The Ringer NFL Show - The Quarterback Episode With Mike Sando | The Ringer NFL Show

Episode Date: August 26, 2020

The Ringer’s Kevin Clark is joined by The Athletic’s Mike Sando to discuss the different tiers of quarterbacks (7:31), who could make the leap (23:49), and whether Deshaun Watson and the Houston Texans are underrated (43:25).  Host: Kevin Clark  Guest: Mike Sando Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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who are quarterback to yours, one of the most plug-in guys anywhere in football journalism. It's Athletic Senior Writer, Mike, Sando. Mike, how you doing? I'm doing well. It's good to be here, Kevin. My debut, I believe. Your debut, absolutely. I met you in a press box at the Hall of Fame game, and I think 2012.

I don't know why you were there. I don't know why I was there. But we sat next to each other. You explained, I think you explained expected points to me at that point. Wow, you know, that's great that you say that. The QBR. So I know why I was there. Okay, so I was the, I'm the Seattle Area Hall of Fame selector.

So I think that was the year Cortez Kennedy went in. So, you know, I don't go every year, but if I'm presenting Cortez or Walter Jones, I'll go back because I know those guys. You know, it's a fun little get together. But I'm glad you brought up EPA and QBR because some of that is really a reason why I'm here today with the quarterback tier thing, which you kind of think is it's sort of the opposite of the, you know, I'm pulling guys for their opinions as opposed to just looking at the EPA. But this has all been sort of a search for me for kind of ground truth in quarterbacks, right? And QBR, I was the number one evangelist of that at ESPN.

I will say this. I remember so the Hall of Fame, it's like three days, two days, whatever it is. And you were to the right of me and Wright Thompson was still left of me. And I'm not totally sure why I was breaking up the ESPN thing. But I do remember having a very good time just listening to both perspectives, very different. right from more of the human feature element. Yeah. The analytics element.

That was quite a two-day period. So we're going to break down quarterbacks. That's it. That's the show, the quarterback episode. You drew the quarterback tiers every year. You came out with it last month. It's one of the best pieces of content that anyone does in football, quite frankly. And you've done a couple other things since then.

You did the breakdown with strength of schedule and all that. But this all centers around one thing, which is who are the best quarterbacks to football and how is this developing. I'm curious, Mike, you said something, and you've said something over when you talk about the quarterback tiers that I found fascinating, which is when you're pulling these guys, you almost find out more about the evaluators and the teams than you do the quarterbacks each year. And I'd like you to expand on this. You've been doing this for seven years. And I'm curious how the evaluators have changed their opinions on just the quarterback position, what they look for. Do they look for anything differently? how to coaches view it, how do GMs view it,

analytics guys, whatever it is. When you start polling in 2013 versus polling in 2020, how do those opinions evolve, I guess you could say. Yeah, well, the primary basis is the same, which is the more help you need as a quarterback to succeed, the lower you are thought of, right? So the better you're able to operate with the less amount of support, we're not just talking about the players and your team,

teammates, that's important. but we're also talking about, okay, you know, can you, when you're down 28 to 3 in the Super Bowl, have a chance to throw when we don't have a play action game, we don't have this amazing run game, right? That's the essence of the quarterback tiers, and that hasn't changed. I think clearly what's changed is the NFL has developed more of an open mind, has we've seen even one of the longest tenure coaches in Andy Reid had Brad Shilderis studying college offenses. I think that the initial skepticism,

on a Russell Wilson because of his height, because somebody like that hadn't succeeded to the level that he has, really. That's definitely changed. I mean, I think there's much more of, you know, hey, we're not going to, it's not my way to the highway with my system. And so I think that's been a very positive development. And some of these guys maybe have a greater chance for some success, even if they don't get to the top tier.

I think that's really the chance. Yeah. And that's, I think, the overarching lesson of the past half decade, I would guess, is that you can't be a coach who puts square pegs in round holes and you can't just say, and this used to be, I mean, Mike, you know this. There was 40 years, maybe more of, we're going to get this guy and he's going to run our system. And if he can't run our system, he's out of here. And I think that making the system around your quarterback is the prevailing trend, if there is one of the past five years. Brad Childress, as you said, when he was out of work, he came and he was a spread. game analyst. I talked to him back then. And he told me about how Carson Wentz was the perfect

kind of marriage between quote unquote pro style and spread style. And he's able to do it all. And then we see that in Doug Peterson's offense. What two years later? And he looks like MVP candidate. And I think that there are, I'm really fascinated to see where this goes because you start to look at a team like the Ravens who built one of the best offensive infrastructures ever around Lamar Jackson. and I think if you're an owner now and you can get a special player like Lamar Jackson who by the way inexplicably dropped to number 32 in the first round if you can get a guy like that

