The Ringer NFL Show - Most Surprising Teams

Episode Date: July 20, 2022

Kevin and Ben go through their most surprising teams heading into of the 2022 NFL season. Host: Kevin Clark and Ben Solak Associate Producer: Stefan Anderson Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, friends, and welcome to a golf podcast unlike any other. This is Fairway Rowland on the Ringer podcast network. I am your starter. Joe House every week on Fairway Rowland. It is myself and our PGA tour correspondent on the ground, Nathan Hubbard talking all things, professional golf, amateur golf, amateur betting, professional betting, amateur drinking, professional drinking by Birdie Buddies.

If you want to hit them straight out there, please check out Fairway Rowland every week. Available on Spotify. It is the Ringer NFL show. Part of the Ringer Podcast Network. I am Kevin Garg, join on a beautiful Wednesday afternoon by Benjamin. So like Ben, hello. What's up, Kev? How we doing?

We are doing something different. 50 days until the regular season begins, Camp starts this week for a bunch of teams. The Las Vegas Raiders reported to camp, I think today, July 20th. Josh and Daniels, baby. Early bird gets the word. Cracking the whip, baby.

Cracking the whip. Here we go. Vacations over in Vegas. Although in Vegas, it feels like you can ease into that. Yeah. I don't know vacations ever over in Vegas. It's not like reporting to St. Joseph, Missouri, you know? Love our guys in St. Joe.

Latrobe, pencil. Pennsylvania, baby. Come on down. Rochester, Rochester, New York, where the Buffalo Bills will be reporting this weekend. I think Jacksonville is pretty soon. They're in the Hall of Fame game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It'll be a great week.

So here's what we're doing. 50 days until the season starts. So we're going to do podcasts Monday through Friday with all of us, the entire ring or NFL team where we're going to talk about one subject for 20, 25, 30 minutes and just get in and out

and solve your problems. You're wondering, for instance, who's going to be the surprise team of the NFL, and we have 25 minutes to tell you. Ben Soak, I went through it this morning. I had a tough time with this. I have an answer. I knew your answer coming into it. You had a competitive advantage here,

which is that you would share me what you wanted to do. So I was kind of picking second. I came up with it. This is a top heavy season. This is a top heavy season, and this is a season about maybe five to eight teams per conference who have injury luck and turnover luck and quarterback luck, and then that will end up determining who wins the conferences.

I think there's a whole bunch of teams who are what we consider real bad, who you can make the case for as a playoff team. Yeah, and I think that top heaviness is an increasing reality in an NFL where we've talked a lot, especially in the offseason, about like team building constructs and like going all in and kind of figuring out when to compete or whatever. But the reality is that, and like when we talk about surprise teams, this is where my mind goes, we are seeing on a yearly basis a team going from worst in their division to first in their division, right? That at least one of the eight divisions has that pretty much every year.

Last year was the Bengals went from worst to first. Year before that, it was Washington. 2019 was a year off. But in 2018, there were two teams, the Texans and the Bears. And in 2017, there were two more teams, the Jaguars and the Eagles. And so while top heaviness is real, there are also divisions that are hotly contested. And there are, like you said, random pluss of a coin, they kind of throw a division up on its head. like, yeah, you have your Baltimore Ravens this year.

Like, oh, them going first or worse, wouldn't be that much of a surprise. Right. But there doesn't care. Yeah. Like, if anybody on the pod did that, we would get booed. Yes, exactly.

And so to me, like, there are teams that I like at last year who are objectively bad. And I can figure out for them, a couple coin flips, a couple good breaks their way, how they become,

like, actually objectively good. And that is a fun thing, I think, to kick off like a 50-day preview conversation. I completely agree. I try to talk myself in a certain teams. I just couldn't get there.

