The Ringer NFL Show - Sean Payton's Future, Coaching Trades, and More With Bill Barnwell | The Scramble

Episode Date: January 12, 2023

Today, Sheil is joined by Bill Barnwell from ESPN. They start their conversation by speculating on all of the possible landing spots for Sean Payton. They then go around the NFL and debate their dream coaching trade scenarios for teams that currently have vacancies or are obviously in need of improvement (12:07). Next, they talk about the changes they would make to the All-Pro team roster and which coaches and players have the most at stake on wild-card weekend (29:30). They end the pod by answering some of your mailbag questions (43:15). Host: Sheil Kapadia Guest: Bill Barnwell Associate Producer: Chris Sutton Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Mac Jones is ripped. Matt Patricia's calling plays. The Celtics are title favorites. And The Ringer has a new Boston show. I'm Brian Barrett, host of Off the Pike, the show covering all things Boston sports. I'll have shows multiple times a week covering your favorite teams and with your favorite ringer and local guests.

Plus, maybe Bill will stop by to rant about the socks. Follow off the pike with me, Brian Barrett, now on Spotify. Welcome to The Scramble. I'm Sheila Capadia coming to you on the Ringer NFL feed every Thursday with a guest. And today I'm excited for this one. One of my favorites, my friend from ESPN, Bill Barnwell. Bill, how are we doing? Shiel, you have many friends from ESPN. I'm not your sole ESPN friend. That's true. That's true. I do have many friends. Belved ESPN former, former contributor, and just many people here have love for you. I appreciate that very much. I'm excited to have Bill. I know with

Bill on, I can go any direction I want. We can go playoffs. We can go postseason awards. We can go look ahead to the off season. And so that's what we're going to do. You know, basically on the show for the next few weeks, it'll be a little mix of a little bit of everything because there's a lot going on. It's not just the playoff. So Bill, what I did, I just came up with five questions that I sent to you. I just thought, what are five questions on my mind that I want to know what Bill thinks about here? I sent them to you. We haven't discussed our answers, how we feel about it. And so we're just going to get to those. And then we'll get to a couple of listener, listener emails at the end. How does that sound? It's good. My concern with this is there's, I would say at least

three people who come to mind. It's you, Mina, and Greg Rosenthal, where when I have to do something like this, I have to have two answers to every question because I feel really confident that we're going to have a very similar answer. So I have two for pretty much all of these. I did a similar. Thanks. See, we're podcast pros. We know it's boring if we both say the same thing for some of these. So yeah, I have alternatives. to some of them as well. You're the guest. I'm going to give you first choice on all of them. And then if I need to pivot, I can. But sometimes you want to get to your second option. Like I'm hoping some of these I can be like, oh, but I was also thinking about this and we can kick it around.

So let's get started. Question number one, if you were advised in Sean Payton, Sean Payton calls you up. He says, Bill, I was reading you even before you blew up at ESPN. I was reading you. They're in your football outsiders days. I need your advice. I need to know what to do. What advice? do you have for me in terms of what job to take, whether to take a job, whether to wait. And I'm calling you right now before Wild Card Weekend, knowing what we know right now at this moment. So just to update the listeners, as of this podcast, we know that per Nick Underhill of New Orleans football, that all five teams with openings have reached out to Peyton. Three of them, I believe, are planning on interviewing him, Denver, Houston, and Arizona. But we only

have one official meeting, and that is from Adam Schaeffner. The Denver Broncos are scheduled to meet with Peyton in Los Angeles Tuesday morning. So, Bill, what advice do you have for Sean Payton at this point in time? Okay. So I have a theory. I don't know if I've written about it before, but it's the Bill Cower theory. And it is that if you are on television and you are a former coach, the further you get away from your former coaching career, the more palatable you get and the more power you will be afforded

in a new coaching opportunity. Now, there's a limit to this, Sheel. Bill Cower had about an eight-year window where he could have gotten any coaching job he wanted and probably had more control than your typical second-time head coach, but he chose not to stay with the media, and I don't blame him. That's a great job. I think Sean Payton will only grow more powerful and be more appealing to desperate teams the further we get away from his tenure with the New Orleans Saints. So to me, if there's a perfect job out there for him, I would say, sure, go for it. But none of these jobs are particularly appealing. It's not Trevor Lawrence.

It's not Justin Herbert. It's not one of those other guys. I would say, wait, because you will only grow more desirable as you sit out and do like a bunch of of random like YouTube videos or whatever on the side. Now let me, let me ask you this. So we know of the five openings now. Is there a potential opening that you look at and say, if that one were to open up here at some point, you know,

after the playoffs or in the in the weeks ahead, that that might get a little closer to the perfect opening? Or do you feel like, you know, that opening might be at least a year away? I don't know what's going to happen. And I don't think the Chargers are going to fire Brandon Staley if they lose. I don't think they should, frankly, fire Brandon Staley if they lose, even given his heel turn when it comes to fourth down decision making. But if that job came open or if they lost in embarrassing fashion or ugly fashion to the Jags,

if I were Sean Payton's representation, would I call the Chargers and say, hmm, guys, you know, if you can get a deal done, we might be interested because I can go coach Justin Herbert for the next decade, I would probably go after that one. Yeah, I think I'm in a, so I have a similar take to you, you know, like Houston. I mean, I would not even interview with Houston. They've been a dobs their fire of an organization. I don't need to talk to them. The Colts, I don't need to talk to them.