I think you're going to see more and more teams say we'll just get this guy, we'll figure things out after that we'll hire the coaches, we'll get the players needed but I think that's the path forward and I when Lamar was when he was on one of our shows a couple of months ago I asked him this and I said what is the overarching lesson from you and he said get guys who want to

to win and figure the rest out later. And I found that very enlightening. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So I think your general premise I'm going to agree with, I think the specific application to Lamar, we have to acknowledge how specially is, can you name two other guys ever in the history of the world who could do what he does the way he does it? I guess the point I'm trying to make is how many guys throughout history would have been like that, had they been given a chance? Oh, no doubt. And so we're going to see you guys come up. But I think he's so special that even some of the other guys that we've seen who have been given a chance, right? And just go back through the years.

Steve Young, Rich Gannon was an athletic guy. Randall Cunningham was an athletic guy. Michael Vic was an athletic guy. Colin Kaepernick was an athletic guy. None of them even close to the ability to run in the manner that he runs. And we'll talk about this, I'm sure. Still in the end, when you're down in the Super Bowl like Patrick Mahomes is, that's not what's winning in the game.

So there is an element of what you still have to be able to do to check every single box at the quarterback position. All right. Let's start with Tom Brady. He is the number one guy in tier two. I think that, and this kind of goes to what we're talking about as far as just conventional wisdom in the league, I think that the NFL as a whole is going to hold on to Tom Brady as a tier one quarterback for as long as they possibly can because you default to the guy you've

seen do it over and over and over again. When you think about the league and the people you've talked to dropping him to tier two, what stands out? Is that just last year the weapons? weren't as good. And so now all of a sudden he gets into that zone where he needs that infrastructure. Yeah. I think there's a feeling that, hey, it got bad for him last year and he wasn't able to overcome it as well as maybe he could have earlier in his career. And I don't know how fair that is. I was a little bit surprised that he didn't hold on one, you know what I mean? Sort of get one more

year than you deserve maybe in the top tier. But I think all of these guys, to some extent, need a baseline level of support, right? And I think what is that? You know, to what extent, to that go away. Now, I know people that have watched all of this film for the last five years and think he's still tier one and that it just fell off enough around him that he couldn't quite do it. And they expect him to really bounce back. And there's other people who, you know, you kind of look, if you really look in recent years, they've, they've had a great run game. They've been a 21 personnel team more than others. And he's had Rob Grankowski at times, the best tight end and best, maybe one of the best five receiving teams.

targets in a representative position. So this year will be telling, right? I mean, I think if he has a top five season, just eyeballing it, right? Not even watching the film of it. Just look at it. Does he have an amazing year? I think it will affirm that maybe he was deducted out of it prematurely. Yeah.

What kind, when you look at Brady and you look at the book on Brady, is Tampa Bay set up to be his ideal type of team or is a different team he needs right now? Or is that, is the Mike Evans sort of. Aryan system and the pretty good offensive line. Is that what he needs right now? I think they need to tailor it to him so that the protections are there. You know, if you look at, if you look at all the quarterback's Bruce Ariens's head, we can put together an amazing tape of them just getting the snot knocked out of them, right? I mean, it's all of them, Carson Palmer, Aaron or Andrew Luck, you know, all the, all the way through a lot of these guys.

Now, it doesn't mean that they can't adjust it, but I think the protection element of it being in sync with Skarnakia in sync with McDaniels calling the game a certain way. Some of that has to be adapted over or else I think that he doesn't like to get hit, right? I mean, he's not in a position at this age to take those kind of shots that Carson Palmer was taken five years ago. Yeah, no, I think it's going to be fascinating. I want you to break a tie in everybody's minds because I think that there's a real argument. So you have the 2016 quarterbacks. You have golf, DAC, and wins. All of them have had incredible success in this league to varying degrees. And you have the JV version of that, which is Baker, Josh Allen, and Sam Darnold, who have not had roaring success, but are also

kind of tied together by the draft class and by their relative stature with everybody else. And I'm curious, if you're looking at Baker, Donald, and Allen, right now, and I saw the, I saw the tears, but when you're talking to the 50 guys you talked to, who is pegged is having the best career right now of those three guys? Wow, that is such a great question because on all three of them, I'm like, I see the limitations before I see the upside, right? Right, right. With them.

