The Ringer NFL Show - The QB-Agnostic NFL Roster Rankings!

Episode Date: June 10, 2026

The Ringer’s own Steven Ruiz and Diante Lee get together to shine a light on the current rosters of all the teams around the NFL and analyze, debate, and rank the state of each one outside of the quarterback position.(00:00) The QB-Agnostic NFL Roster Rankings!(05:15) The bottom-tier teams(26:52) The mid-tier teams(54:53) The top 10The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available.Host: Steven RuizGuest: Diante LeeProducer: Chris SuttonVideo Editor: Stefano SanchezProduction Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. I'm Stephen Ruiz filling in for Shield Kabatia. He's on vacation, presumably touching grass and spending time with his family and hopefully not thinking about the NFL landscape too much. That's exactly what we're going to do today. Deonté Lee is going to join me shortly and we're going to rank every NFL roster outside of the quarterback position. So these are essentially quarterback agnostic power rankings of rosters. We have a lot to cover. We have a long show.

So let's take a break and get to it and return with Deonti Lee. All right. Welcome back to the show. We're welcoming in the head ball coach himself. Deont Taylor, you look like a head coach right now. You got the headphones on, the hat. How does it feel being a head coach, by the way? I haven't talked to you in a while.

Honestly, it feels like, not exactly. There's not a one-for-one comparison, but it feels a lot like where I became, when I became a father, and it's like, you go home at one point, and it's like, why do I have all this responsibility again? Who trusted me? Why did I sign up for this?

You know, like, who actually trusted me with all this stuff again? You know, I definitely have those moments to kind of like, I'm going up and asking me questions, and I'm like, oh, yeah, that's right. I am the one who has to make the final decision and the final determination on these things. I will say teenagers, walking liabilities. You spend a lot of time thinking about all the ways in which having to supervise kids can go terribly wrong for you.

That sounds like a horrid experience. I was going to say, like, we've gotten past June 1st, we've gotten past the busy part of the NFL offseason. Now, things chill out. But when you have head coach responsibility, that's been. It just doesn't. But it does feel like that we've passed that point in the NFL Aussie. With the Garrett trade last week,

AJ Brown finally, that finally got resolved. And now we can start to look at these rosters and that's what we're going to do today. And you had the idea of divorcing this ranking from the quarterback position, which I thought was a really good idea. And then I started ranking these teams. And I was like, this is really freaking hard.

Yes. And I want to know, like, where did you have the most trouble? Like which part of the list? The middle, the top, the bottom? I would say it's probably like your wild card contender types, right? Like I'm sure we'll get to it in this process. But you think about teams like the Jaguars or the Bears,

teams that like got hot with like turnover variance or third down or, you know, stuff that's not as sticky year to year. And you really have to think about like, am I evaluating them on the basis of their roster? or am I evaluating them on how hot they got with this roster during one specific period of time? And does that project forward at all? Right. I think that that's the thing that I got hung up on.

There's also some of the rebuilding teams, right? Like I will say, like the Raiders specifically, you have to, it takes a lot of work, I think, if you're trying to twist yourself and they're not saying, oh, okay, they've done some things with their offensive line, and they spent a lot of money on their defense. And then you actually look at the roster again. I would say the same is true of the Giants on offense.

I don't know we'll get out to all this stuff where it's like, oh, there's a lot of activity. But when you're actually having a nail down, putting a number next to a team, you kind of have to catch yourself and saying, like, did I just get swept up in reading Adam Schefter tweets and Tom Pelisero tweets for a couple months? And this team is actually not as good as I thought it was. They just had a bunch of names attached to this logo. I think that that's kind of where I'm fascinated in hearing, you know, where you stand on this. because we really haven't had a chance to kind of talk bald you and I in a little bit. Yeah.

Speaking of Adam Schefter, my heart almost stopped this morning. I got like a notification from a Schefter tweet. And I just saw the words breaking Aaron Donald retirement. And I was like, oh, my God. I got to open a Google Doc. It's time to start writing. But it was just him breaking down the possibility of Aaron Donald. Adam Sheppardt shouldn't be able to tweet unless it's breaking news.

That's my proposal. This is a good take. It's a good take. I follow these insiders. Like, Ian Rappaport, I don't need to see Mets tweets popping on my notifications. You know what I'm saying?

Yes. But just some housekeeping before we start ranking these teams. So we did factor in coaching a little bit just because it's hard to divorce the coaching from, like a unit like defense especially. I feel like defenses are some of their parts

rather than individual talent. But other than that, we're factoring everything except for the quarterback acquisition, which I think led to some very interesting results is how I'll put it. I think this exercise, you could do one or the other. I think you can either try to divorce it of coaching and allow the quarterback in and just talk about the actual whole 53-man roster, or you can take the quarterback out and factor in the roster. Plus, like you said, a small

percentage for what the coach is doing schematically or player development-wise and how that swing, how you feel about it. It would be really difficult, I think, to extract how you feel about all 32 teams devoid of anything to do with coach or quarterback in the same exercise. Right. So let's start at the bottom. Do you want to give me your bottom five teams first? And we could just kind of talk about those teams generally.

We don't need to spend too much time on the dolphins. I'm assuming they're at the bottom of your list. I think that, yeah, I think the dolphins, it's the Browns, it's the Cardinals, right? Like, I still have the Raiders down there in the bottom five. I think that like that last spot is where it maybe gets a little bit more interesting. Like, I'm kind of caught between a few,

but I would say those are like my core four that are at the bottom of the list for me. I would say the Cardinals are in that consideration as well. Yeah, like the Dolphins, I mean, I know they're rebuilding. They have a new regime, a new front office, a new head coach. But with these other teams,

you can kind of like grasp onto something. Like, even like the Cardinals, who I don't think are going to be very good in their quarterback situation is dire to say the least they got Jacoby percent holding out on them. But they have skill players. You can look at him.

Be like, all right, they got Love. They got McBride. They got Marvin Harrison Jr. If he breaks out. But the dolphins, you just have nothing to hang your hat on. I feel really bad for Belique Willis. He's finally getting this chance to start in this league. What was he drafted?

Yep. 22. My first combine was the year he got drafted. I remember that combine. We were thinking he could be a top 10 pick and ended up going, what, around three, right? Yikes. But yeah, that's going to be brutal.

But I think where things start to get interesting after the bottom five is, around the Jets. I feel like you can look at the Jets our last page and squint and then be like, I can see this coming together. Like they added some defensive pieces. DeMario Dave's comes over.

He has, you know, experience in Aaron Glenn's defense. Gino Smith comes over. I think we soured on Gino a little bit last year, but that supporting cast in Las Vegas was awful. And even P. Carroll was like,

I mean, we let Gino down. What do you think about the Jets? And what do you see as their ceiling this year? I'm right there. are with you. That's a team that, like you said, if you squint really hard or don't look at all, right, you can very much convince yourself like, oh, okay, like you go, you go out and draft a couple guys that I like, right? I do have high hopes for Kenyon, Sadiq. I actually think for all

the heming and hauling that was done about picking him in the first round, I kind of like the pair of both he and Mason Taylor. You know, Mason Taylor being a little bit more of an inline guy, Sadiq more of your move around, kind of manufactured touch, Tyler Warren-esque type of player. I do like that. I like adding a little bit of talent around Garrett Wilson, who's a wide receiver I don't always love and maybe just kind of have a blind spot for because we just have not seen his skill set

really translate into like a gravity bending, change the math type of impact. Some of that I think is ultimately hampered by the quarterback situation that he's had to deal with too. So I try not to be too hard on him in that respect. But this offensive line is young. I would like to think that it's trending upwards. I like some of the picks that they've made.

think I would feel even better if they were able to keep Elijah Vera Tucker. Right, I think that that really would have had me feeling very bearish about this team. It's usually very bullish about this team coming into the season. But ultimately, I just look at it and I'm like, ah, you traded away your two best defensive players last year. I don't really trust the defensive side of the ball at all for you. It's a lot of older guys, a lot of guys who have played their best football already. It might not be able to reaccess that.

I am kind of hung up on them. I think that when we talk about what the coaching influence might be, if I knew that Aaron Glenn was an excellent coach, I would be able to sell myself on this a little bit more. But the combo of Aaron Glenn and Frank Reich, as your play call it, like, man, it is really hanging me up right now. Yeah, that's where it was hard to separate the coaching piece of it. Like, what does a Frank Reich offense look like in 2020?

In 2020s, man. I have no clue. Like, it didn't look good in Carolina. He ended up giving away play calling responsibilities half midway through the season. Even at the end of the Colts days where they were competitive, but the offense wasn't great with Carson Lentz there. That's my one concern. I do think you can look at the individual pieces here,

especially on offense with the offensive line, the young offensive line, and think that they could get, I would say, the 20th best offense in the NFL, but I don't think that's going to happen because I don't believe in Frank Reich right now. And I don't know, is Eric Glenn a good coach?