They either had flaws or holes or the salary cap was busted. There were probably 10 teams where I was like, maybe. And they ended up settling on one. I know who yours is. And I wanted to bring up the borough comp and kind of who this year's bangles are if there is a bangles. And I want to tee you up for your team because then we can get into that because I have a different viewpoint on it. Yeah. So I went through some of those teams that went from worst to first, 2017 Eagles, 2018 Texans and Bears,

20-21 Bengals. All of those teams had sophomore quarterbacks. They all had quarterbacks who came in in the rookie season, got a varying amount of playing time, took their lumps, and then in their sophomore season, took some step forward, like Treviski's in there. So it's not like it's a massive step forward, but still a significant step forward,

such that they were able to kind of take control of the division. The Jacksonville Jaguars, oh, baby. Have a sophomore quarterback in Trevor Lawrence, who despite the fact that they lost many games last year, despite the fact that Lawrence's stats, you know, net catch-all stats don't look incredible, they have a sophomore quarterback that was pretty good as a freshman QB,

pretty good as a rookie. And there are plenty of reasons, a myriad of reasons, to assume that you get a sophomore bump in the win-loss column. His receivers are better. Should they have given Christian Kirk and Zay Jones as much money as they did? Probably not. But the fact of the matter when it comes to projecting out wins, and losses is they're in the building now.

Those are much, much, much, much better receivers. They're on the bus. They're on the bus. If he can catch passes, no one's going to say, eh, the salary cap. Like, at least it's something. We're not starting to Von Austin anymore, right? We don't have to have Lequan Treadwill be our primary target on the outside. Now he's our depth piece, right? They have Evan Ingram.

He's going to be their tie-end now with Dan Arnold, did they acquired in the season? Is Ingram the best tied end in the league? No, is he better than what they had? Absolutely. Got brain and shirt for the building. We brought Cam Robinson back. Offensively, you look,

that you take one side of the equation, you look at the nucleus. It's not guns blazing rams. It's not blow your mind, talent everywhere. But it's good. It is fine. It is above average

for the NFL in terms of the offensive nucleus. Then you put in a quarterback in Trevor Lawrence, who sophomore bump projected, was such a good prospect coming out, was expected to be a guy who could acclimates the league quickly. And you say, all right, well,

coaching failed. Like last season, Irvin Meyer, Daryl, Just like kind of like no clarity of what was going on. Just asking your rookie like read out coast to coast and like operate from the pocket, five step drops, no help, right? Distractions on every single Monday, every single Tuesday.

Just nothing good there. And instead you get the Doug Peterson, Press Taylor, John B. Philippo Nucleus that was in Philadelphia developing Carson Wentz when he in his sophomore season took the Eagles to 13 and three and had the MVP caliber year or whatever. You say, right, we now have guys who know how to bring up young quarterbacks. They have done it before. We have seen this work five years ago. go, we saw them pull this off.

And it feels a lot better offensively for the Jaguars. So I think the Jags offense. I think Lawrence is going to be good. I think they have good weapons. I think they're going to be good. The big question for them as the surprise team, as a team that I think has a chance to win the AFC South, is what happens defensively.

Because they have Mike Caldwell, who's a long time NFL positioner coach, but it's his first time coordinating a defense. And then they have a ton of additions, right? They gave big money to fully defuncti a defensive tackle, big money to foot a Saudi Alohaan, linebacker out of Atlanta, and then drafted Devin Lloyd and Chad Muma

in the two in the first three rounds, linebackers with this past draft. They drafted Trayvon Walker to be another pass rush, or number one overall pick. They signed Darius Williams. They have done a lot to bring new bodies into the defense. And it's a question of how all of that coalesces. This is where your coin flips are coming in, right?

I think Tennessee's going to take a little bit of a step back. Lost some receivers, think offensive they're not going to be the same. Plus you hate the Titans to begin with. Yeah, which, you know, obvious. So if you can get some good breaks the defensive additions, right? Walker hits, Lloyd hits, Battsukasi hits.

And then you can get a win over the Colts that you probably don't deserve. But hey, they did that last year, brother, and it was sick. You're sitting right there as a team that, all right, this division has not have like a 13-win team. You are hanging around for the entirety of the season. And again, it's a couple breaks and we're good. And so I think Jacksonville's off-season of surprising decisions, $20 million to Christian Kirk, number one overall, pay Trayvon Walker. is obscuring the fact.