So if they were going to be like in a draft, that's a great one. Like who would people take? I mean, it's probably to some extent Baker because they've seen less of them. Isn't that something how it is? It's like, well, we're not really sure he sucks. Yeah, right. That's a little bit part of this, right? I mean, I think you could find guys to herald each one of them.

But with Allen, there's definitely a hardcore crowd that just thinks he doesn't have enough feel for the game. You watch him when he scrambles, he gets hit like knockout hits. And then the actual thing. So we'll see a little bit this year. With Darnold, he's the opposite of that. He's all instincts and doesn't, you know, he's always going off schedule. he's almost better doing that. And you would like to see him just sort of settle down and play the offense.

And then Baker Mayfield, it's more of like the makeup, the leadership, the things he says, the maturity, right? So, but I think you can grow out of some of the maturity things. And maybe for that reason, you would peg it with Mayfield, but that's not a real ringing endorsement. Yeah, it's going to be really hard. And I don't really know what happens. And good thing they're, you know, for extensions, I don't even know where you.

you begin on any of the three, I think it's really hard to figure that out. Buffalo likes Allen, though, don't you? Oh, yeah, no, of course. Yeah, I believe that they'll pay him. I believe that they'll pay him. And then with the Jets, it sort of depends who's in charge, right? Who the coach is and all that. I mean, where they are in their development and this year,

because I think that Joe Douglas is playing a very good long game as far as the building projects. I like what he did in the draft, but it's a really bad time to have a quarterback due first, fifth year option. yeah if you were to figure out how to screw up sam darnell coming out would you change anything right right i mean it's amazing and that's one of those things where i wish the jets hadn't given mike mcgagnan that extra draft and i wish that they had moved on either never hired adam gase or or never hired uh or excuse me or fired him after last season i i just there's so many

missteps and kind of like we're talking about the the goal here is to draft a quarterback and you can to put him in position to win. They drafted a quarterback and then it wasn't intentional sabotage, but it was the closest thing you're going to get. And I'll say that about Buffalo. You know, they've probably done the most to try to help their guy the right way, right? They've given him a defense so he doesn't have to score 30 points a game. And now they're trying to get some weaponry, right? I mean, they were active in free agency before. Now you had bigs in a trade. I think this year will be very telling. I think I would love, I think we'll be able to answer the question a lot better after

this season. Yeah. No, I mean, and that's, why I think it's so fascinating. That's why I asked the question. It's just that those three guys in my mind will always be tethered together in the same way the 2016 guys were. The differences is that all three guys have either been, the two of them have been MVP candidates and one of them has made a Super Bowl, or one of them has played in a Super Bowl, at least. Is there a guy when you're doing this that you think there's the biggest disconnect between how he's viewed in NFL buildings versus how he's viewed by people like us, the media, the fans and where is the biggest golf there?

Yeah, well, there's a segment of media that thinks Aaron Rogers isn't any good anymore because the EPA is low. Right. So there's a segment, my friend Ben Baldwin, who writes for us of the athletic, you know, has been hard on that. And he almost jokes about it. But that's not at all what, you know, he got four second tier votes. So there's a few people, you know, kind of picking nits with him.

But I think for the most part, he's still seen as being able to. Matt LaFleur voting him that tier four. Yeah. You're right, the one vote. Yeah, the one vote. Yeah, he's right. I'm sorry. We're going to just, you know, not include yours.

This is really not fair. But, but, yeah, I think that there's, and even the Packers have fed this, you know, with the draft, the, you know, they drafted a quarterback now. And so I think we can all sort of see the meter ticking, you know, right on, you know, the time is ticking here on Rogers for one or two more years in Green Bay, maybe. And yet everyone who has to play him or watches and thinks he's got all the powers. he's had in the past and that you know you just look at the supporting cast then it's a lot different not as good and maybe this it's not what you know you may or may not be loving what they're

doing offensive the last couple years either so let me ask you the question so i know you you've told the story before about guys who look at just 500 plays michel watson whatever but how much do guys if they're not playing them or not game planning for them or if they're not on the other side of the ball quite frankly how much do head coaches or coordinators who have nothing to do with a player watch a player like Aaron Rogers. How often does it happen? When do they do it? And how educated do they typically get?

