The Ringer NFL Show - The NFL Officially Bans the Hip-Drop Tackle. Plus, the Most Valuable Positions in the NFL. | Extra Point Taken

Episode Date: March 25, 2024

The NFL has officially banned the “hip-drop tackle” after a vote at this week's owners meetings. Are the lines too blurred for determining what a hip-drop tackle is, and will this make it harder for officials to call during the game? Ben Solak and Steven Ruiz discuss that and go through which positions are the most valuable in the NFL. Is a shutdown cornerback more valuable than an elite defensive tackle? 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 Steven Ruiz 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 Hyfitts, 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 Ringer NFL show on Spotify. And welcome to the Ringer NFL feed. This is XPointegan, not really super X.

I'm Ben Solac. Usually you hear Shield Capadia bring in this episode. but Sheila's on vacation this week. So I'm in the host chair, bringing in my dear friend, grinder of the film, whether it be professional football or collegiate basketball, Stephen Ruees. Stephen, how are you? I'm tired.

I have to admit. I spent like seven hours writing like about 10,000 words on college basketball this weekend. But Stephen and I were hanging out at the combine, which is at the end of just like a murderer's row. Like the NFL coverage, the season is so long. Playoffs, you're traveling for the Super Bowl, and then two weeks you have to travel for the Com. You've seen every NFL writer there.

Like you've seen every NFL writer three times over the last two months. You're exhausted. You're tired. And we're both bemoaning just like, oh man, it's such a long season. I was so excited to kick my feet up. And Steve was like, yeah, and I'm also covering March Madness this year. And I was like, are you insane? What are you thinking?

Yeah, I have to watch NC State film. It's exhausting. I have to know, like, who's on Arizona and who their backup point guard is. Like, get me out of here. Enough. Any spicy takes for the Rast Sweet 16 and Beyond? What are we thinking? Duke Final Four.

Duke Final Four. You heard it here first. I have no opinion on those. I picked Tennessee to win because I know you like the Dalton Kid. And that was the whole reason why they won my bracket. And so far we're doing great. That's right. That's my pick for White Boy of the Year.

Dalton Connect. Is it Connect? Is that how it's pronounced? Yeah, connect. How do you think it was pronounced? The K isn't silent? It is not. Connect.

Were you calling him Dalton Necked? That's what, what do you, are your fork, spoon, and Knafe? I'm sorry for thinking K-N was pronounced with a just an end. I thought it was a silent K. Hey, watch the games. The commentator say his name on the broadcast. Not a player's names are pronounced. All right.

Steve and I were talking last week. We wanted to do an episode talking about positional value. This is something that comes up every single year. You're in season a couple of times and you see trades or a certain team is performing super well and they built their team a certain way. And we try to make kind of these big sweeping generalizations about, oh, corners are more valuable. Devenants of tackles are less valuable, tight ends, wide receivers, like all this stuff.

And it also comes up a ton of the times in the off season, predictably so, because you have all these free agents at the market and they get these massive deals and it kind of tells us a little bit about the league's thinking about various positions. So we're still going to get to that. We're going to try to rank the positions by value. Talk a little bit about which ones are being invested in recently, which ones aren't being invested in and kind of why that's the case. But we did want to start today's episode with some of the news that came from NFL owners meetings, namely that the swivel hip drop tackle. Not the hip drop tackle, but the swivel hip drop tackle. Definitely a good naming, good branding, is being outlawed. It has been unanimously removed by the NFL's

competition committee. It will have a 15-yard penalty associated with it. It'll potentially have a fine associated with it. League owners talking about how this tackle is responsible for a disproportionate number of injuries. You saw Mark Andrews get hurt on a tackle that was in their teach tape. You saw Tony Pollard get hurt on a tackle that was in their teach tape. This has been a big thing for the NFL over the course of this season. It was brought up on this podcast as a off-season thing? Steven as a proxy for Nora and Sheel, what do you have to say for yourself? Sneering at my hip-drop tackle take, besmirching me when I said this would be important? How can you stand there? Are you going to take this W happily? It should not have been a thing,

and I'm very disappointed that it has become a thing, and the leak has taken it so seriously. So I'm standing with Sheel. I'm standing with Nora, and I'm against you. Yeah, well, I'm not happy that this is a thing. This is a dramatic thing. And so for those who who haven't followed it precisely. The swivel, hip-drop tackle as the league defines it. It's a tackle in which a defender makes contact with the ball carrier, ungrounds himself, elevates himself, lifts himself. They have such weird terminology for this.

And then, and this is critical, swivels, what the swivel is. I'm also not super clear on, but presumably, it seems like it's getting the defender's legs to a point where it's behind the offensive player's legs. It's like at their knee level. And then they drop their weight down. And then obviously when they drop the way down, they're going to land on the calf, land on the shin, potentially twist ankles, break ankles, break ligaments, so on and so forth. That tackle in particular, which has an unseating and unweighting of the self, a swiveling,

and then a dropping of the weight. That tackle is going to be banned. There's going to be flags on Sundays, 15-yard penalties. There's also going to be fines as well, potentially assessed on Tuesday. Rich McKay, who runs the NFL competition committee saying that they want to look at it on Tuesday and look at it from a fining perspective to really make sure that they, they outlaw all instances of it, even those of the referees, do miss on Sunday. Steve, I've seen people say, like, you know, this is going to ruin football.

I think that's a terribly overreactive take. People say, we're going to have flags on in 10 years. I think that's a terribly overreactive take. I've also seen people say, like, oh, this is just like the horse collar and everybody's going to forget about it. I also don't think that that take is accurate either. I think this is going to be a very challenging thing for the league to officiate. Horse collar, I think, is a little bit easier. And also a thing that defenders are going to push back on, not just this off

season but off seasons into the future because there's not only so many ways you can get a guy down at this point you either got to put your velocity through him and the danger that comes with that is getting leading with the head penalties getting unnecessary roughness penalties or you have to put your weight on him right it's either be a force under him or be a force against him right to put your weight on the guy drag him down and now this hip drop tackles a potential penalty you get for going the other direction and so I do think that you're going to see some really bad flags over the course of the season some really bad fines over the course of the season I do think you're going to see defense a pushback for this. This feels like the sort of thing that is just so challenging to legislate that it's going to

become drama again and again and again over the next few years. Yeah, and like the way you described a hip drop tackle, sorry, a swivel. Swivel, hip drop tackle. The hip drop tackle is not outlawed. The swivel hip drop tackle is. Because if it's not complicated enough, let's make two of these things. Let's make two separate categories for them. But when you described a hip drop tackle, it just sounded like every tackle I've ever seen in football. And I know when I played football as a young kid in the neighborhood and I was trying to tackle people that were bigger than me, That's how I was tackling them. I didn't know I was putting their limbs in danger when I was doing it.

But, like, I tend to fall somewhere in the middle. Like, I don't think this is going to ruin the sport. I don't think it's going to fundamentally change the sport necessarily. I think it's going to be a lot like, I think it was like five years ago when they added the leading with the helmet rule. And when they first came out with the language of the rule, if you read it and then you watched a football game that had happened the previous season, you were like, oh, there's going to be 50 penalties. Like, I actually did this exercise. I went through a game, the first half of a game and found like 50 instances of a penalty that could be. called on leading with the helmet. And then in the preseason, they started calling it like that

and people complain. Fans complain, players complained like you said. And then all of a sudden, within like a month within to the season, it stopped. They stopped calling the flags. So I think that's going to happen with the hip drop tackle. I think we're going to learn what it is. I think the extreme cases are going to be brought up and we're going to, you know, analyze them, analyze the video of them, whether it's a penalty or not. And I think there's going to be a better understanding of like the illegal version of a hip drop tackle. And then I think we're going to see, the ones that might get flagged initially start to go away. We're not going to see those flagged.

And then I think it is going to end up like a horse collar situation where we don't really complain about the call anymore. Yeah, this is the sort of thing that I think, right, always ends up like whittling down into some sort of unspoken compromise, some sort of like tacit line in between what we on the field see as a penalty and what the rule book has as a penalty, those two things being quite far apart. The truth's going to come somewhere in the middle.

And that's going to be like very okay in 19 of 20 instances. of the tackle. And then there's going to be a super controversial one that's called to extend a fourth quarter drive that ends up swinging the result. And everyone is going to be posting the screenshot of the rulebook. This happens every time there's a rule thing. People are like, well, if you look in the rule book, it's like, dude, nobody looks at the rule book.

Like, we don't legislate games according to the rule book. That's part of the problem. And so I agree with you. I think this is going to settle into some sort of a very like contentious, but kind of dynamic equilibrium of a truce between like what the players want with the union wants versus what the what the league wants. The two things that really stand in out to be about this that are frustrating, though, is the first thing is that this is going to elicit more fines, right?

We already saw that there was a almost unprecedented level of fines being assessed on Tuesdays and on Wednesdays during the league year last year as a result of like leading with the helmet into contact and unnecessary roughness fines because I almost had flags there. These weren't plays that were flagged. These were plays that happened in the flow of a game that like nobody noticed. And like the broadcast did not comment on. And like the player was not like, oh, is he good going back into the huddle? It kind of just came out of nowhere.