I don't need sort of a meddling owner who's going to be doing videos about me in front of his jet. If things don't go well, I don't like their talent. They have no answer to quarterback. The Broncos, I'm taking the interview. I think he's right. He's smart to take the interview. Listen, it's not perfect.

It's not just about going in there and fixing Russell Wilson. I just think it's sort of, you know, when you want some leverage, you want to sort of sniff out some desperation. And that is a desperate franchise. And so I'm sure his agent is saying, let's at least go talk to Denver. I mean, we have no idea what we can get here from a financial perspective, from a power perspective. And it's not like they have no talent.

I mean, you know, certainly you could make the case that the defense could be good next year that with one of the greatest offensive coaches we've had in the NFL over the last 30 years that the offense could look different next year. So I think he's smart to take that meeting. I think Jay Glazer reported that Peyton's not

interested in Carolina and that might just be a case of them being in the same division as the Saints. Otherwise that job would intrigue me a little bit. So in addition to Denver, I think the other team where I take the interview is Arizona because I think they fire

their GM, they don't have a coach. So that's a situation where you can go in and have full control. I don't know how he feels about Kyler Murray, but obviously there's talent there with Kyler Murray. And so that one would intrigue me. And also, you know, Bill, we always talk about like, all right, quarterbacks and ownership and all this stuff. Like, I really relate to the athletes and coaches and whoever else who, like, choose destinations

just on what they want their quality of life to be. Like, I think Sean Payton has already talked about, you know, like he likes to golf, you know, maybe he wants a nice climate, whatever. Like, that makes so much sense to me. It's the old, like, Shaq thing, you know, with the NBA where it was like, well, he didn't maximize every single opportunity he had to be the greatest basketball player he could be and win titles. But, like, he had a really funny, I'm sure he had a great time from kind of day one to the end.

So I can kind of relate to that type of thinking. So I think Arizona could check some of those boxes. So that's what I'm saying. I'm saying interview with Arizona and Denver. We don't have to rush into anything. But I do think, let's see how this weekend plays out. I'm telling Sean, I'm saying, let's see what happens with the Cowboys. Let's see what happens with the Chargers.

By the way, let's see what happens with the dolphins. We know, listen, let's just get Stephen Ross involved. I mean, we can have no interest of going there, but let's just get him involved. That's going to be nice for us financially. we know he's not going to act rationally. We know he's tried to tamper to get us previously anyway. So those are kind of the three teams I'm looking at. I'm with you.

If you have a chance and you're Sean Payton, again, one of the greatest offensive minds of the last 20, 30 years, if you have a chance to coach Justin Herbert, that to me would probably top the list. But the Cowboys would be an interesting job with Dak and Miami with their sort of, you know, some of the roster and also just kind of what you could do there. that would interest me a little bit as well.

Okay, so two things. I would say number one with the dolphins. This kind of feels like one of those NFL things where they can't officially tell the dolphins, you're not allowed to hire Sean Payton, but it kind of feels like they'll tell the dolphins you're not allowed to hire Sean Payton. Like you can't lose a first round pick for tampering

and then go hire him. It just seems like it would set a bad example. You can do this. It's just you have to give us a first round pick and the state's a first round pick to get it done. So, I mean, it would make total sense. I would absolutely see it if there had not been a penalty. That one might be tough.

I do agree that that job could come open, though. And I think that, you know, I think Mike McDaniels been very good this year. But I think for the right coach, Stephen Ross is going to be happily, he'll happily cut ties with whoever he has to to get the right guy in there. For the Broncos, I think if you're Sean Payton and you think that's a good job, not the perfect job, but a good job, I think you go to the. them and you say, hey, we want eight years and $160 million. We want to be the first $20 million a year coach. Like, like, we want $20 million a year and we want enough of a, we want enough term that if we can't fix Russ, we get plenty of time to go out and find that new guy and develop him.

Or even if we do fix Russ, we are in here in time to get the guy after Russ, assuming Russ is not sticking around after this contract with the Broncos. So I think you have all that leverage. You can push the coaching profession forward by establishing yourself. And I think Belichick is kind of the guy who is rumored to get about $20 million a year. But if you're publicly saying, hey, coaches can get $20 million a year from the NFL now, which I think is absolutely not out of the question given, you know, what college coaches are getting in terms of term and money now.

I think that that's absolutely what you're doing for Walmart. Like that's a rounding error to get a guy who's going to fix your. franchise. So I think you could even ask for more. I think you could ask for 10 and 200 if you want. But I think I would say 8160, take it or leave it, negotiate the draft capital. I wonder, that's going to be the tough part for the Broncos is just, what do you send back to the Saints to get this deal done? Yeah, they got the one from the Bradley Chub deal, but they obviously gave up a lot of draft capital for Russell Wilson. So that, you know, that's a great segue. That leads into our second question here. I think you're right, by the way. I think if our current jobs don't work out

for us, I think we should try to team up and be coaching agents because I was just getting so excited about what you were saying there. And I'm like, you're so right. Just target the teams that are desperate and have a lot of money to spend. And yeah, you can really, I mean, eight, I was at first I was like, eight years. What is he? Then I'm like, no, yeah, he could ask for wild stuff. He already has a great media gig. He has all the leverage in this situation. So yeah, something for us to file away down the line if our current, current jobs, which we're, of course, both happy with. Don't work out.

All right. Question number two, Sean Payton aside, what's the most fun coach trade you can think of? And I'll be honest, Bill, when I was like prepping for this, I'm like, we could have just done the whole episode on this. This is a very exciting topic. This was definitely the question I was most pumped about to hear your answer. So I'm curious to hear your thought process and kind of what you came up

with in terms of another coaching trade. Yes. I absolutely agree. We could have done an entire topic, an entire podcast on coaching trades. I have two. I will give you the one I like more. I'll give you the juicier one. I think it is very implausible to be clear.

