The Ringer NFL Show - The Confusing Brian Burns Trade, Kirk Cousins's Fit With the Falcons, and Much More! | Extra Point Taken

Episode Date: March 12, 2024

The NFL free agency legal tampering period officially got underway Monday, and a few big names found new homes. What exactly did the Panthers gain by trading Brian Burns to the New York Giants? Speaking of the Giants, their former running back is now headed to the division rival Philadelphia Eagles. Plus, will Kirk Cousins lead the Falcons to an NFC South title with his new, massive deal? The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more, or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Ben Solak and Sheil Kapadia Producer: Cliff Augustin Additional Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopal and Conor Nevins Social: Eduardo Ocampo and Kiera Givens Musical Elements: Devon Renaldo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There are a lot of quarterbacks in the NFL draft this year. My name is Ben Solac and I host the Ringer NFL Draft Show with Danny Kelly, Danny Hypatts, and Craig Horleck. We cover trades, free agency, and the draft, which is, yeah, obviously. We'll tell you about everything, which includes which quarterbacks are good, which quarterbacks are bad, and which quarterbacks are just Kirk Cousins. That is the Ringer NFL Draft Show. Search the Ringar NFL Draft Show on Spotify. Welcome to Extra Point Take and Shield Kapati here, joined by Ben Solac, the legal negotiating period. It opened up today. We had trades. We had signings. We had rumors. We had two former giants running backs feuding on Twitter, which is a big topic of my chat threads in my world. A lot going on. Benny Solz.

I'm great, man. Cion Taki Taki. 10 million. Well, Jeff Akuto, 4.5. Big news today. See that Sean Murphy Bunting deal? Crazy. All right. We may not get to every deal, but here's what we're going to do. We're doing a little change up to how we normally do the show because we wanted to be able to get to a lot. If we each just did our three takes and then an extra point taken, there would have been too much we missed. And we're not, listen, this is my Super Bowl. Longtime listeners, no, I'm more excited about this than I literally was in the, you know, the Super Bowl postgame stuff. So walk us through your day, right? Tell, no, no, no, we don't have time for that. We'll have a Friday show. Give me 30 seconds of color. She'll be a journalist. Let's go. What do you mean? Go check the ringer.com free agency tracker. That's my day. That's what I

I shaved at some point. Rocky music in the morning. Get yourself a special breakfast, getting the right headspace. Did not do that. Got myself a coffee, got some exercise in the morning, still getting a little neck pain because that's what happens when you're an old man and you stare at your computer all day. But we don't have time for that. Okay. I normally like the nonsense. We don't have time for that today. We have too much to get to. So I'm starting with the storyline. We're going to talk about it. You're starting with the move. We're going to tie. And then we're just going back and forth, hit all the big stuff. and then in the extra point taken segment, we're going real rapid fire

to get to the stuff we missed. All right. One of the biggest moves of the day. Giants trade a 2024 second round pick, 39 overall, and a 2025-fifth to the Panthers for edge rusher Brian Burns. The Giants then sign Brian Burns to a five-year, $150 million deal

with 87.7 million guaranteed. Listeners to the show, know that I felt strongly that Brian Burns was going to get traded. I got the team wrong. Where were you at, 49ers? Come on. I knew they were going to keep Brian Burns. All right, so here's my take on this, So lack.

I can't believe how badly the Panthers screwed this up. I mean, this is embarrassing. Okay, remember, 2022 season, 400 reports out there. The Los Angeles Rams offered the Carolina Panthers a deal for Brian Burns. That included two first round picks. They turned that down. Okay, fine. Last season, they had a chance to trade him before the season.

They had a chance to trade him during the season. They did not do that. This is a 26-year-old pass rusher who is 12th in the NFL in Saxon quarterback hits over the last five seasons. And you get a second and a fifth for Brian Burns? I mean, when we did the hypothetical trades, I was saying a first and then like a third that turns into a second. I didn't think you'd have to settle for a second and a fifth. And so this is bad to me on so many levels. Number one, why are you not just paying Brian Burns this money?

Is it a rich deal? Yes. Is it out of this world blew up the market more than Nick Bosa deal? No, it's not. It's under that. I don't think it's an unreasonable contract for Brian Burns if you think he's going to be one of the best pass rushers in the NFL over the next several years. So the players on your team mostly stink, Carolina.

This is a 26-year-old at a premium position. Why don't you just pay the man? They didn't pay the man. So you didn't do that. But then you decide to trade him. When did you decide to trade him? And how is this all you got? Listen, if you're listening to this thing,

Sheal, they had a GM change. You know who you can't? You know who was there the whole time? The man David Tepper, the owner, who is not really the most hands-off owner. We know this. The man has been there the whole time. And he has been overseeing this entire operation. And this is what you get back for him.

Let me remind you why I'm so upset about this. The Bears got a second round pick for Montez Sweat, and they really only had a commitment of like eight games for Montes Sweat. This was in the middle of the last season of his contract. The Rams Solac traded a second and a third for nine games of Von Miller when he was like 32 years old a few years ago. The Dolphins traded a first round pick for Bradley Chubb, yet this is all you could get for Brian Burns. And here's the last thing I'll say about it, and then I want to get your take. like even if you didn't want Brian Burns long term, why not sign him to the deal? Because guess what? You are selling low. He had a down year last year. If he has a good year,

you're probably going to be able to get at least a first round pick, maybe multiple first round picks. Like this is probably the lowest his value is going to be. Why are you trading him now under these circumstances? So to me, this is mostly a disaster for the Carolina Panthers. I like it for the New York Giants. I think that's a fine price to pay for a guy premium position, 26 years old. These guys are not easy to get on the open market and you pay him what he's worth there. So I like it for the Giants, disaster for the Panthers. Where are you on this whole thing? Yeah.

So it's important to acknowledge that some cost is a fallacy. Just because you had a better trade offer for him in the past, doesn't mean that now when the trade offers are worse, you shouldn't take them because the previous one was better. He had it down here. You're in a worse leveraging position. Like, you know, we live in a different world and we lived in yesterday, as the movie draft day told us like 19,000 times. So, like, with that acknowledged, this is awful.

This is terribly done. Like, pole to pole, this is bad. This is a bad deal in a vacuum. They should be able to get more than a second and a fifth for Brian Burns in this context, with the context of the previous offers, at which point the Panthers should have known, like, hey, even if Bryce Young hits, we are still not going to be in a position where,

like, you know, extending Brian Burns is, like, we're ready to compete right now. They still have multiple pieces missing. They still had offensive line questions. They still had offensive line questions. They still had cornerback questions. It wasn't like, oh, Brian Burns, we draft Bryce Young and we move, which you can point to the Texans and say, oh, but the Texans took CJ Strata at two and they took Wallyndersh at three and then they went to the divisional round, yada, yada, whatever.

Sure. I'd tell you right now, Nick Casera is a pretty good GM. If he had Brian Burns burning a hole in his pocket before the 2023 draft and he had two first and a second on the table, he would have made the trade. I always forget about the second. I forgot about the second until I think Jonathan Jones as CBS Sports tweeted out. Right.

And I go, oh, my, it wasn't just two first. There was also a second in there. I mean, that's crazy. No one of the biggest trades in NFL history. Certainly one of the biggest non-quarterback trades in NFL history. And instead it's the second and a fifth. It's the Calil Mcdeal. It's the Bears to Chargers, Kalil Mac deal.

Not even the first Kalil-McDiel. It's the second one when he was older and not as good. And oh, like it's pick 39 overall, buddy. The Panthers had the first pick in the second round last year after Jonathan Mingo. Right? You can make yourself feel better, call it top 40 pick all you want. This is not a good selection. Not good enough for Brian Burns.

It simply isn't. You want to play my favorite game, which is name the good players? That's probably my second favorite game. I pick him the wins the most. Name the good players. What does that? I'm not familiar with this game. Name the good players on the Panthers roster right now.

It's on your head. Taylor Moton is still kicking around right at right tackle. Okay. Yeah. Left tackle, no. It's not good. Wide receivers. No, not good.

Tight ends, not good. Quarterback, I was a fan of, but he's not good. J.C. Horn when he plays. Can I count Jason Horn when he plays? Okay. It's close. Maybe not.

Probably not. Leuvoo is no longer there. Cannot. Derek Brown. I should have let it. Yeah, there you go. There's a one more you're missing. Listen, if you're a team,

need a defensive tackle, go call about Derek Brown. I mean, you might have them for a fourth and a back peanut. Yeah, six round and they'll throw Derek Brown in like a seventh back your way or something. All right. So those are the ones that and Shaq Thompson. So Shaq Thompson was the one you missed. Right now there are four good players on the Carolina Panthers and not a single one of them is arguably elite. And I would argue not a single one of them is great. They have their four best players are all like tier three guys at their respective positions, like above average starters, good starters. With Brian Burns gone, there is not an impact player on this roster, besides maybe Derek Brown for like four games of the season.

Maybe, and that's me being charitable. There is not a single, this is crazy to say out loud, there is not a single player on the Panthers that you have to game plan for right now. You just show up and run your stuff. There isn't a single player who has any gravity at all. A horrendously mismanaged team that should have seen the end of the Cam Newton era forced them into a clear, concise, and effective rebuild and instead decided to try to scramble

for pies in the sky for a one-year recovery and flubbed abysmalty time and time and time again. And you know how I know that too? Because Baker went to the Bucks and got good. Baker went to the Panthers and was terrible. Baker went to the Bucson and was fine. Healthy organizations can pull that off. You can't because you're on.

healthy. It's very pathetic. It's, uh, it's very pathetic. I don't know what they were doing. You like it from the Giants, uh, Giants end or no? Absolutely. The thing that's tricky about the Giants is that, like, directionally, they're just hard to understand. What, what are, are you contending right now? Trade for Brian Burns, given the second biggest or the third biggest defense of player deal ever. Uh, great. Are you not contending right now? Because Seekwon left and you signed Devin Singletary. Like what, you know, what are we trying to achieve here? That's my question. But overall, it's good business. In a vacuum, they got an elite pass rusher not spending a first round pick, right?

Like, they basically spent a second round pick to get Burns to free agency and then to sign him the deal that he would have demanded him free agency. That's good business any day of the week. I just kind of don't get what the Giants are going to achieve. Yeah, that's a bigger conversation right now. I'm with you there. I mean, the thing I like about Burns is like there's no timeline that Burns doesn't fit. You want to win now? Okay, he's very good now.

You want to win three years from now? Okay. He'll be 28, 29 years old. and he'll still be really good then, and you'll still have him under contract. So, oh, my God, Panthers. I don't know what the Panthers are doing. Giants, nice job by them.