This from Justice Mosquita of Acme Packing Company. The NFL had $7 million of fines in 2021. It had around $20 million in 2023. There were 419 plays that resulted in fines last season. If the NFL has one hip drop, swivel hip drop tackle per game called, which is what they anticipate is what Rich McKay said to reporters today. That means an additional 272 fines on top of that. So firstly, I think we are going to see remarkably more fines on swivel, hip drop tackles.

Dude, I feel so freaking dumb every time I taste swivel, hip drop tackle. I think we're going to see remarkably more fines on swivel, hip drop tackles, and we see penalties. And I think that that hurts players because you have just more money coming out of guys' pockets. And we have guys who are going to be like seventh round picks and special teamers and preseason guys who are not making that much money. And at least just pulling fines out of these guys for doing something that they've been doing for the last 10 years of they've been playing football, eight years they've been playing football. So I think one, that's very frustrating. The second thing that's really frustrating about the swivel, hip drop tackle,

I definitely forget what the other thing that was frustrating was. It was the fines? You got it. I don't remember what it was. It's going to be impossible to legislate. I'm certain I'll remember this 35 minutes into the podcast, and then I'll scream it out randomly while we're talking about wide receiver contract value. We're going to see how this goes.

This is going to be, I think, a big narrative over with the, the course of the offseason. Thought it would be a big narrative a month ago. Got laughed off the podcast. Doesn't matter. All right. That's it from owners meetings for now, unless we want to talk about Antonio Pierce calling himself the guardian at the gate of the

Raiders franchise or Jim Harbaugh calling JJ McCarthy the best quarterback prospect in history. Any interest in those? No, no. Both of those things track. They sound about it. Yeah, it's on character. So we're going to transition out and go into what we were intending to do in the pot all along, which is positional value.

Steve, you first came to me with this idea. and I really liked it. Why was this something you really wanted to talk about at like this stage in the off season? Because like you said, it's been a conversation. Everyone talks about it during free agency. I think it's going to get talked about more when the draft comes and someone drafts the running back in the top 20. I think people are going to complain when Brock Bowers gets drafted, wherever he gets drafted, there's going to be reaction on either side of that debate.

So I think the off season is the perfect time to talk about this. When there isn't any games going on and we can't watch the film, we can't pay attention to that. That's when the nerds can come out and have their little talk. about positional value. That's when I'll allow it. All right. So as per usual, this is just me and Steve getting mad at the nerds who aren't even on the show and don't have an opportunity to defend themselves. We just straw manned him for 45 minutes. I want to do this by ranking the positions from most valuable to least valuable. Obviously, the value of a position, this is a tough thing to kind of nail down. The paradigm that I used for this was kind of, okay, at what position, if I went from an average starter to an elite starter, would I expect to gain the most wins? gain the most games won, right? If I go from an average guard to an elite guard, maybe I win one more game, maybe I don't.

If I go from an average quarterback to an elite quarterback, I expect to win several more games. I think a quarterback can be more valuable than guard in that paradigm. The other one that I used was kind of like if I had to build a team to win the Super Bowl tomorrow and I was allowed to get like, you know, four elite players, three elite players, five elite players, at what positions would I go get those elite players? And everywhere else I have to kind of fill with just like average NFL starters. Where would I want my elite guys to go win the Super Bowl, win a chance? championship, win a playoff game, where I want to build those guys.

That was the paradigm that I used. That about where you were? Yeah, yeah, that's how I did it. And then that's when I, like, first realized the problem with this, this exercise, the one that I suggested is that, one, it's, sometimes it's impossible to separate a player from his unit, like with offensive line. I think it's very hard to say, like, oh, I want to build a right tackle instead of saying, I want to build a really good offensive line.

So that makes things a little harder. And then, two, my answer, at least, would change by. the year. Just how the game evolves dictates how these positions are going to be valued. Right. It's important. Like a cornerback, five years ago, teams were playing man coverage like 50% of the time on third down. So you wanted a man coverage corner. You needed that on third down. Now that percentage has dropped to around like a third of the time, around 33%. Now all of a sudden corner, you don't really need a man cover corner because we're not playing man coverage. We're playing a lot of zone coverage. We're running simulated pressures, running creepers. We're doing all this stuff

on the back end to kind of lessen the value or the importance of one cornerback in the scheme. So I think the value of a cornerback over the last five years has changed dramatically. And you can see that in how we talk about the position and how we talk about the best players at the position. I don't really do it anymore. So it's impossible to have this conversation. I think that's why it's so interesting because it is connected to everything. It's connected to what's happening in the offseason.

Connected to what's happening on the field during the games and how teams are calling offenses and how they're responding with their defensive calls. So I just think it permeates the entire sport. Yeah, and that's a very good point. And you talk about the changing nature of how teams are winning games. There's also at any one fixed point in time, different teams are trying to win games in different ways. There's a lot of ways to skin a cat here in the league, right?

And so when we make a generalization, like these are the most important positions for the league, we are taking an aggregate of a thing that cannot be aggregated, right? The intentions of the 49ers, the way they build their offense, dramatically different than the intentions of the Ravens of the way they build their offense, different defensive systems.

You talk about man's own coverage. You talk about how teams run their fronts, pass rushes, like, you know, what they ask their linebackers to do in coverage versus fitting the run. Like there's just, there's so many different skill sets. It's really true on the defense side of the ball,

but it's also true offensively. There's so many different skill sets that can work, depending on the scheme, such that making these generalizations is irresponsible, impossible, and inaccurate. With that said, let's rank some positions by value.

I have quarterback up top as a tier onto its own. I'm imagining you have the same. Yes. Yeah. All right. So with that said, put off to the side, second most valuable position. We're going to kind of just go kind of position by position here.

And if you and I have like a big disagreement, we'll talk about it. Or if we have like a clear agreement on something, we'll talk about that as well. For me, the second most viable position is edge rusher. That's where I think if I have an elite quarterback and then you're giving me one more elite position to spend on, I want an elite pass rusher off the outside. What did you have? I have edge rusher as well. And my reasoning is that it allows you to do certain things on defense that you couldn't do without an elite edge rusher.

And I think it's one of those positions where obviously like when you look at a team's group of pass rushers, you separate, you don't separate within positions. You're like, oh, the Eagles have a good pass rush. They have a good interior line. They have good edges and stuff like that. But I think like a singular edge can be a game changing player and a game wrecking player. And I think we've seen defensive tackles have that same effect, just not to the same degree. that's why I have them at number one because I think they're the position

that affects the quarterback our number one group they affect them the most and they can do it within a matter of seconds two seconds, three seconds whereas a cornerback a lot has to go right for a cornerback to be able to make a play

that affects the quarterback. Yeah, I think a good like just purely logical way of thinking about it is right like what is more valuable passing or running? It's passing. Passing is more explosive, it's more dangerous.

It results in more points. So as a defense, I want to take away your passing. That's the first thing that I want to hit. It's the first thing I want to limit. In the passing game, I only am certain of where the ball is going to be at one point. And it's when the quarterback is in the pocket. Like when it comes to distributing the ball, I'm throwing in the passing game, they can go to a number of different areas on the field and a number of different receivers. Right. I am uncertain

of, okay, like, obviously, Justin Jefferson is going to get some targets, but I don't know how many. And I also don't know to which area of the field. And so those guys who are responsible for covering Justin Jefferson or covering areas of the field, they're easier to avoid. There's just more optionality, though. There's more randomness. I know the quarterback's getting the ball in the pocket. I know that at the beginning of the passing play, I know where the ball is going to be. It's going to be held by the quarterback, and I know where that guy is.

The dude who beats him is the edge rusher. The weak point, the point that I know in the passing game that I can attack is the quarterback in the pocket, and the guy need to do that is the pass rusher, is the edge rusher. So that's why I think the edge rusher has more value than the cornerback does. We can also start talking about offensive tackle here, right? because okay, he's the guy who stops the edge rusher, right? And so that makes his position very important. You can have a really good offensive tackle,

so have a terrible passing game. He doesn't have enough control over the passing game, as the quarterback does. So I want to be able to affect the quarterback. He's the guy who has the most impact over the passing game, and I feel like I can do that with the edge rusher. Now, I will say, because I felt good about having edge up here, and I'm glad you had to hear too.

I can't get some of those Cowboys games out of my head when talking about this, where Michael Parsons is on defense and it's just ending the game with one tackle, and it's because the offense had so much designed into them, so much built into them game plan-wise, to avoid that dude to make his life, just make his impact negligible,

to just take him out of place. You see Nick Bosa get treated this way quite a bit with the 49ers as well, running misdirection plays and pitching the ball to the outside, running bootlegs and running motion, and leaving him unblocked with the intent of just manipulating him. Wherever he doesn't go is where I'm going to go put the ball, right? It's RPO's, it's read-option stuff, it's bubble screens, It's just ways to say, hey, we can't block you,

so we're just going to avoid you and play against the other 10 guys. That worries me a little bit in terms of edge rusher value, but here's the thing. You can also do that to a corner. You can do much the same thing to a cornerback. They have an elite corner on one side and not a great guy on the other side, you can avoid him too. Yeah, and the other thing that gave me pause about putting them second

is the emergence or the growing popularity of like simulated pressures and creeper pressures. And the fact that we have seen smart teams, namely the Baltimore Ravens, who I would argue are maybe the smartest team in terms of process in building their roster, we've seen them neglect this position. We've seen them kind of,

they've used the draft to find players they can develop, but once they develop them, they get to their second contract, they let them walk for a comp pick and they restart the cycle. And I do think that, I think that does weigh on my mind when I try to rank these positions.

