I would say Mitch was, a lot of people thought that he was, for whatever reason, people were like that. He's the smart guy. You know, Marquist isn't.

But Marquist ended up was the guy that was actually the really smart guy in the film room and helped impart a lot of wisdom to Mitch. So Mitch grew into his role in North Carolina. A lot of people thought that he just walked in and was ready to play. But that's not who he is. He has the arm strength. He can roll out. He's mobile.

We saw on the two-point conversion, I mean, that was a beautiful fake. That is the stuff that he can do because he's an athlete. And I think you make a great point there. And I think if I'm Ryan Pace, the GM of the Bears, and if I'm the Bears' ownership, I'm saying to them, look, whatever we decide to do with John Fox, that's fine. But whomever is our next head coach, we can't change offenses every five years. year. So if we hire a defensive guy to be the head coach, he's got to have somebody who's going to install the same offensive system for the next five years. Or if we hire an offensive coach to be

the head coach, then we're going to have, because the one thing to make Mitchell Trebisky successful is to keep doing it over and over and over again. If he gets in one of those situations where he loses a coordinator, then the next year gets another one, the next year gets another one, the offense starts changing, the nomenclature changes within the, that's not going to be good for him. Just looking at Pace, looking at Trubiski, if I'm Pace, I need to get this kid in a consistent environment as soon as I possibly can.

Does that mean keep Dowell Oggins the offense coordinator? Maybe he might be the best fit for him. But, you know, the new head coach, maybe he has to take him because this would be the best thing for the franchise. It's reps and rhythms. Yeah, no doubt. Yeah, he's a spread quarterback. He's never played under the center, and that's what a spread system usually is.

It has a lot to do with rhythm. He had a great wide receiver's coach Gunner Brewer at North Carolina, a guy that coach Justin Blackman, Desbron, all these guys. I mean, he's throwing to spots a lot of times, and guys are going to be on beats where they're going to be, and he's still going to figure it out. But the guy can make the throws. Right.

And I think he's going to play a lot on instincts. I think he's going to piss you off and throw some interceptions, but I have a feeling he's going to make some plays, too. He's got a little gunslinger in him. There's no doubt. And, you know, look, do I think Watson's a better player? No question I do. But this kid's got a lot of talent,

and he's just got to be in the right system to really utilize a skill set. And let's talk about the Arizona Cardinals. A team that going into Philadelphia last weekend, specifically you thought that they would be a team that would compete against the Eagles and maybe making a close game. It wasn't that way at all. Well, yeah, because the Eagles typically have given up a lot of big plays on their defense, and that's where the Cardinals make their living is on big plays on offense.

But they can't block anybody. I mean, the Cardinals, other than New York Giants, might have one of the worst off seasons. I mean, they left their offensive line a mess. I mean, their two tackles are truly a mess. Now, I know they have DJ Humphreys and they move Vanda here over from left tackle to right, but their offensive line can't protect their aging quarterback. And now they trade for Adrian Peterson.

Now, how do you think that's going to work, Tate? I know he's not David Johnson. I will say that. And it's also going to lead to one of those things where Adrian Peterson and still thinks he's the AD from 2008, which is I'm a one-dimensional back. I'm running H.B. off tackle. And here I go. And, I mean, they have no run-game.

They can't block for run-again. When Peterson was in Minnesota before he got hurt, he averaged under two yards of carry. And then the backs that came in to replace him actually averaged three. the line was bad. Bad offensive lines don't make the back better. And I don't think Peterson at this point in his career can make a bad offensive line look good. Plus, when he's in the game, every run stunt is going to happen on defense. And besides, this offensive line's going to get attacked by every team they play going down because they can't block anybody. I mean, Philly kicked them. I mean, it was over within the first half. And if I'm Bruce Ariens, you've got to

say to yourself, I don't know what we did this off season. We didn't make our team better. It doesn't appear that we've done anything to make our team better. We lose Callais Campbell, and he was one of our best defensive players. We couldn't really replace him. We've spent this money on other players. I don't know. They need a quarterback badly. They need an offensive line badly.

I think it's really a tough situation. Peterson had to leave New Orleans. But my Lord, like what's he going to do there? It is a make or break trade. So they trade for Peterson. They trade. I can put the story pick. It's like trading for a salami sandwich.

Yeah. It's like it's the proverbial salami sandwich. I mean, really, seriously. I mean, like, you know, I'll gladly pay you two. for a hamburger. That's kind of what it was. I mean, it's a wimpy deal. I mean, it's one of those wimpy deals. They're just basically the Saints found somebody to take Peterson off their hands and didn't have to embarrass them and cut them. Well, 10 years ago, if you heard that Adrian Peterson got traded and Chris Johnson got cut, that'd be a pretty big news story.