Brian Burns, Dexter Lawrence, Cave on Tibado. You got some pieces at least up front with this move. All right, next big move, Solac. You lead us off. What do you got? Yeah, this is Kirk Cousins going to the Atlanta Falcons. I wrote coming off of the Combine a couple weeks ago that I don't think, I didn't really think anybody was positive

what was going to happen with Kirk. I think that the Vikings were like going to try the best to keep him from free agents. he was going to go to free agency. There were multiple landing spots. You and I talked about different teams that would make sense for them, a different spot that would make sense for them. Things became clear over the last like 48, 72 hours.

Kirk made it to free agency, met with exactly one team. That team is the Atlanta Falcons, and he signed with them pretty much a couple hours after free agency was done. The final deal, it's a four-year, $180 million deal. Healthy. 45 per. I can't remember what you had him out. I had him around this number.

I felt pretty good about my prognosticating. I thought around 40. I thought he would beat the Derek Carlin. number, but no, I did not go as high as 45. So he is now tied for the seventh highest paid quarterback in the league by average annual value. Tied with whom? Do you know who else make it 45 exactly? Daniel Jones is under that, right? Daniel Jones was 40. Who's making 40? Russell Wilson? No, not Russ. He's a little bit of a, he's a little bit of an esoterra quarterback. He's Patrick Holmes. I don't know. He makes 45 per year. Yeah, yeah. So Tim and Kirk, just,

you know, the two of the same quarterbacks, two of the same realities. But this is the cost of doing business, right? it's important to understand about quarterback, because people are upset about how big the Kirk deal is. A good quarterback is never available in free agency. Like, it's such a rare thing to happen. And Kirk, to me, is like a top 16,

but not a top 10 quarterback. Kirk's still a good quarterback. Like, he's good, he's 35 years old. He's coming off the Achilles, but he's a good quarterback. So when a good quarterback makes free agency, man, the price is the price, right? And Diana Racina was seen of the athletic,

who did a lot of the reporting about Kirk being Atlanta's big choice and Atlanta being Kirk's big choice. I thought had an interesting line today when the deal became official. she said Atlanta was going to do whatever it took to get Kirk in the building. And so 45 million per year. Now structure-wise, guarantees-wise, I like the way the Falcons built this deal. I like the way the Kirk's team built this deal. It's 45 million guaranteed this year. 45 million guaranteed next year, right? He is for sure there for two years 90 million.

After that, most of it's non-guaranteed money. So basically this is a two-year $90 million rent. You're going to get Kirkman. He's 36-37. You're going to know how good he is coming off with the Achilles. You're going to be able to evaluate Drake London, who's got two years left on his deal before the fifth year option. Kyle Pitts has two years left on his deal. Right tackle Caleb McGarry is two years left on his deal. Left tackle Jake Matthews, three-year deal, but you can get out of it after two years. Terry Fonson, this is the offense that he built. He extended these guys. He drafted these guys. This is the bedrock he built. They now inserted a solid quarterback into it,

and you're going to be able to find out in the next two years. Is Kirk 100% back? Is he healthy? And if he is, did we build enough of an offensive nucleus here to actually contend with this group? And then after 2025, you want to get out of the Kirk deal you can. You want to move on from London and Pitts. You can move on from McGarry. Or if you're like, hey, like Kirk's still cooking. He's 37. We got a couple more years.

You can try to extend things out a little bit further. And so I think the deal structure makes sense for Atlanta. I think the price tag is what it is. And I think this was the best landing spot for Kirk. I think you could argue the Vikings have a better offensive nucleus. Right. He's been with Kevin O'Connell before. But that's a much harder division to win than the NFC South,

where I think the Falcons, the right now minus 110 on Fandville Sportsbook, they're a clear favorite to win that division. So it's a much harder. division to win. And then the other spots, Pittsburgh, Denver, the Raiders, like, those are hard divisions to win. That's, that's tough business, right? That's tough sledding. Atlanta, you walk into a situation where a lot of the offensive bedrock is primed for you. This defense probably overachieved a little bit last year, but it still has some good pieces. This team's ready to go. They've kind of rub the quarterback carousel a couple of years. They've had cheap quarterbacks that's allowed them

to invest in other positions, but now they should need a guy and catapulted. So I think it's a good landing spot for Kirk. I think it's the right fit for Atlanta, who they don't want to mess around of the rookie quarterback. They want to get good now. And it's an understandable price tag, given the fact that it's a solid quarterback on free agency. So it's a solid B, B, plus all the way around for me on Kirk Cousins to the Falcons. Here's what this felt like to me. This felt like ownership basically being like, you know what we did the last two years where I had to sit here and watch Desmond Ritter and Marcus Mariotta and Taylor Heineckee after we drafted all these guys in the top 10 and after we

paid these offensive linemen big money. I'm not doing that anymore. So if any of you want to keep your jobs, you better find a way to get me someone who when I sit down on a Sunday in the fall, I feel like this guy's not going to screw the game up for me. And there's not many options, like you said, to actually do that. So that makes sense to me that they were in that boat of we're going to do basically whatever it takes.

We're going to trump any offer to grab Kirk Cousins here. So I'm fine with it. You know, you laid it out well. Like they have good pieces on offense. They have young, talented pieces at the skill position spots, and then they have a solid offensive line. They have a offensive coordinator and Zach Robinson, who should know how to help.

Kurt Cousins came from Los Angeles. I will say this. Like, he's 36 years old. He's coming off an Achilles injury. He's joining a new team. And even in Minnesota, where it felt like, all right, this is, you know, like, okay, they had some pretty good, like, they had a top 10 passing offense in terms of DVOA.

once in five full seasons with him in Minnesota. I almost feel like the Netflix show, and then the absence of Kurt Cousins in the second half of last year has sort of inflated what we think of Kirk Cousins. Like I feel like a year ago before the Netflix show, there were a lot more jokes, and it was like, all right, you know, you're going to finish probably with eight or nine wins, and he's okay, but he's not going to be a difference maker.

He's not going to come through. And now that's totally changed. So I think he's fine. I think he's good. I think he's the best of all their options. at the same time, like you said, you know, you find out if you're a contender. Like, I have a hard time coming up with a scenario where they're actual contenders. Like, what does that look like?

You would almost have to kind of like luck into it. I have one of those weird seasons where everyone's healthy and you're getting turnover. Now, they could do that because they aren't a bad division. So maybe you stack up wins against the division. I still think the ceiling's pretty limited, but that's okay. They're going to be a competitive team. The ceiling with a quarterback like Kirk, so Kirk defines the floor, right? He raises the standard for your team period.

The ceiling, when you have a quarterback like Kirk, is defined by the ancillary pieces. It's okay, we think Drake London's a wide receiver won, but he's never had a thousand-yard season. Just how good is this guy, right? Zach Robinson, who's the new play caller there, has been with the Rams last four years. Under Sean McVeigh, who was Kirk Cullen's initial head coach,

got offensive coaching job after Kevin O'Connell left because Kevin O'Connell was Kirk's coached with the Rams. Like, Robinson's going to run the system that works for Kirk, but just how good of a play caller is he? How good is he like in the moment calling the plays on third down, getting to the right looks. Kirk describes the floor. When you have a system quarterback,

when you have a cube, you can win with, like not an elite player, Mahomes, Allen, but a win-with guy, he tells you your floor, okay, you will be functional. You will get to 10 wins.

You will win the division. Your ceiling now belongs to the other dudes. And that's why, like, Drake London is a big deal. Zach Robinson is a big deal. We have to, like, be honest about the state of the NFC. The NFC division around this past year

was Brock Bertie versus Dak Prescott and Jared Gough versus Baker Mayfield. Yeah, good point. You can push in this conference. Because all the elite guys are in the AFC, you can push in this conference with a win-with guy, with a not top 10 but top 16 guy. The other pieces have to be really strong. And that's why, like, this is enormous news for Drake London and Kyle Pitts and Bijan Robinson. This is enormous for Zach Robinson, Jake Matthews, Caleb McGarry.

If those guys are what they've been paid to be or drafted to be your builds to be, then Atlanta really can, I think, right, make a run, get a little bit lucky with injury, lucky with turnovers, defense takes a step forward. And you have a Lions' NFC championship game run, right? you have a Jared golf sort of a run. But that's the world you live in when you're signing quarterbacks in free agency, right? Yeah, Kirk's top 10 paid quarterback. All the other guys like Burrow and Allen and Mahomes and Lamar, guys who are the quarterback of contending teams, then guys like Deshaun and Herber and Kyler Murray who are expected to be contending teams.

And then Kirk's just there. Hey, Kirk Cousins. It's a little bit of a, he sets a high bar with his contract figure. You have to be honest about who's really going to be the engine behind that. bar if you get there. If you're a Falcons fan, it's a win. I mean, you've been, you've been victim to some just horrible football, horrible endings the past two years.

And now at least it's going to look competent here. You brought up the quarterback carousel. There are only four teams in the league who have not been to the playoffs in the last four seasons since 2020. And the Falcons are one of them. It is the Jets. Really, only four teams. That's interesting.

So the Jets, 13 year drought. The Broncos, eight year drought. The Panthers, who we just call it like the most embarrassing team in the world, six-year drought. And then the Falcons, six-year drought. Last time in the playoffs was 2017. Everybody else, the commanders, Colts, bears, saints, pages. Those were all in the playoffs three years ago. So Atlanta, it's been, it's a huge win for the fan base because this is a return to competency that we haven't seen since like Kyle Shanahan left.

He's a hero. If they get to the divisional round, Falcons fans are going to be having a good time down there, being like, all right, we enjoy this. If they beat the Saints twice. Just beat the Saints twice in the regular season. The vibes are not going to be as bad as what they've been with the Saints, if nothing else, with Elena. All right, next one here. I'm up. The Green Bay Packers, you know, you forgot to mention Jordan Love there, I think.

Did you forget him when you were going through all those quarterbacks? I did not mention Jordan Love, that's correct. How dare you? How dare you? My boy. All right, so Packers signed safety Xavier McKinney to a four-year 68 million-old. Oh, yeah, wait. No, I said Dak was in the division run.

He wasn't. It was Jordan Love. Oh, my gosh. I got that wrong. That's on me. That's all me. The team of Shield P.T. Maybe not the team of EPT anymore.

All right. Xavier McKinney, fourth among safety, $17 million per year. And then this might have been like the weirdest thing of the day. Like I did not see this coming from a mile away. The Green Bay Packers signed running back Josh Jacobs to a four-year $48 million deal. Okay. Then they release Aaron Jones, who Brian Gooda-Cuntz just two weeks ago said, absolutely. Aaron Jones is coming back as a member of the Green Bay Packers. So it is a little bit

of a confusing situation. I was just reading the athletic Matt Schneidman and Diana Rossini reporting that the Packers asked Aaron Jones to take a 50% pay cut per their reporting. He was like, I don't want to do that. They couldn't come to terms. And I think as a Friday, they were basically like, all right, well, this is over. And so then obviously the Packers turned their attention to to Josh Jacobs to fill that running back spot. So I'm looking at it overall. The McKinney deal is aggressive, but guess what? I'm okay with it.