But I do like it a lot in theory. So here's what it is. It's a three-way trade first off. So you know it's, you know, it's, you know, it's legit when it's, when it's a three-way trade involving a coach and it involves a player and an involved traffics. We have Mike Frable leaving Tennessee to go coach the Carolina Panthers. We have Jordan Love and a 2023 fourth round pick from the Panthers going to the Titans.

And we have a 2023 second round pick from Carolina. going to the Packers. Now, is this enough for Mike Vrabel? It's a little thin. I think this would have to be something where Tennessee was saying, we're starting over, we're going to get a new coach.

We appreciate what Mike Frable's done, but we kind of feel like we've hit our peak and we want to go in a different direction, which I don't think is likely. Mike Frabel's a great coach. So I think it probably would involve more for Vrabel. Maybe you throw another player in there, maybe you throw in another starting caliber player.

I thought about a Mike Vrable for Ike McQuahe Kuanu straight-up trade to get Tennessee a left tackle for Taylor of the Juan. But I think this achieves a few things. Mike Frable is a great coach in my eyes, goes to Carolina. He can be kind of one of their franchise cornerstones now. Tennessee gets a quarterback to compete in the post-Rion Tanna Hill era with Jordan Love. They get a mid-round pick as well. And then the Packers for a guy on Jordan Love, who maybe they're not picking up a fifth-year option.

If Roger stays, he's kind of redundant. You trade him. You get a two in return for a guy who used a late one on a few years earlier. It's a good second round pick. I don't know if this is a perfect deal, but I think it's at least the building blocks of a deal that could make sense for three teams. What do you think? I totally whiffed on thinking about Vrabel when I was doing this, but I was doing your thought process that you just had. I was like, who's a good coach who's in a bad situation right now, who's like probably not, you know, the roster's in bad shape or whatever.

and he absolutely fit. So I wish I would have thought of Brable. I'm glad you thought of Brable. If I'm Carolina, I'm absolutely doing this. A second round pick, two, twenty, three, second round pick to get Brable. I think that's a smart, you know, a smart move to make.

You get him in there. I mean, it would be probably one of the most talented teams that Brable has ever coached, honestly, just thinking about some of what they have at their premium positions, at left tackle, wide receiver, Eddrush, your corner, D tackle. Like, they've got some of the best young talent.

in the NFL at just those premium spots. They obviously have work to do at quarterback. So I like it for the Panthers. If I am the Packers, it's so tough for the Packers because, yeah, you're right. If Rogers comes back, are they really going to keep Jordan Love and just play it out and then, you know, potentially see him walk? I don't know. I mean, I watched Jordan Love in the end of that Eagles game and I was like, ooh,

I'm kind of intrigued by Jordan Love here. So in that respect, if I'm the Titans, do I want to do that? After I fired John Robinson, I think if I'm the Titans, I probably would say, thanks, but no thanks. We found a coach who can kind of set our culture and we can win games with and we're not going to give up. We would need more to kind of give up on Mike Rable there. And then I guess the last aspect of it would be the Packers, like you mentioned, they are giving up Jordan Love and they are getting a second round pick from Carolina. I think I would just wait with Jordan Love. I think I would not try to maximize that I would be.

Because even if Rogers comes back, let's say he gets injured. And Jordan Love plays four to six games and is awesome next year. Like you have him in the building. You've put in a lot of work for him. I would be okay with kind of just hanging on to him at that point. But you're in rough cap shape. And yes, that's true. The 50-year option for Jordan Love is $19.5 million.

Can you afford to pay Aaron Rogers and Jordan Love $19.5 million to be your probably backup quarterback in 2024? Yeah, that's tough. You're right. It's a good point. And you have to decide on that this offseason. So you have to decide right now if you're willing to pay that. And it's fully guaranteed, unlike the old CBA where you could cut the guy if he was healthy. So that's a scary proposition.

I think I could see what they'd want to keep him. I think he is still a exciting prospect. but I just think it's a very dangerous financial situation to set yourself up for if you want to build a Super Bowl caliber roster around Aaron Rogers. Yeah, they could use some clarity from Aaron Rogers the sooner the better. Do we think that's going to happen? I don't know. I would not bet that that's going to happen.

Okay, I like that one. All right. What's yours? I identified a few coaches who I thought could be candidates, one of them. And again, to echo what you said, this is implausible, I think. The Texans trade the 34th overall pick and a 2024 first and probably something else to the New England Patriots for one Bill Belichick. The crafts, they can say, you know what? We chose the wrong person.

Tom Brady went. He got to the playoffs. He won a Super Bowl. Belichick told us this was the time to move on. He was wrong. We can bring Tom Brady back. as a free agent. We can let Brady, you know, have input on whoever he wants the next coach to be.

You know, I don't. That's my question is who's replacing Bill Belmont. I know. Who would coach the Patriots? Who do you? I was trying. I don't know. I mean, when you said Vrabel, I'm like, I don't know.

I guess if they're trading away. Can there be a three-way trade where they get Brayble? And they trade away Belichick. Maybe there's some way to work that. But, you know, they can acquire some draft capital, which would give them three picks in the top 50. They could then trade those picks and add some veterans on the whatever offensive line, wide receiver.