You kind of pose the question. What would you say right now? I mean, it would kind of have to be no, right? Like, I don't think he's Brian Callahan-level bad where it was like, oh, a month and Tee, your coaching tenure is very clear that you have bitten off more than you can chew. But, I mean, the whole Justin Fields thing and, you know, how long it took them to make a move on that and the fact that they really had no offensive cohesion on that side. And then for him, as a play caller defensively, basically everything that was the Jets' problems,

the last two years under Robert Sala got worse last season, at least in the first half of the year when they were trying to be competitive. they were still missing tackles like crazy. They were still blowing coverages like crazy. Their situation with defense was not very good, in my opinion, either. I didn't really understand what the vision was for what they were trying to do. And then you get to the mid-season point, you trade away your two best players. And then it's like, well, I can't even really evaluate you fairly in this respect because it's not like you ever approached this 53-man roster like you were anticipating

losing your best defensive linemen and your best defensive back this year. So they're a tough one for me. I think that they could be a riser. don't think that they're going to be better than top 20 this year, even in the best case scenario. No, yeah, I had their roster at 28th. I had them right ahead of the Browns, which is not saying much, but they're leading that kind of bottom five pack, the teams that they are going to be competing for Harch Manning and the worst record in the league.

I have the Titans right above them. Where did you end up with the Titans? I have the Titans right above the Cardinals. So I guess they're, like I said, they're kind of right on that fringe of bottom seven or so. right? Like I love Jeffrey Simmons. I like what I think they're going to be able to do defensively. I actually, I kind of enjoy just kind of how their front seven is set up right now in general between Jefferson Simmons and John Franklin Myers.

I have some trust in that. I don't think the Cordell Flot is a particularly special DB, and this is where the coaching comes in this place. I just look at some of the defensive pieces that they've brought in this year around Jeffrey Simmons, and I think about Robert Sala. And I'm like, I think that he can give them the 5% positive bump. they need to be able to get to, I don't know, 19th, 18th, right? Something passable, something functional.

And then, and I, you know, it's funny, I was listening to our buddy Derek Classen on the athletic football show talk about this was Cam Ward. I'm still very much in the wish casting with this offense, you know, type of thing. And I know we're not necessarily counting the quarterback situation in this rankings, but I think about what this offense is going to be schematically. I actually think that Brian Daibble as an early down pass heavy type of coach, I think that that's going to be a better fit for their skill set for what they have on offense. I think they just kind of need to live in the gun and let their wide receivers cook out of the spread

and try to take chances on early downs because this offensive line is proven no matter how much they've invested in it that you can't get under center and play bully ball. It's just not going to happen. Dan Moore was disappointing when he was healthy last year. I still don't think that we've seen the Peter Skoroski that we were hoping for, even though he's been bumped around a little bit. And I think he's turned out to be a fine pro, just not anything special. I think that, you know, J.C. Lake, just the entire collection of their guys has kind of been less than, you know, the sum of their parts, like individually.

They've all been disappointing and they haven't found a way to maximize it schematically. I do still have some trust, though, that this staff can get something, something that does not look like the abject disaster that it was under Brian Callahan last year. Yeah, yeah. I think that scheme was just a terrible fit. Like you said, they were not talented enough to play bully ball to get under center. and run the football in early down. So I do think this is going to help Cam Ward in the long run. I think it makes sense for their pieces. They bring Cardinal Tate. The Wendell Robinson move is kind of a red flag for me.

It's like, let me run back what I did in New York, which wasn't that successful, Brian. But yeah, I do like the defensive pieces. And like bringing in Alonty Taylor, like he, I have a soft spot for him. I just a pest point of D. He's just a thought of D. And he plays the way that I like to see D.D.S.

He's going to compete. And I, so I think we'll see like some of those, like, early Jets, 49ers defenses that we saw. They don't have the talent on the defensive line quite like the 49ers did, but it's comparable to what the Jets had when Sala was there, so I can see that in a case. It's a solid roster. I don't know.

I wouldn't go higher than 27th, though. This is when we start getting into teams and fan bases that are going to be offended by where we rank them. My next team is Washington, which I don't think is surprising that their roster is in the state of this just based on how they built the last couple of years where it was like, we're going to invest in a lot, of veteran players around our young quarterback and try to win two playoff games. And they accomplished

that in the first year. But in the second year, obviously, Jaden gets hurt. And the rest of the team kind of falls apart around the pieces that you've got to overperform in year one with Jaden, did not overperform in year two. Any thoughts on Washington's roster and the state of it right now? I mean, they're exactly in the spot that you never want to be as a franchise. Minnesota was there when they were going through their competitive rebuild with Cuezia, Adolfo Mincea, right? Where You have not drafted enough talent to really fill out, you know, the supplemental pieces of your roster. And now you've got to go out and spend market rate on those guys, right? You have to go spend a lot to get Leo Chanel in.

I think that Rodafé Owe is a good edge rusher. I just would not want to be the team that has to pay, you know, a market price to bring him in. We have not had that kind of breakout performance from him. I still don't love their lineback room. Their DB room, I feel like they have taken a dart throw at. both with a veteran and a young guy every offseason, and none of them have really fanned out, save for Trey Amos, right?

And I don't think that Trey Ommas is ceiling, is high enough to make you believe that they're going to be an above-average DB unit either. And then you look at their offense, and you think about the changes that they've made, both schematically and, you know, a little bit on the personnel side, and you're going to have a hard time selling me on the idea that this is built any differently than what it's been for the last two years,

which is Jaden Daniels, go be a superhero. We're going to have to live in the spread all the time. You're going to have to take a lot of hits hanging in the pocket, waiting for guys to get open because you don't have a ton of receiver talent around you. And the run game is still going to be extremely dependent on your legs, forcing the defense to have to honor us if we're in the gun, right? I really struggle. I'm going to have to see it with this team trying to build something around their quarterback that's a little more sustainable, but I don't think that this roster is necessarily built to do so right now. No, it's like Dan Quinn has been trying his

hardest to rebuild the 2016 Falcons defense? Like not even the Seahawks defense. He built that got him the head coaching top. That 2016 defense that got hot in the playoffs and was an average unit at best. But to your point, not a lot of homegrown talent,

especially homegrown talent that was there that came aboard when Quinn was there. Like, Duran Payne is still like the one homegrown piece that you feel decent about. But outside of that it's just a bunch of veteran acquisitions. Like you said, throwing darts at board and hoping something sticks.

And I don't know. I think this year could get really ugly. I wonder what an offseason looks like if they go, say, they win four games next year. And I think it's within the realm of possibility, even if Daniels is healthy, man. It's going to be really hard for them to control the line of scrimmage on the defensive side of the ball in spite of the money that they have spent, as spite of the resources they have spent. We know stylistically on defense.

This is a defense that is always apt to give up explosive plays, even with the changes that they've brought in. I don't necessarily trust it just bringing in Durrante Jones means that they're going to approach things differently philosophically. We've seen Dan Quinn too many times say, hey, we're going to embrace

what's happening in the modern era and you look up and while they're playing a lot of soft zone shells, it is not necessarily generating good defense for them. And this has been since he was in Dallas that we've been waiting for this defense to turn a corner.

And this style of play basically ran Pete Carroll out of the league, right? Like, why would I believe it be any different for Dan Quinn, especially when you're not going to have an offense, in my opinion, that's going to be as gangbusters in terms of scoring points per drive as they were two seasons ago. Yeah, I think that NFC title run may have done more harmed and good in the long run in terms of roster.

Definitely learn the wrong lessons from that. All right, moving on, my next team, and maybe I have, I might be too low on them. I have Carolina next at 25th. Where'd you end up from Carolina? I had them at 21st. I had them a little higher. Who do you have in that next sector of team? it's 25 through 20.

So I have the Saints at 25. I've got the Giants at 24. I've got the Falcons, maybe surprisingly, at 23, because I still have a hard time with this offense, this offense in spite of its top in talent. And then I have the Bengals at Panthers, basically rounding out, you know, just 21.

Yeah, I've got the Bengals pretty low. I got a lot of the same teams here. I got Carolina 25th, obviously. I got the Giants 24 same as you. New Orleans, I went 23rd, Atlanta 22nd, and then India I went 21st. Okay, Indy for me is going to be an interesting thought exercise. Okay, let's talk about Indy.

Where did you end up with Indies? So, Indy, for me, I have at 14th. And I think that this is, I guess my question for you is like, how did you weigh the offensive line? Because I think that this, and this is beyond just Indianapolis, I think this is going to influence how we talk about the Patriots. I think this is going to influence how we talk about the Packers and Texans as well when we start talking about some of the teams that are on the fringes of contention.

to me, I had India 14 because I think that they have such a high floor with their offensive line, right? Like they don't have a Tristan Whirfs, they don't have Elaine Johnson, they don't have a Trent Williams,

they don't have one of these true top-in book-in. You can book it now that if the guy stays healthy, he will be a first team all pro. But they've done such a good job at insulating themselves from having any major holes. And honestly,

that, as much as anything, is why Daniel Jones looked the way that he looked in their first half of season. They did such a good job picking up blitzes and making the game very simple for him, all I've got to do is ID where pressure is coming from and go find a one-on-one out on the perimeter, right? And then that doesn't even consider what this offensive line and what this run game has been able to do to lift the floor of this team in general.