Because, you know, it was funny. When I talked to Jim McGroplo last year around this time, and he was injured, obviously, the year before. And he had Mike Shanahan in. Kyle had Mike come in and just hang out with Jimmy and just kind of coach him up when he was injured and nobody was able to work with him. And he said that one of the biggest things for him

was just watching other offenses because he never done it before. There was no reason or no incentive to sit around watched Patrick Mahomes or watched Drew Brie's and he said he spent a handful of weeks with Mike Shanahan just watching these concepts and saying, oh my God. So how much does this happen at the league level where they actually study this stuff just to see what's what? Yeah. So if you're someone like Rogers, I mean, you're going to have a baseline knowledge, you know, a head coach will have baseline knowledge from just watching them over the years. You've seen the playoff games. You have a feel. And then if you are preparing for common opponents,

they see the cross tape. So a lot of the time just say, hey, you actually had him on about three or four cross tapes last year and what we weren't preparing for him but here's what I saw. And then you'll get like the personnel evaluator, the pro personnel guy who if he's doing his job, then he's seen a lot, right? He's keeping more of an inventory. And so he's going to have maybe a little bit more. And then you will get some people who will say, you know, we haven't seen car in a couple of years and, you know, I don't have as great of a feel on him. But then that guy might have a great feel on five other guys. Right. So you'll occasionally get somebody. And they'll admit who just doesn't have as strong of a feel.

And that's why, you know, I don't know if 50 people's the right number, but you talk to a lot of them and it sort of evens out. But you'll see some outlier votes in there, right? We're like, oh, how did, who gave this guy, you know, at three, you know, or whatever. And it's just, it's just part of it. Yeah. No, and it's a fascinating part of it because I think that there are some guys in this league who just study the hell out of other trends and schemes and teams and some who are just,

they really just want to focus on their own building. And it's really fascinating. All right. Derek Carr, I just, there's a lot of smart people who've made the case that he was better than his reputation last year. And then there's some people who are sort of dug in on the theory that John Gruden doesn't like him and they've been trying to upgrade. That's why you bring in a Marcus Mariotta. Anything there with the Raiders that we need to be on alert for as far as them being a sleeper team this year. Well, John's always got his eye on the next quarterback.

I mean, I don't think, I mean, I don't think it's, I don't think John Gruden. I think John Gruden's love is fickle. And I think, I mean, heck, I know John pretty well. I traveled with him from Monday Night Football for three or four years. Yeah, of course. And I went to all the Gruden quarterback camps and stuff. But I think it's clear that by his actions and what he says that and just by what we know about John Gruden, that Derek Carter is not probably his ideal quarterback, right?

I mean, he likes the, he wants the tough guy, rich skin, even Brad Johnson, the guy. just kind of a crusty, salty, leader type guy for your team. I'm not sure Mario does that either, although John loved him coming out. But I think when people criticize Derek Carr in the league, a component of that is they just don't like the way he carries himself. They don't like the way he is or isn't accountable, the things he says. It's kind of like when Kirk Cousin says, hey, no fans, that'd be kind of cool. People are like, that's my quarterback.

Woo. Let me, you know, you know what I mean? And there's an element of that with not only Derek Carr, but kind of all the cars, right? I mean, and so there's a rub-me-the-wrote-me-the-wrong-way thing that people, just in a league see in general, and then think that they know that extends to John Gruden. And so everyone's watching.

And yeah, they paid Mariotta. I'd be surprised if John's not excited about Mariotta. Yeah, and it's funny because, and this is not uncommon, but it is notable. I remember someone who knows things, reaching out to me two years ago, forget what it was, and them saying like,

you know, no one really, and this is, maybe it's not a fault of his, but it certainly is a pattern. There's a lot of relationships between quarterbacks and John Gruden that don't end well

and that end with, with the quarterback being a little bit upset. And there's just a pattern there. And I think a lot of that is because, quite frankly, he's ruthless with quarterbacks. And that's kind of what we're talking about, is that he is he is such a he is such a command of the position i think that that there's just

certain things he does that are a little bit out of left field i mean i think last year him just randomly on august 10th or whatever saying i love nathan peterman i just if you're dera car you just kind of look at that and say what what is going on here he's doing the same thing with mara this year i love this guy so it's it's all all very strange and all very entertaining i guess you good say. All right. Yes. Give us a regression candidate this year. Give us the guy who when you're talking around in the NFL circles, he was a fool's goal last year or not or just is going to come back down to Earth. Okay. It's mostly a function of the old guys, right? I mean, I think at the top, at the top, anyone who's a younger guy, people are generally excited. And now some people will think that

Lamar Jackson, you know, defense will be prepared for him, you know, may not be quite as good, but no one thinks he's going to be a bad player, right, who's already up there. So I'll give you a way to figure this out. So a year ago, that guy was Baker Mayfield. Everybody loved him after the first year, and he kind of came into the bottom of the second tier, and this year he's middle of, he's about tier three, and that's probably where he should be. The guy who's like that this year is Kyler Murray, but I don't sense people feeling that way. Now, I didn't sense him feeling that way last year either, right?

that's why he was that high. But are people, Kyler Murray got, is the lowest rated guy who got a tier one vote, right? So there's a lot of excitement for Kyler Murray. And I think it's pretty much justified.