But what ultimately led me to ranking edge rush rush second was the fact that they have to do the stuff they have to do to make up for the fact they don't have edge rush. They have to do simulated pressures. They have to disguise. They have to line up in too high, rotate it into one high after the snap. They have to have a linebacker like Roquan Smith, who they pay a lot of money. They have to do so much stuff to work around the fact that they don't have edge rushers where they're saving a bunch of money.

But they kind of lose that money when they invests. in an off-the-ball linebacker, when they draft a safety in the top 15, when they have to pay Marlon Humphrey and they have to bring in all these corners every year to keep this defense together, when they have to find a Mike McDonald for it to all work, because it didn't work with Wink Martindale. So I think the Ravens are more of an exception to the rule. And I think what you realize is that defense and calling defense is just a lot easier when you have those guys.

And that's the thing you don't have to worry about is edge rush. You don't have to do all this stuff. And it's just makes it easier. Yeah. It's all just the value of knowing when to Zigg and knowing when to Zag, right? Because one of the reasons why the Ravens pressure packages and the way they get pressure without having elite edge rushers, one is Justin Medibuki, defensive tackle, we're going to get to him in a little bit. But the second thing is NFL offenses, I think spend a lot more time, offensive coaches thinking about, okay, when I go up against an elite edge rusher, here's how I'm going to negate the guy, here's how I'm going to counter the guy. I don't think that they spend as much time thinking, okay, when I go against the team with Judeavian clown and Kyle Van Noi that still gets great pressure on me. Like, how, how, that, that's a harder problem to solve just because I've spent less time on it, right? Like, I, the, the, the, everybody's kind of got their book, their bag of avoiding the elite

edge rusher. It's a lot harder to be like, all right, avoid the elite defensive tackle and then deal with the slot pressures and then deal with the, the third down looks, like just the multiplicity of it. Like, like, teams are just less prepared for that. And so, because edge rusher is so valuable, offensive, offensive coaches are preparing for that position. And then accordingly, you, as the defensive coach, when you present a great defense

without edge rushers, they just don't have as much in their bag to account for that. Does that make sense? Yeah, makes sense. Yeah. All right. So edge two for both of us. I think this is where we're going to split because you told me a little bit of how you're viewing offensive line.

I still have offensive tackle up here. I think that you have seen elite offensive tackles become the foundational pieces of running games and then also like enormous saviors to their passing game over the last like 10, 15 years. I think about what Trent William. is meant to the 49ers, how well they run the ball off of him. You think about what Tyrant Smith has been at left tackle for the Cowboys at Pass Protection for a decade.

You think about what Lane Johnson has been for the Eagles. These are players who just solve one side of the line for their respective teams. They solve half of it in pass protection. They just do not give up sacks. They rarely give up pressures. You can just go to sleep feeling like you've won that one-on-one. It's a critical one-on-one, as we just discussed. And then they also become like keystones of the running game, right?

Again, I'm thinking about the way that Trent Williams is weaponized, by San Francisco. Like, they have built some of the running game identity off the fact that they have a Trent Williams and he can do things that you can't. So I still put offensive tackle up here. I also do think that when you start to talk about some of the other positions that could be here, cornerback being one of them, wide receiver being one of them, defensive tackle being another one of them, there is a scarcity at offensive tackle.

We haven't really talked about scarcity yet too much. But there's a scarcity at offensive tackle that inclines me to put it a little bit higher, right? Where it's just like, hey, like, I think the 20th best wide receiver in the league can, like, take over a game, right? like Devante Smith, like T. Higgins, like, Nigo Collins. These guys can just like dominate out of nowhere, right? Because there's just so many wide receivers.

The 20th best offensive tackle is like a problem. Like if you have a tremendous office to tackle, you have an issue on your line, right? The scarcity also makes me like if I want to get an elite player, that's still where I want to go to go get that guy. To this point, there was an interesting thread, released Jason Fitzgerald of Over the Cap, put it out a couple of weeks ago where he was showing the growth in salaries at positions over the last 10.

10 years relative to the salary cap and the position that has grown the most in the last 10 years in terms of how much the top contracts have been paid has been right tackle. It's been faster than quarterback. Right tackle growth of 191% relative to 155% at quarterback in terms of the top five contracts at that position. You are seeing teams over the last 10 years pay right tackles more money than any other position in the league relative where they were 10 years ago. And so to me, tackle still belongs up here. I have it third. What about you? So, well, let me ask this question. Would you separate, if you could separate right tackle and left tackle, would they be separated on your ranking list?

Or would they just be neck and neck? I think they, I think like inherently they are because, like I said, it's really hard to aggregate NFL teams. One thing that we can aggregate is that most quarterbacks are right-handed, which means the left tackle is going to be more valuable than the right tackle in the aggregate. So I think you would split it so you could put left tackle over right tackle. But if you're asking me to split, I might literally list it as quarterback one, edge two. and then left tackle three, right tackle four. Like I still feel like I'm willing to put offensive tackle as a total that high. Yeah, and I guess the league hasn't quite caught up to that.

Obviously, the gap between those two positions and how they get paid is shrinking. But at the moment, like, left tackles almost average double the salary of right tackle. So the league still kind of thinks that. But here's my thing. I wouldn't just group the tackles together. I would group the whole offensive line. And that's why I would put. Walk me through this.

Because I think, like, I would just want to build a good offensive line. And I think we've seen in this league over the past couple of years that there are many different ways of building a good offensive line. The chiefs are a good example of this. The chiefs have obviously invested in their tackle position, but it isn't where they've wanted it to be. Meanwhile, they've had an elite core on their offensive line in the interior of their offensive line.

And I think that's been one of the reasons they've been able to evolve so much. We tend to give all that credit to Patrick Mahomes. We're like, oh, he's checking the ball down more. Oh, they brought in Isaiah Pacheco. He's a tough runner. But, like, really, they just got a better on the interior of the offensive line. Like, when you go back a couple of years to 2019, when they were still winning the Super Bowl, they didn't have that.

They didn't have that offensive line, that interior offensive line. Their interior offensive line was actually kind of weak. Their stars were Eric Fisher and Mitchell Schwartz at the tackle positions. And their offensive line was a way bigger problem than it is now. Obviously, like, you could use the Bucks game as an example, but that's a bad example because they were hurt. But even before that, they had problems protecting Patrick Mahomes. Now we're not really seeing that, and they haven't found, like, answers at tackle. That's still a position they need to address.

Donovan Smith wasn't, like, the best player this year. I left tackle. They obviously invested a lot of money in him. They let Orlando Brown Jr. leave the offseason before that. And then let's bring up other examples. Like, for example, the Philadelphia Eagles, who obviously had good tackle play, but the star of that show was Jason Kelsey.

He proved that you could build a running game around a set. He proved that you can weaponize the center. And then we've seen other positions or other teams kind of build in a similar form. We've seen Quentin Nelson be the focal point of the Colts run game in the past, where they would pull him outside of the tackle a bunch. I think we're seeing in Detroit right now where we're seeing a right tackle become the focal point of that offensive line in Penae Sewell. Right.

I just think there are so many different ways to build a good offensive line and that we've seen bad offensive lines with good tackle play. we've seen good offensive lines with bad tackle play that I don't think there's any right answer. And if you were asking me to kind of like break up these positions and rank offensive tackles, rank interior guards, rank centers on their own, I think I would put wide receiver over all of them because I've never seen an offensive lineman affect the spacing of a game like I've seen many wide receivers do over the last couple years. So my choice for number three is receiver. I want to get to receiver because a receiver I think is the most challenging to rank just in general.

on the offensive line play. Let's wipe away like, I think you're right to say that you can build a running game around any guy. When you have an elite guy, you can be like, all right, our running game is predicated on having Jason Kelsey, having Quentin Nelson, having Pennies,

or having Trent Williams. Like at any position, you can build the running game around the fact that that dude exists. So I'll, I will give you that. In pass protection, I tell you that you have to, you're playing the Cleveland rounds.

You're playing like a Jim Schwartz defense, right? It's just four down guys and they are, you know, all coming at your quarterback, bananas. You have to hide, one dude in past production. You have to hide out. You have your, your, your, your, your,

OT3 is in. I left or right, you pick, or your OT3 is in, your third guard is in. Who's going to be harder for you to hide in past production? Your tackle or your guard? My tackle. Yeah. And that's the difference to me, is that like, I just, there are, again, like, I talked about a little bit of, like, accounting for an elite edge rusher. Whenever I start thinking about this, I start thinking about, okay, what have I seen teams work around? What have I seen teams, like, account for? Because inevitably when you build a team, You're going to have positions that are like, you know, stopgap veterans, you know, minimum contract for agent guys, you know, third round picks. You're going to have positions where you have to play like suboptimal dudes.