And the crafts can say, you know what, we're not in rebuild mode. We're going to bring Tom Brady back right here. We're going to try to win a Super Bowl in 2023. Bill Belichick, he goes to Houston. Now, I don't know, Bill Belichick would have any interest in going to Houston at this point in his career. But he obviously has the Nick Casario connection. They keep the number two overall picks. And now all of a sudden, you know, he can go there.

Bryce Young, C.J. Stroud, one of those two quarterbacks. Terrible division. I mean, I don't know what Bill Belichick's motivations are right now, but if he wants to, you know, break that Don Chula record, you go play in the AFC South for, you know, two to three years. I think you'll have a good shot at breaking that record. And who knows? Maybe with some savvy roster maneuvering, you can build a good team. So what do you think other than we need to find a coach for the Patriot? If that trade was tweeted out, how many times would you,

you have to check the Adam Schaefter, the account that tweeted it to make sure it was a real account and not someone posing as Adam Schaefter. Because I think it would be like six. Yes, I would be convinced it was Adarn Schefter. I'd have to reboot my computer and checking a clean browser to make sure that I had not been fooled somehow if this trade was announced on social media. I mean, if Bill Belichick came to you and said, listen, I'm tired. Like, we've taken the organization as far as we can. I just want to one more fresh start before I retire. That kind of makes sense. Like, I think the Texans have a lot of cap space. They have not a tone of young talent,

but some of the young talent they do have is on the defensive side of the ball. Their secondary has some exciting pieces. I know, Derek Stingley had a, you know, not as good as Suss Garder, but a promising rookie year. Jell and Petrae looks good. They have some pieces on the defensive side of the ball. The offense is a major question mark. And again, there's the other Belichick question of, well, he couldn't find someone to coach the offense in New England. And the guy who would make sense to come back with next year is Bill O'Brien. Well, you're not hiring Bill O'Brien to be the offensive coordinator of the Texans. So you got to find someone who can, maybe it's Cliff.

Maybe it's Cliff Kingsbury, a Texan born and raised, who can come coach the offense for you with the Texans next year. Or maybe Bill Belichick has a revelation that I'm the greatest coach of this generation. why don't I search a little further and wider than Bill Freakin O'Brien and Matt Patricia because I could acquire probably the most talented coaches, offensive coaches in the entire world to come work for me. I don't know. That's just an idea, Bill, that you might want to look into, even if you haven't known them for 10 years, that might help your team a little bit. Sorry, I had to get that in there. I think he'll just discover another member of his family who's uniquely qualified to coach offense is what we will solve. I mean, like, like, I think

think if you're going to go start anywhere, the Texans do make sense. But again, if you're a real balochek and you're going to the Texans, you're telling the owner, is Hal McNair? I think it's Cal. I think Cal. I'm telling Cal McNair. You're paying me like so much money that and you're not, you're not allowed in the building. Like I'm, I'm running things. You can be the owner. You can show up on game day. You are not allowed to make any decisions during the week. You're not allowed to come to the facility. You have to go to an undisclosed location and stay there during business hours. I'm running things the exact way I want with no interference. And you know what? If you're Cal McNair, maybe you say yes to that. I love that clause. We had the Kyler Murray homework

clause, like a coach clause. Owners card will not grant him access to the facility. And he is not permitted to call me as the head coach for the duration of my contract. That is a great idea. Now, Our last three questions are a little shorter. So I want to just, I got to get what your backup trade was in this category. And then I'll give you mine. Okay. It was John Harbaugh going to the Panthers for DJ Moore and draft compensation. Oh my gosh.

That was one of my, that was one of the ones I had written down. We both wrote down Harbaugh. That's funny. So I wrote down three coaches, Belichick Harbaugh and Sean McVeigh. But McVeigh, I was kind of like he might just want a break. I don't know. But Harbaugh was an interesting one because if they lose this game, is there a scenario where they're just like, you know, this is kind of stale.

It's been 15 years. He's still a great coach, but it's not working out great. And so I had the Panthers trading the ninth pick to the Ravens for John Harbaugh. You know, David Tepper obviously used to be with Pittsburgh. He's gone against John Harbaugh in the past. Like I said, the Panthers have some talent there at some premium positions. Maybe that's just one of those where we get one of those tweets. Both sides agreed it was for it was for the best.

So I can't believe we both had Harbaugh going to the Panthers. That's interesting. I can absolutely believe this shield. No surprise to me that we had almost an identical trade. I like, I think yours is probably better. I just thought the Ravens need a receiver. It's been so long. But maybe they don't want to spend that much money on a receiver.

Maybe they're trying to deliberately go cheaper at that position. So I think the nine would make sense for sure. I think that's probably, you have to kind of time that right. Like, because if the Ravens come out and say, listen, we're parting ways with John Harbaugh, we're just going to trade him for whatever we can get. I don't know that you get the nine. But I think if you are saying, hey, he's our guy. And if you want him, you have to go out of your way to get him.

I think the nine makes sense. Yeah, the compensation part of this is a little, is challenging because we just have a small sample. You know, Gruden got two first and a second in that Bucks Raiders trade per Medaverse, which is one is the forgotten one. Jets Chiefs, a fourth round pick. Mike Holmgren, got a second round pick. Seahawks, Packers.