Listeners to this show from last week, no, he was one of my guys in free agency. He's 25 years old. I feel like he has big time upside. He can cover tight ends. He can play the deep middle of the field. He has range. He gets his hand on the football quite a bit.

He's a playmaker. And so it's an area of need. It's a young player. And I think, you know, again, he has upside to be a lot better than even what he's shown so far. I'm fine with paying Xavier McKinney, even if on paper, $17 million per year. I think I had him at around $14 million per year. Whatever.

It's fine. I don't have a big issue with it. The running back thing, I'm on the fence on it. I'm curious to hear what you think, because I know you love Josh Jacobs. Here's my concern. $12 million per year. Now, it's really only a one-year commitment to Josh Jacobs, so they can get out of this after a season, so I like that part of it.

But Jacobs has had 663 touches over the last two seasons. That's third in the NFL. He missed four games last year. So if you're telling me, hey, we're moving on from Aaron Jones because he's entering his age 30 season and he's had some injury issues. I don't know. Like Jacobs is younger, yes, but I don't know that you're necessarily solving those issues with Josh Jacobs. So I'm excited to watch Jacobs in this offense. I think he could be really good.

I think they'll know how to use him. And I think if he's healthy, he'll be good. I'm just not sure I would have turned around from Aaron Jones. and then paid that money to Josh Jacobs. What do you think about what the Packers did today? Yeah, right now, if I joined the Green Bay Packers, I'd be the sixth oldest player on the roster. Well, you are getting up there.

An unbelievably young team that is in Green Bay. They had like the youngest offense in the league last year, and then today was just get rid of Bach, get rid of Aaron Jones. Everybody's over 27, get them out. They released Pock Diari too, yeah. I forgot to mention that. We're getting younger.

We're going even younger here. Uh, the, uh, the Aaron Jones Josh Jacobs thing. I don't like I, it's not that the transactions were bad. Like overall cap wise, it come, it doesn't come out totally neutral, but like, it wasn't a huge, uh, transition for them to go from the Jones deal to the, the Josh Jacobs deal. And again, like, talking about the Kirk deal, kind of the real structure of it. The Josh Jacobs deal, all the guarantees are in year one, right? This is essentially a one year prove it. And if he comes and he's like, not healthy and he can't handle the volume and he falls off a cliff, then get it. out of the deal permission right away.

So like, it's not that any of the transaction part of it was bad. It's just like, why do this? Like, does this help anyone? And like, yeah, when Aaron Jones was healthy last year, it was very, I mean, he was playing awesome. Aaron Jones, the last five games of the season, both regular and post season,

Aaron Jones had over 100 yards in each game. It's, it, this is the very rare player ends the season extremely strong and team endeavors to move on from them. Right? Like, it wasn't even like, sell high, get someone to come trade for him. They just straight moved on from them. And so I feel like there's got to be more there than we know in terms of like Jones has been

banged up. Maybe they feel like he's got like a knee thing or an ankle thing that's like never going to go away, you know, an unbelievably high estimation of Josh Jacobs. Like I thought I was big on Josh Jacobs. Maybe it's something like that. And so it's weird because like money wise, I end up kind of neutral on the exchange. talent-wise, I end up kind of neutral in the exchange. Like, I think that Aaron Jones is probably the better player,

but also given like expected depreciation and the age thing. And like Josh Jacobs, I think is a really good player. Like, I'm pretty neutral on that too. And so they just kind of shuffled a deck for me on this. It's hard to give it a grade. I'm very beige on it. Moving on from Bakhtiari, I think was appropriate. You haven't been able to trust him at all.

Moving on from Darnel Savage, getting Xavier McKinney, huge upgrade. They very clearly believe in continuing. continue to believe in their ability to draft and develop, right? They're moving on from Devonra Campbell as well, right? They have Isaiah McDowphe behind him. They have Quay Walker behind him. Like, this is how Green Bay does business.

And it's tough to argue with it. Like, their offensive nucleus is amazing and they're all 26 and younger. But it does leave to some like head scratching moments like the Aaron Jones, Josh Jacobs moment today. Especially since he Jones very well liked as a teammate has been there for a while. I'm with you. I think you articulated it well. I was struggling to find the exact motivation to make a move like this.

Like you could have kept Aaron Jones. you draft a running back or whatever, like you're going to be okay there. But like you said, maybe they just love Josh Jacobs. That's something we'll keep an eye on if they explain that move going forward. All right. Let's take a break. We'll come back. We've got to talk some Eagles.

We've got to talk some Raiders. We've got to talk some Vikings. We got other stuff to get to right after this. All right. We are back on extra point taking. So lack. You're up. What do you got?

Yeah. Always a fun day for the Philadelphia Eagles. My birds. Go birds. Free agency, trades are available, phones are ringing, Howie season, as per usual. Two big deals for the Eagles. We have Sequin and Barclay, the running back from the Giants,

leaving intra-divisional free agent movement. He joins the Eagles on a three-year, $37.75 million contract. It's a 12.5 per year. 26 million fully guaranteed at signing. Incentives can bring it up to $47 million. This is a nice, healthy running-back deal. You talked about the Brian Byrd's tag and trade prediction.

I thought that the running back market was going to have a nice balance back here. To be clear, I did not predict 8.5 million per year to Dandre Swift, 8 million per year to Tony Pollard. I didn't even have that much diplomatship, okay? This all with Derek Henry unsigned through day one of legal tampering. But here's the take on Barclay. You asked me on our late February episode if I saw any back getting into the 12 million plus family. And I said, I can see Jacobs doing it. I don't see Barclay doing it.

We have both Barclay and Jacobs in that deal in terms of APY and certainly expected cash flow through the first couple of years. The Eagles signed Sequin Barclay, which I don't like, I think people want this to be a Howie Roseman, knows something about the running back market that other people don't and, you know, dramatic change of like how the Eagles approach the position and how the position is approached by the smart GMs. I think it's just Howie saying a top five pick, elite athlete at the position, and I can get him in a huge cap balloon year, while the running back market is probably at the lowest it's going to be in a while. Like, let's just buy low and see if we hit high, right? Like if Berkeley, when Berkeley is healthy, this is a high impact player.

And how he's like, yeah, I'll throw $12 million of that any day of the week and twice on Sundays. I think this is more of a like caps coming up. I've got room. And this might be a special player. This might be a Christian McCaffrey's sort of impact to our team thing more than it is like, hey, like the getting's real good on running backs now. Like, you know, they actually matter now. Like, I don't think it's that big of a trend setting thing.

The other interesting move for the Eagles, was the signing of Bryce Huff, who was a designated pass rusher for the Jets. We talked about him in our free agency preview shield, again at the end of February. It's a potential like, okay, he's in free agency. Beware, that's what we said. His numbers are great.

Highly effective pass rusher, elite numbers, pressure numbers, but he also has never played more than 50% of the snaps in the season for the Jets because he's been a guy who comes onto the field on third and long as a designated pass rusher. The Eagles signed him for three years, $51 million, which is starter money. There's no two ways around it. Now, the Eagles rotate their defensive ends enough

that if they were to keep Josh Sweat and Hassan Reddick and rotate Huffin as the third guy as the pass rush guy, he could hit that value for them, but we know they want to move off of Hassan Redick. We know they want to move off of Josh Sweat. And we also know that their problems with the defensive ends last year were run defending problems. Bryce Hoff ain't defending the run, brother.

That ain't Bryce Hoff's game. Not that we've seen. He's becoming on the field and pass downs. And so it increasingly feels like the Eagles will move on from one of Josh or Husson Reddick. I think Reddick is more likely, given Huff's role, given the position that he's going to play. I think that makes the most sense.

And you'll see a starting duo of Josh Sweat and Bryce Huff with first round pick Nolan Smith filling in the back there. But kind of a classic Eagles day for Harry Roseman. He tries to invest in the pass rush like crazy, putting a huge deal on a guy who hasn't played that many snaps, going after a pass rusher with run defense problems, which is apparently the headache he has right now with the starters. I don't care. I'm just going to getting another one of those guys.

We'll figure it out. And then buying low on a player like Sequin Barkley, potential elite elite talent, feeling like maybe I can do the AJ Brown thing and people don't realize how good he is and he's going to explode here in a better offensive system. Eagles added a talent today and they added it in the smart way and then the plus expected value, you know, a good value-based additions way. I have my suspicions, however, about both transactions. Yeah, we're going to talk more about this at length on the ringers-filly special.

So if you want a little deeper dive on the Eagles moves, be sure to check that. out. I'm a little skeptical of both these moves. I hate to write on your parade, Eagles fans. If you're listening, I mean, the Seekwon-Barkley thing, like, this is the type of signing that if a rival or something makes this move, you know, you're laughing at them saying, our team, our GM, our analytically inclined organization would never make a move like this where you're paying a guy in Seekwon Berkeley. You know, you say, like, I don't think by low is a fair way to term. I mean, determined. I mean, 12.6, million dollars with 26 million fully guaranteed. Like when we were kicking this around about what

would it take for the Eagles to get in on this? I think I said something like, well, whatever it was like eight or nine with some incentives that could get him to 10. And you're like, oh, yeah, you know, I do, I do that. I didn't think 12, you know, $12.6 million per year here. And I just look at it from an Eagles perspective and like what they did with DeAndre Swift last year, what they did with Miles Sanders the year before. It seemed pretty clear to me like what was driving them was the blocking the scheme, Jalen Hertz, as a threat. And so Barclay has 640 touches the past two seasons. That ranks fourth in the NFL.

Like, you know, it just, we have a history here. Paying running backs on second contracts, over $10 million. More often than not, the team is disappointed with that move. So I think the Eagles got more fun. I think the offense is going to be more fun, you know, this year than it was last year. I'm going to like watching their run game on film more than I have in a long time since the Lechon McCoy era. But in terms of like, is this a deal I would have done?

I'm probably a no on Sequin Barclay. And then Bryce Hoff, you laid it out well. You know, like I was, you know, pointing this out, you know, right after they made the signing. He played 480 snaps last year. That was his career high. As a point of reference, Hassan Reddick played 821 snaps last year and Josh Sweat played 795 snaps. Now, maybe they see something in Hoff and they say, hey, he can be a full-time player

and he's an ascending player. that's fine. I'm just saying there is a projection there. And so we kind of have to see what's the other shoe to drop here with the Eagles. Are they going to trade sweat? Are they going to trade Redick? What's the market going to be? I thought the market might be pretty good for Josh sweat. But now that I see the Brian Burns, what the Panthers got back now? I'm like, if that's what they're getting for Brian Burns, what are the Eagles getting for Josh sweat? So I think it's a tricky situation where it's hard to evaluate completely until we see all

the moves they make. I think it's going to be a busy week, continue to be a busy week for the Eagles but in isolation I'm a little eh on the two signings that they made on the or the two deals they agreed on. Running back value. Nice thing. Talk about it. Oh, no, it's the top five figure, whatever. The first clip I see of Sequin Barclay standing next to A.J. Brown, just those two very large, very fast boys on my Eagles, oh, I'm all the way in. I can't, I can't, the first handoff dude, the first like, you know, like classic Saquan break ankles in a tight area behind line of scrimmage. Oh, heavens to Betsy. I'm so excited. I sense a bet between us that's going to involve quads at some point. I don't, I'm not going to go any further. I don't know what it means. I don't know if one

of us has to build up our quads. If we have to show our quads on YouTube, I don't think anyone wants that. I got good quads. Quads is the one muscle group I would say I'm performing. Everything else is flex. Unvillard. What are you doing? What are the, what are the moves you're doing to build up those I do no moves. I never move. You just have naturally amazing quads. Always have a good, good quads. I was a runner for a while, and so it was good. But I would say quads. What a revelation. Can't stress how bad everything else is.