And I've just seen so many teams so successfully work around having like average guards. And even like center is a little bit different because I do think having like a bad center can just like, okay, your snap suck, your timing suck, your protection suck. Like center is if you have a below average guy that can present itself as an issue in like a lot of the operations perspective. but in general, like, the opposite of tackles are so much more frequently playing one-on-one ball. And so frequently the guards and centers are playing three over two. And it just, the numerical advantage, it's just so much easier to hide average dudes there, in my opinion. Well, here's my question. You gave me that scenario.

What down is it in this scenario where I'm trying to hide? What down is it? That matters, though. Like, if it's third and seven, yes, I'm worried about my left tackle. When it's first down and I can run play action, I can run a reverse or I can run a screen pass. I don't have to. If I could just run it up the middle. and guarantee myself getting four and a half yards every play.

I don't, I can avoid those situations, and I think it's easier to avoid those situations. When you just have, when you have, you have four and a half yards on a carry? If I have Jason Kelsey and two Pro Bowl guards next to him, then yes, I am. But, like, my answer is, I'm just going to chip the defensive end and send the running back out into the flat after he does it.

Like, there are answers to these questions. Like, usually. But those answers cost you ineligible. That my answers at Guard and Center don't cost me ineligible. Well, that running back was running to the flat whether he was chipping Miles Garrett or not. And he was going to be an option later in the route, whether he ran to the flat bass or he chipped Miles Garrett before he did it. We're not throwing a check down on third down anyway. So I'm not concerned about what the running back is doing.

I don't think chipping is as free as you think it is. I've seen a chip mess up an offensive tackle plenty of times. Yeah, that's true. But I'm just saying there are ways to work around this schematically. And I don't think you can replicate that without talent at receiver. I think that's the one thing we've seen with the offense is over the past couple years is when you don't have that talent that forces you to make changes on the back end becomes a lot easier to rush the past.

Yeah. Now, okay, last thing on offensive line and then we're going to go to receiver. I do think that for as much as you say right, it's a, you know, you chip help and you can play action, you can account for the tackle. I can follow the money. I can follow the draft capital. and I can also see what teams do with tweeners, right? I can see what teams do with Elijah Vera Tucker and with Rayshon's later.

Faratka is actually a bad example because they wanted him to be a guard when they got him there. But when you have guys who have positional versatility, they play those dudes first to tackle. You let him fail at tackle and then you move him into guard because you want to see, all right, if he can be a tackle, I think that could be a lot more valuable to us. I think teams are telling us that they still feel like tackles are rare things and more valuable things. We're going to go to break. We're going to make money because companies are going to advertise to you. we're going to come back to talk receivers.

So I have receivers at four. You have receivers at three. You, I think, you've brushed up against the case a couple of times here, but you can make it emphatically now, you know, pole to pole. Why for you is wide receiver, third most valuable position on the field? There are a lot of reasons, but I think the biggest reason is how they dictate defensive space, which I think is the one thing we overlook when we talk about mostly anything. Like, this can apply to how we evaluate quarterbacks.

It can apply to how we talk about the importance of the run game and the value of running back. Like, usually when we discuss the value of a player to their offense, we kind of sometimes we talk about in terms of gravity, like, especially with a receiver. Like, do they command safety help? Or with their running back, do they command an extra defender in the box? I think that the talk about defenders in the box and the run game, like, that's such a tough conversation to have because then you have to get into like how teams line up, their fronts. what kind of formations they're using, what kind of backfield sets they're using. But with receivers, it's a lot easier.

It's like, we put this star dude out there on the perimeter. Do you put another player out there, or do you guard him with one? And the answer to that question dictates what you can do in coverage elsewhere on the field. So I think a wide receiver more so than any other position on the field outside of quarterback dictates what the defense does. And I think that we've seen over the past couple of years that passing against defenses that are selling out against a thing that isn't the past game, like whether it's we're going to load the box,

or we're going to play five defenders on the, or five or six defenders on the line of scrimmings to stop the run game, or it's we're going to put a safety over the top to make sure that Jamar Chase doesn't beat us. Like, we see those changes directly. And I think those have the biggest effect on game plans. I think those have the biggest effect on down-to-down play calling. And I think they have the biggest effect on third-down success.

Because in the run game, the better you do on first and second down, the better you're going to do on third down, the more dudes you have that you can throw to in passing situations, the better you're going to do in passing situations. So I would say that wide receivers, the reason why I have them third is because they affect the game the most, and it's the easiest to put a number on how they affect the game.

You could see how teams are playing coverage against them. You can see if teams are doubling them. And I think that's a direct result of wide receiver talent, whereas a running back, it could be a multitude of things. Like you never see, I'm trying to think of a good example, of a team that has good receivers but not a great, like the Packers, they have multiple good receivers, but you can't double any of them. And you never see the Packers have a receiver get doubled in certain situations. Whereas like if the Packers running game is working, they are going to add

an extra guy to the box. So I think they're the one position that can dictate the terms for the defense outside of the quarterback. And that's why I haven't. Yeah. So I largely agree with you. Let me devil's advocate here for a second. Are there not like, aren't there a lot? Aren't there a lot of ways that I offensively can dictate what you do defensively. Like defensive is inherently a reactive position, right? I can just walk out and be like, all right, I'm going under center, multiple tight ends. I'm putting two backs in the backfield. Like, I just dictate a lot just by personnel formation as to how you can line up and what

you can call accordingly, right? Like the second I force you to take a fifth defensive back off the field and put the third lineback or put the fifth defense alignment on the field, your coverage menu just got a lot more limited, right? Can't I, okay, I'm running 11 personnel, I'm running my traditional sets, but I, I, I just got to put speed on the field. I got to get me a Marquis Brown and stick them on the field.

And now all of a sudden I'm going to dictate a little bit about what sort of coverage you want to run and where you want to put your deep half safety. Just by having an average speed receiver. Markies Brown is available for $7 million on one year deal, right? Like that's like, you know, that's an average wide receiver in the league right now.

So aren't there like, don't I have a lot more ways to dictate on offense such that like, sure, having a lead receiver allows you to dictate, but I don't need an elite receiver to dictate. I can do other stuff to dictate. Yeah, but then you have to invest in other things. that, in going back to the positional value discussion, like positions that you don't necessarily want to invest and you have to have a bunch of big tight ends to be able to block and to be able to

not just be a threat to defenses, but to be a viable threat. Like if I put three bad tight ends on the field that can't run block, the defense isn't going to care. They're going to just play nickel the whole time. I don't think you can replicate with that receiver. You use Hollywood Brown as the example. Like, he hasn't been on teams for the past five years and hasn't had that effect on teams. Like, he didn't have that effect for Arizona last year. He never really had that. effect for Baltimore. In theory, he did. He was supposed to be the guy that kind of took pressure off the run game in Lamar Jackson, but it never happened. You know, why? Because Marquis Brown, yeah, he runs like a 4-2, but he's also 5-10, 160 pounds, and he can't make contested catches. Like, you need a

contested catches and a guy who isn't built like a middle school. Like, you need all these things. And then he needs to be able to run, like, routes from the slot, routes from the outside. He needs to be able to be able to be able to find boys and zone. I'm not saying that Hollywood Brown does when an elite receiver does. I'm saying just once I put speed on the field, right? If I walk out, like, if I walk out on trips and I've got speed at three, you know the defense is calling out, like, speed at three, speed at three. Like, you know that they're alerting to certain plays and certain looks. And that speed could be anybody, right?

That could be Khalif Raymond. It could be Darius Slayton, right? You should be anybody who's just, like, fast, that's going to change defensive geometry. What I'm saying is, like, non-elite receivers, non-true wide receiver ones, can have field-adjusting effects, just as elite receivers do. Like, not the exact same.

Like, how can... Like, how can... What effect has penesuel ever had in terms of spacing on a defense, individually? Probably none. I mean, maybe... I mean, the only thing I think that it would impact is kind of where I set my pressures up from, right? It would kind of be like, all right, if I'm going up against the lines, and, like, lines...

Like, Taylor Decker is a good left tackle, so lines maybe, like, aren't, like, the best... Like, let's do, like, the 49ers. Trent Williams at left tackle. Yeah. Col and McKiv is at right tackle, right? Big difference between the two. If I'm going to set up my pressure look on third and eight, you know I want to come off my left, they're right.

Like, I'm trying defensively, I'm trying to write. I will just, I will put my second best edge rusher opposite Trent Williams and say, do your best to win a one-on-one tiger, you know, laying integrity, I believe in you. And then I put my best guy on the left, and I'm putting a linebacker walked up to the B-gap, I'm a nickel coming off the D-gap, and I'm trying to firstly facilitate and make sure I get the one-on-one

between the right tackle and my elite edge-rusher. Or I'm trying to throw different bodies at him and make him think and make him adjust on the fly. And so, like, I would say that's, that's how, like, having an elite tackle kind of affects space is just, it's going to, I think it's easier predict where the defense is going to send blitzes from. I don't think that, quote, like, this player manipulates space,

this player changes gravity, is a perfect proxy for this player is premium. This player plays an elite position, right? I think, like, that assumption that you're making, I'm like, kind of there. I'm not 100% there. But, yeah, it's based on the idea that they affect the game in tangible ways that we can recognize where we don't have to have these theories. And like the way you just explained what you would do against, you know, the 49ers,

you were using a lot of directions that you didn't have to change. You're like, yeah, I could set it off the right side instead of the left side. You know what you can't do that with? A receiver, because Devonte Adam could line up on the right side. You can line up on the left side. He can line up in the backfield. Like he changes a receiver like that. Like even a player like Debo Samuel, who's not, and I don't want to get into an argument,

who's not a top 10 receiver. Who's not a guy, you just go, hey, go out there and line up and get a bucket for on third and seven. So Devo Samuel has the same impact that all of your purported top 10 receivers do. How interesting. How curious. Not on third down. Not on third down on first and second down.