But after only one year to be ahead of Kirk Cousins and Goff and Garoppolo and, you know, some guys who've had some success in the league and even been to a Super Bowl in a couple of cases, like it wouldn't surprise me if, you know, he didn't just,

automatically pick up where he left off in year two, even though he's keeping the same coach and he's got a new receiver now and we can make the case that he's our big riser this next year. Well, I also think that there's just a debate of whether or not there can be a riser this year when there's no OTAs and there's no and no one was on a football field in any meaningful way from March until

until August 18th, essentially, when they put pads on. And I just, I don't know what that looks like. I'm not smart enough to know what that looks like. And by the way, I keep talking to people, whether that's GMs or whoever and saying, what is this you're going to look like? And nobody knows because you never see anything like this. And the closest analogy is 2011. And that was totally different.

And there wasn't, you know, it wasn't hard to travel back then. So I don't know. It's taking any big leap. And now the year one to year two leap is always the biggest leap. There is really statistically no you leap from year two to three. And with quarterbacks, it just doesn't really happen. and I think that I'm curious to see how that that plays out this year. Well, we should, we should think that the really experienced polished players should have a leg up going into the year because they don't need all of that work.

Right. If you think of Aaron Rogers, it took him two or three years early in his career to really become great, right? I mean, just the things that make a veteran quarterback great with just your handling of the game and and drawing people off sides and looking over. and winking at this receiver, right, and knowing how that safety is going to rotate. These reps now are really important for Sam Darnold and Josh Allen to have, right? So a Trubisky, right?

All these guys that are really green and need that. So I would think that it's a greater advantage to be the master of your craft in the same system this year. Opposite question. Who takes a leap this year? If anybody. Yeah, well, it was interesting. So I can kind of, I can kind of,

you sort of gauge the optimism of people's voting, right? So if you're a GM and I'm calling you and I'm like, hey, all right, so what do you think about this quarterback? You can say, uh, three or you can say, you know, three. And then I pick that up. So the three, the excited three guy was Daniel Jones. Hey, Daniel Jones came in at the second to last spot of tier three. So he's actually right below Sam Darnold.

but I thought people were more excited about Daniel Jones and Sam Darnel. And some of the reason for that is because the way the tier structure is set up, if you haven't played a lot, like Daniel Jones has, what, 12 or 13 starts, sometimes people will just give them a four, kind of need more information. Whereas the fours that Darnold got are more like, you know what, I'm not sure. You know, it's like a negative four. So, you know, is there enough help around Daniel Jones? is he's got a new system.

How's all this going to go? I don't know, but I think people were sort of more optimistic on him than I thought they would be. Do you think that there was, even though Donald, was ranked ahead of Daniel Jones, that there is generally just more optimism about him? And do you think if there was a, if you had all the guys draft who they want for the next 10 years,

that Jones actually might get that edge? I think he would, just off of what I was talking to. I think there was enough people that were optimistic. So like the way the voting came down, basically the difference between the two is nine additional voters put Daniel Jones in the fourth tier as opposed to the three compared to Donald. Okay. Well, those are just people who, you know what, we didn't play the Giants this year. And I don't have a real, you know, he hasn't done enough, hasn't played a whole season, give him a four. It's not, I've seen this guy for three years, he's a four. You know what I mean? So I think that's what it is. I just sense the optimism. And some of that could be that we overvalue guys when we haven't seen them fail, right? We haven't seen. him playing up. There's some of that. That's why quarterbacks go really high in the draft,

because we see that glass as three quarters full. But he was one to me that I thought, I also thought, I thought people were more down on Josh Allen, and he actually made one of the bigger jumps from last year. So, you know, do people think he's to go through the roof? No, but I thought people,

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All right. Is there a difference in the makeup or a big variance in the makeup of how the league is concentrated in the sense that, you and I both have the same experience probably, which is we'll go to one place and they're talking about efficiency and analytic and they're talking about, you know, managing the cap in a really heady way, and they're talking about five years in the future.