It's a relative measure. All right. So there we go. If we do do a bet, Solac will reveal his wonderful quads to the audience. Good time to plug our YouTube page, Ringer NFL. I mean, if you want to see this in the future,

you got to subscribe to Ringar NFL on YouTube to get a look at those quads. All right, that's the Eagles. Next big one here I got. Raiders signed defensive tackle. Christian Wilkins. Four years, $110 million, makes him the third highest paid defensive tackle in the NFL based on average annual value.

And then another interesting one, Gardner Minshu, two years, $25 million with $15 million guaranteed. Talk about a team where I don't, I mean, I forget who you just said, the giants you were talking about. What direction are they going in? I feel that way about the Las Vegas Raiders. I'm fine going to that number with Christian Wilkins. I think he's a high floor, high-ceiling player.

I'm excited to watch him next to Max Crosby, where Max Crosby doesn't just have to take on an entire offensive line on 90% of the snaps every game, and there might be another defensive lineman that opponents actually have to game plan for. So that's good news for Max Crosby. Crosby and Wilkins is a nice tandem. And don't forget, that Raiders defense last year was a good, solid defense.

I mean, you look at most of the statistical categories. I think they were like a top tenish unit in DVOA last year, really for the first time in a long time. So I'm fine with the Wilkins move. It's a big number, but he's 28 defensive tackles age gracefully. No issue there. The Minchew thing was interesting, so like, because we always said, I mean, you are more online than me. Everyone knows that. But I was online at the time, and I'm very online in these early days of free agency.

And I saw a tweet, I think it was, I want to say one of the athletic Raiders reporters that said the Raiders are kicking the tires on Justin Fields. And I was like, ooh, what are we got here? And then like literally less than five minutes later, Raiders have agreed to terms with Gardner Minchew. So I don't know what was going on there, how seriously they were looking at Justin Fields, but obviously that's at least for now,

not going to be in the plans. They're going with Gardner Minchew. And this is like a bridge quarterback type deal where it's like, we have you. If we draft somebody and don't play you, that is like possible. But if we need to start you, then we're getting good value with you. So I don't know what to make of this Minchew signing and what they're doing,

a quarterback. Your plug did on all the draft stuff. Like, do you think this is just they're going to draft a quarterback in the first round? They're taking Minchu just in case that doesn't work out. Are you surprised that given how we've heard crickets on Justin Fields? I mean, that was the only thing I heard about Justin Fields all day was that the Raiders were kicking the tires. It really looks like the Bears could be. in a situation, and we know this can change very quickly. But for now, it seems like a situation

where the Bears are not going to be able to get much for Justin Fields, and there's not a lot of interest in him. What do you make of what the Raiders did here? Yeah, I think you view, I think to start from Fields and work backwards, I think Ryan Pace and the Bears view Fields as a market that has kind of like three points of life, right? And the first one was this point, right? It was, hey, like, the league year's about to open. We're allowed to trade the guy. Kirk is a free agent. as a free agent, like who, who, anyone want just the field? Who wants Justin Fields? And nobody was particularly interested in getting into the market. And, and I think some of that is the asking price. It's got to be. Because you can have whatever opinion about Fields that you want,

like, you know, I still think like he's got juice to him and development to him and he can keep growing. And I like him as a starter. Fields like, Fields is very clearly one of the 32 best quarterbacks in the league. Like, I don't think that's the UK, I don't think you can have, be anti that opinion. Like, just from a physical tools perspective, he can do it. And then he's improving. He's gotten better and so on and so forth. So some of the market has to be the bear's asking for us. They have to be asking a decent amount because like there are too many teams that would like to have a Justin Fields just able to hold like or be the bridge quarterback

for them, be what Gardner Minchu is being for the Raiders. So I think that this moment is the first moment where like a Fields market exists. The second moment is probably post draft, right? Where you have a quarterback goes to the Bears, Caleb, and then a quarterback goes to the commanders, whoever. And then the Patriots want a guy and the Raiders want a guy and the Broncos want a guy and the Vikings want a guy and there's not that many guys and so someone's going to miss out on who they want to get and at that point you say hey we got just the field's burning a hole in our

pocket let's work together let's get you a starter you know we can hold the hold the spot for a year hold the spot for two years if that moment fails through i think you get to the third moment which is the sam bradford moment right it's the bradford's a backup to cars and went for the eagles we're going to see if someone's quarterback gets hurt during training camp and then all of a sudden we're going to have the one guy that you need you don't want to get to that moment but you can't that it exists. You can, you know, try to try to get some blood out of that stone if you get there. And so the Fields market wasn't strong for them in moment one. I think they're okay with that. I think if they don't find a spot for Fields like during or after the NFL draft, that's when

I'll start to be like, okay, what is going on? Like, what are they asking for? Why is nobody taking it on Justin Fields right now? Because I think that it's important. Like, this is not the end-all-be-all moment for Fields getting out of out of Chicago. So that's what I think about Fields. Gardner Minchew Shore Like water come What? Like Minchew

We know dude You get James Go get Jacoby Go get somebody Like more fun Well Mitches fun Like from an off field perspective

For my Ben wants to watch My Ben I feel like I've seen The off field stuff too now Well yeah I mean like you know Oh Minchew in Nevada He's gonna show up to

I don't need another Minshoe montage or feature I'm not clicking into that bad boy It's just right It's just like okay Sure The two years 25 million is funny money like guarantees wise he's not he's like i think he's like 30th in the league right now

quarterback guarantees like they could very easily start o'connell they could very easily move on from minchu trade minchu in the middle of next season because their rookies good and they don't need him like there's like there's just like the the contract figure at first kind of as eye popping it's not real like i but why like why minchu now instead of like jacobo bursat was available in like a actual one-year deal james is still a free agent sam darner was still a free agent like i don't get why you feel like you have to go get minchu but whatever whatever. So that's my menshoe opinion.

Christian Wilkins. Did we mention the Raiders once in the entire pre-free agency process is like, you know who should be big buyers for an elite talent, the Las Vegas Raiders? I can't remember. I mean, your point is, because I just, I don't know what they're, what are they exactly trying to do here? Like, they feel they're not punting on next season. Obviously, they have older players.

They have Devante Adams. They have guys who they think they can win with. they're not a serious contender. I mean, what quarterback would they have to get like an amazing quarterback to be considered real contenders? Are they hoping to get like a CJ Stroud type player in the draft? Good luck with that. That's not going to happen often.

So that's why I think I just didn't, you know, I certainly didn't project them to do much, even though I knew they had a lot of flexibility to make moves that they wanted to. Yeah. So, I mean, I like, Christian Wilkins is a great player. I was very clear about how much I like Christian Wilkins in the pre-free. agency process. This deal is 110 million over four years, 27.5 per. This is the fifth largest defensive deal in the league right now for a player who is not a double-digit sack player on a team that is not ready to contend. I'm very like Wilkins, Wilkins got his bag and kudos to him.

They held firm during the Dolphins negotiations last season. He had a career year. He has earned every send of this contract. But I have, I have no clue. what the Raiders are attempting to achieve with this. And I don't think that Wilkins, in the position that he plays and the way that he plays it, is impactful enough to be like, our top 10 defense is now going to be a top three defense, and we're going to beat the Chiefs. We're going to win 11 games. Like that is just not a world that I can get myself to with the Raiders.

Maybe nail a draft and, like, get a great quarterback. I mean, if they got a big, splashy quarterback, I could maybe get myself there, but they didn't. They got Gardner Minchu. So I'm like, all right, like, by the time. you get enough offensive pieces in place and you get a quarterback, like a rookie quarterback ready to go, you're going to be in year three of the Wilkins deal.

Like it's already going to, you're going to need to be like restructuring and creating space and like, I just don't, the time frame makes no sense to me. You can go get a Christian Wilkins of 2026. Like I don't know who it's going to be, but there's going to be one.

You don't need to do this right now. Well, I think part of it is that to play, like it was a weird situation where he just hit the open market, no franchise tag, no nothing. I mean, that was really because of the Dolphins,

cap situation that Christian Wilkins hit the open market. They weren't going to be able to sign him long term or didn't want to sign him long term. And then they couldn't really afford to have the cap hold with the franchise tag on him. So I don't know. I mean, I don't think, like he's young enough. Like he's, what, 27, he's 28 years old. And so I think, you know, for the length of this contract, could he be a top 10 defensive

tackle in the NFL? Yeah, I actually think he could. I mean, you said, you said not a double digits. Heck, I mean, he had nine. I mean, come on. He's like right there. Okay. So a fringe double digit sack guy.

And that was his best year as a pass pressure. So maybe you view him as an ascending player. He has a high floor guy. He's going to impact the game. He's going to be very good against the run, regardless of what he's doing with his pass rush. So yeah, I don't totally get it in terms of a team building perspective,

but in terms of like, hey, he's a, you know, if you're going to overspend like this, do it on young players who are good players at premium positions. That's all I'll say.

And that's what they did. So I don't have an issue with it there. All right. What do you got? What's next? 27.5 million is estimate spending right there. Yeah, cap spiking, inflation. Caps going on, baby. Which, by the way, we should get a $30 million jump in the cap every year.

But he's just throwing money of people. Devin Singletary is getting three-year deals, baby. We are living out here. More enormous cap hikes. This is a hoot and a holler today. Okay, wait. Now there's two things I need to complain about here. All right, one is that I'm tired of the reporting

that is, you know, this is the fourth richest deal in NFL history. Yeah, the money's just going to go up. I mean, come on. That's not that. Oh, wow, it's bigger than the deals in 1986. Thanks for telling me that. So I don't like that framing about like I need the context of what it is right now. You're not impressing me by saying in NFL history.

I don't like that. And the second one, and I really meant to lead the show with this. This is how important it is to me. Oh, wow. We have a lot of enterprising, you know, I don't even want to say, young because just people who they want to get in the industry. They're all what people are offering to help with the show. We asked for that spreadsheet thing.