Right. But today, maybe not so much. The Cardinals are collecting great running backs at the end of their career. Emmett Smith and Adrian Peterson. I mean, that's pretty good. I mean, maybe they like that. Maybe they're like you. They like to collect jerseys with their things on.

I don't know. But to me, to me, I think you'd be better off taking somebody off the practice squad. I mean, you've got to find a younger, you've got to find more explosive. Like, if I'm the Giants or the Cardinals, I'm taking guys off everybody's practice squad now. I'm going to be dangerous because we need to improve our talent base. Yeah, it's one of those things where I feel like, you know, the Cardinals at this point, they're just trying to edge into the NFL films, Adrian Peterson of football life. You know, he ends up with the Cardinals so they get the last few shots with them.

I mean, they kind of actually think that they think that they're going to go anywhere. I mean, their defense is good, but look, they can't, they can't block it. anybody. The quarterback's old. I mean, Drew Stanton gets anything. I think it's going to get any better? No, of course not. No, but I do like Drew Stanton. I know you do. That's why I brought them up. Well, let's take a quick break. We're going to talk about MyBooky real quick. If you're watching the games, it's time to start making money. Try to be the Kirk Cousins of your betting pool. My bookie is the industry leading website that can fill all your betting needs with their great odds, fast payouts and decades of expertise. You can bet with confidence. So what are you

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Let's talk about a guy that was set up to get paid. and decided to walk away from the game, and that is Oregon State head coach Gary Anderson, who had $12 million still on the table for him up in Oregon State and decided to walk away from the game this weekend before they go to Colorado. Is that right this weekend they're going to go to?

And it kind of shocked everyone, shocked players, shock former coaches, everybody. Fascinating story. I mean, Gary Anderson was a guy that when we were in Cleveland and he was the head coach of Wisconsin. We talked to him. He thought about maybe perhaps becoming a head. NFL head coach. He was obviously more suited for the college game. Left Wisconsin, which was a

really good job to go to Oregon State. Oregon State was able to get away. Mike Riley has always been a beloved figure there. They owed Mike Riley a lot of money and they wanted to make a change. Yeah, and for people, Mike Riley left in 2014 to go to Nebraska. Right. They couldn't make that, they couldn't fire Mike Riley. I mean, they owed him way too much money and Mike wasn't going to walk away from his money. So he took the Nebraska job. Now, you know, Gary comes in and signs this deal and now Gary walks away, which is fascinating. I mean, Oregon State is always going to be a tough job. There's not enough players in the state of Oregon to make Oregon a great team.

There's not enough to make two teams great. And then you're competing with a lot of other teams in the Big Ten. You're going to have to go to Los Angeles. You're going to have to go to Hawaii. You're going to have to go to different places to find players to get your base. It's a challenging job. It really is. And I don't know how Gary, I don't know what the real story is.

I'm going to take him for the word that he walked away from 12 million. But do you know very many people that walk away from 12 million? I know. It's a strange account. So Ron McBride, the legendary coach of Utah. all those years. He was, you know, basically his protege was Gary Anderson. He'd brought him to a lot of stints even, you know, at Wisconsin. They had worked together and all this stuff. And he's been coming out. And he said two weeks ago, they had sat down, you know, after a big loss. And they were trying to

figure it out. And they were trying to find a ways to figure out this team. And he could tell Anderson was dejected by the losses. But I think sometimes with the coaching profession, a lot of people don't understand how much these losses. Obviously, it affects the kids, it affects the fans. But the coaches really take it hard. And Gary Anderson seems like one of the those guys that it was just too much for him. He was just tired of taking the losses at Oregon State. And even though they had last year they finished the season, I think they beat Arizona and maybe even Utah at the end of the season last year that were big wins.

It just, I don't know, for whatever reason, it seems like he just couldn't handle the losses and you just had to get away from the game. Look, if you can win in Pullman, no disrespect to Pullman, Washington, you can win in Corvallis. It just takes a unique leader. It takes a unique plan. It takes somebody who's going to have some time to do it. And Gary did them a solid because he walks away from a lot of money.

now that allows them to be able to afford a coach that can come in there. They need to have their football program to stay in a pack 12, but they're going to need to get the right guy. And so much of college, I think, is overlooked by this whole recruiting thing. And this is where Leach, I really believe, has an advantage on a lot of college programs. He doesn't get caught up in the stars, five-star, four-star. Everything about college football, some player development. You've got to have a great weight room.