And I do think if Sauce Gardner is healthy, that is enough for me to view them as a top half of the league roster. Why were they in the bottom, you know, the kind of bottom tier for you or bottom court-off for you team-wise? I think I underrated the offensive line. I think I did that as a whole, like throughout this list, because it's like, for me, it's the hardest thing to project unit-wise, just because there are five pieces and like continuity matters so much. Like one injury could really, like, ruin a lot of things. And then the sauce gardener question, which that trade so far has not aged well at all,

obviously due to some circumstances with Daniel Jones going down and kind of tanking the season. You know what I totally had forgotten that Philip Rivers played football last year? he had to play football because every quarterback on their roster was hurt and or very bad. Or bad. Or bad. But yeah, I think that I do think I underrated this team because those first eight weeks, they were a good football team. I think Lou Anarumo did some good things. I think Lou Anirumo did some good things with the defensive roster last year.

but if you get Sauce Gardner from two years ago, three years ago, I think this has a chance to be an above-average defense. And if the offensive line does stick together and play as well as it did last year, and they're creating explosive plays at the same rate they did last year, I don't want to say that they, I don't think they're better than Houston, like their ceiling isn't better than Houston, but I do think they can compete with Houston.

So I'm going to actually change my rankings. I'm going to move them up. You have convinced me, I'm going to put them up to, I'll go up as high as 17. That's where I have the Chargers. I think the next thing we have to talk about in this range is Cincinnati. Where do you have Cincinnati ranked? I had Cincinnati 15.

Okay. And I have the 22nd here. And it's mostly the high end talent. It's still the wide receiving core, which I think as much as good as Joe Burrow is, and as much as he raises the floor for that offense, those two receivers are unlike anything anybody else has in the NFL. Even if you look at teams that had dynamic duos at receiver like Dallas with George Pickens and C.D. Lamb, I don't think those guys are like the tent pole players that T. Higgins and Javar Chase are where you have to pick your poison with them and you're losing either way. Like, there's no game plan for them. That's why I think the Bengals could run this simple dropback passing game. I think it is relatively simple, even though they have a big brain quarterback. It reminds me, I think,

this is like the Gen Z version of the Colts. Yes, this is definitely the mid-2000s Colts 100%. Yeah, we're not motioning. We're not like throwing a bunch of personnel groupings at you. Our formations are relatively simple. It's basically like pick aside route concepts that aren't. I don't think their drop-back passing game is more robust than like the Eagles drop-back passing game.

But it doesn't have to be because of the talent because the quarterback is so good at it at picking aside and knowing where to go. with the football, but I think the offensive line got better this past year. I'm sorry, I think that's like a, one of those, like, tired talking points. Like, you remember when, like, the Cowboys had the best offensive line in 2016? And then, like, for the next five years, everyone was like, oh, they had the best offensive line.

And it was, like, not even true anymore. I think it's, like, the opposite effect with Cincinnati. And obviously, the concern is the defensive talent. This team could not, they've tried their hardest. We've talked about this plenty of times. But losing Trey Hendrickson hurts. But I just think the offense is strong enough to carry them through, where I would rather have that strong of an offense

than some of these other teams around the same range. Like I'm looking at, let me see a team that's like close. Like Tampa Bay, I think I'd rather have Cincinnati's star talent in Tampa Bay's roster, even though I think roster, or their roster is deeper on the defensive side of the ball. I think that's fair. And I think that for me, maybe the biggest hang up and why I dropped them down here

is like you still are like crossing your fingers and squinting your eyes with their front seven defensively. Like, I think the Dexter Lawrence, a healthy Dexter Lawrence is still a world changer. He's still a match changer. Like, I hope that that part doesn't get lost in what I'm about to say. But Boyette Maffei, kind of a specialist in Seattle. He's really, like, I think the metrics all suggest,

it's like a basketball player, right, that is maybe like the seventh or eighth man in a rotation, but he's a high volume three-point shooter. And some team of free agency convinces themselves like, oh, if we take his six three-point attempts tonight, now we're playing him 32 minutes, and that six becomes nine to 11, right? This guy is going to be a fringe All-Star.

And then it turns out like, oh, wait, this guy doesn't do enough for the rest of the, you know, we don't have the right ecosystem around him. He's not impactful enough to make it worth the money that we're spending or the resources that we give up. I think that Lawrence can be that. Unfortunately, he's surrounded by Jonathan Allen, Miles Murphy, Boye, Maile. They need something out of Miles Murphy, right? Like, that's the way.

He has to hit. Shemar Stewart has to turn. into something. I think that Mafay can still be a high pressure guy in Cincinnati. It's just not going to matter if he's only playing 300, you know, 300 pass-rest reps per season and the other 300 are being split with Shamar Stewart or Cassius Howell, two guys who I'm just not very much sold on being able to give you plus surplus value in that way and Miles Murphy for all his size and, you know, the straight line linear speed that he showed when he was at Clemson, like None of that has translated quite yet, and they're playing in front of two linebackers

that I would say are in the running for having the worst single-season tape that you will ever see. That's his position. It's rough. Demetrius Knight and Barrett Carter both might turn into something eventually, but if you go back and watch them on early down, is trying to figure out what motions mean what, what run actions are supposed to mean what in terms of run fits, how to handle play actions. It was rough. It was absolutely rough.

And I can't cast that aside. Maybe I'm too defensive-minded in this respect, and maybe this is something that could be fixed at the pro level a little easier than I'm giving it credit for. But I'm going to err on the side of the Bengals being dragged down by this defense again more so than saying that the acquisition of Dexter Lawrence and Bois Maffei is enough to kick this team up to where you want it to be. And Brian Cook as well in that equation.

I think you could make the argument that Dexter Lawrence, is the most load-bearing defensive player in the NFL right now. And probably has been for the last, like, four seasons. Yeah. And like when you hear Bengals fans talk about the linebackers, they're like, yeah, but we have Dexter Lawrence now, and he's going, like you said, that you still have to know where the football is going.

And I'm not sure the linebackers do. And you got to tackle too. That's a big thing. That's like one of the most underrated thing, which is kind of funny because it happens every play, is that tackling is a big deal. Yes. And, yeah, and they're not a good tackling team.

But I do think they have. enough to, I drag them up into the top half of this list. Okay, so we've gotten to around the 20th. Let's take a break here and then come back and then let's look at your 20 through 15. All right, welcome back. We have ranked the bottom 12 rosters. Now we're going to get into the top 20. And this is where things really get interesting for me,

but I'm interested to hear where you have these teams, the 20th through 15th ranked teams. 12 through 20 was agonizing for me. So hard. Like, I feel like we could have recorded. this podcast at any point this week. And depending on how I felt when I woke up, this entire thing could be totally reshuffled.

20, I have Dallas. And I'm still kind of up in the air with how I feel about that. 19, and I think this might be the biggest surprise. And I think we're probably going to spend a lot of time talking about this. 19. I have Kansas City. Item 20th. Okay.

Yes. Okay. So we're probably seeing this pretty similarly. 18th. 18th, I have the Chargers. I think that's another one that's going to be worth conversation. I have the Vikings at 17. I have the Jaguars at 16. I have the 49ers 15th, the Colts 14th, the Bucks 13th, and the Steelers 12th. We have similar teams. So I have Kansas City 20th. I have the Bucks 19th. The Steelers 18th, Charter 17th, Jacksonville, 16th, and Dallas 15th. And then we're getting into the, I think these are all teams that are going to maybe make the playoffs,

win a playoff game. I got Baltimore at 14th. I am not a fan of their roster right now. And I had, I actually had Cincinnati at 15th. I guess I had Dallas at 16th. And then I have Green Bay at 13. Oh, okay.

That's another interesting one for me to talk about with you. Let's talk about Kansas City first. Where do you want to take this conversation? Because I went back and watched some patch Patrick Mahomes recently. He's a pretty good quarterback if you haven't. You should go. I highly recommend watching the play. And I'm just astounded by how bad things were around him at the end of the year right before he got injured and how much he was lifting that team. The offensive line, just penalties were a problem on first down. The receiving court couldn't get open. They couldn't

catch the ball when they did get open. The defense is just a lot of talent drain. I think they brought back with Jerry Sneed this week, which shows you the standard. Not a good sign. No, not a good sign. massive red flag after getting rid of Trent McDuffie they lost Leo Chanel where like outside of Patrick Mahomes

if you could draft one player from this team who would it be for like the next five years it could only be like Kenneth Walker right like that's the only guy I would just sign in free agency

exactly like and who's going to be making basically market rate at the position now like that's not a good that's not a good move for me It's like a neutral move.

100%. I mean, we haven't seen a lot of them over the last year. So, you know, maybe it's possible that with some distance and then with all the off-field stuff that has given me a little bit of pause with them, the version of Rishi Rice that I thought we were going to have at this stage in his career and the one we actually have, there's a huge delta. I thought that he was going to be like, oh, this is a guy, yards after catch-wise, short area, intermediate.