I was just about to say, like, it's funny because if you look at the roster, like, oh, this is okay, then you look at the price tag associated with every single move, you're like, oh, you feel much worse. But that's not what we're deciding. That's not the right, exactly.

Trayvon Walker is a good acquisition. Is he a good acquisition of the first overall pick? Eh, who cares? In this question, in this question, we're not trying to, nobody's handing up, this is not the team builder awards. Okay? This is the, this is the,

this is the more games than we used to be in. Is the team better, yes. And I think because Trem. bulky being retained was a little embarrassing. Because the Christian Kirk contract was a little embarrassing and the Trayvon Walker Fed was a little embarrassing. There's kind of like a public consensus of like, yeah, the Jags are just going to win

a couple games this year and they'll still be bad and they're like, like I see them on all these previews. Like the Jags are still a couple years away. They got adults in the building. I think they're going to be a difficult team to be a legitimately good team. I think that they're going to be around 500. I think that that gives them the ability to then push for like

a 10 and 7 season and a win in a from the AFC's out. Okay. So the Jaguars are my first thought when we decided to do this exercise. Lawrence was a little more, I mean, he was locked in on his first read last year. He forced throws. He had, I think, a top 10 for rookies, top 10 worst turnover worthy pro percentage, like in the PFF era.

Like he really did throw the ball recklessly, but that was, I think, part of it was he just had, and we saw the numbers, there were so many perfectly covered plays. because the receivers just weren't very good, right? Like, that was, I really do think I'm not one of these people who looks at the roster and makes plenty of excuses for quarterbacks. I think that every quarterback should be able to show you something. But I really do think that was a complete nightmare last year.

Urban Meyer was just an, like, a top five worst tire of my lifetime. And I don't, I think that Lawrence could not rise above that. I don't think Patrick Mahomes could have risen above that if you were a rookie this year. He had pocket presence, his pressure to sacrate, according to P. of us 14%, which is one of the lowest in,

uh, among rookies ever. Uh, he knew kind of how to operate there. And he's got points. And I think that there's, there's something that I saw last year. I was like, okay,

I, we, we can build on this. So I'm in favor of the Jaguars being a borderline playoff team this year. Um, Doug Peterson ranks where for you on coaching? I almost snuck him into top 10 when we did the top tens a couple weeks ago.

Mostly as a bit. So I've been like sneaking eagles into the rankings, not intentionally. And I was like, man, I should just keep doing this. But he's clearly like top 16, right? He's clearly above average. And to me, he's French top 10. And my proximity to the Peterson led Eagles over the course of like the really good year, the Super Bowl year, and then the subsequent bad years made it clear that like,

Doug is extremely good at handling his players, handling his offense and handling his business. When the scope gets wider than that in terms of like dealing with the general manager, and with ownership and with quarterback drama. He had weaknesses. Now he's here in Jacksonville where he's got another GM which is kind of like tyranting over some things.

Yeah, no, isn't that actually more of a concern? He couldn't handle Hallie Rosen. I think it's a concern long term. Yeah. I think short term, if it's, hey, we have Christian Kirk and Jay Jones and Evan Ingram. We just added all these new pieces

and we have a second year quarterback and we need somebody to make this all work. Doug Peterson was far and away, the single best person from college, ex-head coach, you know, offense coordinator of first year head coach, whatever paradigm you want.

Peterson was far away the best guy to get into the building to make that work. It's like Peterson's so good at getting you from bad to good. I think it's like the little stuff that gives you from good to great that he wasn't great at in Philadelphia.

Curious to see what it looks like here in round two. Okay, so a couple of things. Number one, I tried for about 10 minutes today to talk myself into the New York Giants only because of the day bowl bump from Joe Judge and the fact that I don't think Daniel Jones is like historically bad. I think Daniel Jones can get to a place of competence and you could see something.

There's just, if this is a Buffalo style rebuild, then they're going to view the first year as a bit of a salary cap wash and just say, let's just hit the reset button. And that's what it's doing. Yeah. Yeah. And that that's what it is. And I don't, I don't think they have high expectations. So I'm not going to have high expectations for them. Right.