You've got to work their asses off in the weight room. You've got to take those two- and three-star players and make them better. and you've got to hope that you can keep them for four years because you're going to have to grow your program. You just can't. You're not going to out-recruit USC. That was the funny thing about the USC Washington State game. People were saying, well, you know, Sam Darno played, you know,

with three young linemen. Hell, those three young linemen have been the best linemen on Washington State's team ever. That's natural ability and physical size and all that. They could never recruit those three linemen at Washington State. They would never go there. They couldn't get them. They'd be top.

So you've got to develop players. And I think that's the key for the hiring cycle at Washington, at Oregon State is find somebody who can develop some talent like Gary Patterson did at TCU, like Matt Ruhl did at Temple. I think those are the things you got to do. And we see even, I mean, just the response from everyone, it's just sort of like Chris Peterson, we saw him at Washington come out and just like, I'm blindsided by this. We had other former coaches that, I think it was even Mike Riley that came out in Nebraska and said he thought it was a fake report when it was first reported. Yeah, everybody. Nobody walks away from

12 million. And I mean, you know, Gary was, I've spent some time with him. He was a nice man. I mean, but that doesn't mean you walk away from 12 million. I mean, I mean, you walk away from 12 million. I mean, you know, and so that's like to me that has everybody's eyes looking. And, you know, if you owe you 12, take two. You know, if you want to be a nice guy, take six. You know, I mean, a lot of things you can do with six, you know. No one's offered me that contract. Yeah, well, you'll get that.

No worry, Tate. No worry, Trey, Frasier. Let's talk about, we mentioned some of the five-star guys. And a school that tends to get a lot of five-star guys, actually just got the number one quarterback in the country to commit to them, unless you Georgia Bulldogs. They have got the best start in school history since 2005, and that was back when No-Shall-Marie.

was there and Matt Stafford was there and that was, you know, a prime time for them under Mark Rick. But now Kirby Smart is almost building the Alabama of the SEC East there at Georgia. He gets a lot of five-star guys. I'm sure Mac Brown knows all their names and all their families and everybody. It's all Mac knows five-stars. We do know that. All he talks about is the player where they recruited. He's never going to tell you about what happens on the play.

He's never doing that. You could see Mac never went to one coaching meeting ever. I mean, like, you know. Just a CEO, just pulling guys in there. Yeah, look, I got to get me some five-star. Man, I'm going to give me some five stars. You know, I've got to go out and get some five stars. Like, Mac, you know, like, tell us about what happened on the play.

I like when they always ask Mac, like, how do you break this game down? It always comes down to recruiting. Well, you know, that team had a better recruiting here. Well, it comes down to one thing, and that's five-star guys on offense and five-car guys on defense. You can do the first. I can do how. You can do him really well.

But, look, I think Georgia has always been like LSU was sleeping giant. And, you know, Mark Rick did a good job. They just couldn't get over the hump. But Kirby, with that Nick Sabin program, I think he's, kind of got it going. They got some incredible I mean, Georgia's one of those teams. You go to every year. In fact, one year, Belichick and I went there,

you know, it's such an incredible place. We go there. I was just talking to a guy on the phone about it today. So we're in Auburn and we're going to work out a bunch of guys at Auburn. We were going to stay in Atlanta and then go over and work out about all the Georgia guys, right? Private workout.

So instead of staying in Atlanta, we decided to stay in Athens, but we can't get a hotel room. Finally get one. And I'm like, what the hell's going on here? Like, why can't we get a hotel room in Athens? It's Athens, Georgia. I mean, like, how can you get a... It's a beautiful place. Kentucky's playing basketball. So they get all the hotel rooms. For people that don't know this, Kentucky travels. Like, that's like a weekend vacation. Oh, my God. It was like unbelievable. It was like unbelievable. It was like unbelievable. Poor Mark Fox and the Georgia Bulldogs basketball program for all that game.

I mean, they played their asses off that night too. So Bill and I are at the game. Barclays at the game. I mean, it was a hell of a thing. I mean, it was unbelievable. Next day, that's where we found David. Next day. Next day, we worked out, David Andrews to starting center on the team. But Georgia, every year you go there, there's always 12, 13, 5-star kids. You're working out. And you're like, why didn't this kid work out? What about this kid? And now Kirby's got it to the point where it's like really good.

Like, I mean, you can just see how much better they are. And they're in that division over, what do they call it? How they break the southeast is east and west. Yeah, they're in the east of the east. Yeah, so they're in the opposite side with Florida and all those guys. They look like the class of these. Although Florida, if Florida could ever get a quarterback. Yeah.