We got so many emails last year. I need someone, Solac, to come up with tracking which agents are lying the most with their first, when they're leaking this stuff, the reports about these contracts. Who are the ones who every year are just like inflating the numbers? The first report, like the Mike Evans thing, right? The Mike Evans deal first reported as. two years, $52 million. It was two years,

$40.5 million. Come on, you've got to get closer than that. There should be some type of penalty where if you inflate over a certain percentage, like, you should have to give your client some money. I was with you until you said there should be some sort of penalty. Yeah, that just came to me. The old man yelled out of cloud.

Listen, you can donate it to your favorite chair. But I think the only way to change this system where Asians will leak wrong numbers and reporters will go with the wrong numbers, Because I understand it. Those of you might be, you're in the news breaking industry. You want to break the news. And so rather than, you know, you're following up, well, how much is Gary T, are you sure, is that with incentives?

You just want to get it out there. It's a competitive space. That's how you make a living. I'm not mad at you. So I think the only way is to shame these agents. We need to shame them. So if we have somebody who could just track, here's the agency, here's the agent. Here's how much they lie about their numbers.

This year, we can do it over like a three-year span. and then I'll come back in like 2027, we'll unveil this great spreadsheet to the entire world. Everyone at the ringer will retweet it, and we will shame these agents, and people who are doing podcasts in 2028 will have a better way of doing this. All right, I had to get that off my chest.

Obviously, that was the most important thing. Nothing else going on in the NFL today. All right. What's next? All right. I thought you're going to be more excited about that, honestly. A little disappointed. I said, I was with you until we got to penalize people.

No, man, just lie. Great Ben. I'd be I hear being like, yeah, no, I just got my boy like $28 million per year. Do you see who I can get to tweet that? That's a good bit, man. All right. I tell you, the team that continues to interest me the most this offseason is the Vikings. We are, this is a, this team is getting a rookie quarterback, man.

They are building the defense. They're getting a rookie quarterback, and they are trying to, like, do the thing, right? Like, build the true contender. The Vikings lose Kirk Cousins, obviously, to the Atlanta Falcons. their big moves in day one. John Grenard, edge rusher. We liked him out of Houston.

Good player, big fan of this guy, fun, shield, Ben, little X-Point taken for age of the year. Yeah. Four years, 76 million. 19 million per year for John Grenard. It's a healthy, healthy contract. You had them like more mid-teens, right?

I think ESPN actually headed at four-year-72 million. I think that's another one. Originally reported 76, 72. So it comes down a little bit. Yeah, I had him a little bit lower. than that for sure. Yeah, so John Gronard four years 72. Big healthy deal for John Gernard. The Vikings do this losing Marcus Davenport and free agency who already signed with the Lions, potentially losing Daniel Hunter, who remains yet unsigned. They also add another edge rusher and Andrew

Van Ginkle, who's a little bit like linebacker who became the edge rush, a little hybrid player out of Miami, two years, $20 million for him. And then they also add Blake Cashman, who was a linebacker with the Texans, sent on a lot of blitzes with the Texans, three years, 22.5 million dollars. I will say that like when you're in a brian floris defense, this is going to blitz as much as it does. In general, I'm kind of like, okay, you don't need to spend crazy money at edge rusher because the whole point here is that we're generating pressure without paying elite money at edge rusher. But granard is a great three down player. He's very good against the run. Van Ginkle is built to be in a blitz defense because he can rush and he can drop. He can stand up. He can put his

hand in the dirt. And then that's also what cashman does well. So all of this is is in Brian Flores's image. All of this is to like round out and maximize what Flores wants to do defensively. And so overall, like I like the moves. I like the philosophy. I'm kind of like, okay, you're giving this money to Grenard instead of, and Van Ginkle, instead of Davenport and Daniel Hunter. Like, I'm not sure it's too much of a needle mover in a positive direction. You get younger with Garnar, you get better run defense with Garnar. Like, I do like that. I appreciate that. But overall, like, I think that right, you're filling out some of the gaps on defense. Office of lines in place like we've talked about. Wide receivers in place like we've talked about.

go get you a veteran free agent on the market there's so few guys left go get Aaron Jones go get it there canary go get somebody and then you just need to plug and chuck a rookie quarterback in here and tell Kevin O'Connell all right get this boy good quick because they're they're built man they're they're like a year behind where the Falcons were as the Falcons have ended up right now where it's like hey like the pieces are pretty much in place for you guys to get a rookie quarterback and go and so I like what Minnesota is doing defensively I understand the vision I get the structure I'll be curious to see if they get a bridge quarterback, right? There were reports, oh, they're going to go get Sam Darnold. Like, you know,

you know, why not, dude? Sam, Sam Donald's only two years older than Bo Necks. All right. He's still young, still learning. Maybe they go get a Trey Lance, bring the Minnesota kid back from the Cowboys, go get you a little developmental guy. And then if you, if you told me right now, one team in the league trades up from where they're at right now into the top five, who is it? I would put substantial money on the Vikings. That would be my guess for sure, as the team is going to be most aggressive looking for a trade-up chance to go get their quarterback in the future. So, Vikings, man, they're lining the pins up for a very, very fun next couple of weeks. For which QB? Do you have a QB? Who's the rookie quarterback? Oh, they scream J.J. McCarthy.

They just ooze J.J. McCarthy vibes there. We talked about an ex point taken the Monday after the combine. It hurts my feelings a little bit. Made my prediction. No, I think they're a JJ team. Kevin O'Connell, plug and chug, run my offense, ball distribution, go through the reads. It's all, it's all JJ. All right. You're a little bit more bullish on the Vikings than I. I think offensively they have a lot of pieces that I like. I think defensively they had like one of the worst rosters going into free agency. Now, I don't know. That might be a bit too.

I do not like their talent on defense. So I understand why they want to sign these veterans. They needed to upgrade in a bunch of different spots. I thought they were doing a lot of smoking mirrors. That's actually mean smoking me. Brian Fleurs was scheming stuff up and lifting them and doing more with less last year. as the season went on, like the last month of the season, you thought there were some, I thought there were some limitations to what you were going to be able to do with that group.

So I think they have a lot, you know, a lot more work to probably do defensively. They've had some drafts. They've had some picks in the secondary that have not necessarily worked out. But, you know, I'm fine with what they did here. I love Grenard, really one of my favorite free agents there, Van Ginkle on that contract is fine. And I don't think the Blake Cashman details are out there. So I don't know what the guy. Cashman was in this year reported 22.5 over three, which is about, what, 7.5 per,

which I think like Aziz El Shere signed for more, Jordan Brooks signed for more, like, Sealing Toki-Taki goes for less, Jordan Hicks, who just left Minnesota goes for less. I don't think Cashman is meaningfully better than Taki-Toki and Hicks. So to me like that's a little bit like, all right, do we really need to go and prioritize that contract? I think that, yeah, I think they need to make at least another added corner before you feel like, right, defensively they've really taken a step forward. But what I like is I like the philosophy of what they're doing. I like the fact that they are, okay, Flores in Year 1, right, made a lot of chicken salad out of what we had.

Let's go get him a couple of designer pieces. Let's go get some guys that make more sense for his defense. It'll work in his system and see if we can, right, make this a more reliable unit instead of the kind of feaster famine unit that it was. Yeah, he needed some players on that side of the ball, no doubt about it. But I think your point is right. Number one team maybe to watch going into the draft where it just feels like, well, they got to do something. They literally got nothing right now. as we record at quarterback.

So they're going to be a team to watch both in terms of signing a free agent, maybe trading for a quarterback, but also more specifically going into the draft. All right. Next up, the Jacksonville Jaguar signing Gabe Davis on a three-year, $39 million deal. Center, Mitch Morse, two-year, $10.5 million deal. They signed Safety Darnell Savage from the Green Bay Packers. They sign wide receiver returner, Devin, DuVernay from the Ravens. They signed cornerback Ronald Darby still in the league from Doug Peterson's Super Bowl team with the Eagles in 2017,

played with the Ravens last year, and is now back with Doug Peterson in Jacksonville with the Jaguars. Let me be clear. I don't really know what the Jaguars are doing. I don't know what Trent Bulky is doing. I think he probably does not know what he's doing. I don't like this roster. I don't think the Gabe Davis signing is like, oh, I'm not. That's not like an F for me.

Like, I think people go a little. It's not that bad of a signing. He is a useful player. He's 34th in receiving yards among wide receivers over the last two seasons. He's not a bum. Okay, he's 25 years old. He has to be theoretically, if I'm thinking about what could that Jaguars offense use? Like, all right, a big fast guy to run down the field who's averaged, you know, almost 17 yards per reception in his career to make some explosive plays.

Yeah, that would be good. Now, is he going to be able to do that? that, I don't know, is a wide receiver going to go from Josh Allen in that offense to that Jaguar's offense and be more productive? Probably not, but I'm just saying it's $13 million per year. Like last offseason, Alan Lazard got $11 million per year. Like, this is kind of, it's in the neighborhood. Like, I thought he would be more around 9 or 10. Yes, because the Chiefs and Jets fan bases respectively just loved the MVS and Alan Lazzard deals. Huge value for their franchises. Well, you got to compare it to what they signed for initially.

at first they were happy about him. So I don't think it's great. I don't love their whole group that they're putting together. Calvin Ridley still has not signed as of this recording. So that's interesting. Is there a chance he goes back there? If you told me Ridley Kirk, Evan Ingram, Gabe Davis, I'm still like not that excited,

but at least I'm more excited than I am right now. So I don't know what's going on with the Jaguars. I'm a little concerned about the direction they're going in, the state of the roster, and whether we're going to see much of an upgrade on that team. in 2024. Where are you with Gabe Davis and the Shag's team? Yeah, so the Gabe Davis deal.

I missed right at first and I thought it was 39 guaranteed and I lost my mind and then I was wondering what you thought it was. I was like, did he think it was $39 million per year? Like that? Now that would be aggressive. I would rip them for them. I thought it was 50 with 39 guaranteed. And I was like, what are they doing?

And then I misunderstood it. I will say, okay, Gabe Davis for 13 per. Fine. They traded a fifth and a condition. fourth for Calvin, and that conditional fourth became a third because Calvin produced, which means that if Calvin walks, in part because they signed Gabe Davis and gave Gabe Davis money, then they traded a fifth and a third for a one-year rental of Calvin Ridley, and they will not see a compick from the deal that he signs, not necessarily see a

convent from the deal he signs, in part because they signed this Gabe Davis deal. that to me is where the Gabe Davis landing the Gabe Davis resolution of the Calvin Ridley trade is what doesn't make any sense to me now if they bring Calvin back

all right great when I have Calvin on a veteran deal Gabe Davis on a veteran deal Christian Kirk on a veteran deal Zay Jones on a veteran deal they just signed Devin Douverna on a veteran deal did anybody tell Trent about the wide receivers in the draft there's a ton of them

you can get them whenever you want that they have all seven rounds got Evan Ingram on a veteran veteran extension, right? So like, let's say the world is like Gabe plus Zay plus Kirk plus plus Evan Ingram. Those are all vets that they've acquired over the last two years. Where would you rank that receiving room in the league? Like it's, it's average, right? Like it's middle the road. I was going to say. Yeah, maybe around 20. Maybe it's Gabe plus Calvin and they move on from Zay and then it's Kirk and it's and it's Ingram. Like I still, it's probably like 14th.