This guy is going to be a killer. He's not as big and physical as Puka Nakua, but he would approximate that role, I thought, for Kansas City. Ultimately, what I think he is right now is a Patrick Mahomes market, which is not what this offense needs. I think that they have an entire wide receiver core who are all Mahomes merchants, right? They're all RPO, quick game, screens, working within 12 yards of the line of scrimmage guys. And this offense has been trying and trying for the last two years to push more vertically,

to get more explosive. And ultimately, they continue to have to go back to playing in a phone booth because none of these guys separate often enough. None of them are detailed enough route runners to merit and justify that style of play. And it falls back on Mahomes to, and this is something I was saying, you know, I'm working on a piece about the best quarterback blooms in the NFL. And the thing that I continue to come back to with Mahomes is he is literally like the parent that has to get up and get their teenager out of bed.

in spite of the fact that they have an alarm clock and stand in the door sill and watch them brush their teeth and put on their clothes and get out the house on time. He does everything just for this offense, at least last year, to be middling. And I think that we have been talking about this for the last two years, even as they were making a Super Bowl run in 2024, that eventually the run game was going to crater. The offensive line was going to regress. There would be some kind of attrition with the defense, and we are going to see a basketball. Holmes totally on an island by himself. And that was a situation we saw last year. And I thought that he was playing some of this best superhero ball that you could have

asked for out of a quarterback. Like, we talk all the time about Justin Herbert and Trevor Lawrence pre, Liam Cohen being stuck in these situations where they have to be superheroes just to get their offense across the finish line. Nobody has a situation like what Patrick Mahomes is being asked to do. And he's playing in an offensive ecosystem that is what, like, six years behind the meta. They still struggle to get to the play action game.

They still struggle to be multiple as much as they need to be in spite of how many tight-ins. They've tried. You still don't see enough of a downhill run game. At least it's been waxing and waning over the last few years. This team has just been very disappointing when you don't consider Mahomes, especially now that the defense is taking a step back.

And like you said, as you were kind of detailing it, this team has lost more talent than it's added in each of the last two off-season. and I think that people might be disappointed, even if Patrick Mahomes is healthy and healthy all year in where Kansas City lands in the hierarchy of contenders. Because if it's not him being an MVP, I just don't see how this team's supposed to make another deep run.

Yeah, like you said, you watch Patrick Holmes play, you watch the tape, and then you look at his numbers, and you're like, no, those are incongrual. That does not make sense with how good he's playing. You watch the last Broncos game. I mean, he's playing one on 21. he's playing against his team and the Broncos defense. And he's holding his own.

And I know he had a couple of turnovers in that game. But man, they asked him to put the cape on. Both games against the Chargers, I would say. It was Mahomes being a superhero. And the rest of his offense just being totally bully on a snap-by-snap basis. Rishie Rice, like, they try to make him a vertical threat at times last year. And he just can't do it. Like, he can't separate.

He can't get downfield. Even if you look beyond the off-the-field stuff, the fact that he wakes up and he's got, two stars on GTA, like when he gets out of bed. He's just not the player that they thought he was going to be. And maybe that comes next year because he's over the injuries, but he could be suspected again. I don't know. It's tough to talk about him as a player and know where his ceiling is.

To answer my question, it would probably be Creed Humphrey would be the player you draft. And the fact that it's a center. Yeah. And it's not like they've been skimping on, you know, infusing talent into this roster. The swings they've taken just haven't connected at all. But Brett Veach is, whenever you see a GM ranking somehow, he's in the top five.

I don't get it. Should it just be Patrick Mahomes. Never mind the fact. He has, Patrick Mahomes is making $2 million lower than market rate right now. It's making $45 million a year. And the market rate is 55. And they have this very complicated contract design to be able to manufacture cap space, basically whenever they want it.

And they have absolutely botched that over the last two to three scenes. It's basically since the Tyree Kill trade, they've just had a super superhero quarterback long enough to patch it over until they didn't last year. So I'm fascinated to see if they're young guys that they're banking on actually gives them what they need to get them back to where they want to be in the AFC title race. I hope so. I just want to see Patrick Holmes could again. Is that too much to ask?

I don't want to see a 6.5A dot, man. God damn. This team pisses me off so much. What team, where do you want to go next? What team do you want to talk about? I think that we should probably talk about the Vikings and Chargers. I think that these are two teams where you really have to wait. coaching versus roster talent.

I mean, the Vikings at least have your A1, you know, above the full type of player. Justin Jefferson that does have to carry, that carries a lot of weight and creates a lot of opportunities for his teammates. But to me with Minnesota, it's basically been Brian Flores taking these misfit toys on defense and turning them into superstar appearing players by production, maybe not superstar players in terms of quality.

Like you think about Angie Van Ginkle two years ago, Basically looking like the greatest utility player in the NFL. And then you're actually watching it's like, oh, yeah, that play was made because of Brian Flores. That play was made because of Brian Flores. You made that play because of Brian Flores, too. They don't have a ton of depth on either side of the ball. They're offensive line. Another team like the Chiefs, they've taken swing after swing with veterans and trying to make different additions and trying to change the way that they play up front.

None of those things have really come or materialized. I think that this is also the perfect team to talk about divorce from quarterback. play because they didn't get good quarterback play last year, and we're still able to go 9 and 8 because their coaching staff is as elite as it is in terms of play calling and game planning. But yeah, I just don't know how you'd make an argument that they're a top half of the league roster right now,

and they'd probably be, you know, 23rd or worse. I would say Minnesota would be at least if you did not have Kevin O'Connell and Brian Flores at the helm on both sides to the ball. It's definitely Flores doing the heavy lifting on defense. I think their offense is more, like, KOS, he's a good coach, obviously, and he's a floor raiser,

but I do think they have a lot of offensive talent. We just didn't see it at its best last year because of the quarterback situation. Like a bad quarterback could just ruin everything. Like they make the offensive line look worse. They made Justin Jefferson look. At times he looked like a bad player. He couldn't catch the football.

I really like the John Jennings acquisition. I think they needed that like tough chain moving wide receiver to go along with Jordan Addison and Justin Jefferson. I think the explosives are going to be there, but a little more consistency. I don't know if Kylo-Murie. is necessarily the best quarterback for a guy that does a lot of work over the middle

and Jennings. It's not really Kyler's strong suit. I think the offensive line should be a lot better this year, but we'll see how that looks. They'll have to be healthy. Yeah, they'll have to be healthy. And then they just weren't healthy last year, especially at the beginning of the year. I forget what position it was. Like, was it

the right guard? I don't know, but there was a back of line that played and he was, I think was the left tackle, actually. Worst player I've ever seen on a football field. That's a slight exaggeration. But I like what they did in the draft, adding to the defensive line, because I think that's where they really needed to solidify things, if they're going to continue running the defense like this.

Caleb Banks. What do you think about Caleb Banks as a prospect? I think that if you watch the right plays, the right games from him, you can see Chris Jones. And then if you're not watching those games, you're really trying to squint and figure out whether or not you're going to get tier one play. And then you have to factor in the fact that he's dealing with these foot injuries that have been nagging him.

for the lot of, you know, all year, really, you know, and it's kind of cost him some money in the draft because he certainly could have been a top 15 talent in this year's draft. I think if he's healthy, you get an above average, maybe no, you know, big impact play at a defensive tackle from him. I just don't know if I'd be comfortable taking the risk

on this roster, which needs defensive tackle help more than anything. They lost guys, they lost talent at that position, and they weren't very good at that position to begin with last year anyways. So I'm very concerned about whether Banks can be the tide that lifts all boats for this defense up front. Yeah, they also drafted nose tackle, Dominique's Orange in the third round.

I do think, I think you're right, like your trepidation with Banks, but if there is a coach to get those four plays where he looks like Chris Jones out of them, like you said with Van Giggle, like I think Brian Flores is that. But I think I overrated the coaching with this roster, especially on the defensive side, but I do like the offensive pieces. I think this has a chance to be a top 10 offense. I think they could score a lot of points. Kyler stays healthy.

I don't know if he's going to make that offensive line look good because those quarterbacks tend not to, but we'll see what happens. I think KFC and Kyler is an interesting pairing to me. I'm really excited to see how that works. Let's talk about the Chargers. What do you like about the Chargers roster? You have them 13th?

Is that what you said? No, I have them 18th. I have the Vikings and the Chargers tied together. I don't love them as much. And I think that most people who are bullish on them would also, you know, would all kind of sing the same tune that this is a Mike McDaniel belief thing more than it is an offensive roster belief, right? Like I think Quentin Johnson has gotten a little bit better, but he is certainly not the number

one receiver they need. I think that in terms of scheme to player match, someone like Ladd-McConkie working those play action, you know, in-breaking routes, working drags, getting that yak, kind of being, I guess, the Brandon Ayuk of this offense, I think that that's something you can picture for them. I just don't know if he's going to, if he's going to make it work at a high enough volume to make that work, right, to really be a difference maker. I think that last year they would have needed that from Ladd-McConkie and they didn't really get it, you know, and I think that you're really counting on Mike McDaniel to make the interior

of this offensive line turn into something. And I know that they spent, I know that they spent somebody to try to bring guys in and Colstrains and Tyler Beaudish, right? I know they took a swing last offseason with Trevor Penning to kind of be a swing interior guy. You cannot convince me that this interior three with pinning, you know, it. and Josh Kottnberger as a backup center, you know, kind of swing around guy.