Like, it ain't Felipe Frank. I can be honest with you there. If they could ever get a quarterback, there's another five-star recruit. That's not a five-star player. Well, let's bring up another one, Jeff Driscoll. I mean, you start going to the line of all these guys that have come through. And even Jacobi Brissette, who they let go to NC State. It was a five-star guy that was playing behind someone.

I mean, you just start running through post-tebo, all these five-stars that have come through Florida that haven't quite worked out. It's remarkable, but they have run-backs. They had this freshman running back. They put on the field against LSU. LSU won that game because they missed a field goal. And he played hurt and looked incredible in that game. Oh, my God. It was unbelievable.

But look, the point here is, I said this to you before, the Georgia, Florida, All-Star, High School All-Star game, if you just drafted off that list, you'll be great. And Georgia, and that's the only thing. Clemson has to be careful because Georgia and Clemson, those three teams, Georgia, Clemson, and Alabama, they're going to be fighting for a lot of territory. Yeah, well, they're all right there,

and they're all fighting for the same group of kids. They're all getting to South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and they're all trying to pull the top guys. And for people that don't, I think a lot of people try to pull up guys, from Georgia and you automatically think to certain guys. But I mean, look at Leonard Floyd last night. In Chicago Bears. I mean, the guy looks incredible as a pastoral.

They got another kid on the team this year that when I was, the year when I was there, when we worked out David Andrews, he was a freshman. And I forget his name. I think he wore like number one. You know, he's a single digit. He looked like Leonard Floyd's twin. I mean, he'll be a high draft pick, you know. And so it's, they always have players.

And you have to be very careful when you go there because in the past, sometimes they didn't always play to the level. I think now they're playing to the level. Yeah, and it's good for Kirby. I'm happy for Kirby. I am too. I mean, it's always good to have good players. It's good to have good.

I mean, Alabama needs a little competition. Yeah, exactly, especially in the East. And we'll get an SEC title game, championship game. Finally, that's worth something, hopefully. Have you ever gone between the hedges there? Yes. A lot of people don't know this.

I was going to Georgia before I went to North Carolina. I wanted to be Dominique Wilkins. I was like, you know, I wanted to be from North Carolina. I wanted to go to Georgia. That was like my big thing. But then got a scholarship. ended up going North Carolina. My parents were very happy.

They were going to be very upset if I went to Georgia. Really? I decided I was going to Georgia, went to visit Athens, fell in love with it. Especially Chapel Hill and steroids. I mean, I went to the north campus of Georgia, and I thought that was the full campus and I was happy go lucky. I was like, this is the most beautiful place. They were like, no, no, no, you got to go see the rest of the campus.

I had to get on a bus, go to South Campus, see how huge it was. And I fell in love. It is a magical place. It really is. If I was a football player, I would have committed to Georgia, that's for sure. I think Georgia, I mean, Florida, Georgia, all those. I mean, those are like special places. That's kind of fun.

You can feel it. Oh, you can. Do you have a story from Al Davis for this week, or are we just going to leave the people hanging? It's all right. You know, I don't know if I have one off the top of my head. I mean, there's always so many Al Davis stories. You could tell them all day long.

I mean, you know, it's fascinating that, you know, have I shared the Jeopardy story? No. Okay. Well, you know, when you work for Al Davis, he would always call you at 10.30 in the morning. and he would always have three things for you. Never two, never four, always three. Like he never had more than 11 friends. You know, like he always had that.

And those three things would be something he would ask you about. And he was saying, I got three things for you. And then he would say, you know that young man from, you mean Tate Frazier from North? Yeah, that's right. So I always called a jeopardy because it was like I had to ask the question and then answer the question. Okay. Who is Tate Fraser? And then, of course, I had to tell him, oh, he's 6040, 280.

You know, he runs a 5-140. His hands are 9 and a half. He was obsessed with hands, size, and arm length. So you would always do that. But he always had three things that he wanted to talk to you about. If I said to him, what do you think about that LeBron James guy from Cleveland? He was saying, oh, that's not why I called you and click hang up the phone. I never played a home game.

I just always, I just always, I said you should do. I never played a home game. I always was on the road with Al. I always played road games. I was always in my dress grace. Never got to wear the pinstripes. Never. Always on the road.

But, you know, like I could ask him questions about women's basketball. Like I would say, did you see the... We're talking college? College women's basketball. Loved it. Geno. Loved it.

Loved Yukon. Love Yukon. Love the Spurs because they wore the Raiders covers. He loved the NBA, too. Don't get me wrong. And the good thing I think about it, Al would be very good right now in this time,

in this political climate about what's going on in football. I think he would have a really smart take on it. He was able to see some things from a different level. I think it would be really good. All right, Lombardi, this has been another edition of GM Street on the Ringer Podcast Network. Thank you for listening.