The problem is they've overpaid for every single one of the. these guys, even if you like some of these players. There is nobody who runs so quickly to the third tier of free agents to just start throwing money around and Tramolki does. It's the third year they've done this. Like, someone get me to Dornnell Savage, that.

Like, why? There's other guys. I don't understand why we rush to these deals. Savage is going to be around. And if Savage is around, equivalent players will be around. Mitch Morse, like there were 19 centers. It was like, the Morse deals actually fine, like whatever. But they just

sprint to their dudes. And, and, like, I just, I, I, I don't, like, you can play the market. You can, like, engage with the agent. Come up with the structure. Stay around for a couple of days. See if there's any other interest. You know, kind of play the game a little bit.

Get the numbers down. Like, they just are like, no, we, we have to get Say Jones in the building. I just don't know why they run it like this. Like, the Ezra Cleveland deal. Who was sprinting to sign Ezra Cleveland? And I just, they are. building a spectacularly mid offense with great intention

and I don't know why. Their building must be so much fun during free agency. Yeah, you're, for, yeah, you're Luicon. The agent's probably like, wait, what? Darius Williams, Rayshaw Jenkins, where are there? How much? Are you sure?

Are you, are you, are you, are you, pranking me? I need Roy Robinson Harris. They're like, is this really, this isn't really Trent Balkey. You're not giving me that much. And then, and then Josh Allen, drafted by the franchise,

cornerstone player. He's like, may I have a market deal, please? And they're like, no, franchise tag. Shut up and get in your room. Yeah. Trevor Lawrence is like, can I please have an offense with real weapons? Like, we're trading a six for Mac Jones. I just do not understand why they decide to live like this, man.

Me neither. I have no idea. So there you go. That's your Jacksonville Jaguars. Oh my gosh. They drive me up the wall, dude. On free agency. All right, we've got two more here before we get to the extra point taken.

Go ahead. Actually, no, let's take one more break. Then we'll come back. We're going through some position groups because there's just been random stuff happening. We'll do that here in a minute. All right, we're back on extra point taking. Solek, what do we got next?

Yeah, I brought up the Ezra Cleveland deal, right? 28.5 or three years, Ezra Cleveland. We got me the trade deadline last year. The Jags got ahead of their guard market because, boy, howdy, did the guard market explode? This free agency market. A lot of that extra money made its way to the guards. And so before free agency began, the Eagles extended Landon Dickerson, their incumbent guard.

He's a 84 million base, 50 million total guaranteed, 21 million per season. Very healthy deal for Landon Dickerson who, like I like Landon Dickerson. I don't think Landon Dickerson is like at the caliber of a Zach Martin, at the caliber of a Joe Tooney, like Elton Jenkins, some of these guys who are top guard contracts, Elton just signed for 17 million year. Land it gets on top of that by $4 million. Like that is a substantial, a raise, substantial leap in terms of the top of that market. And to be honest, like, I was looking at like, man, I don't really understand why Harry Roseman and Eagles felt like they needed to get this deal done. They still had time on his extension. Like, that interior offensive line is going to have

some shuffling with Jason Kelsey gone. Like, I don't know why you go for this big of a deal. So they're why don't you wait? And then Dolphins free agent, Robert Hunt, signs with the Panthers. $100 million over five years, $20 million per. Boy howdy, yeah. I'm not sure Robert Hunt's the top 10 guard in the league shield. And I like Robert Hunt. At Louisiana Lafayette, been a fan of Robert Hunt. He gets 20 million per.

He gets a massive deal from the Carolina Panthers to be a starter for them. Mike Unwenu, who is a guard tackle kind of hybrid player for the Patriots. Back to New England, $57 million over three years for Mike and Wenu. I think a lot of this, you know, I brought up to Ezra Cleveland deal. I think a lot of this was also the result of the Kevin Dotson deal. Kevin Dotson signs $48 million over three years, $16 million per year for Kevin Donson. That was a top 10 figure at Guard when he signed. It's since been like beaten by Landerson and landed and beat by Hunt.

And he's kind of been bounced out of the top 10. But still a big fat deal for Kevin Dotson, who was available on trade for peanuts last season. This trickles all the way down, right? You have Jonah Jackson who I'm quietly really good. I like what the Rams did a lot. The Rams went and got Jonah Jackson. They got Kevin Dotson. They really short up their interior.

So Jonah Jackson gets a $30 million extension from the Los Angeles Rams. You saw John Runyon Jr. Leave the Packers, go to the Giants. He gets $30 million over three years. There was a lot, a lot, a lot of money, Sheel for guards in this market. And I think that, okay, you know, whenever something like this happens, we want to figure, oh, what does it mean? Like, you know, the impact and the trickle down.

I don't think it means too much. I think it means that having a good offensive line is good. And when the cap goes up like that, the league with all of their young quarterbacks and Bryce Young and whoever the Patriots are going to draft, like, all we need to protect this guy. The Rams with an older quarterback and Matthew Stafford has been banged up, like, okay, we need to protect this guy. Like, you've seen the Eagles be heavy investors in the offensive line. The Chiefs have been heavy investors in the office line.

The Lions, the Ravens. Like all these smart teams have been heavy investors in the O line. So I think it's just a continuation of that. But boy, howdy. 20 million for Robert Hunt got me up out of my chair this afternoon. That was the land in extension into the Hunt deal. I just did not see coming that the interior office line market was going to get that big that quickly.

That was the big surprise for me of today. What's going on with boy howdy? Is there a drinking game? Did I say it twice? I feel like when I said it the second time, I was like, oh man, I think I said this. four, seven. Okay, I thought that I thought maybe there was some drinking game I didn't know about where you say boy howdy and people are having a good time.

No, boy howdy is when I'm, I'm really surprised and I'm trying not be too critical. That's what that one comes through. Oh, man, I'm the old guy on the pot and he's using boy howdy seven times. Hot dog, man. What a market. Gee Willickers. I was thinking about the Panthers, made fun of them to start the show. Now we're nearing the end of the show.

What do you think they were off on like the deal with Brian Burns? May it like what, three, four million dollars per year? Maybe. Topps. And then they signed Robert Hunt for 12. You couldn't just settle for a $17 million per year guard. You had to go get the $20 million per year guard and then not keep Brian Byrne Byrd. So that one, that Robert Hunt one was probably the strangest of these to me in that he's not like,

tell me if I'm wrong. I know you studied him out of college. His strength is as a run blocker. He is like a physical run blocker, right? Like the past protection is not his elite strength, even the best version of him. So that one was a little bit puzzling to me to go be. that aggressive for him at that number. Yeah, I thought that Hunt was the best guard on the market, like, in terms of when you

considered quality of play plus like availability, longevity. He missed some time this year, but I think overall has been an available player. Like, I thought that, again, like I said Jonah's film. I think at the peak is probably the best, but I thought Jonah had more injury concerns. I did not think that Robert Hunt, like, if you asked me what Hunt's going to get, I would have been like, oh, Shaq Mason signed for 36 million over three years last year, like probably beat that. I go get like 13, 14, this, this beats my expectations by like five million per year. And for it to come from the Panthers, who sure have like money burning a hole in their pocket a little bit,

but just had like a truly elite player that they were negotiating with is perplexing to me, perplexing. You mentioned the Rams. Yeah, so they bring, they bring back Kevin Dotson, the right guard for 16 million per year. And then they go out and they sign Jonah Jackson at last. left guard for $17 million per year. They already had Steve Avila playing left guard. He's now, it looks like, going to move to center. So they really obviously had the priority of, hey, we are shoring up this interior

offensive line. And now they've got like three guys in what, their mid to late 20. Like that's one of the best interior offensive lines now, I think, in the entire NFL. So I was a little surprised that they were investing that much in those spots. Like they could have just kept Stevea Villa at left guard and signed a center for, at a lower cost, but I guess they really liked Jonah Jackson there. So their path to being a contender is obviously the offense being elite. They need to keep Matthew Stafford upright.

We saw Puka Nakua last year, still have Cooper Cup, still have Kyrn Williams in the backfield. And so I get what they were trying to do. Defensively, it's going to be a more with less situation over there, given the resources they poured into this offensive line. Yeah. And it's funny because, like, the Panthers kind of had a, like they went and got, Austin Corbett, right? They drafted Brady Christensen.

They drafted Ikea Kwanu. They extended Taylor Moten. Like, I love investing in the offensive line. There comes a point where it's like, hey, you should probably just chill and like, see what the, like, like stop shuffling the line around, let the young guys play a little bit. I guess, you know, you're trying to solve the Bryce Young problem. That's what creates the urgency. But also, who were you bidding against for Robert Hunt?

Yeah. Who do you? I like that you're still on Robert Hunt. Yeah. I was like, yeah. I was like, wait, is he talking about the Rams? No, okay, he's still upset with the Panthers. The move Steve Avila thing to center is a little bit weird to me.

It's just like, hey, like he was definitely good at guard there. Like there were a lot of centers on the market. I'm not sure you had to go get Jonah Jackson that badly to then move the young player. And then they could have got a low cost veteran center. Yeah, and then what happens if Jonah gets hurt? Because like Jonah can get hurt sometimes. You know, move a Vila back out to guard? or you know and or and get a back like that would be bad like you want to keep the pivot consistent

that's the thing about the guard market that is a little bit weird to me and I it I I am emphatically an O line guy and would like to be recalled and entitled an O line guy but of the three positions tackle center or guard the spot where I feel like oh I can just kind of go get a guy and plug him in and go draft a guy fourth round and plug him in and be okay that's what's guard like tackle is the higher technical is the higher physical challenge position right that's where like your physical tools matter more. You kind of need to be more of a unique body. And then center is the more challenging tactical position in terms of the mental aspect of the game, pointing out protection, calling the line, the snapping of the football, the accuracy of that snap, not having your

one hand, your dominant hand at the moment the ball snapped. I do not want to suggest that elite guards don't impact their teams. They absolutely do. As the chiefs and Joe Tuny, nor do I want to suggest that guards is unskilled position. The entirety of the office line is a highly skilled position. But if you made me like heavily invest in four spots and then plug the fifth spot in with like a journeyman guy, I'm choosing guard as my journeyman every day of the week and twice on Sundays. So that's what's a little bit weird to me. Yeah, I would agree with that, especially you can get the guy like if there's a solid guard who's like 33 years old. I mean, that's going to cost you like $6 million per year.