That's kind of where I'm sitting there. I will say this. Caesar's put this out this morning. the most popular NFL wager by Handel in July. Do you know what it was? Lions over six wins, baby. Lions over six wins. I am a part of that handle, sir.

And Dan Campbell has drawn the most money for coach of the year. And D'Andre Swift is unbelievable. Has drawn the most money overall to leave the NFL in rushing guards. Is this just Detroit people escaping spring? I guess it's July, but like, you know, coming over over the past. couple of months and saying, let's get into DeAndre Swift hype train Ben Zolak? It's an offensive line

thing is what it really is, right? That offense line returns five or five starters and was one of the best offensive lines in the league last year. A healthy Swift is among the league leaders in rushing yards. So what the bet is injuring on is not like, is Swift really that good. No, he is. The line's that good. It's how many games

of Swift you actually get? Their typical back of running back, no, Jamal Williams is still there, but still, yeah, it's a bet on Swift's availability. No, I think the Lions more than six games. I think the Lions have a chance to be plucky. I don't think that'll be as surprising because I've seen so, like Peter King's whole

column for Football Morning America, I think this week or maybe was last week, was like, Lions baby. And like a lot of people, like Eric Eagle at PFF, I, at the end of last season was like, hey, Detroit Lions, baby. Like, to me that's not as surprising. I think the vibes are more clear. Okay, so there's two separate streams here. First is the rebuild is going really well.

the second is the rebuild is not even close to complete because they have a quarterback. And I don't think the rebuild is going so well they're going to be able to lift Jared Gough into the playoffs. So that's why I think that they're going to be like a nice inspirational eight-win team and they're looking for a quarterback next year

and maybe we're talking. When you talk about a couple years away, it's the lion, it's not the Jaguars. Yes, I agree. I've very much agree with that where it's like they're going to be a nice inspirational, wow, this team's going to look so good when they get a real quarterback,

sort of an arc. Okay, let me tell you who's going to make the playoffs. the Miami Dolphins are going to make playoffs. No, we can't do this. Why can't we do it? Because I'm doing it right now and you're not stopping. Please, the floor is yours. Okay, so upgraded the offensive line, thankfully, to the point that I think Toronto Armstead is really good.

There's enough, you know, it was interesting. I was reading a little bit about this over the past 24 hours and I was doing research for this. And there's enough first round pick, signings where I feel okay about at least competition at every spot where it's not. can be a complete disaster. Okay. But that's not,

that was such a weak link last year that I just had to address that off the top. Is that the office line was miserable last year and now it will be below average, average,

I don't know, in that zone. That's all you really need. Last year of the Dolphins defense, fourth in yards allowed per drive. This is from the football outsider's almanac, which did a great job.

Fourth in yards allowed per drive, ninth and points allowed per drive. 31st in three and outs per drive. So these drives kept going for a long time. It was tough for them to get off the field in some points. But they have talent everywhere. They led the league last year in defensive pressure rate, 34%.

Okay. Emmanuel Agba is better than the way we talk about him. Andrew Van Ginkle. Yeah, he just got an extension. Agba and Van Ginkle were just one of eight teams, two pass rushers had 30 more hurts. Jalen Phillips is right there. Jailen Phillips is really good.

And so you take that, the best defensive pressure rate in the NFL, and pair it with Xavier and Howard, where that situation seemed settled. Javon Holland, who we all wanted to put in our top 10 last week, didn't, didn't. That secondary can be really good. The blindbackers know what they're doing, Jerome Baker, guys like that. There's some competence there. And then on the offensive side, Mike McDaniel is the perfect coach for Tua. We know what Tua is.

I'd rather, listen, would I rather have Justin Herbert? Yeah. But the second best thing if you're going to have Tua is knowing exactly what he is and having some self-awareness about it. Like that what's, I think it's misattributed to Mark Twain, but it's the old line. Like, it's not what you're wrong about. That's the problem. It's what you know to be true that just isn't right. Like that's, if you thought Tua was something you're not, that's where a problem shows up.