Belichick, Arrian. Belichick was definitely a one. I want to say a one and more from the Jets. And then Ariens was like a swap of a six for a seven. Like they did nothing to maximize the leverage. Oh, I forgot about the Ariens. Oh, okay. It was so funny to me because they make that trade when Ariens is retired and

Lux want to hire him. And they're like, yeah, you know what? you're a nice guy, we'll let you go. And then when Brady this year, there was like rumors of a Brady trade when he was retired. Aaron, it's just like, there's no way we're letting Brady go for like more than 20 first round picks. And I'm like, wait, you, why is it okay for you and not for Tom Brady? Oh, my, good for him. He was like, I don't know what the Cardinals were doing. They should have exercised some more leverage there. So I like, I like that one. We need more coach traits. I mean, this was so fun doing this. I was just, and, you know, your point about the like salaries and stuff,

is a good one because like there's no salary cap on coaches you can pay them whatever you want you know there might be one team finding more value in a guy than another team there's all sorts of power struggles with every organization we absolutely need to see more coach trades i was even trying to think of uh like like can we get lamar to the panthers as well a little tag and trade type deal where it's lamar and harbaugh go to carolina and the panthers give up something wild to the ravens in return. I mean, how fun would that be? That would be amazing. Lamar with that defense and DJ Moore. And then I guess it doesn't put the Ravens in a great spot, but they could really ask for a lot and get a lot of draft capital if they felt good about something else. Sorry, none of that's

going to happen. Lamar and Harbaugh will be with the Ravens next year, but I like where our heads are at. That was going to be my question. What is the percentage chance that both John Harbaugh and Lamar Jackson are on the Ravens week one of 2023. I think it's high. I would say, I think it's like probably over 80%. But what do you think? You think lower or higher? I would go in like the 80% range, but there's still 20% of the time something really juicy

happens. Yeah, I know. That might even be low. Like it might be over 90, honestly. We will see. We will see. NFL Wildcard Weekend is here, and the easiest way to get into the playoffs is with Fandul, America's number one sportsbook.

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If they called you, Bill, who I had the first all pro team that I saw anywhere online, Bill gets ahead of all these things. You guys are all late to the party. If they called you before making their list public and said, hey, Bill, we're giving you the power to change one pick. We don't want this to be sort of a laughing stock. We don't want people to make fun of us. You have the gravitas.

You've thought about this. What would your one change be on the players? all pro team. And they only did a first team, right? There was no second team. No, there was a second team. Oh, there was. Oh, okay.

I missed that. Separate tweet. What a day I'm having for stuff. Sean Payton calls me and wants me to get him to a team and then I hang up and then the NFLPA calls and they're like, oh yeah, fix J.C. Treter is like, hey, Bill, fix this for us. Okay. I'm going to say something just on the side.

I don't think this counts. I don't know why they have a fullback and a third defensive tackle. Oh, my God. Seriously. Like, like, if you're going to be like, hey, listen, we no football guys. We're not going to screw things up. And then you have five defensive line. You're playing a 5-2-3 or 5-24 on defense. Like, come on. The NFL has played now with three-word receivers, three cornerbacks. That's what they should be. I feel like Kyle Eusecheck clearly lobbied

the NFL PA to have a fullback on this list. But abiding by the honor of this question, I'm going to leave Corderole Patterson out. I think that was my first instinct. I'm going to say Quinn and Williams for Aaron Donald. And I know. the NFLPA told players, hey, if a guy has played, I think it's 10 games by week. If he's missed five games by week 15, he's not eligible. So Donald did qualify, but Donald missed a ton of time this year. He missed almost, I think, six games. I missed six games, I believe. And so he played in 11. Yep. So as good as he is, and Donald was still incredible this year, it's tough for me to believe that you're in all pro player, that you're one of the two best players at your position when you are missing so much of

this season. So I'll go Quinn and Williams. Other guys qualify Dexter Lawrence, certainly an option as well. Jeffrey Simmons when he was healthy what was at that level. But I think Quinn and Williams has been such a force for the Jets. He's been finishing plays, which he hasn't always done in years past. And that defense got so much better as the year went

along and Soss Gardner was part of it. And I think Quinn and Williams was a big part of it as well. We're so boring. I didn't even have a backup for this one. Yeah, I had Quinn Williams in there for Aaron Donald. Aaron Donald played the 11 games. Now, I will make the case. I think you could also throw Jvon Hargrave in that mix when I was doing this exercise with Ben Solac.

I did have Quinn and Williams as a first teamer with Chris Jones. And I had Jvon Hargrave as a second team, All-Pro. But I think looking at that first team, I would definitely have Quinn and Williams in there instead of Aaron Donald. And then if you want to get sneaky, I think you did this with your All-Pro team. You sneak Michael Parsons maybe on there as an off-ball linebacker? What do you think? I think that's fair. I have another kind of sneaky one where it's not, like fans are going to be insulted at first

and then they're not going to be insulted. And you would know this very well because this is an Eagles related change here. Would you swap out Darius Slay for James Bradbury? Oh my gosh. Yeah. So like and I were just talking about that. I would give it very hard. I would think about it for a long time.

I think that, yeah, I mean, I think Bradbury, I just, Bradbury has been so consistent. Like he gave up one deep pass a couple of weeks ago and then it like made you think in your head like, wow, that hasn't happened the entire season. He had an interception against the Jaguars earlier in the season against Trevor Lawrence that's kind of underrated. It was a red zone interception that was just a fantastic play that kind of secured a win for them.

So I could easily be talked into that, yes. Okay. So I'll go, that was my backup one. I'm leaving Corderole Patterson aside because he's just like, I don't care about kick returners that much. What is your next question? My next question, number four, who is the player with the most at stake this weekend? We got six games, wildcard weekend.