And that guy's probably going to be pretty solid. So the guard stuff was pretty weird storyline here of the first day. All right. Last one before we get to the rapid fire. linebackers linebackers go off the board texans sign aziz al-shayr three years thirty four million dollars dolphin signed jordan brooks three years 26.25 million dollars commander signed frankie louvo three years 36 million dollars you already talked about some of the other ones earlier i don't have an issue with any of these signings you know i think the texans are certainly buying high

on aziz al shire he was a free agent last off season and signed i think a one year five million deal with the Titans. He had, I think, 163 tackles, played really well for them. And now he obviously gets a huge bump over $11 million in Houston. But D'emico Ryan's coached him in San Francisco, so he knows what he's getting there. He should know how he's going to fit in his scheme. Al Shire is still a young player. So I'm okay with that. Jordan Brooks to the Dolphins, this was one of my, I thought, the best values of day one, $8.75 million, given some of the inflation with some of these other players, some of the other positions. I think Jordan Brooks is a good player. He's a three down player. He's a young player. I think he's got upside.

I really like that move quite a bit for the Miami Dolphins. And then Frankie Louvo goes to Washington. That makes sense to me. I think Dan Quinn will find a way to get him. Yeah. I mean, I think he'll blitz him and find different ways to use him in that scheme where he can just kind to cut cut him loose. And I think Quinn is pretty good about finding a player skill set and then adjusting to his strengths and putting him in positions to succeed. I mean, we could name a lot of players from the Cowboys here over the last couple of years who were not like household names who played pretty well for him. So yeah, he's a disruptive player. He's not like a, you know, sit back, cover type player. Obviously, you don't want him in those situations. So I think Quinn

will find ways to let him be aggressive. So I was fine with all of those. You don't don't like the Louvre one it sounds. The Cowboys were one of the bottom teams in the league in terms of five plus men in the rush and six plus man in the rush. And so I think that Louvo will be really handy for them on third and long, like stand him up, put him as a wide nine, like he can drop and whatever. But Dan Quinn is not a heavy blitz guy. And Louvo to me works exclusively in a heavy blitz scheme.

Like I think I'm trying to like kind of permanent edge him and like have him like play as like a on ball outside linebacker. At this money, like he's got to play. all three downs, he's got to play true offball. And like, in terms of coverage ability and, and he's a good run suffer because you can kind of like use him like a hammer, right? One gap and go. But still, like I like Louvue.

I do not like the fit with Dan Quinn. I don't think I want him to be on a team that blitz is heavily. No, you're right. That is a good, I mean, I guess his role could change there. They don't have a lot at edge. They signed Doran Armstrong, but obviously they traded both those guys. So maybe they are envisioning a different role for Frankie Louvo. anything else on those off ball linebacker.

Are you running out of gas? How do you feel? Yeah. Dude, the Aziz al-Shaheer, thank the Texans is really funny to me. You want to know what one year of winning football does for a head coach? Damiko arrives in Houston.

Aziz Al-Shahir is available for one year $5 million. And Nick Casario is like, shut up, dude. Like you're a rookie head coach. Nobody cares. It's not getting Aziz Al-Shahir. You'll take your Blake Cashkin. You'll take your Christian Harris,

your Denzel Perryman, you'll like it. One season goes by. And DeMicaa says, I like Aziz Al-Shire. for three years, $34 million. Yes, sir, absolutely. Get him in the building. Here we go.

Man, the stock price is up for D'Amico Rhyans. I love that. I think that's, you said he's buying high. I love it. It's peacock walk. Absolutely, go get you in his ease. I like what the Texans have done a lot. Al-Shayir, I think kind of like at market rate, like they paid a decent amount

there. But like, De Nico Autry, two years, $10 million. That's a useful player to have. Jeff Okuda, one year, $4.5 million. That's a useful player to have. They're just kind of, you know, they're doing the thing that smart teams do. You don't try to solve all of your problems in free agency. You just get baseline starters everywhere you have a gap.

Set the floor. You can be flexible in the draft. They're still sitting there with a lot of money. And Eric Armstead is still available. And Calvin Ridley is still available. And T. Higgins is it wants to trade out of Cincinnati. The running back market is robust, right? Aaron Jones is still available.

During the pod, we've been recording shield. The Bengals cut Joe Mixon. Joe Mixon is now available on the market. Derek Henry. that the Texas are holding their money and they're waiting, I still think it splashes around the corner for that team, and appropriately so. Aaron Jones and Eric Armstead.

How about that? Eric Armstead seems like he makes too much sense for the Texans, right? When I saw him get released, I'm like, he's got to be going there. I'm looking at the Cowboys here. So last year, they were eighth in terms of percentage of rushing five or more. So I think he's mixed it up. It depends on the season. It depends on the personnel here.

I had my six, oh, I had my six plus man and then I, oh, I, I, I apologize. I looked at six man rushes where they're below their bottom five, and I looked at percent of rushes with DB in the past rush. I'm sorry, I looked at the wrong. Okay, yeah, so he was eighth last year, 13th the year before, and then he was seventh the year before. So we'll see. We'll see how. Probably a lot of that is front stuff, which again, like that works if he's a stand-up guy on the outside. Like, that can make sense to me. I think like he's going to Michael Parsons him a little bit in terms of where he puts him. It's just, it's not the way that Frankie was typically used in Carolina. I think that's

going to change for sure. All right. A little rapid fire here. Extra, what do we got left? I mean, I feel like we can see, what I don't want to do with like a show like this. I never want the listener to then get to tweet the day after. Why didn't you talk about X? And I know that's coming anyway, because we can't get to everything. But that's why I like to get to as much as possible. Free agency. It only happens once you. All right. So these have to be quick. So like, are you ready to be quick? We can't be meander. We can't be going all over the place. We need quick.

what do you think about this? You ready? Yeah, why am I being treated like this? What do you mean? What are you treating like what? I'm sensing a lot of like you're the problem over there. You're half of the calls the issue.

I'm just, I want to make it clear. You know, I got to be clear with the instructions. I apologize. All right. I'm ready. I know you're going to like this one.

We're both going to like this one. Lions trade a third for Carlton Davis, quarterback from the Tampa v. Box and Brad Holmes. Hey, Panthers. Take some notes for Brad Holmes. at home says, no, we're not doing that. You're giving us two sixth round picks back with Carlton Davis.

You know, you got to ask for a little bit more. So Davis is 27 years old, has had some injury issues. What do you think? You like this move, don't you? Yeah, I like it if it is what it is, which is that this should be considered a one-year rental. Because he's only got one year left on his deal. He's certain, like, he's getting banged up.

He's not what he wants to be physically. This is a placeholder. You trade a third-round pick for a good placeholder, right? This can be a corner one for you. Davis doesn't have a lot of ball production. but he can still take away wide receiver ones. This, I think, does not and should not exclude the lions from the cornerback market in this year's NFL draft.

The big mistake would be saying, okay, cool, we got this position locked in for 2024. Let's look elsewhere. No, no, no. Cam Sutton with his deal, Davis, with his deal, you need to get a young corner in the building who can play on the outside. So if this is what it is, which is shorting up the position, giving us some flexibility. That's great. You still need to add, I think, highly drafted youth to this spot.

I think it's what we just talked about. You set the floor, you get a corner, you don't want to be going into the draft with nothing there. Now you have somebody, maybe you draft someone. Maybe you trade for Marshawn Latimore. In the summer, how about that? Throw a few darts at the board. Marshawn Ladamore. Just take every good corner out of the NFC South.

Yeah. And you're only got one year left. Let's do it. And draft somebody. There you go. I like it too. T. Higgins requested trades. So like you are Duke Tobin of the Cincinnati Bengals.

What type of compensation do you need to actually trade T. He doesn't want to play on the franchise tag. He wants a long-term extension. I want a first or the equivalent, right? I want a first or like an early second and then some more. Like, let's get a future pick that's tied to production, right? I don't think I'm getting 13 overall, but I certainly would like to get a pick in like the mid-to-high 20s if I can. I brought the Lions at 29 before.

You have the Texans that are there at 23. I'll send something back to the Texas if I can get 23 overall. I think that all of that is, it should be the expectation. T-falls somewhere in the AJ Brown, Marquise Brown's back. spectrum. Eagles sent a first for AJ Brown on draft night, gave him a huge extension, and it was massive for their team. It sent him to the Super Bowl. The Cardinals gave a first round pick to Marquis Brown on draft night. It did not meaningfully impact their team at all. T. is somewhere in the middle of that. And I think he's more on the AJ Brown side. You can't be certain with these things.

But I'd want to and be willing to send a late first for T. Higgins. I don't think they're going to get the compensation they want to move T. Higgins. I think cooler heads, cooler heads or calmer heads are going to prevent. Cooler. Cooler heads are going to prevail. I think there'll be a lot of like rumorish stuff and this team should do it and we'll probably do it on this show. I think eventually T. Higgins stays in Cincinnati, plays on the franchise tag and then gets a hit free agency next off season. I think he means too much to that team. And unless you get great compensation back in the form of a first round pick or close to a first round pick, I'm not moving T. Higgins in a season where I think I can win Super Bowl. I think team moving in the next seven days is unlikely. I think team, I think it's much. more likely team moves at or immediately after draft night. Okay. Makes sense. Team looking for draft a wide receiver doesn't get what they want and then move in a

different direction. All right. The Indianapolis Colts, we talked about this player. We talked about should they do this? They signed Michael Pittman Jr. 3 years, $70 million over $23 million per year. Have your feelings changed on whether the Colts should have done this? How would you have advised Chris Ballard in the?

this situation over the last 48 hours. I, you go first. I would have said, have him play on the franchise tag. What are you doing? Why are we paying him $23 million per year for a guy who averages 10.9 yards per reception? He's a useful player. Seems like a nice guy. Reliable possession receiver.

Guess what? This is like the Daniel Jones thing. This is precisely what the franchise tag is for. Just chill. Let's see how he looks with Anthony Richardson next year. Guess what? If he looks like a playmaking machine with Anthony Richardson and their chemistry is off the charts and we love what we have because he's a young receiver. We'll pay him then.

We'll pay a little bit more. That's okay. I want to pay for one year to buy a little bit of time. I don't need to get ahead of this with Michael Pittman Jr. No, don't do that, Chris Baller. All right. Good. Eduardo, clip that, said Matt. Ben doesn't say anything about Michael Pittman anymore. The number one player I don't talk about. Sheo, when he signed, 10 immediate ads from Coles fans. Oh, Ben Zillac so pissed right now. I'm not this. Spend money, whatever you want to spend the money on. for me. $23 million for Michael Pittman is not for me. I agree.

This was a good tag opportunity. Now, if they lost Pittman and if, or if they even tagged Pittman, I think they would have needed to be like invested in the wide receiver market. They have Alex Pierce on a rookie deal. Josh Downs on a rookie deal. I don't really think they have anybody waiting in the wings that's going to be able to take the amount of targets that Pittman takes. So he is a good player.