And then you go to some places, and they've given no thought to the cap. They've, they don't have an analytics department. And, you know, they don't know what efficiency is, right? And they say efficiency, yeah, touchdowns are efficiency. And by the way, there are good teams who do both and they're bad teams who operate, I suppose. But is there a quarterback where, there was a pretty clear divide between, I guess you could say,

analytics driven teams or younger teams, whatever you want to call it, versus the older, more traditional guys. Is there a quarterback where there were more, where there was a divide along those lines? I think that, I think that Aaron Rogers is that guy.

Yes. Okay. So I do include some people in the survey who are sort of cap analysts, analytics type people. it's not most of them, but there will be, you know, it may not, it's probably less than 10 of the 50, but I try to have a wide array of types of people in it, right? There'll be GMs and head coaches and coordinators and personnel directors.

But of the four tier two votes for Rogers, I think two of them would have been in that sort of analytics kind of cap window. And that's what we were talking about earlier with like somebody like Ben Baldwin who's really into, the data and the EPA probably makes up a more disproportionate amount of his evaluation, right? Right. You can't help but look at Green Bay and say that's really falling off, and you could plausibly attribute that to Rogers. So to the extent that the statistics and the numbers are compelling to you and driving

your evaluation, then somebody like Rogers is going to be lower. But for people that are tuned in to other aspects of the game, more disproportionately, that's not going to be the case. I actually thought Rogers could have been lower in this because I do pay attention to, I mean, I'm into QBR and EPA and all that stuff too. I pay attention to it. But for me, it's maybe a little bit more of a component than the driver. And for people in the league, it's probably something that some of them aren't aware of,

and some of them are. And then some of them are really into, but it's a smaller number. Is there any Mahom's skepticism at all? Or is this unanimous? Because obviously I think it's unanimous, but when you're talking to guys, is it, all right, Mahomes, we got it. And I know that it was, there were 50 tier one votes. I get that. Was anybody like, well, Andy Reed, Tyree Kill, Travis Kelsey, that infrastructure?

No, I don't think so. You know, I do think people will say things like this. Look, if you put Russell Wilson in that offense with those guys or Aaron Rogers, their numbers would be the same or better as good as Mahomes. But that's not a knock on Mahomes. That doesn't mean that, you know, Mahomes wouldn't be good without that. It just means that, wow, this guy is a, he might be the best race car driver and he also happens to have the best car. You know what I mean?

But no one's saying, oh, Mahomes would be Tier 2 if he was playing for Seattle or Green Bay. No one's saying that. Yeah, I mean, it's just, it's unlike anything we've ever seen. He got seven tier two votes a year ago, but that was all just the hardcore of, hey, you know what? The guy played Tier 1. he's my MVP, I just want to see it again. And they saw it again. And now they're 50 out of 50 and no one's picking any holes.

It's almost boring to write about it. I was like, I don't have any really many of that comments on the homes because it's like a given. So Lamar is that guy this year. He's seventh on the list here. Yeah. Is that a mixture of they appreciate what John Harbaugh did, putting him in position to succeed as far as help goes and kind of the we need to see it again, kind of skepticism? Lamar's difference is that everybody thinks.

Mahomes can throw to win the game when everything's stripped away from them. And that is a, you know, I've really gone in my mind as the game's evolved, I'm like, okay, do we need to tweak what the tiers are? Right. And there's a peer passing component to being in tier one. And peer pass is what I described before. It's Mahomes down by two scores against a really good 49er defense late in the game. And the 49ers are scared to death because he's going to throw every play now and they're going to win the game.

Whereas for Lamar Jackson, he throws at 58. eight times in his last game and they scored 12 points because it's hard that's the hardest part of the game right so when you strip away all of those things that make him be unleash what makes him great that's why he's not that's why he wasn't unanimous tier one there's 16 tier one votes for Lamar where they're like he's the MVP the league I don't care what you say peer pass he's what you got to prepare for he's different he's tier one and and I get it but to the extent that you think the end of the game when you have to throw the ball and none of that matters factors, which I think is there is a piece for that. That's why he wasn't unanimous or more

tier one and even higher than he was, even though he made the biggest jump of anybody. So Russell Wilson, same deal as Mahomes, 50 top tier votes. Makes sense. Everybody loves Russell Wilson. In the league, what is the sense about the system Pete Carroll has built around him, almost kind of the let Russ Cook debate? I don't want this podcast to eat itself every single week by getting into the same Russell Wilson debate, but I think it's important, especially when you're talking about people around the league who watch this stuff, what is the sense of the situation Russell Wilson has put in from a league standpoint? Yeah, I feel like it's divided. So most people feel like, okay, he hasn't been helped enough through the, just looking at the receivers they've

had over the years, right? I mean, it hasn't been a Julio Jones lineup there. So there's some people who say, you know what? I actually think they shouldn't be throwing a ton more because personnel-wise, nothing against Russell, just personnel-wise, they're not really built for that. So there's a component of that. There's some people who will say, they definitely should be tapping the gas a little more, right? They need to be, they need to take more advantage of this player, especially early in the games. There's a component of that.