Like, you cannot convince me that that is going to be an above average interior. I think it's entirely possible that we look up at midseason and say, Ray Sean Slater and Joel are healthy and Justin Herbert are still running for his life on every third down because their interior is just getting caved in. That's been the problem is the interior offensive line. There's nothing you can do quarterback-wise to kind of mitigate that. There was always that saying, like, oh, the key to stopping Tom Brady is to get interior pressure. That's the key to stopping every quarterback.

in the NFL. But yeah, it comes down to be oddish. I think in the middle of the offensive line, it's obviously a big deal in that offense, the wide zone offense if you want to call it that. Although, I think if anyone's deviated from that, out of necessity, it's been Mike McDaniel

over the last couple years. I think you're right where if you are bullish on this team, it's because of Mike McDaniel, because I'm looking at the roster now, and it's like, Quinn Johnson is your number one. Like you said, he got better, but he's not reliable.

And even Ladd McCawcney last year was not reliable. He didn't have the year you thought he would have coming off his rookie year. What do you think about the defense? I think that's a question, Mark, with Jesse Minter. The defense I like, but that's really what you're kind of left with is how much was their ceiling raised by play calling? I think very weirdly, they've built this young kind of amorphous front seven that you can do a lot with.

I think even if Kalomac is not as good this upcoming year, and I think that now we're certainly at a space in his career where you can't ask him to be much more than what he's been for them over the last two seasons. But I think that even if you don't have Pete Kalomac, I still think you can get enough out of their lineback room with Perryman and Henley. I think that Tully, Tuol 2 can definitely give you a little bit

as kind of your flexible move around interior rusher, where their new defensive coordinator, I always, I feel like I blush his name all the time. I think it's Chris O'Leary. I think that he has the right kind of starting point to have an average defense, right? And I think that that's really where I'm at with them. I think they can be really good in the box.

I don't think they have enough difference making around Derwin James and the secondary to make this team a top 12, top 10 level of defense and level of supporting cast around Justin Herbert. But I think there's just enough for this team to be what they've been basically for the last few years, is right on the fringes of the wildcard race and hoping that Justin Herbert doesn't get

into the playoffs and laying an egg the way that he has the last two years. God, he was so bad against New England. He was so bad. It's unwatchable. That game is unwatchable even by his stance. It's in the playoffs and he's had some rough ones. I defend him as much as I can,

but I could not defend that game. It was the worst game I've ever seen him play. And it was like in ways that he typically isn't bad. It was, I don't even want to talk about it. Who did you have right outside the top 10? So this next cluster 15 to 11 is, oh, I've got Jacksonville at 16. I've got San Francisco at 15. I've got Indianapolis 14.

I've got Tampa Bay 13. I've got Pittsburgh 12 and I've got Green Bay 11. All right, let's talk about Pittsburgh. Because I thought I was ranking them high when I put them 18. And I honestly like the roster. No, no, it's pretty good. It's pretty like the offensive line could be very solid. I like what they were doing with the tight ends and the sixth offensive line.

I don't know if they're going to continue that with Mike McCarthy taking over. The wide receiving, they have wide receiving talent. The defensive talent, obviously, the defense like laid in egg last year and they were pointing fingers all over the place, but the talent is there. Like, if Aaron Rogers is decent,

which is a big if at this point, like this could be a team that threatens to win the AFC North, even if the other teams stay healthy. I know they won it last year, but obviously a lot went right for them. What do you like about this roster the most? I think that I think they've done a good job. job at addressing weaknesses and trying to insulate themselves from having any major holes

outside of the quarterback position, right? Like Michael Pittman to me is a kind of receiver that for most teams in the league, you look at him and say, for his price point, probably not worth bringing in. I think that for the way that Mike McCarthy likes to structure his offense, he needs a Michael Pittman. You need a slant merchant, right? A slam boy, yeah. You need a third down, run right to the sticks, turn around, and move the chains guy.

I think that that's the best use for Michael Pittman. And I think if you allow D.K. Metcalf to continue to be your field stretcher. He's going to run nines. He's going to run his hitches. You're going to get him on an end breaker once a game. And hopefully you're able to connect on those. I think that that's a good spot for him. And I like Jeremy Bernard playing that kind of Debo,

maybe being like a Debo-Samuel-esque player in the league where you can manufacture touches. And again, in this offense where you know Mike McCarthy wants to be in 11 personnel a ton, I think that's a good spot for him. I think the more interesting thing is, can he properly value the tight-in combo of Darneau, Washington, and Pratt Fire Rules? If he can maximize that from a run game perspective,

then the ceiling, I think, takes another big step forward. If you are able to get spread and under center runs together with this tight-in group and be able to be multiple offensively, I think that's just to see it to believe it. And then on the other side of the ball, while this defense did lay an egg, there's still a lot to kind of like, right? Like there really aren't big, big holes.

Maybe outside of Peyton Wilson, who has just not been a favorite of mine. I'll say both he and Patrick Queen can be very much catch chasing lasers in games. You know, I think that they can be good tacklers. They just don't always go where the ball is going, right? But up front, I like what they have,

and I think that Patrick Graham has enough of a track record now as a ceiling-raising play caller that you can take this above-average-esque, you know, defensive setup and be a good play caller, not give up explosive plays, and we might look up, and this is a team that is top 10 in DVOA defensively, even though, you know, we don't necessarily think of them very highly at any one particular point because guys are aging, have been banged up, and they're coming off at 20, 25, but they were pretty disappointing. I think that was the most underrated thing at the end of the Tomlin era, because there was so much

focus on the quarterback position, and there was so much focus on just, like, the overall results, like, oh, they go 9 and 8 every year, is that I thought the defense, defensive scheme left a lot to be desired. They were trying to do too much. They busted so many coverages. Yes. So I do think having Patrick Graham come in, who I think is just more solid. I don't think the,

I don't know if the ceiling is as high as it would be with those coaches, but I think the floor is a lot higher. So I think, and that's good when you have this much talent. I think a high floor is better. The quarterback position is just, I mean, a black hole. 100%.

But you said Michael Pidman, like you need a Michael Pittman and a Mike McCarthy offense. And I think if you have Aaron Rogers, you need a D.K. Metcalf. So I do think the talent fits the scheme and the quarterback. That's why I'm a little bullish on this team. But I guess I'm not as bullish as you. But I like we said, 12 through 18, that was just a cluster fuck for me. Like you could have swapped any of those teams.

I had Green Bay at 12. I'm interested to hear where you ended up with them. Oh, we're right next to each other. I have them at 11. Okay, okay. Because this roster wasn't as good. Like you think of Green Bay and you think about like, Flore and Jordan Love

and they're an ascending team because they have a young quarterback. Then you look at the defense and outside of Michael Parsons who is in red right now in our lads. It's hard to get excited, especially about that front seven

and I don't know where the pass rush is going to come from. This team has quietly turned into a Stars and Scrubs roster. Yes, 100%. The whole the whole draw to them for the two or three seasons

prior to this one was that they've got a lot of depth, especially up front, the trenches on both sides of the ball. So if guys get banged up, you're not going to see a massive drop off from one, you know, from one guy to the next. What's happened as of recent, I would say, especially over the last season, season and a half, the offensive line is taking a step back.

You don't get the same kind of body moving aspect. You don't get as consistent in terms of past protection as you might like to see from a green by offensive line. I would say Jordan Leap did an excellent job still being able to be explosive. We saw him use his legs a little bit more to extend plays. I think that he did a lot more to paper. over some of the issues this offensive line had, especially on obvious passing downs, then what we might have noticed in the moment, I think that people should go and re-watch

and see how much Jordan Love was actually doing to lift the level of this offense. I think that the wide receiver room, they've made their bets on Jaden Reed and Christian Watson and Matthew Golden as their first round pick from two drafts ago. I think I can squint and see how that mix of skill sets can make for a good passing game. I just need to see Christian Watson look like, you know, a $20 plus million per year wide receiver on a week-by-week basis. The flashes, 100% meet the mark. It's just not consistent enough. And he's obviously just not been available long enough to make that work. And then on the other side of the ball, man, like last year was just disappointing. There's really no other

way around it. Very disappointing. Even when Michael Parsons was healthy, the defensive backs were getting dunked on from time to time, right? They've got a key shot Nixon problem. I think. I think even Carrington Valentine has been an issue for them. They've just not gotten the kind of even play that they need. You get to splice. Flash plays from Evan Williams, from Xavier McKinney, right? Like, that has been good for the most part. Their safeties have been good young guys. But the rest of this roster around Michael Parsons has either stagnated, regressed,

or just left more to be desired. I'm really interested to see in, you know, taking Parsons out of it, what the other 10 guys on this defense can do to raise the level of this roster because I've just been really disappointed waiting for them to break through in the way that we thought they might when they were hot during the first half of the 2024 season. and the first half of the 20-25 season for that matter. If you believe in the talent and where they were drafted, I think there is a way to envision this defense being a lot more solid than it was last year.