You didn't let me finish my thought. Because you can line up in the backfield. You can be a running back. You can dictate personnel. Like that will never change depending on like who the right tackle is. Like you said, offenses can do a lot to dictate the space on the field. I could put two tight ends on the field. And a defense is going to match with like eight guys in the box,

whether Penae Sewell's your right tackle or like it's some third stringer instead. That's not true with receivers. Receivers is the one like you need talent. You just need. There's no way to fake talent at receiver. I've never seen it done without having like the best offensive line you ever seen. And that's why if you were to allow me to group all offensive linemen, shit, I might put them ahead of quarterback on this list because I think it's increasingly becoming an offensive

line league. But if I'm breaking them down into tackle, guard and center, wide receivers going ahead of them. Yeah. Now, I will say that I do think that a key factor here is that I feel two tackles. I feel two edge rushers. I filled one quarterback. I feel two defensive tackles, right? I feel two corners usually. I feel three receivers on average, right? Like, your average team is going to be an 11 personnel. And so, and I said two corners, like, for me, like slots, that's a little bit of a different position. Think about outside corner versus the slot. In general, I'm feeling three receivers. So accordingly, like, I think you can get away with like,

on your roster having one above average tackle and one average tackle. All right. Like that's not amazing, but it's fine. If you field a team that your receiver room is one above average guy, one average guy, and then the rest is whatever, you're going to lose games.

You're going to die. Just because of the amount, you have even a third player on the field. So there's just, there's so many good players. They are involved in so many reps. It is so valuable to have multiple good ones and not just have the issue where you have one elite guy and he's changing coverage,

but then nobody else can take an account for it. Like when you have those three, players on the field, you really desperately need to have some good receivers on the field. If you're going to play three dudes and all of them are going to be average, I figure up the creep without a paddle a little bit. So receivers, four for me, it's three for you. I think that that wide receiver offensive tackle problem is really quite the fascinating one. I do think that like building a Super Bowl contender, give me elite receivers over elite tackles. Building a team for like a rookie quarterback, give me elite tackles over elite receivers, right? Again, like, that's why a lot

of these generalizations and doing this for every team at any moment. time is challenging. Next two positions for me, because they're in a tier above the rest, and I imagine it's the same for you, are going to be cornerback and defensive tackle. Are those in your next two? Yes. Yes. I have them in that order.

You? Yeah, I do. Yeah. So this is a little bit similar to offensive tackle and wide receiver, where the same side of the ball for corner and defensive tackle. I sure want a good one at both spots. I think that you have the ability to, like, take over a game, kind of, do it. define your unit.

Define you'd be a defining player of your franchise. Patrick Sertan for the Denver Broncos. I think about Justin Madibuki for the Baltimore Ravens, right? What Aaron Donald has been for the Rams. Like you can be the player of your unit. That is the reason your unit works. And when you play either one of these positions.

Corner is the position that I think experiences the most, like kind of vacillations in terms of how people think about the elite play. I remember like in the late 2010s, there was the coverage over pass rush movement, right? where it was just like, you know, all the nerves, but like, listen, like, you got to have coverage over past rush, like, have elite corners over elite edge rush to play. Like, that's the best way to do it. And then, like, five years later, I see people with like, listen, corner's not a premium position.

Like, corner value is going down, right? I've thought corner is the one that jumps up and down on this list the most, at least over the last, like, five or ten years. The reality of that of corner play, and I think the reason why that you see a move like that, is that it is extremely fickle. It is very fragile. Regular listeners to the show will know that one of Shield's great. adages of team building is that you just don't pay a corner who's over 30. The shelf life on these guys is just shorter than it is in other positions. You start to lose the quick twitch when you ate 31,

32, ballgame, it's over. You are a safety dude. You are Pat Pete in it back there. Like it's just, you are guessing at routes. Like that you do not have a shot. And so I think the shelf life is shorter at this position. And then I think good play is harder to grasp at this position. The best corner play denies routes. It denies targets. It doesn't get in involved in the play at all, right? And accordingly, like, metrics struggle to catch elite cornerback play because, oh, we're using like separation metrics, separation when targeted, targets denied, like, okay, was he really in the concept, was he acting the concept, like the caliber of receiver you're going against, what's the safety I look like, what's the leverage look like,

like it is just such an unbelievably reactive position to context. What's the play call who's you playing against? What's the down's the distance? And also, in a successful play, there's no stat at the end. There's no result, right? Like, at people, is usually a play that was imperfect for a corner because a target was invited. The quarterback was willing to throw it that direction. And so it's a very, very challenging position to capture. Accordingly, you have a player like Ligerius Sneed who just had an unbelievable season at corner, who like a year previous, every chiefs fan in the world would have told you.

He gets so many penalties, he's too grabby. And people are still talking about the penalties now. You're trying to have a large sample size. but just the margins, the difference between having like a fine season and having an elite season are just razor thin at the position because of how fragile it is. So it as a position in real time is very difficult to nail down. From this vantage point we have now, late March, haven't seen any games last month and a half talking about positional value. There is no doubt that having an elite corner is great.

Just line a guy up against the wide receiver one and go to bed at night? You've just solved such a problem. What a relief you can play man coverage? Man coverage is so easy to call. You don't have to check it at the line. You have to adjust it to motion. You just line dudes up. It's amazing.

Elite corner is the best thing in the world. Who is that guy? Don't ask me. I don't freaking know. I can't find him, but I know that I want one. And that's why for me, corner comes in at five on this list,

below wide receiver, above defensive tackle. Okay, I was actually, I actually lied earlier. I have interior defensive line at headquarters. Oh, yeah? You're kind of feeling it out on the fly? Yeah, no, no.

I just read my list wrong. The reason. Yeah. Bad preparation. But no, the reason why I think that is because of what we've learned, quote, unquote, like I feel like the nerds have kind of like stolen the fact that interior defensive lines matters now, even though that was a thing that the film guys have been saying since the dawn of time.

But anyway, what they allow you to do on the back end of defense just makes cornerbacks jobs easier. Like I said earlier, we're playing less man coverage than we did. This idea that you have, this dream you have of playing man coverage. with no safety help over the top. It's a dream because it doesn't exist. Nobody does it anymore. There are no lockdown corners anymore.

Dorel Rivas is not walking through that door. Like, Nate, who's the top quarterback in the league right now? Are you saying corner or quarter? Corner. Okay, it's very challenging to hear. Surstant? Yeah, I guess. But like, there's not a debate about it anymore.

If I asked you this 10 years ago, you would have had a take and you would have been very upset if I had a different take from you. Because people were arguing about Richard Sherman. They were arguing about Patrick Peterson. They're arguing about Revis. And now it feels like the title for cornerback one is like nobody cares anymore because everyone's playing zone and we don't really see it. Like Sauce Gardner has an argument for being the best cornerback in the league and he barely

plays man coverage. And he barely has to. I find the idea that I could have any take as to who's the best in a position and no one will get mad to be hilarious. How are you of all people being like people will get mad about this take on the internet? You're the king of people. People are mad about me at this take on the internet. I know and I won't get mad.

That's why I'm using myself as a proxy. I'm the person that I'm talking about. I'm going to get an at from at Sauce New York 2K25 after this pod comes out. It's just like, you write, Patrick Stato, but I'm sorry. It's going to have like past breakup stats

that I said I didn't care about already. Like it's going to be a nightmare. It's going to be terrible. But like the thing that we kind of haven't covered when we've covered the too high revolution, so to speak, over the past couple years, like that's all we talk about,

oh, they're playing two safeties. Now there's two safeties back deep. We haven't talked about how they're able to do that a lot. And the reason they're able to do that is because of how defenses are playing up front. Like, they have these defensive linements who can take a gap and a half at the same time. They can take two gaps sometimes. And in the past, like, that's not what we value. We valued defensive ends and three texts that could pin their ears back and rush the passer and get into gaps in a hurry and get in the backfield in a hurry. And now that's kind of changed.

And that's why I think defensive tackle has kind of changed because you still have those guys, like Aaron Donald, who's obviously retired. But you have the, like these interior pass rushers who obviously affect the game, but now we're coming to appreciate the early down guys, the gap stuffers, the gap eaters, who allow cornerbacks to not play man coverage anymore. Now they can play zone without worrying about being left on an island. Okay, the wide receiver offensive line one,

I kind of like agreed enough with you, thought it was close enough, whatever. This one I disagree with you on. I don't think the fact that we, we as coaches, are using interior defensive linemen more creatively. and we as a football viewing public are coming to appreciate that creativity and appreciate the value of it changes the fact that an elite corner solves 19 problems for you every day when you have a guy who you feel comfortable he can land up against their wide receiver one and i will get away from that exchange at least at neutral at least at like all right like you know Jefferson went six for 84 and one on me but like whatever like you know okay he went like seven for 79 on me great like fine the fact like and that's not even like when he's against him 100

of the time. And in general, I keep him at like a quieter day. That solution is dramatically more valuable, in my opinion, than the fact that on the chalkboard in August, I can be like, oh, I can run this package and do this and then play this zone coverage, get these bodies over that body because I have this defensive tackle play gap and a half. Because I acknowledge what you're saying in that the emergence of a gap and a half, the emergence of elite defensive tackles and creativity in the running game allows for more zone coverage, takes way the explosive plays, area is pretend it's going down, scores is going down. I acknowledge that arc, that connection for sure.