But it's not outraged the way that it is, you know, from just a pure analytic standpoint, right? Especially two years ago. They were the most run-heavy offense early in games since Tim Tebow, but, you know, two years ago. I actually talked to Pete about it. I did a pretty fun story on it. And then last year they came back a little bit.

So if they don't move to the middle of the pack or towards the top, you know, more past this year, I think we will see more people in the league think that they should do that. But it's not an overwhelming. It's just a component of people. When you think about this season, how it plays out, and you talk to, and one thing I want to make clear to everybody is that it's not like you panel 50 people in the spring and then never talk to a scout or a GM or a coach.

Again, you are one of the most plugged in people I know of in football as far from a media standpoint. When you think about this season, do you think that the tier one guys or even the tier two guys, just guys who can throw really pretty unguardable passes, do they have more of advantage than normal because of just how flat footed defenses are going to be? And do you think that there's going to be a golf that opens up a little bit between teams who can just do whatever they want in the passing game? Because we saw all this in 2011 when defenses just took September and October to get their act together. Do you see that being a significant thing in 2020?

I do. I believe that's going to be exacerbated, the upper tier quarterback is going to have an advantage. Now, I've actually been talking to folks about this last couple days, and I followed up today because that was the one thing that before the show, you know, when I said, hey, is there anything going to want me to research? That was one. I actually checked in and had a good conversation with someone today about that. Now, some people will say, hey, the defenses have had actually more install time this year because what's happened, unlike 2011, is we had all these Zoom meetings, right? So the installation defensively, and maybe even offensively for that standpoint, could be more extensive than it was in 2011, right? You could have had more time. But to actually rep it and time it up, I do think that that experienced quarterback, you know, the Rogers is, you know, Brady's in a new system.

That could be a little, you know, he could have his own challenges there. But Wilson, Mahomes, I do think those guys will have an advantage. And then remember this year, too, the 85 decibel cap is the cutoff. you know, for how much noise is going to be in the stadium. So I would think it's not going to be like a quiet auditorium that's totally silent. But that's going to help, right, the quarterback on the road being able to communicate. Yeah, no, for sure. And I think that the Zoom meeting thing is so fascinating to me, because what can you learn there?

What is the upper limits? I don't think football teams know. I don't think teams know at this point what it is. if you're the Bengals or the Browns or the Steelers, in your opinion, in researching this, can they catch up to Lamar Jackson by just having a bunch of Zoom meetings about him and then having 14 padded practices in late August? Catch up to him? No. I mean, I think that stuff helps. I think it does help. I think the Zoom thing is really going to be good because people, everyone had to learn it.

It wasn't the gap that it used to exist between people. You joke about some older guy who doesn't know how to check his email, right? I think that's gone. I mean, I think there is going to be a component that helps on that. But you're right. I mean, the 14 practices, I think Bill Parcell said something yesterday or this week. He had his birthday where he was like, you know, I had such and such. It was a way hugeer number of.

I think he said he had 50 padded practices before his first regular season game. Yeah, which I don't know if we need 50. But for timing up stuff and your exotic packages and all that, I think early in the season against a real master of the position quarterback. No doubt that guy's going to have the advantage. But I think some of the guys at the other end who are really green could be a disadvantage. You know, somebody like Mitch Trubisky probably needs every rep he can get to do that. And that could be tough.

If early in the year they're playing Green Bay, you know, and Rogers is just a master of checking off this and that and changing the play, you know. Well, and then there's also just the teams that, want to rebuild and churn rosters this year, aren't able to do it. I mean, how did, you're in the Seattle area, how did the Seahawks get really good at the beginning of last decade?

Well, they made more transaction than anybody else. They would have a guy on on Monday, have them out by Thursday, bring somebody else in. Pete Carroll would teach him out of play defensive back. And then, you signed Lendale White for crying out loud, okay?