Who is the player with the most at stake? What do you got? I actually want you to go first for this one because I feel like I'm just going to steal. I feel like I've been stealing too many of your answers. So please, go ahead. I've got Dak Prescott as my answer. We do not have the same one. Okay, we do not have the same one.

I actually thought this was a hard question, even though I'm the one who came up with it. It is. And he emailed it, but I was like, I don't know. Because, you know, some of these players, like a, you know, you could say like a Justin Herber, but does he really? I mean, he's so young. He's got plenty of time. And so I actually had it down to two.

I won't tell you my second one until I hear yours. But I thought DAC just, you know, the discourse around DAC is obviously usually is generally out of control. But this would be, I think he's a very good player. I think you think he's a very good player. But this would be seven Cs. without getting past the divisional round. This would be four straight years for the Cowboys without a playoff win. You think about how last season ended in the fashion that it ended with that play against

the 49ers, the QB draw, where then they can't get another snap off. You're favored in this game. I know it's on the road against the bucks, but you're favored in this game. The NFC is wide open. If he doesn't play well in this game, I think he would probably, you know, in the grand scheme of thing, like they're not going to like get rid of that. Prescott or anything, but just in terms of public perception and the conversation around Dak, I think there would be kind of a lot of attacks or criticism of Dak Prescott if he didn't

win this game. Spending too much time in his sleep number bed, I think is what we would hear on sports talk radio Tuesday morning. I, the only thing I would say about that is I think you are correct. The only thing I would say is that with these, it helps if you have someone who you can transfer the blame to. And I think if the Cowboys do lose a close game, the guy who's going to get blame more than DAC is Mike McCarthy. So that's the only thing I would say is that I think there's going to be a source to transfer some of the heat to. And that is the only thing that

might save DAC if they do lose this game. I thought about it from a different perspective. I was like, who has the most writing on this in terms of money, in terms of prestige, in terms of their legacy. I guess legacy is the DAC one for sure but like that's going to get paid either way. He's not going anywhere. The guy who I said is Daniel Jones, is Danny Dimes. That was my second pick. Yeah, I'm with you.

Gino was my second pick. Kind of the same vein. But for Danny Dimes, he's been playing great. I mean, over the last month of the year, I, this is another side. I had to triple check. Daniel Jones has the best QBR in the national football league over the final month of the season.

Now, he did miss a game. It's out Week 18. That includes scrambles, and he's been excellent scrambling, but I did not think of Daniel Jones as the best quarterback in football for any stretch of time. But the comparisons I've made this entire season for the Giants are between the 2022 Giants, and I believe it is the 2017 bills. This was the team that Show McDermott inherited from Rex Ryan, where they were kindery building. They traded the way Marcel Darius at the trade deadline. They brought in Nathan Peterman for a start. And then they still kind of made the playoffs somehow.

They backed into the postseason. I think they actually gave, I'm mistaken. I could be wrong, but they actually gave Tyrod Taylor in extension during that season. But it was one of those extensions that they could move on from. But either way, they make the playoffs. Tyrod Taylor has a good end to the season. They don't do well. They lose them the playoffs to the Jags, the offense struggles.

And the bills basically proceed with their rebuild. They draft Josh Allen next year. they move on from Tyrod Taylor. And even though Tyrod played well and led them to the postseason, it doesn't matter. And I think for Daniel Jones, that's on the table. If the Giants play a miserable game against the Vikings and lose, I think they go out this offseason and Joe Shane and Brian Daible get a new quarterback, whether they trade up for Bryce Young or do something else, I can't say.

But I think they go out and get a new quarterback to be their quarterback of the future. But if the offense plays great, maybe the Giants have to franchise. Daniel Jones. Maybe he gets 30 plus million dollars next year. Maybe he gets a new contract altogether. I know who was it. I think it was Lawrence Hines who was saying Daniel Jones should not accept anything below $40 million a year on a long-term deal, which I mean, hey, if you can get that, great. But it feels like there's a lot of different possibilities on the table for how Daniel Jones's off-season could go based on what happens in this Vikings game and any playoff games that might follow. Yeah, I think it's a great one. Like you said, I mean, whether it's with the Giants or with somebody

else, if he kind of goes to Minnesota, lights them up, they win a playoff game, and he plays really well, then it kind of even doesn't matter what happens in the divisional round. Like, I think he's got a lot riding on one game here where he can, you know, he's already changed the perception of him this year. But to go in, win that game and play really well would be huge for him. And yeah, like you said, same thing for Gino. You know, somebody who is also going to be a free agent. If they were somehow able to upset the Niners and he were to play really well against that defense, man, yeah, that would certainly change kind of his outlook in the future.

Yeah, quarterback contracts are so tricky. I mean, you have all these guys making over 40 million. You have Kurt Cousins is making 35 million, but there's not, you know, usually that middle tier. Like James Winston got 14 million a year last year from the Saints when they were projecting him as the starter. So usually you're kind of down under 10 million or you're up over, you know, 30 million. There's only literally like four or five guys in between those two.

And a lot of that depends on their rookie contracts or when they sign their deal. So I like the Daniel Jones one a lot. All right. Last question. Same question. But coach, which coach has the most at stake this weekend? And I'm wondering if you just kind of gave us a hint about who you're going to choose with your previous answer. I am going to take Mike McCarthy.

because I mean maybe it doesn't change things maybe it's just like oh that's just Mike McCarthy whatever but the fact the fact that Sean Payton is available the former Cowboys assistant the guy who the one who got away right for the Cowboys when they could have maybe kept him around and had him be the replacement for for Bill Parcells when they were both on the same staff, I have to think Jerry Jones is at least thinking about that possibility. And maybe he's not making the decisions on a day-to-day basis. Maybe he's not the guy who's grinding draft tape. Maybe he's not that person.