We know it's going to be Rahim Mostert, who by the way, I just saw has the number one madden rating for a running back. Congratulations, Rahim. It's number one speed rating, right? Oh, speed? Okay. Who's number one running back? Is it a... I understood.

It's got to be J.T. But no, we got to... People forget, Rahim Moskert, 60-yard dash of Purdue. Go look up some YouTube highlights. Holy smokes. So it's going to be run heavy. It's going to be Mike McDaniel

knowing what to do. It's going to be Tyree kill, Jalen water on the other line of scrimmage. Don't make Tua do anything he can't do. And listen, there's a lot Tua can't do. But Mike, you don't think Mike Bidnaud knows that? He's a really good offensive.

of mind. If the defense is taken care of and I think it will, this is a 10-11 win team. Ben-so-L-Lock. So, firstly, Mike McDaniels the perfect coach for Tua. Even if I agree, and I'm not sure that I do. Okay. You can get

this offense, this style, this approach, in for a quarterback who needs it, and still not have the immediate success that you want. Right. And I think something we talk about with offense is like it's kind of plug and chug you put your mediocre quarterback into this like shanahanny

sort of approach and then you get a a boot a bump a boost and yeah it's happened quite a few times but you go to like new york with zach wilson and it's oh they had to spend a whole season with this young quarterback figuring out what exactly he liked and what exactly he didn't now that offense looks a lot different right like when michael flor just gets to bop on over to erin rogers they figured it out a lot faster, but it still took some time in the first season to like, all right, what buttons exactly do you want? We're not talking about Aaron Roder. We're talking about Jimmy Garapolo.

Okay, but while jokes about Jimmy are the absolute bomb, and I've been making them and making my career on him for years, to the man's credit, he makes the offense work well because he throws that middle of the field ball with the confidence of like a Peyton Manning, Johnny Unitas, Joe Namath Fusion. man. Like he, that throw isn't easy in the sense that a lot of quarterbacks will look at it and they won't want to throw it because it's a scary throw around a lot of bodies.

And you know who balks at that throw? Tua. He'll throw it short. He won't throw it intermediate. And now you're losing like eight to nine yards on that depth. And that matters a lot. That doesn't come out in the wash. So to me,

this offense for it to work is going to be so extremely horizontal. And yes, Tua's got a great, like, release speeds. So you can get that ball out horizontal quick. And yes, like Jaylon Waddle and Tyreek Hill are extremely fast. But Tyreek actually isn't that good of a yards after catch guy when it comes to short throws because he has to break tackles and break contact.

He doesn't like doing that. So like those numbers lie to you a little bit. So Tyreek and Waddle, yes, very, very good for yards after the catch. But it's still like, and okay, yeah, like, you know, go through the date and you can find two of throwing nine balls. He's like it's like a three-step rhythm and he's throwing this nine ball on the outside. He can throw it. It's just this offense is going to be short throws.

and then quick, deep outside stuff and anything that develops over the middle, which is where like the bread and butter of the McDaniel offense has been, I don't have the faith yet that he makes that throw. And so I think that while McDaniel and Tua work, I think that there is a longer onboarding experimentation, which button do we press for what process

that puts the dolphins at like a nice two-year arc but doesn't put them out of a strong-over-one-year arc. Okay, so I have a... I think a couple, I want to take exception with a couple things you said. Okay. For me, Mike McDaniel is the perfect coach because he minimizes Tua. Do you get what I'm saying? Like, I don't think there's a coach who's going to turn Tua into the guy we thought he was in a draft.

I think it takes a lot of weeks to figure out how to minimize the guy. I know, but they sort of did it last year where he became the best RPO quarterback in the NFL and he against the Panthers. He was 19 of 19 on throws in her 2.5 seconds. And, you know, it's interesting. Ruiz had this data last year. But the problem with Tua is that when he had dropped. of longer than 2.5 seconds.