Like, let's say, like Lucas Van Ness becomes something, DeVante Wyatt takes a step. But those are a lot of big gifts. And on the other side, like the wide receiver thing, I'm with you. I think they made the right bets based on what they had. They obviously had a lot of pieces in there and they had to choose the best of them. But none of these are sure things.

I don't think Matthew Golden's a short thing. Christian Watson has obviously had trouble staying healthy, inconsistent when he has. And Jaden Reed, trouble catching the football. So Tucker Kraft coming back from an injury, that's a big deal. He's got to be a superstar. He's got to be a superstar.

If he's a superstar, I think this offense is going to be enough to carry the defense, even if the defense is below average. But I don't, I've been talking to myself, talking myself into them being a contender the last couple years, and I don't think I'm going to, you know, do that this time around this year. Where do you have San Francisco? I brought them up. I haven't heard you mention them.

I'm guessing I have a top 18 for them. Yeah. Item 8 because I think you can ignore the, I don't know, it's hard for this exercise because there's the age and health thing, which sometimes comes down to luck. But with the 49ers, like, they're an old injury-riddled team.

Yes. They get injured every year. And I don't think it's because the electric substation or whatever the hell that was all about. I think it's just when you sign injured players who are old, they tend to get injured. but on paper this roster has a chance to be really good

as always like the offense the skill group Mike Evans I think still has a lot left in the tank that's going to be really interesting to see how Kyle gets the most out of him because I mean when's the last time we saw a wide receiver like him and that offense is it

like obviously he's not prime Julio Jones but that body type that's the last archetype yeah that's the last time they've had a guy of that archetype playing in a shanahan offense yeah and that passing game looked demonstrably different from what we've seen in San Francisco. So I think there's a chance for some evolution there on the offensive side. The defense, obviously, it's hit or miss.

You still have the best linebacker in the league. You still have Fred Warner. Nick Bosa, if he's healthy, is still going to give you pressure, going to give you double-digit sacks. After that, though, you got Lenore. After that, it's kind of hard to get excited about the defense, which is the only thing that's keeping me from making this a top five roster, which in October, I would not be surprised.

We're like, holy shit, the 49ers are very good. To me, this is like a litmus test on how do you feel about Oso Odaigizua and how do you feel about Yon or Eleanor, right? Like, where do you have them ranked, I think, in the hierarchy of guys at their positions? And I think that I am just a little bit cooler on both of them. I liked Osa a lot two years ago. And in this past year, not as much, right? Like, it's hard to kind of parse out, like, how much of that is Michael Parsons.

I don't think they was 100% the entire way. You just didn't get the same kind of production from them. You're still banking on Nick Bosa being healthy. I think that of the edge rushers who could be on the fringes of, if they give you top five production, that changes the way that we look at this entire unit. And if they stagnate it all, it will definitely lower the floor for a team like this.

So Bosa has to be that guy, I think, to make it work. And a lot of that comes back to the fact that the safety position has been a major disappointment for them. Jaya Brom, flashed at Tom. I bought into the flashes earlier in his career. It is not materialized. Malik Mustafa was like one of those draft darling types

because he's a downhill, I'll blow you up in the middle of the field guy. That is not really materialized into anything consistent. He's not a Cam Chancellor type of player, right? And I think that Renardo Green too is another guy that like you need a player like that to take the next step up.

We just haven't necessarily seen that from him. I think that he's been fine, but they need better than fine. I think in a lot of spots on this defense. Yeah, yeah. Like a lot has to go right for the defense to be where it has been when they've been really good. Like that's,

the offense is always there in some way, like even with the quarterback injuries. But the defense has dictated this team ceiling. When they're a Super Bowl contender, they have like a top 10 defense. When they're not, when they don't have a top 10 defense and have a bottom 10 defense,

they're also ran. So I think there's a lot riding on that, but I think this offense could be super. I didn't mention Christian Kirk, who I think, like, he's not, wasn't worth the money Jacksonville. gave him, but he's a functional player in Kyle Schenney. It's going to get the most out of that type of player

in particular. So we're on the cusp of the top 10. Let's take a break before we get into the top 10 and then we'll see what you have. All right, welcome back. Let's get into your top 10. Give me your 10 through 6. All right. So the back half of my top

10, we Baltimore at 10. I've got New England at 9. I've got Chicago at 8. I've got Houston at 7 and I've got Detroit at 6. Okay, so I had Minnesota at 9. And then I had San Francisco at 8. But outside of that, we have similar teams. I have Buffalo at 10, Minnesota 9, San Francisco 8, Houston 7th,

and then I have New England 6th. And then I had Chicago 11th. You want to talk about Chicago first? Yeah, let's talk about Chicago. Chicago and Jacksonville, to me, were two of the harder teams to place in this. Both were teams that got hot in the second half of the season. Quarterbacks seemed to take major steps forward, and their defense was for it. defenses were forcing turnovers left and right.

And it gets really hard to parse out hot streaks from what is actually going to stick on a year-to-year basis. I think Chicago, honestly, might be even more extreme, right? Because they got like the holy, like, trifecta of things that don't stick on a year-to-year basis, an explosive run game, high turnover margin, and a quarterback that was nails in like fourth quarters, third downs, high-leverage situations. Those three things are very hard to carry over on a year. year-to-year basis. I have a hard time trying to figure out exactly what to make of them.

But when I look at the players, and maybe this is just projection because they have a lot of youth in a lot of spots, when I look at the players almost at every spot, it's guys that I can kind of squit and say, okay, I think that this could work out for this team. I trust what this player is in a Ben Johnson offense. I trust what this player is in a Dennis Allen defense. So maybe I'm wishcasting a bit, and that's why I have them at eight for me. But I do genuinely believe that there is another step forward. They can take, even if it's not as, you know, as many fireworks as what we saw in the second half of last season.

I still think this can be a 10 to 11 win team, even if things are a little more stable and less explosive for them. Yeah, I think I have the same concern. I think that the turnovers in particular really, like, embellish how good the defense was. Yeah. And that's where I had the most pause. Obviously, they bring in a Dylan Thienman.

I think he could really help that defense. But like the Kyler Gordon question, He hasn't been on the field and Ben Johnson's saying weird things about him right now. Yes. There are a lot of question marks on that. But the offense, the offensive line was what they paid for.

I think they got their return on investment. But there's a lot of heavy lifting done by Ben Johnson, I feel like. You look at these pieces and you think about the offense as a whole. And you're like, oh, they were top ten offense. But then you look at the pieces individually. And I'm not like in love with him. Like Colson Loveland, he's awesome. And then after that,

like, who are you buying in? Like, who are you positive is going to be a star player down the line? Like, even like Roma Dunzee, I don't know where I'm at with him yet after two years. He was disappointing last year. I don't know if there's another way to cut it. He was disappointing last year.

A guy of his size with his athletic ability, you would expect him to be one of those when at the catch point every time can go dunk on dbs, especially in the red zone. And it was always just fits and starts in and out of the lineup. up. I think that for him, again, he's kind of the linchpin. I think of the ceiling of this

offense. I trust some of the better plays that their quarterback Caleb Williams made. I do trust that Colston Loveland is going to be an absolute stud, right? I think that he can be everything that Detroit was hoping that Sam LaPorte could be, right? I think the Sam LaPorteur has kind of topped out as like a very good receiving tight-in. I think Loveland gives you that maybe even more of a receiver ceiling. I think he's like a force is how I would put. Yes. He can be like what Tucker crap was before he tore his ACL. Every time the ball's in his hands, you can get 20, 20 yards of, you know,

yak. He can be a George Kettle-esque type of impact player as an inline and as a split-out tight-in. And then I think that really the projection is with Luther Burton. I think that we've heard positive things from Ben Johnson about Luther Burden, right? I think that one of his OTA comments is that it looks like Luther's playing at a different speed than a lot of the other receivers that they're working out right now. He's playing much faster than the defense can cover him at. And I think that if that's what we get, if we get that version of them, then they have

what I think they wanted at a DJ Moore, which is a guy that could work in that intermediate area that could also take the top off and be a decoy at times and allow other receivers or allow Colston Loveland to work underneath. I like Burden a lot coming out of college. So maybe this is just me being anchored to how I felt about him coming into the league. But I think that there's a lot of need left on the bone for him. And now there's a lot of opportunity opened up for him now that DJ Moore is out of the building. I just find myself saying, while Ben Johnson does a lot of the heavylifting for this offensive line, that they have the right ecosystem of playmaking talent around this

O line, especially on the interior to be able to make it work. Yeah, I'm excited for Burden. Unlike Rome, I think Burden is a player that can be elevated by the coaching, by the playcalling. Like, he's that style of receiver. Whereas Rome, for him to be at his best, like, that's individual talent. like him being a 50-50 ball winner winning in the red zone where Burden is going to get plays drawn up for him

he's going to get explosive plays drawn up for him he's going to get open deep I think the production is going to be there I wouldn't be surprised if he like we come out of this year and we're like okay Burden's the number one like not role-wise but the production wise yeah

is the number one in Rome is taking a back seat to him let's move on I had Buffalo at 10 let's talk about Baltimore I actually oh yeah let's talk about Baltimore yeah let's talk about Baltimore because I think that there are a lot of people who were going, this is one of those like helmet sticker things

or people see Baltimore and you think about the reputation of what they usually have in terms of roster deaths and it's going to be easy to assume that this should be one of the five best rosters in the league. And what we've just seen boring out after the last two seasons is that it's Derek Henry, it's Kyle Hamilton, and then it's a lot of, on a week-by-week basis,

you're kind of hoping that another guy breaks out. A lot of old players. Like, it's kind of reminiscent of the 49th, I don't think they have quite the high-end talent that the 49ers do, but you think about the players they're relying on to be good that are well-past their prime. Like Andrews, even Henry, who Henry, he's a freak. He's the new Adrian Peterson.