But I do think if he gets a twinkle in his eye and says, this is what I want to happen. The Cowboys are going to make it happen. So I think Mike McCarthy is not on the hot seat, but I think there is that possibility where if the Cowboys lose this game in a similar fashion to the one they lose last year, I think that possibility is out there. Yeah, I think that that's the obvious layup answer. No doubt about it. I mean, you know, they've won a lot of games in the past couple of years with Mike McCarthy,

but as you said, it's all about what are your other options and how do you lose, you know, losing on the road as favorites to this Bucks team. That would be hard to swallow. I go back and forth with Jerry Jones because, like, they held on to Jason Garrett for so long and kind of just gave him the benefit of the doubt. And I do feel like NFL owners, yes, they want a good coach. They also want someone who they can kind of, you know, go to lunch with or comfortable being around.

And like, they seem to like each other on a personal level joking around. But, you know, at some point, some of these owners, not to get like more bit about it, but, you know, they're getting older and they're probably like we are feeling some urgency where we would like to win a Super Bowl or compete for a Super Bowl right away rather than look, you know, five, ten years down the road. So, you know, a couple of the owners we mentioned certainly fall into that age range with Kraft and with Jerry Jones. So that's a good one. I'm going to go with Brandon Staley.

I looked, you know, and you mentioned him earlier, I hated how they handled that Week 18 game. I mean, I thought that was kind of egregious the way they're playing starters deep into that game, even though they have the five seed locked up. As we record this, Mike Williams did not practice Wednesday. They said earlier in the week that they expect him to play or that he's on kind of on track to play in this game, even though he suffered a back injury. We'll see. But man, if you have that week 18 performance

and then you follow it up with a loss to the Jaguar, specifically if Williams doesn't play and the offense struggles and it's obvious they really miss him. I don't know that anything's going to happen with Staley. Like you said, they still, you know, they got to the playoffs. They earned a wild card birth. But it's certainly going to raise, I think, a lot of fair, questions about the structure they have in place, whether they have the right structure in place

to maximize Justin Herbert's talent. So I think, I think one way or another, you know, Staley's got kind of a lot at stake in this game as well. Absolutely. All right. Let's take a quick pause. Those were the five questions. We'll take a quick break. And then we'll come back and finish the episode with a couple mailback questions. All right, we are back on the scramble. Shiel Capadia, joined by the great Bill Barnwell. Let's get to the mailbag. A reminder, you can email us at the Scramble Mailbag at gmail.mail. Or just tweet at me.

And we will get to your questions. Maxwell asks, what wildcard team do you think can make a run to the Super Bowl? Could it be my chargers with this new and improved defense? What do you think? Well, I really went with this one by going process of elimination. And so dolphins and ravens. I mean, you never want to say never. The NFL's a crazy place,

but it's Skyler Thompson and baby Anthony Brown at quarterback. I just, I have to assume they're not going to be advancing past the wild card round. I hate this matchup for the Seahawks against the 49ers. I just think the Niners excel at stuff. The Seahawks struggle to stop. I think the pass rush and a very aggressive secondary bat fit for Gino-Smith don't like their chances there. the Giants, I don't buy that they're a Super Bowl caliber team.

Admittedly, they may be better than the Vikings who, I don't know if you saw Jill. Did you see where the Vikings finished in DVOA? Was it 25th or something? Down there, right? I think it was 26. The teams who are worse, maybe 27, the teams who are worse than the Vikings this year by DVOA are four of the teams who fired their coach and the bears.

So that is, they are hosting a home playoff game. So I don't think either of those teams are going far. So that leaves you with the Cowboys and the Chargers. And I have to lean towards the Cowboys. Maybe not because I'm super optimistic about them, but I just think the NFC is a more wide open field than the AFC. I think the Eagles are banged up. Certainly Jailen Hertz is, you know, not 100%.

We don't know what he's going to be like for the divisional round. Same thing with Lane Johnson. And we know that their numbers drop off precipitously when Lane Johnson is not in the lineup. Hopefully he's going to be able to play, but might not be 100%. The Niners have Brock Purdy, a quarterback. You know, that could collapse at any time. Who knows? I think the Cowboys have the best shot.

I mean, even we talked about them, you know, playing the bucks and maybe losing and they are, but they're favored. And they're playing an eight and nine football team that. has needed fourth quarter magic to beat like some of the worst teams in football and get here in the first place. So, you know, if you get a runout where it's bucks and then Eagles with a compromised hurts and a limited offense and then you get the Niners with Purdy in the NFC championship game, like that's not that's not the hardest runout to get to the Super Bowl. So I just think it's tougher than the charges who will probably have to beat, I mean, what, the chiefs and then the bills or Bengals. in the AFC championship game. I think that's just a tougher path than the Cowboys would have.

Yeah, I'm with you. It's all about the path. I mean, I'm not in on this Chargers team. I'm not buying it. I think they beat three teams all season by more than six points. And those teams were quarterbacked by Nick Foles, Davis Mills, and Baker Mayfield. I mean, they've just been way, way too up and down. Like, I was out on the Chargers a month ago,

I'm not getting reeled in by them winning some games against terrible teams down the stretch. I just see too much inconsistency with that team. It just feels destined that, you know, I don't know if it's going to be this weekend or the next week that they're just going to lose. And the Lombardi, you know, Joe Lombardi complaints are going to come through. There's going to be some key fourth down decision. Like, it's not going to go well for the Chargers. So they still have blue chip players. They still have Justin Herbert.