His average deck for the target was still like nine and a half, which is almost the worst in the league. So he was taking a long time on these developing throws. And this wasn't often. He was obviously getting involved very quickly, and he wasn't going downfield at all. And so I think, first of all, you just try to remove those and do more quick game stuff.

And I think that the middle of the field stuff, that's a Mike McDaniel thing. Like that's, that's a, you talk about it's a confidence problem. That's coaching. And that is squarely on the feet of Mike McDaniel. And I think he can do it.

I think that an offensive head coach is probably a good move right now. A guy who's going to be able to scheme up around him to where Tua doesn't have to do a lot. I think that this can work. And I don't, you know, I think that if you want to just rely on the RPO stuff, you can. I don't think it's going to be, certainly it's not going to be as much as last year where they're doing it on more than any team in history of football. But I do think that there are ways to get to a moving in this office. And including on the middle of the field. Right. I think our experience of Mike McDaniel's offense as run by Tua is going to give us some clarity on the things that Jimmy Gravolo actually does well.

I think it is so easy to have seen Jimmy in San Francisco uniform for so long, running that offense for so long and being like this offense is just all, Chanaan, it's all coaching, it's all the theory, and Jimmy just kind of executes. And then I think we'll, if they're really trying to bring like the Shanahan offense, again, Michael Ford, game from that system is doing different stuff with the Jets. I think if they try to do the exact same chain and I think with who I will not work. I think that'll help us realize just how much Jimmy's blind, undeserved confidence that I can make this throw out every time. And it kills him sometimes, but it really does help them a lot of other context. Do you think also I am a little bit worried about defense on Brian Flores, but that's a different conversation.

Yes. So that was actually my next question is this entire discussion has been about the offense. How good does the offense even need to be at the defense? plays up to its personnel. So you brought up that the dolphins are one of the highest pressure teams in the league last year, the highest pressure. Number one. Numro Uno.

Yes. Derek Classen on Football Outsiders made on Minna Kimes podcast the very good point of saying they were a tremendous pressure team last year. They also had like negative or they had a positive EPA for play aloud when they got pressure, which is like when they got pressure, the offense was generating positive plays. Yeah. And that's because pressure came at such a huge cost to this team because they blitz like crazy and they play man coverage behind it. To the point where good quarterbacks can just say, all right, you're going to find the match if I like the most of the man. I'm going to throw it.

And if you're pressuring me, all right, this is not going to be a fun game for me. I'm going to hurt at the end of it, but we're going to move to ball. To the degree to which Josh Boyer continues to live by that sword, you're going to get games like you got against the Ravens where they're able to dominate and they're able to just. just absolutely like tsunami, just inundate an opposing quarterback with pressure from every different angle, get him seeing ghosts and destroy him, and you'll get games like they've played against the Titans,

games they've played against Mac, where they just got Mac and the Patriots, where they just got diced up because they weren't able to kind of get that ball rolling. So it's a very feaster family defense. To the degree to which he moves away from it, personnel-wise are not suited for that. They ain't got zone coverage in the back.

I love their back seven, but they don't have, Zave and Howard Byron Jones cannot, you cannot like, oh, let's just transition to being like a quarter's team. This is not the skill set of the team. It's not going to do it. They're built in that image.

So they are walking a very narrow line there in terms of what they want to be defensive identity, which obviously Boyer was there with Flores. And I imagine that's the side they'll stay on as opposed to being like, right, is the juice really worth the squeeze here? There's a lot of a cost. That worries me about the defense. It invites a little uncertainty that I'm curious to see how it gets hashed out. I agree with that. They did win eight of her final nine games last year.

They started generating turnovers. Name the opponents. Texans, Ravens, Jets, Panthers, Giants, Jets, Saints, Patriots. Not good, brother. Well, they lost the Titans, so you think are the worst team of that list. That is not true. Tyler, good team. I maintain beating, first of all, again, this is not about a team winning the Super Bowl.

This is a team winning 10 games and beating teams like the Jets and the Texans and the Panthers and the Giants is a good way to do that. Like, beating bad teams is important to your overall mission. No one's ever told Mike Tom on that, but it's true. The beating, that, you know, just crushing bad teams. You also got to beat the bad teams. You also got to beat the bad teams. I'm not going to penalize them for that.