But Andrews, Ronnie Stanley, Patrick, or not Patrick Queen, Raquant Smith, Marlon Humphrey. You're adding Trey Hendrickson to that midst as well. I add him to the list. It's Mattibouquet's coming off a major injury that I think some people were concerned that might cost him his career. If he's not at 100%, like this defense could be really bad

in ways that they've kind of been bad since losing Mike McDonald. And then the offensive side of the ball, like the wider receiver room still has those question marks. The offensive line wasn't great. And they bring back John Simpson. I know they drafted Ayanu. I'm not high on the offensive line.

Like it's, again, another year of Lamar Jackson and Derek Henry make magic. And thank God for Derek Henry. like, where would this team be if they didn't sign Derek Henry two years ago? Which wasn't like a scene as a slam dunk move. They would be asking Lamar to be 2018, 2019, LaFar again. Which is obviously just not feasible. It would not be feasible.

I don't think they'd have a functional offense if not for Derek Henry. So at least take some of the load on early downs away from him and away from Jackson in this passing game. And these wide receivers have just, they just have not delivered the way that we thought they would. Even the best of Zayflowers, I think, has left some people wanting in terms of down a down consistency. And we just haven't seen the connection really with Rashad Bateman and Lamar Jackson, you know, outside of, you know, or two or three weeks stretch here where they're pushing

the ball downfield and then they can't connect or they're making, you have these miscommunications in terms of where routes are supposed to break. You know, you think about the divisional playoff game against the bills two years ago where they're, you know, you end up getting an interception because guys aren't miscommunicate are miscommunicating. So this offense has been, I think, more disappointing in the past game than what you might think, given the fact that Lamar Jackson was playing at an MVP level. And I think that kind of speaks to what he's been as a pocket passer

to really paper over, I think, what they haven't had in terms of difference making wide receiver talent. I have them at 14th, and the only reason I have them that high, like I think you could put them in the same boat that we put Kansas City, the way we were talking about Kansas City. But I do believe in this coaching staff, even though they still have to prove it.

Like, we haven't seen Jesse Minter be a head coach. We haven't seen Declan Doyle call plays. Right. But that's the type of offensive coach they need it. Like attention to detail, we're not going to take that shit. Like, if you mess up, we're going to correct it on the field immediately. And I think they've lacked that the last couple of years. And we've seen that with the lack of consistency with the route running.

But if this works, then they make the playoffs. I think it's going to be the result of good coaching and Lamar Jackson being an MVP type player again. Yeah, where are you at with Buffalo? Because I have them at five. I mean, I could have put them easily put them at five. I think it's the defensive part of it.

They're issues, developing players. I think that's the concern. Like the offense, I think is underrated just because Josh Allen has this narrative that Josh Allen is Superman and he looks like and he plays like it sometimes. But the offensive line was really good last year. I think scheme factored into that,

but they were really good on the ground. They were good in past protection. Those two tackles could be left on an island you didn't need to give them chip help. I'm not excited about DJ Moore. I don't think he solves the man coverage problem that they had last year, where Josh Palmer was like their go-to target against man and Khalil Shshir. But I think they have enough with those tight ends where they don't need that superstar number

one receiver. So even if DJ Moore is what he's been in Chicago the last couple years, I think that's enough for this offense to be once again a top three offense. The question is situationally, when they get to the playoffs and their season, man coverage, are they going to be able to create explosives outside of Josh Allen putting on that cape every third down? I don't know. I don't think so.

Yeah, I struggle with that too. I think the interesting thing to me about Buffalo's offense is that you could remove Josh Allen and put a totally different quarterback in stylistically. And I think this offense could just meld itself around whatever quarterback it has. because the run game has been so stable, right? Like James Cook is not the most dynamic back, but he does such a good job at taking what's available. And I think that we've seen that this offensive line is so good

at basically giving him explosive plays where all he has to do is play downhill. I think anybody can play behind this offensive line and be an effective runner. And I think that Cook has done a good job at maximizing what's available to him. Ultimately, though, I think that while this team is fifth, the reason why it's not in the same tier is like,

my top three, top four, like I do think there's a tear break after four for me in terms of like ideal situations is that other teams do have receivers that can break man coverage or they do have you know, they do have play calling that makes it impossible to play man coverage against them, right? Like we saw Buffalo and I feel like this has been for the last two years and I think that Joe Brady is an above average play caller. I would say that he's solidly a good play caller. Yeah. But you typically see these two to four week stretches where defenses just say, you know what, screw it. If all they're going to do is playing mesh,

we're just going to run with drafts. We're not going to give you this open air. All you want to do is throw slants out of the gun, then we're just going to stick to that. If we want to throw hitches and all that, we're just going to stick to that, and we're going to force you to have to convert these routes into something more vertical,

and we've seen them struggle to do so. I think that this offense is where Kansas City wishes this offense could be, and still there is a gap, I think, ultimately in them not having guys that can beat man coverage. And the other thing that's an anchor, in spite of what I think of their offense and how warm I am about their offense, I think that their front seven still just leaves so much to be desired. There's so many questions about what Bradley Chub is supposed to be as a lead pass rusher,

what Greg Russo is supposed to be potentially as a lead past rusher. Yeah. I need to see a healthy, impactful Ed Oliver again. I liked the film we got up Deoni Walker last year, especially once you could kind of tell that you had a better understanding of the defense. in his role within it and how he could be a game wrecker. I think that pair can be good. We just need to see it on a week-by-week basis. And ultimately, I think Jim Linter is going to have to be like a Jesse Minter-type

ceiling razor for this defensive backfield. It is possible. It's entirely possible. But he's got to be a Mike McDonald, Jesse Mentor-esque. You can give me any five pieces back there. And I will find a way to put together a coverage menu that makes it hard for offenses to get explosive plays on us. I need to see that first.

If they deliver that, that would paper over, what questions we might have of their wide receiver room because they're going to have a dominant run game. I think that they can have a good interior defensive line, but ultimately they need one more thing between their wide receiver room or their defensive backfields to really punch through if you want me to consider them like an elite A-tier S-tier type of supporting cast.

Yeah, and I think the potential there is for the secondary. Cole Bishop was fine. If you listen to Tony Romo, he's the next coming of Ed Reed. I don't know if you caught any of those games. Jesus Christ, the guy's just lavishing praise on him. Maxwell Harrison, I don't know how you felt about him. I think he's good. He can stick to receivers,

but he can be bullied a little bit, which is always a concern, especially when he get to the playoffs. But I think this is going to be an annoying defense to play. And it's hard to balance that, because the defense has had its issues over the last couple years, but Sean McDermott was a good coach, and they were well coaching for the most part.

And we're going to a defensive coordinator who has NFL experience, obviously, he had played in the NFL too, but we haven't seen him call plays at the NFL level, so that would be interesting to see. Where's you got up with Houston? Houston, for me, I have seventh.

Yep, I have them seventh as well. All right, let's go to the top five. I'll give you my top five first, and then we'll hear yours. I had Detroit at fifth. I have Seattle, the defending champs at fourth, Philly at third, Denver second, and then the Rams, obviously, first.

Yeah, for me, I've got the bills at five, who we discussed. I've got the Eagles fourth. I've got the Seahawks third. I've got the Broncos second and I've got the Rams, obviously, number one. Okay, let's talk about Philly first. Like, am I too high on them?

Am I too high on this roster? Is it as good as it was two years ago? Or was the coaching really the problem last year? I think it's really hard to divorce the Kevin Petulow of it all and then what we saw out of the offense. I think the offense is objectively, any offense that loses A.J. Brown

is objectively worse than it was when it had A.J. Brown, right? Even if he lost a step last year, which I think the quarterback factored into that, but he's still a very good player. 100%. You're also talking about an older Lane Johnson. I think that Jordan Milata was very uneven in his play.

You had a banged up Landa Dickerson and Cam Durgan's all last year and a Tyler Steen at right guard, who I think the Philadelphia ultimately needs to find a player to replace within the next couple of years. I don't know if he's a long-term option as a starter. That to me, I think, it's not like it's a bad unit, right? And I'm going to do my best to not be an Eagles homer that also hates his team.