So I don't want to go like all in on this stakes. I still love Herbert. And, you know, who knows if he catches fire for a month, then anything is possible. But like you said, to beat the Chiefs and then the Bengals or Bills, that would really surprise. me. So it's the Cowboys. I mean, I have the Cowboys as one of six teams that can win the Super Bowl. I have them as one of three teams in the NFC that can come out and make it to the Super Bowl. I think they obviously didn't have a great game in Week 18, but overall, I think they've been a very good team. I think they can do a lot of things offensively. They can rush the passer. They have those

injuries at cornerback. But you're talking about beating that Bucks team. And then like you said, you know, can they go on the road and beat the 49ers and Brock Purdy? and then kind of see what happens in the NFC championship game, whether it's the Eagles or somebody else. So I think the path is there for them. I think the talent is there for them. If I had to pick one team, one wildcard team to make the Super Bowl, I would go with Dallas.

I agree with you there. This was a great question. We'll finish it off from Ben. Who is your prediction for this postseason's Gabe Davis? Basically, the guy everyone kind of knows who explodes unexpectedly. If we have the same answer on this one, Bill, I don't know. There's a wide range of players to choose from. Let's see how aligned we actually are.

Who do you have for this one? Here's what I want to do. I'm going to count one, two, three, and then we should both say the name at the same time because I feel like we have the same person. Okay, ready? I like it. Okay. One, two, three, Cadarius Tony.

Darius Slayton. Ah! We got some Zoom, we got some Zoom. some Zoom timing. But yeah, I mean, I think Sladen is totally plausible. I think he's been a good receiver his entire career. I couldn't really understand why he was like sixth on the depth chart in training camp this year. But by injuries, by trades, by disgust with Kenny Galladay, he's gotten an opportunity and he's run with it.

And I think he's a legit, you know, maybe not a number one receiver, but I think he's a legit downfield threat, a guy who can have that kind of three to four you know, maybe not three to four touchdown, but at least like a hundred, 150 yard game. So I think that's a really good pick. Yeah, this is a pro Darius Slate podcast, Danny Kelly and I did like a trade episode in the middle of the season. And we're both like, we like Darius Slate. And why does nobody else like Darius Slate? Like he can make plays downfield. He's had over 700 yards in like a few of his NFL seasons. He's 26 years old. We were wondering, we were trying to trade him to the chargers in the middle of the season.

But I guess nobody, yeah, no one was interested. in trading for him. So yeah, I'm with you. I just like the matchups. You know, I don't like that Vikings defense at all. I think there's going to be a chance for someone to pile up some receiving yards in that game. And then who knows, uh, the following week against the Eagles, whether he could do the same thing. So he's kind of got a lot. I think he's a free agent, uh, after this season. So he, you know, could maybe make himself some money with a, uh, with a good stretch here. Yours is excellent too. Kedar, oh, I could absolutely see that, uh, Kedareas Tony just absolutely going off in these playoffs, assuming he,

you stay healthy. Yeah, that's the thing. It's like there's probably an equal chance of him having a four touchdown game, staying healthy, and injuring both his hamstrings on the same play. Like, we don't know. Like, I think he's a work in progress. Obviously, has not had a big role. Did have 71 yards on four catches in the Broncos game.

Did lose a fumble, which is not going to help his chances of getting meaningful time. It's not played more than 44% of the snaps in a single game. So obviously has not been a full-time player, but maybe one of those guys where he has a really nice divisional round game. And so he has a bigger role in the lineup. Certainly, you know, plenty of targets to go around in this offense. I mean, like, it feels weird that every week we're like, oh, who's going to catch passes for the chiefs? And then it's like Jared McKinnon has two touchdowns in the red zone every single week somehow. Like that has to stop working at some point.

They have to have another receiver besides Kelsey and McKinnon. and maybe it's Tony. Yeah, the chiefs are a great option for this question. I was even like, ooh, should I just go wild and pick like a Justin Watson or something? I mean, they're going to play games. They're going to put up yards

and somebody's going to emerge, whether it's McKinnon or Tony or whoever else, we shall see. All right, that will wrap up this edition. Thank you to Bill Barnwell. Always love having him on and podcasting with Bill. Bill, you've got your all, I mean, you're still churning out content.

Like, I get older and I slow down a little bit. I mean, you got all pro teams. You got postseason awards. Today, yeah, you predicted every single playoff game out there. You've got the Bill Barnwell show. What else do you have to plug here? Absolutely nothing else. I think I did TV earlier this week.

It's already done so you can't watch it anymore. I don't think I have anything else going on. The reality is, you have kids. I don't have kids. I have no life. So might as well turn out the content as opposed to, just sitting and watching stuff on YouTube, which is what I would do if I was not writing all the time. I love it. And we know Bill will be out ahead of the offseason stuff, as he always is looking

at teams who didn't make it and what their plan should be in the off season. Those are always fun columns as well. So thank you to Bill. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for Pinch Producing. Appreciate him. As always, additional production supervision by Connor Nevins and Arjuna. Ram Gopal, stay tuned tomorrow for the Ringer NFL preview show on this feature. I will be back on Monday night with Benjamin Solek and Christopher Sutton as we talk about the Bucks Cowboys game, other thoughts from Wild Card Weekend and other thoughts around the NFL on Extra Point Taken. So be sure to stay tuned for that. Thanks to everyone for listening.

Have fun this weekend watching the Wild Card Games.