Like, they got better as the season went on. Like, I don't, that was the back off of their schedule. Like, they lost, they lost to the Falcons in, in week seven. like, what I think clearly, it's not like they were crushing, they're getting crushed by good teams, but they lost to the Jaguars, they lost to the Falcons,

they lost to the Raiders, who obviously were just stuck in the wild card and got better season, went along, lost the Colts who weren't a playoff team. So it's not like they had some, like, you know, tail of two halves thing.

It was just that they were a bad team in the beginning and a good team at the end. Then they fired their head coach. And, oh, and then they got wrapped up in a massive, massive scandal that might end up being, the biggest scandal in history of football. Yeah.

I... Other than that, though. Yeah. I hear the, the dolphins arguments they've been made, and I think they are like a good, like, surprise team to, like, push in that AFCEs. I just, I try to get, like, you with the Giants, I try to get my head around it.

There's just too much uncertainty for me there. Yeah. I mean, the Giants just a different part of their, of their reboot, you know? I'll tell you this, though. I was at a Ranger game a couple weeks ago, and Dave Ball and Joe Shane were one section over. And, uh, boy, are they rock stars in New York?

Like, like, I've never really seen that kind of reaction for like a new, a new head coach who's not like, like in Miami yet it was Sabin because he was like Sabin, but it's Brian Daibel.

Like he's not some like, you know, rock star savior in the eyes of casual fans, but man, he's a, those guys are gods in New York right now. Who was the last, like,

obviously likable New York Giants head coach? Because like, Daibel is just like, like, like, I think he's just like, yeah, fun to like.

So, all right, we had, Joe Judge, before him, Pat Schermer, before him, Steve Spagnolo. Pat Schumer, Pat Schumer is a really nice thing. Yeah, it's like a fine guy, right.

But he's not like a, there's not going to be like a close of personality. But before him was Steve Spagnollo, Ben McAdoe, Tom Coughlin for a decade in Jim Fasel. Jim Fasel. Yeah. Dan Reeves, not a leader of men. Ray Handley.

I mean, Bill Parcells. But he wasn't likeable. He was just a winner. Bill Parcells wrote a book. I believe called Parcells, that has so much good stuff about making a team better. It's really astounding. Like, his whole thing is just the reason he's able to turn around teams, aside from honesty and just telling guys if they're good or bad or exactly explicitly what to do to become better,

that's the biggest thing. But his second biggest thing is like, just improve the special teams and you'll get two more wins. Just become an elite. It's so easy to do. You just go out and spend money where nobody else does. You hire like a good special teams coach, which is easy to do. Like, it's such an inefficiency. Just become a better special teams coach,

and you will immediately be a better team's unit, and you will immediately be a better team than you were when you were two and 15 last year. Green Bay Packers, Super Bowl-bound, baby. Rich Versa Sacha in the building. Dude, that's one of the reasons I'm picking them to win the Super Bowl. Aside from... Spoilers! I already said this.

You got to save that John for like a big episode. I already did it. I said like a month ago. Thanks for the invite. You were there. Oh, I don't listen to me. You talked stuff. That would be why.

No, no. I don't. Maybe you weren't there. It may be a Minora and Stephen thing. I don't think I don't remember when I said it. I also said the Chargers are going to be the AFC team. I'm in. Chargers' AFC championship ticket that I've placed in like mid-March, baby.

Ben Solac. We'll see you soon, buddy. We'll probably do this next week. You're going to be back on Friday with Danny Kelly. We're going to have a different. Everybody's going to be, because we're doing so many of these, we're going to do rotating cast all the time. We still owe you guys a couple episodes.

We're still going to do top 10 quarterbacks with me, Black and Ruiz as part of this at a later date. Got some other interviews that will drop as well. But thanks for listening. Thank you to find it. I understand for production out with additional production productions provision by Arjuna, Ramble, the NFL show on the Ringer Podcast Network.