A doomer? Yeah. Right. Exactly. You know, but I do think that the run game issues were real, and I think that they would have existed no matter who was calling players for this team. I just don't think the offensive line was very good last year.

They looked like a team that ran the ball 600 times or whatever. It was like 580 touches for Saquan Barkley, probably over 600, and you add in all the touch pushes and all that. They looked like that, And it's the same characters. It's entirely possible that they show up next season. And again, they look a little older, a little slower, and a little less powerful.

And that would definitely be a restructure plate for me for this offense. Pass game-wise, I'm honestly not even in a position to project because it is such a different scheme that they're going to have under Sean Mannion. We're going to see a different distribution of touches with Devante Smith as a number one and Mackay Lemon as a rookie. I really don't even know what to do with that, right? So I'm willing to set that aside. Defensively, I think it's entirely possible that they're better than they were last year. Yeah. I think the roster is insane.

I think that Jonathan Grenard is a better player than Jalen Phillips, and I like Jalen Phillips. I just think that Grinard gives you something a little bit different on run downs in terms of motor and playmaking in the backfield. And I think maybe one of the more underplate things was Jalen Carter playing through two bum shoulders last year. I think that there was reporting that he felt like he couldn't even do push-ups on a consistent basis. and you're asking that guy to be your space eater on the interior, right? If you get those shoulders taken care of, it comes back healthy, I think that there is kind of like this silent but not silent kind of kicking the ass of if you want to go make $35, $40 million as a defensive tackle,

you got to go actually play like Aaron Donald because that's what we thought we were drafting. So I'm really interested to see if he's able to go reach that level of play. And if he does, that alone between the addition of Gernard, Jalen Carter playing the way you're supposed to, and the back seven, which has been, you know, I think no worse than third or fourth on a week-to-week basis. Even last year when it seemed like they kind of had struggles

or they weren't playing at the same level they were in 2024, I still have very high hopes for this team. I love Cooper DeGine. Think Quineau Mitchell is one of the three best corners in the league. And you add a requal in which I thought was a really smart, high-ceiling type of bet. If those three corners are what I think they can be around Zach Bond in the middle of the field,

we're going to look at this team be just as impossible to throw the ball against as they were two years ago, I think. Yeah, and if you can't run on them, you have no chance. And I think, like you said, alluded to, it's going to be harder to run on them. Seattle, that's probably going to be the more, most controversial ranking from this. I had them fourth.

I think you had him third. I have him third. My one concern is just like the offensive line could be an issue, and this offense wasn't, they won the Super Bowl, which, you know, papers over a lot of their issues during the season. Sam Darno led the league in turnovers. It was like the 13th ranked offense by efficiency. So it wasn't like a world beating offense.

They lose Kenneth Walker, who was a big part of the explosiveness of it. They lose Kubiak who did a lot of scheming around the offensive line and helping Sam Darnold play at his best. So that's my concern with this roster. But defensively, like they're going to be the best defensive in the NFL probably. And Mike McDonald's the best defensive line in the week. So any concerns about this roster are very small concerns. Yeah, I have literally nothing smart to add on TIA.

They were the best last year. I think they're going to be no worse than second this year, right? Like, they're going to be excellent. They're still going to be sticking in coverage. They're going to be the most physical defense in football, and they're going to do everything in their power to continue to dominate the Shanahan-McVaytree, which they've done basically as long as Mike McDonald's been there. I think the one big question that we have to get answered is,

did Mike McDonald hire Brian Fleury as the offensive coordinator because he wants to get into the heavy personnel pound the rock physical run game that San Francisco has leaned on under Kyle Shanahan. That, I think, is a big question for me is, are they going to show up this year knowing the Sam Darnold is a champion and say, in spite of all the good that you did at your hottest and best over the last two years, we still think the best version of this offense is one that takes the ball out of your hands on early downs. If they're able to do that successfully, with Judarian Price and whenever his extra Arbinate gets healthy again,

I can buy them to them still kind of hanging around 14th to 16th in offensive efficiency and I think that's enough for them to be a top three team in terms of supporting cast. I just know no Seahawks fan is going to want to hear that fresh off of the championship, especially with where we have Los Angeles ranked. Yeah, let's talk about Los Angeles.

I don't think there's any surprise after they added Garrett and McDuffie in the offseason. This was already one of the most talented rosters. But let's go the other way. What are you concerned about with the roster? It's wide receiver depth, right? That's exactly what I have at the top of the list.

It's 100% wide receiver depth. I think if this team doesn't make a Super Bowl run, it is going to 100% be because Matthew Stafford needed one more guy to go win on obvious passing downs. And Devante Adams couldn't go do it. Pooka Nakua, I think.

Is this a hot take for me to say that he is much more a product of Stafford and McVe. There's Stafford than he is of McVeigh. I think that Stafford has done much more to make him be a kingmaker type as a receiver specifically than McVeigh is done. I think McVeigh is done a good job of maximizing

his blocking skill set, his physicality and all of that in the run game. But Stafford, to me, is the one who is like, he makes Pooka, Pooka Nakuwa. I think you could put McVeigh and Nekua with a bunch of different quarterbacks and he has nearly as impactful as Stafford has made him

in the intermediate area of the field. And still with that, We've seen him struggle to separate. He kind of turns into a contested catch guy, which he's been excellent at in his career. It's just not a real way to live on a down-and-down basis. No, you need an MVP quarterback to get to cash in on those targets. Exactly.

I mean, Devonze Adams has basically been their short-yardage back, right? Like, he's their red zone guy. He's their third and short, got to move the chains guy. I have some questions about whether or not that's going to carry over on a year-to-year basis. And I think maybe most importantly is questions about whether or not this offensive line can mall the way they did last year. Yeah. It sounds hyperbolic to say

because I think the more casual, more general fan doesn't care as much about success rate in some of the different ways we can filter things to get nerd stats, but it's not an exaggeration to say that Los Angeles had one of the most dominant run games that you will ever come across in the modern era. They didn't mean they were popping a lot of explosives.

Basically, whenever they wanted six yards in the run game, they could go get those six yards because that offensive line was absolutely moving people. I don't know if you can count on that on a year-by-year basis. I think Philadelphia last year was instructive of the fact that your offensive line, even if you keep continuity, might not give you that type of time in production in terms of yards before contact like we saw from L.A. last year. That to me, I think, is a big question.

Everything on the other side of the ball is Miles Garrett's to fix. And if there was one player that you have to go ask to fix whatever problems might exist, Miles Garrett will be the guy. Yeah, that was like their one problem last year was getting, off the field on third down, like in the games that they ended up losing, like Seattle converted 53% of their conversion downs. Carolina did that to them in a regular season. Carolina on the fourth downs.

And that's solved. Like you brought in a closer as a pass rush, and you brought in a defensive back who can stick to wide receiver. So I really don't see an issue. I think it is depth. If they get hurt, then there could be issues, but you could say that about every team. Exactly. I had Denver second.

I think we all know like Denver's just stacked all over the board. the Jalen Waddle thing is the addition is just the rich getting richer, especially with Sean Peyton. He always always had this wide receiver room in New Orleans where just fast guys all over the field explosive. So I think Bo Nix is in for a big year. And he doesn't even have to be a great quarterback to have that big year. But yeah, that's my list.

Remind me of your top five before we get out of here? So first I had the Rams, second to Broncos, Seahawks, third, Eagles fourth, and Bill's fifth. Okay, and I had the Rams first, Broncos second, Eagles third, Seahawks fourth, and Lions fifth. Pretty good list. I think the Super Bowl is going to come from one of those five teams that we had.

I think so too. Yeah, I think it's going to come from Los Angeles and Seattle. Maybe Denver, but I think last year proved that you don't really need a superstar quarterback to go to the Super Bowl to win the Super Bowl. I guess my biggest question for you is, what team outside of the top

10 do you think has the highest ceiling, the most likely starting outside the top 10, but getting hot enough, being like Chicago or Jacksonville last year and getting, you know, a 13 win team that can maybe make a push towards a conference championship game. That's a good question. I'm going to go with Houston's an easy pick for me. Green Bay is a easy pick for me. Yeah, but Green Bay is that team just because Jordan Love, I think, is a underrated quarterback at this point. Like you said, the strides he made, especially creation-wise, were huge, can't be ignored. But Houston, I could see Houston going to the AFC championship. And I picked them to go to the AFC championship last year,

but I think Stroud, how this season ended, kind of, you know, papered over the strides he made down the stretch, especially the first year in an offense. I was really hard for him to learn, put more on his plate. And that defense is capable of, like, $2,000, $2,000, type things, type runs. I would not be surprised if they're an AFC title game next year. Yeah, I think that's my pick tone of the AFC.

O'clock, that'd be interesting. All right, that's going to do it for us. Thanks to Christopher Sutton for producing Stefano Sanchez on video and additional production supervision by Connor Nebens and Arjuna Ram Kapal. Thanks for stopping by. 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C., Kentucky or Wyoming. Gambling problem.

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