I do not think 100% of the value for that belongs to a defensive tackle. Let's talk about linebackers. Let's talk about safety's fit in the box. Let's talk about two gap and edge players. Talk about the defense of coordinators. That's not all the defensive tackles. They don't get all the credit for that versus when I put AJ Terrell up against Mike Thomas. Well, Mike Thomas, a couple years ago.

Crystal Lobby. And he wins the Crystal Lobby matchup for four quarters. That is just neat, cut, tidy, and dry. 100% AJ Terrell. Congratulations. You're the man. Yeah. What is AJ Terrell doing for you on?

first and second down. Winning the Chrysalave matchup. Teams pass it on first down, Steve. They do this, dude. I know you want to just run out and get a second and six every time, but teams are throwing it. I know, but the defensive tackle, the guy that can do both,

the guy that can be an impact player on three downs, he can give you what that edge rusher that you claim is the second most valuable position in the sport. He can give you what that guy gives you, but he can also give you this other... How many double-digit defensive tackles are in the league? I mean, the elite ones can. But only a few.

Like, what is there, three? Right, it's going to be Aaron Donald, who's not in the league anymore. It doesn't exist anymore. Chris Jones. Christian-Madibu- Got you close this year, Maddabuque. So Madabuki had 13 this year. Okay, so like, all right, Zach Seeler had 10.

Feeling good about having... So I'm giving you a choice right now. You get Dexter Lawrence to build your defensive line around. Or you get Patrick Sertan to build your... Sertan! Sertan! by a mile, brother? I disagree.

I don't know how else to put it. I think they affect every down in ways that cornerbacks just can't. You have to hide cornerbacks in the run game. If you don't hide cornerbacks in the run game, you're getting screwed. You're getting ran all over. If you've, like, go ahead. So, okay, blindly, I have not looked at this. I would take, so let's do this.

The fifth highest paid defensive tackle by average annual value and the fifth highest played cornerback by average annual value. I would take the cornerback. you would take the defensive tackle, correct? In 2024, yes. Okay, so right now, the fifth highest paid defensive tackle by average annual value is loading.

Jeffrey Simmons, making 23-5, all right? I'm fine with that. You get Jeffrey Simmons. Great player. Love with Jeffrey Simmons. I get... Frank, I got Trevondigs. Nice.

He's off injury. He's off injury. Okay. Sims also. Okay, who's number six? Six. is is Sneed on the tag. The Chiefs.

Or no, actually, no, it's Sneed on 19 per. Sneed on 19, 19 per. Or four is Marlon Humphrey at 195. See, I'll take Sneer or Humphrey before I'll take Jeffrey Simmons. Ah, see, I just. Yeah. Humphrey actually getting a little bit up there, but still. I don't think that exercise worked out like you thought it would work out.

I was hoping and praying that somehow J.C. Jackson was still up there, and that would be the name you landed on. The fact that it landed on Diggs is annoyed, just because Diggs is obviously coming off of the intro. but the peak season, and this goes back to cornerback fragility, the peak season of digs, right? You know, defense of the year candidate digs up against the peak season. Don't do this.

Don't do this. I will call up Deante Lee right now if you try to do this. It was a little bit fraudulent in terms of the statistical output. However, it was a very, very, very good season. He also gave up like a thousand yards. Let's mention that. Go ahead, Sneed, dude. I need Sneed to make $400,000 for a year.

You know, we've landed on Sneed. I feel good. I feel good about elite corner. I do. I think that, again, like, I think you're giving too much credit to elite defensive tackles for the impact that they have in the other 10 positions on the field relative to corner.

Like, you talk about wide receiver affecting the geometry of the defense. Having an elite corner affecting the geometry of the other side of the field, I get to play 6 over 4 on the back side. Like, come on, that's good geometry right there. That is, but like you said, this guy, this corner that you're talking about, he doesn't exist.

No team plays a corner like this. had a defensive tackle as the same impact to the past rushers and edge rusher there's three dudes or double-tid sacks he doesn't exist either

they funnel the quarterback to the edge oh yeah hidden sack you know how you beat Tom Brady interior pressure now you're giving me agent talk

now you're like listen he had five and a half sacks but he was responsible four of this guys two of that guys clean up sack yeah all right

now I'm getting agent's big from you who affected the Dolphins defense more last year the cornerbacks Jaylon and Howard and Howard

or Seeler and Wilkins That was the key to the defense. It wasn't a very good defense. But they were the heart and soul of the defense, so they were the reason the defense was good when it was good. So you're asking me, who affected the team more? Two players in their prime or two players out of their prime?

Tough question. It's a hard one now. Let me think about it. How old is Howard? He's like 27. Okay, yeah, but he also like is very clearly chalked in terms of health. Everybody knows that. Javier age.

I want to say it's 29? But the reason why I brought the dolphin. The shield rule, all quarters over 30. Done. Don't count. He's been done for. since he was 28. But the reason why I brought it to the Dolphins is because the Dolphins

quarterbacks had a lot to say about Vic Fangio and how he was using him. So like a coach can waste a good cornerback group. A coach can't waste Aaron Donald. It's impossible to waste Aaron Donald. Trust me, Greg Williams tried. I'll be, I would, so Donald, yes, I will give you. I think that Dexter Lawrence would have something to say about being wasted over his first couple of years there with the New York Giants.

All right. I want to move on to the later positions here. We have five left for me, which is interior offensive linemen, linebacker safety, tight end and running back. This is where it starts to get like a little bit shrug your shoulders. I definitely think that there's a clear like bottom,

but this like second to bottom tier is tough for me to suss out. I have a go guard, linebacker and safety. And I think that the reason why I have that order is just firstly like, guard is a tricky one. I think that I obviously like, lower on guards than Stephen is. Stephen is his office alignment totality argument. I think you've made a good point to how like having an elite guard can affect your running game. You can kind of build your

offense and your identity around having that player. I do think that just like when you have above average to great starters at any position on the offensive line. It's just such a again, you sleep easy at night. It gives you the ability like you know, you get that across the board, right? You get multiple elite players at the spot. Then you can really actually pass protect with five. Let's get five into the concept. All the best offenses are able to do this. And so I have guard up there. Linebacker and safety, man. These two are really weird. Because if you have an elite linebacker, dude,

you get away with a lot. Right? Like, you've been talking a lot that we're playing more zone. And, you know, and everybody talking about, oh, we're playing more too high across the league. But if you want to play more zone and more too high, you know, you need a backer who can cover. And there's about four of them, right? And ask the

San Francisco 49ers just how nice it is to have Fred Warner on that team. Ask the Baltimore Ravens just how much Roquant Smith has mattered in that trade. for them. Levante David, DeMario Davis, getting a little bit old, long in the tooth. And man, ask those prime bucks, those prime saints, what DeMario Davis was able to do for the Dennis Allen defense, man, playing that middle of the field? Like, it, it's good, this starts to get to now, like, kind of our specifics on NFL teams, not our generalizations.

We're talking about positional value. Buddy, if you were an NFL defense coordinator, you came to me and said, like, yo, Ben, I want to be able to run too high. I want to be, you know, primary quarter quarter half team, quarters team. I'm like, all right, go find you a backer. That is a non-negotiable. There's other stuff you get to. Don't make a face it, I think a non-negotiable, if you're running too high,

is you need to have like an elite coverage backer. And so I know linebackers tend to get poo-poohed, but to me, like the elite ones really, really, really impact their teams. I mean, honestly, I would have guard, like, in that first tier, that first. Because I do think there is like a clear line between the premium positions or the positions that you should definitely invest in, heavily. And then there's these other positions where it's like, if you have the guy, you should pay him. Like, if you had Fred Warner, you should pay him. If you have Christian McCaffer,

you should pay them. If you have George Kittle, you should pay them. It's funny how all of these examples come from the 49ers, the same team that is apparently done. They've broken every rule of team building. And guess what? They're the best team. They have the best roster in the league. Go figure. But I just think offensive linemen, like interior offensive linemen, I think the way the sport is going where we're seeing more diverse diversity in the run game i would say especially conceptually i think we're seeing the fact that sean mcvay is like selling out to get some guards is proof of where the where offense is going in the next few years and i think guards are just going to become more apparent how important they are not only to the run game but also like as

we see more defensive tackles that can get double digit sacks and as that becomes more of a premium position i do think like that offensive guards centers are are linked with interior defensive tackle. And to your point, by the way, I brought up that the growth of the top five of the positions relative to the cap. Right tackle is first. Quarterback is second.