He is a handy player to have. He has a legit, viable and good role in the NFL. I just, this is a lot of money. And, you know what, it's fine. It's a home graft of talent. Wide receiver is a lot of money. Live your dreams, man. So lack backing off.

I will not. And it's nothing. Hey, good job by Michael Pittman Jr. CTC. Nice job out of you. And I will say this. There is a skill to getting volume as a wide receiver. You need to be able to get open that number of times.

Be trusted. He catches everything. He catches the football. So again, useful, nice player. But I would just, you need a little, if you don't got the explosive. A little more juice. Yeah. I want to wait a little bit.

That's all. Maybe it'll come. By the way. They signed Gropa Stewart. They signed as well. 39 million over three years. The defensive tackle, no stock of their run stuffer. Spot Rack missed put his contract in on their table.

They had him as three years, $390 million. She's a cool $130 million per year. That would have been the first team all CTC right there. Yeah, that was the real deal. Well, we've been trying to figure out who's going to be the first nine figure per year guy. We've been knocking on the door. It was Grover Stewart all along. We should have known.

So yeah, nice sign up for Grover Stewart. And then, yeah, they lose Zach Moss. Zach Moss, by the way, signs a two-year deal with the Cincinnati Bengals replacing Joe McSend who was just cut. It's like two years, eight million per. And so that's the cold state right there. Bengals, that's what you should be doing, my friends. Then I'm 13 million.

I like that by the Cincinnati. Marks, man, Tony Palmer's getting eight, DeAndre, just getting eight. Zach Moss gets four? I don't know. You think that's too high? I think, no, I think it's too low. I think you could know. Yeah, it's a nice deal.

It's a nice value. Yeah. And also, I mean, I don't want to rip on the Colts. And I know Grover Stewart, the film is good. I know he's very good against the run. I don't know, again, it's just, it's like what you were talking about with bulky. I don't even know that I need to rush out and make sure I'm keeping Grover Stewart $13 million per year after he's coming off a, you know, a PED suspension last year,

and is entering his age 31 season and had zero and a half sacks, half a sack in 11 games last year. Extension for Michael Pittman, extension for Grover Stewart. And then they extended Zaire of Franklin as well. Who like Franklin had a ton of tackles this year. again, like a good player who like performs better than when he was drafted at. But Chris Ballard, man, Chris Ballard is a good general manager, but he's very good at keeping the job. He knows, oh, extend the homegrown talent. Make sure you can show Jim Mersey.

Look at these guys I drafted now on these second deals. It's good business. I respect it. It's like everything they do in March is generally boring, the Indianapolis Colts. Now with Anthony Richardson, what they do in September should be very exciting. All right, that was bad job by me. See, I extend that. Juan Lewis too.

They resigned four dudes today. That's what they did today. Which they could have extended or resigned all these guys because legal tampering opened and they just kept their own players. That's not what's supposed to happen at legal tampering. So the Bengals got Zach Moss two years eight million and then they made one of my other favorite signings. This isn't even on our rundown.

Gino Stone, two years, 50 million dollars. It's directly on our rundown. Oh, it is? Yes. Next was supposed to be. Bucks Baker Mayfield and then the immediate subsequent note was Bengals signed Geno Stone. We were like three minutes from here. Listen, it's a long podcast.

I wanted to give them their flowers for Geno Stone. I love this fit. Gino Stone, high IQ playmaker with a Louana Rumo. They had like a transition year at safety last year. Now they bring him in. I like what the Bengals are doing here. All right. Let's finish it up here.

Baker Mayfield, do you have any strong thoughts? Baker Mayfield gets 40 million guaranteed. It's sort of like the Gino Smith. contract, but a little bit more expensive. They do have flexibility. To me, they just seem kind of stuck. It's easy for me to say, I'm not the GM. I could see if I was there, you would say, hey, we made the divisional round. We're not changing quarterback. Would you rather have Baker Mayfield at this contract, 40 million guaranteed or Jacoby percent one year, eight million dollars? Like, Jacoby from like a pure plus minus value perspective, it's just every year if you have to

redo the quarterback thing, it is objectively a headache. It is nice to have like a little bit more stability. They can get out of the deal relatively quickly and relatively painlessly. Like, I think you draft the second round guy, draft a third round guy, have him replaced Kyle Trask, see if Mike Pennix can give you something like, that's the way you have to go about it. So I understand building a longer bridge. What is weird to me is to be like, let's keep Mike Evans. Let's keep Baker Mayfield. Let's get a third round pick for Carlton Davis. It's like, okay, well, like, if we're doing the whole like run it back thing, then like, but just keep Carlton for another year. And I get like, okay,

you're going to lose them in free agency and get a fifth round compact next year. Let's get a third round early this year. Like, okay, I kind of get it. But I don't know. They're another team that feels like they go different directions at times, right? They're yanking towards like, let's be relevant. Let's compete for the division. And then all of a sudden they take a step towards like, let's get young on defense.

That, that to me can be weird. Was it Zion McCollum? Was that the- Yeah, Zion McCollum will be the star in the outside now. So maybe there's just, all right, let's open up a spot for the younger guy and see what he's got. I don't know. Yeah, you're right. They're stuck in the middle type team. If they approach it the way you said, then I'm fine with it.

If this is just a, hey, buy time until we find our guy. If this is a, hey, we might be pretty close after what we did last year, then I'm out on it. But you know what? The post-Tom Brady era has gone better for them than I think anyone would have expected there. All right. Steelers Russell Wilson. I don't know how much more we need to talk about this. We've talked about it before.

He's cheap, $1.2 million, so it's a very low risk move. I just don't see the upside. 36 years old. Sean Peyton had no use for him. He plays in a certain way. So is it an upgrade over Kenny Pickett? Yes, I just don't know where this is getting the Pittsburgh Steelers. So that's my official take on it.

Where are you? I'll be doing the play sheet this week on Russ to the Steelers. This is very disappointing to me. I guess there were like five starters last year that Russ played better then and one of them is Kenny Pickett. So upgrade in the most technical sense of the word. Yeah, statistically, like if you look at the EPI, stuff. He was around like 23 and Pickett was around like 29. So technically, yes, an upgrade. But

you're not going from 29 to like maybe 11. And this is again, a 36 year old who this year might not be as good as last year. Generally is not. I think it, I think it is extremely peculiar that the the voice and the leak out of Pittsburgh last year was like, hey, Tomlin's still going 500. Tomlin's still, you know, yanking us to the wild card round no matter what happens to the roster. but we're kind of sick and tired of this. Like we're kind of, we want more. We want a legit postseason win. Like we want an actual like contending season.

We're going to be more aggressive for that to be the leak. And then to sign the most explicit obvious nine and eight quarterback I've ever, like this is the most nine and eight move I've ever seen in my life. Oh, let's go get Russ because he's just the vet minimum because the Broncos are paying him. We are aiming for mediocrity and nothing greater. Like why? Like what are you trying to do? Like you actually want to win a playoff game or not?

Like, if Tallinn's fired at the end of this upcoming season after they go nine and eight again and their third in the AFC north and whatever, I will hop on this pot and immediately say, okay, well, when you signed Russ, you signed the death warrant. When you signed Russ is when you, you, you've sealed your fate because you were never going to do better than this. Yeah, it's, it's well said. It does. It does not give you great upside and you have a roster that kind of is calling for you to, hey, we have some nice pieces on defense. We have some nice pieces on offense. Maybe we can do something here. we get the right fit of quarterback, and it just feels like they don't have a path towards doing that. All right. Last one. Finally, Titans.

I mean, we do not. We have not talked about the Titans in a long time. We had a nice, fun, like, punching each other virtually argument about John Robinson at one point in time. Which, who won? Me, probably. No, what are you created? You put together the worst roster in the NFL. Now, the guy who replaced him is also not doing it.

Right. And they all, they got rid of, they got rid of, they got rid of rebel. Six seconds later. They're not good at managing their staff there. Okay. He was not doing a good job either. I don't think they're doing a good job so far this offseason either. They signed Lloyd Cushenberry to a deal that makes him, I believe, a top five paid center in the NFL.

And then they signed Tony Pollard $8 million per year. You just drafted Tai J. Spears last year, why are we running out in the first hours of free agency and signing Tony Pollard for $8 million per year when we have holes. literally at like every premium position you could think of on the entire roster. So I am a little bit confused about what the Tennessee Titans are doing. They also signed Cheeto Ouzier. They had the corner out of Cincinnati. He was injured last season.

Three-year deal, 36 million, 23 guaranteed. What? Yeah, Cheeto. Nice little healthy. A million a year? He's 20. Well, a healthy Cheetos deal. GMs listen to me.

GMs listen to nothing else. You do not want cornerbacks approaching. 30. I have come to this realization. Stay away. If it's a one-year flyer on a guy, 29 years old, that's fine. Once that first number is three, stay away. It's not going to go off. They feel right now to me, like they are very strongly in, like, get kind of functional mode. Like, they're like, I was like, why are the Jaguar sprinting to the third tier of free agency? The Titans are also like, we, like, okay, who has started, can start, runs

routes, covers guys, like, we just have nobody right now. And we just want to get use into the building, which is an understandable instinct to be like new coach, go, you know, go get some guys that fit his system. Like, you know, we kind of tore this thing down to the studs last year. We got to rebuild it, whatever. Like, I get the instinct. You don't need to spend money like this, right? Like, you don't need to be making Lloyd that highly paid. But Lloyd's a good player. Tony Paul is a good player. I don't know if you had to give him 8 million. Like, I don't mind the guys they're bringing in. They're trying to get functional quick. And that I think is a worthy pursuit. I do think it's costing him a little bit more than it should. But also,

cap's going up, right? 30 million more than you had. So, why not? Why not? We will end it on that. That is the theme of every GM. Why not? You know, they're thrown out. Could be good.

Could be great. Could be good. Let's do it. Could save your job. There you go. All right. So I know we didn't get to everything. Listen, we'll have more shows this week.

So don't worry. As the week goes on, the Ringer NFL feed, dual threat, extra point taken, we will have you covered with more big moves, more big trades to come, more signings to come. Crazy that you wouldn't put the Will Lutz, Jacksonville to Denver switch in our our breakdown. Belal Nichols, 21 over three years, no comment from Shield Copadia. Silent on the Aaron Brewer deal. Thank you to Ben Solac. Thank you to Cliff Augustine for producing.

Thank you to Eduardo Kampa for the video production. Additional production supervision by Connor Nevins and Arjuna. Rahm Gapal. Appreciate everyone listening. We'll talk to you soon on Extra Point Taken. Must be 21 plus and present in select states. Fanduels offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino LLC. Gambling problem? Call 1-800 gambler or visit fandle.com slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, and Virginia. Call 100, 100, Next Step, or text next step to 5-3-3-4-7-2 in Arizona.

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