Guard is third. 116 percent. It's above wide receiver at 109 percent. Teams and paying guards as a late. And obviously we saw that with the Robert Hunt and deal assigned this year. We saw that with the Bradley Kevin Dotson and the Jonah Jackson deal for the Rams. Like guards, guards had a big, big, big, big, free-dacy cycle. And as like defenses get more complex and as,

We see more of this like simulated pressures, these coverage rotations. I think a center that can call your protections from the line of scrimmish where you could take some stuff off the quarterback's plate because God knows they have so much on their plate already, I think that's going to become more valuable. I think as we become smarter as a football watching public and we recognize the importance of protections and calling those things out and making those adjustments, I think we're going to value a good center more than we did, even like five years ago. I think Kelsey's, I don't even know what to call it, the celebration of Kelsey over the

last couple years, I think has added to that. But like with tight ends, linebackers, safeties, and I even throw running backs in there, although I have them as like in their own tier, it's so hard to rank those positions. So for me, it's kind of like just throw them all into their own bucket. And it depends on the guy. It depends on individual cases. Like Roquan Smith, I will pay that guy whatever he wants. Patrick Queen, I'm not giving him the contract that the Steelers gave him. And I will make all the complaints about paying and off the ball linebacker with him because he's not a guy like Fred Warner who can affect the game going forward and backwards. He's not the type of guy that can affect the game going forwards and backwards like

Roquan Smith was able to do. He's not a guy that's going to organize your defense before the snap. I think if you can find those guys, then pay them any amount of money. You can pay that guy $20 million a year, and I don't think it's going to hurt the rest of your roster. You pay a Patrick Queen that. You pay a Juan Alexander that type of money. You pay a Devin White that type of money.

Then I think you're going to have problems. But I think that discussion applies to all of these other. other positions. You could say the same thing about safety. You could say the same thing about tight end. You can even say the same thing about running. Yeah. I think, again, like this is where some of the like, okay, if I could give you the fifth

highest paid player at these positions, kind of who would you, like, who would you want to have the most conversations come? I think back into it where I started thinking like, okay, when we discussed like, okay, Fred Warner and Christian McCaffrey and Travis Kelsey, we were talking about position defining, change the way we think about how this. works truly one-of-one dudes where it's all right i want them all you know there's no question in my head like get every single one of them to me linebacker it's tough to figure out who the top guys are because some of the the the linebacker chart linebacker contract keeping isn't great right because

you get edge rusher guys and you get uh guys who are who are off the ball as well but like if you're if you're getting outside of the fred warner tier and you are getting to i'm looking at just like inside linebackers right now so i don't think this is perfect you start to get to right like Patrick Queen at average annual value is the fourth highest guy. DeMario Davis, CJ Mosley, Jo Juan Bentley, like those dudes are up there.

If I'm including outside linebackers, I start to get Bradley Chubb and T.J. Watt, which is not helpful. But like Matt Milano gets up there super high. Zaire Franklin's up there. Like outside of the top tier of dudes. Like they're truly like, Fred Warner,

Roquan Smith. It's just guys that you're like, I don't know if I want to be paying in that much money. But that's also true at tight end, right? Where once you get past like Kelsey and Kittle, it's okay.

Like, I don't know if I want to be paying. this much money to a Mark Andrews. It's true at safety where once you get outside of like, Kyle Hamilton's not up there yet, but Kyle Hamilton is going to be up there, right? You get away from, get to your like Jesse Bates, your Marcus Williams. Like, okay, these are valuable players. I'm just not sure any of them are like really truly team defining guys versus when we talk about Deavis of Tackle, when we talk about corn and those dudes like, yeah, those guys absolutely, I think, belong up there. And that's where I think your guard argument has some value. Because if you start to look at at guard

and interior players. It's like, okay, some of the guard contracts as of late madness, right? Like the Robert Hunt deal bananas, whatever. Like, Zach Martin and Elton Jenkins, Joe Tunney, those guys are the fifth, sixth, and ninth highest paid guards, respectively. Those are like franchise pieces right there. Those are like, change your team sort of pieces. And that's why I think like the offensive line argument to your point of like that

entire unit is going up, not just a tackle position. I think that's fair. Yeah. I would say safety is the hardest one to figure out. And I would almost conflate those two positions, like linebacker position and the safety position. It just call it second-level defender. Because I think the nature of the safety position has not only changed,

but how we value it. Like there was a time 10 years ago where you only wanted a center field seat. Everyone wanted Earl Tom. The Saints paid Jerry Spurred a bunch of money to be there. Earl Thomas. They changed their whole scheme. Almost an Eagle. They made Rob Ryan run the Seattle scheme,

even though he was like a Belichick guy, you know, that style of defense. they made him, they forced him to be a Pete Carroll guy. He will tell you about this. He complained about it for the two years after he got fired. But now it's kind of flipped. Now we want the other guys. You want the guys that play closer to the line of scrimmage.

We want the guys that can be a linebacker on first and second down. And then be a slot corner, another position that has kind of been undervalued over the past 10 years. We wanted to be that slot corner on third down. And there are only like, what, four guys that can do that. But I think that's a more attainable model than like, give me Fred Warner or Roquan Smith, who, like, their value goes beyond what they do on the field. and what we watch on film, like the impact that Roquan had on Patrick Queen,

you could actually see it on the field, which is what made it so remarkable. But like those guys are the coach on the field. Whereas like a safety, I do think, I don't think there's as much of that. Like we've certainly seen guys play that role, like Johnny Johnson for the defense in 2020. Derwin James played it not really well

because the charges defense hasn't been good over the past couple years, but we have seen that. But like finding a safety who will just, just run into a bubble screen. Like, you could find that. And then he can also play man coverage on third down. Like, you can find that.

You can find that on day two of the draft. Yeah. So I think with safety, it's kind of in this, like, weird, almost liminal space between, like, those positions we named at the top of the show in these positions where we were like, oh, it could go either way. Yeah. I think they're right. That's, the defining thing for me between, like, linebacker safety tight and a running

back is just, I definitely, like, the one thing that I fully believe with my chest is that like the truly elite. Like we've used the word elite to describe like 10 guys at a position. That always drives me nuts. Elite means like the top two, top three. The truly elite guys at their respective positions. I'm positive that I would want the linebacker before the other three positions. I think that that just comes down to scarcity.

I think that just comes down to like I just like the eighth best safety is good. The eighth best tight end is good. The eighth best running back is good. We can talk about their contracts and whatever. But those guys are good. I'm not even sure I want the ninth best line. The eighth best linebacker on my team, dude. Like, I, like, it goes down to it's a scarcity for me.

Like, that's why linebacker, I think, got to the top of this group for me. The safety thing, I think that safety and tight end honestly have some weird similarities and that like there's just so many different ways to play that position that there's just a lot more outs, right? You can just get guys who are great center fielers and guys who are slots and guys who will just right, run their head into a wall. And it tight and get guys who are blockers and guys who are flex and yak guys and different body types. There's just such a range that's allowed at that position that I can cheese my way around the edges, right? Like it's hard for that position as a total, as a complete position to become premium because I can get so many role players to just kind of do a specific thing for me at this spot. And it's never going to be super value, but it's going to be enough for my defense or it's going to be enough for my offense.

That, that I think kind of drags the group down. There's no doubt in my mind that like Minka Fitzpatrick is one of one. Travis Kelsey is one of one. These players are unique and elite and incredible. But the rest of the position, like, I can, I can, I can, I can make and David and Joku work. I can just, I can just get that done. You know, so like, he's, he's good enough that I can pull that off. I can make a boot of baker do good things for me.

And it's just, there's just too many dudes, right? It goes back to a scarcity argument. So that's why, for me, I have it linebacker, then safety and then tight end. And then maybe I sound inconsistent because I have receiver so high and that I have tight end, like below all these other positions. But, but what makes head is valuable is when they play receiver. Exactly. And that's the thing that really makes me mad about when we talked about.

like receiving groups where the best player is clearly a receiver. They're like, oh, yeah, like, Mahomes doesn't have the receiving talent that these other quarterbacks have, but he has the greatest titan ever. And Lamar didn't have great receivers, but Mark Andrews was his real receiver one. Cam Newton had Greg Olson, so it didn't matter that he had Ted Ginn. But like those players, even the best titan, even like the elite of the elite, cannot impact a game and the spacing of the defense, quite like a reason. Why not?

That's the big difference. because of where they line up, just the nature of the position, you're not going to have a fast guy who's going to be running on the outside taking the top off of defense. You don't use them like that. And I think it just makes it easier

where they run their routes to double them. And I'm using scare quotes on that because they're not true doubles. We very rarely see true double teams in the NFL. That's like a concept that we talk about way too much for something that maybe happens 20 times a season or like even the best team, even like Justin Jefferson.

but it just doesn't happen. So I don't think they have that gravity, even the very best one, even like Gromk, the best one of all time, never had that effect on a defense. And I think that's why I pushed them down to this level. And don't include them with the receiver. I agree with you,

but I wanted you to say it. It's that way I'd have to say it. Thank you for the take. Running back here at the bottom, I mean, this is, we talked a lot about like, Okay, like you brought up the schemes that defense coaches can use because they have great defensive tackles.

And I said, I don't think defensive tackles have as big of an impact on those schemes and on that as you're arguing. With running backs here, it's like a known commodity. The issue with running backs is not the level of talent. There are unbelievable players here. It's not the uniqueness of the elite talent. There are guys that Christian McCaffrey even just do stuff that other dudes can't do. It's that we just know that you don't have as big of an impact on your unit and particularly

on the running game as other players. on the field do. Like the success of the running game is going to be predicated on and dictated by the skill of the offensive line, the blocking up there. And then it's also, I think, more going to be controlled by as well, like, what schemes you're running and how well that fits your personnel. When we go into, like, look at running backs who, like, actually affect the sort of running schemes that you can deploy and then how defenses account for those, like the list is like

Derek Henry. I don't know if there's a set like a second. No, there isn't. There isn't. Yeah. And you can argue, like, some of the elite. speed dudes. I would argue some of what Miami does where like they put Devon A Shane back there and they run some sort of toss play. And it's like, okay, we know how to defend toss.

It's like, are you sure you know how to defend toss when like the Texas state high school 100 meter dash champion is back there? Right. Rahe Moster's 60 meter dash Purdue Big Ten champion. Like when you have truly elite speed like I think the way that you now defend the running game might change a little bit. And so like you can even argue that. But here's the problem. Rheim Moster was around. He was available. Devon Aisham was a second round pick and he's got size problems. Right. Like the guys who are actual. like gravity benders, field changers, space changers are not what's actually prioritized at the position because what's prioritized is how consistently can you chunk away four yards for us?

Can you get us that second and six that you were referring to earlier? And the talent needed to do that is pretty low. And at the running back position, the talent that actually decides that is the offensive line position. That's why it's valued so highly. And so with backs, it's like the backs are good. They are talented players. One, two, the elite guys are elite, man.

like Christian McCaffrey and his effect on the running game, Prime Derek Henry, the way that he impacted the running game there in Tennessee, like the elite guys without question or elite. It's just, there isn't enough impact on the success of my offense to call running back an elite position. It's not there.

Yeah, and like, what thing that we need to talk about more is, like, that the famed eighth defender in the box, like the reason why a team puts a defender in the box isn't because, like, oh, the running back is going off or, oh, this is a team that's known for running. They put an eighth defender in the box

because there's an eighth gap. to defend because there's an extra tight end in the box. There's an extra fullback. So like the running running back is the one position on offense where I don't think they dictate the terms at all. I don't even think like Christian McCaffery is going to force a defender in the box. We've seen this with the 49ers offense before he got there. They were seeing cover three and cover one and one high all the time before he got it. It's because they had a fullback on the field and because they had multiple tight ends on the field. It's because of how Kyle Shanahan deploys his offense. When you hear about here Shanahan and Mike McDaniel talk,

about their fullbacks when you hear them talk about why they cherish Alec Ingold and Kyle Eusecchek, they always talk about it in terms of what the defense has to do to answer those guys. And that's why I think there's been, the way we talk about running the running back position has kind of, I don't know, I think we're having the wrong decision. We say, wrong conversation, we say running backs don't matter and that kind of gets conflated with the run game and now we kind of say the run game doesn't matter and everything's about passing. But like the run game clear matter. If you can have a good run game, you can dictate so much for the defense and it makes passing easier. Like the secret to the dolphins and the 49ers success on offense, in addition to

all those weapons they had, was the fact that teams had to play cover one against them and cover three against them because of how they aligned on the offense. It wasn't because of the running backs. It wasn't necessarily because of Christian McCaffrey. It's because of how they aligned. Now, it's up to those players to take advantage of those looks. And that's what Christian McCaffrey did. Like, the reason why Christian McCaffrey is so valuable isn't because he gets those. four yards every play. It's because he turns those four-yard carries into 30-yard gains, like, once every eight carry. And Rahe Moster can take that outside zone play and take it to the house on any play. And that's what makes those guys so valuable to their scheme. But at the same time,

if you drop Christian McCaffrey into another scheme where they're playing like an RPO style, like the Eagles, for instance, you're not going to magically see those fronts that the 49ers got. You need investment from the offensive line, from the offensive staff, from the front office to get those looks. And that's why I don't give that credit to the run. Now, the eighth defender in the box for Derek Henry is always very funny. It's like, I don't want my eighth defender, i.e. the guy's going to tackle Henry to be close to line of scrimmage, because then he's not going to be able to generate any velocity coming into contact and then he's going to die. I want him coming from depths that he's fast. The only way we're taking this guy down is if we're deploying ourselves like rockets.

It's Derek Henry we're talking about. And so yeah, it is a structural thing. And so much of the running game is a structural thing. I think, right, the, the summary of the value of the running back and the running game value discourse is right. The running game is valuable. However, running backs have less impact over the success of a running game than other factors. Accordingly, running backs have been devalued. It's very important not to conflate those two things because teams are going to continue investing in the running game, especially in this era of zone coverage and two deeps and lighter linebackers

and liner edges. Like, you are, you are already starting to see teams zig towards the running game and the digging is going to continue because the running game emphatically and unequivocally matters. Anybody who tells you otherwise not watching the same football I'm watching. But the running backs impact on that lesser. And that's why I think you saw that running back contract value really take a hit over the last couple of years. And now I think you're seeing it start to level out as the salary cap leaps and say,

okay, we have $13 million to throw to Sequel and Barkley because the cap is going so far up and this guy's pretty good. And so we can make this contract happen now. Running back is still going to not grow and nearly as fast as the other positions as the cap gross because you can just find these guys. That's the nature of it. And I do think they're going to become more valuable as we get away from the idea of needing to establish the run.

Like we spent the first 100 years of the league establishing the run. And like NERG will say like, have we done enough of it? Like pass the ball more. But we've seen like the negative side of that as teams are gearing up to stop the pass more. Russian has become more efficient. Passing has become less efficient as the meta's chain. And we've seen that across other sports. dictates the conversations people are having in analytics. For instance, like in the NBA,

the post-up in the mid-range game was thought to be like a relic of the past. But as offenses have spread out and we're seeing more five-out offenses and more three-point shooting, I'm getting my college basketball work. Yeah, we're not waiting in the pod with basketball talk. The post-up has become so much more valuable because of what it forces the defense to do. It forces defenses to contract, and that opens up the three-point line. Like, you can't have a conversation about three-point shooting without a conversation about mid-range. in post-game. The same way you can't have a conversation about the passing game and how to build an effective one without talking about the run game and the value the running game serves in that.

And I do think, like, as we spread the game out and as we are, it's easier to get these running backs into space, I do think like the Christian McCaffreys and the Rahim Mosterds and like all these guys that can turn a four-yard gain into a 50-yard gain on any play. Like, I think those guys are going to matter more. It's going to be easier to recognize their value. I just don't think it's ever going to get to a point where they're dictating the terms of it. That's why. It's going to be hard for them to pull themselves out of the bottom spot on these. I agree. The Joel Embed post up is the best play in NBA right now. Hopefully it gets healthy and he comes back. That's going to do it for us here, Steve, on the positional rankings plus hip drop. Swivel,

hip, tackle. Swivel, swivel, swivel, swivel, swivel, swivel, you got a swivel, you got a swivel and then hip and then drop. Don't do it, though. The swivel hip, hip, drop, tackle. Real quick, I'm going to run through my official rankings on the position rankings, which as we clarified at the top, these aren't good. These aren't accurate. We wanted the conversation more in the rankings, but quarterback league onto its own, edge, offensive tackle and wide receiver, my second tier, corner defensive tackle, my third tier, guard, linebacker safety, and then bring up the rear from me, tight end, and running back. Steve, what did you have?

I have quarterback in its own tier. If you would allow me to conflate the offensive line and put all this position to do it all. You do what you want. Those are rules. All right, then I'm going quarterback and offensive line in their own tier. They get top tier by themselves, the Patrick Mahomes tier. After that, I'm going edge. wide receiver, and then if I do have to split down the positions, I'll go offensive tackle,

then cornerback, and then into your offensive line. And then with tight-hand linebacker safety, you can order it any way you want. If you check back in with me in a year, I'll probably change my order, and then running back on the bottom. Very good. All right, well, thank you to Steve for hopping into Shield's shoes for me. I greatly appreciate it. This is nice. We got to just do whatever we wanted to. Oh, come with three takes, have correct opinions, get yelled out when she doesn't like them. It was a very freeing podcast for me. I forgot to complain about young people. Yeah, right, right. And the football hipsters. This is a very football hipsters podcast because we were like, you know, I don't know, trying to like anticipate things.

Anyway, love Shil. He's on vacation. I hope he's having a good time with the family to making fun of him because he's not here. Thank you to Cliff Augustine for producing the episode. Pretty sure I only did one ad break. So Cliffs can have to solve that problem. That's why we paying the big bucks. Thank you to senior video production manager, Eduardo Ocampo. who does our video stuff, Kiera Givens as well, for hopping on with social. There will be no Friday extra point taken. Shields off, I'm off on. So this would be the on extra point taken of the week.

Steve, you're going to be on with Nora and dual threat later this week? That's right. Any day, time? Oh, I didn't know I was supposed to pitch the show. That's your job. Wednesday. Tees for the people? We'll be on the feed on Wednesday.

I don't know what the show is about. We still have a meeting after this pod recording, so I can't even tell you that. Undetermined and exciting topic. What will it be? It's like the masked singer. I'm on the edge of my seat. Thank you everybody for listening. Time to you guys next to me.

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