They were trying everything. If you were an NFL player in 2011, did not get signed by the Seahawks, you should take that as an insult. Their alumni, mailer is really big. Yeah, it's huge. It's huge. They had to have a cut off at some point where they just said, if you didn't play a game for us, you don't get a, you don't get invited to get a sideline pass,

right? So I just think that the fact that there was no rookie mini camps or the fact that you just can't bring in, they're trying out guys now. You know, I was monitoring pretty closely, kind of the mid-tier veteran and what that looks like this year, but it looks like a lot of those guys because of the opt-outs or because of just the weirdness of it all have been signed, you know, AQ Shipley yesterday was signed by Tampa Bay. He's a guy who I didn't, I was monitoring those types of guys because I don't know if those guys, because travel was hard and they didn't even have tryouts until what camp started. Maybe that guy gets squeezed out of the league. But no, I think most of those guys are at least getting a chance on teams.

I think it's the older guys and the younger guys, you know, age 38 or 22, who are being more squeezed out. But if you're trying to build a team right now, you're at a tremendous disadvantage. And you don't get even the rookie minicamp. You know, Malcolm Butler. I mean, this is a guy who showed up with no expectations because the story goes, his 40-yard dash time was off because he went to a small school and the tape wasn't very good and all that stuff. And that if you're trying to find a diamond in the rough right now, that's not available to you. And so I think it's a bad year to be an up-and-coming GM.

I am with you 100%. I think it's going to be really fascinating once the year's over to go back and look at who did well, who didn't do well. what number of young players or draft picks contributed, started, you know, had a decent grade or whatever compared to past years. And it's almost got to be different. Yeah, it's going to be fascinating. All right, let's roll through some of the top guys here on your QB tier. And I just want you to kind of outline what the conventional wisdom is or what you learned that maybe surprised you in your evaluation here or your paneling of the evaluation. We will start with Drew Breeze, 33 Tier 1 votes, Tier 2 votes 17. We kind of know what Drew Breeze is now. I mean,

the age is a weird thing because I think there have been so many false alarms about him falling off. He just doesn't throw the deep ball anymore. And that has not caught up with him yet. Well, it was interesting. The last couple of years, if you just look at the really deep balls, like the 30 plus air yards, I think he completed two, you know, in the past, that would have been in double figures. So there's something going on there, but I actually asked people that and they were like it could be more of a function of who he does and doesn't have at the receiver position. I was, I thought he might fall more this year. You know, because people have been saying that.

And then he misses some games last year. But no doubt he played well when he played. And so I think that, you know, we're seeing these old guys. Some of them just, just be able to keep going. They've made the rules easier for him. They're not getting hit and blasted as much. And you've got the continuity. So I think people are going to wait for Drew Brees to confirm it he can't play before knocking him down into the

second tier. Even though we've never seen a generation like this before, Tom Brady, Drew Breeze, Peyton Manning was winning a Super Bowl in his last year, even though he obviously had his health problems. Every time Tom Brady throws a pass, he's breaking a record for oldest player to do something, right? It's just incredible. Do you get the sense inside the NFL that those guys, that a normal run-of-the-mill coach or GM just thinks that this is the new normal, or are they concerned about age, or do they bring it up? Or are we just in the midst of a generation where you're assumed to be good, even if you're in your early 40s or late 30s. I think that they now, instead of, I think they now expect at a higher chance that you can be good longer and even come back from injuries for some of these guys.

Now, if you have a component to your game where you're taking a lot of punishment, you're running, that sort of thing, then that's going to be in the back of people's minds. But I think there's no question in combination with the rules changes I alluded to, right? It's easier to play the position that way. There's just the senseless hits on guys don't take place as much. And so Tom Brady and look at conditioning. Just take a look at the picture of these guys' faces, whether it's Matthew Stafford. You know how like you got a picture from five years ago when you were out of shape and you got the picture when you're in shape and your face looks different, right? It's an angular face.

Well, I see that with these guys. I think we used to see some pudginess sometimes or with the older guy. I think they're taking care of their bodies and it's a different deal. The money's so great and you're not getting earhold that I think we're going to see more guys be able to do this longer. I Googled Ben Rathesberger to see if he was in shape and I just got a headline that says he's, he's Svel. And I'm withholding judgment on that particular headline. That's all I'll say about Ben Rothesberger. We actually get to Ben in a second.

Deshawn Watson. So he's a tier one for you. He's a tier one for me. It's a tier one for 28 of the people you paneled. It was in tier two last year. Can you explain to me why people are kind of sleeping on the Texans in the sense that their Vegas odds to win the Super Bowl are on par with the Broncos. I think they're on par with the Cardinals and the Falcons.

And I just don't see it. I mean, from where I stand, the easiest path to win the Super Bowl, when we're reverse engineering after the Super Bowl who won and we're saying, how did this happen? The easiest explanation is normally they had an elite quarter. quarterback and the Texans had that. Is this just people conflating Bill O'Brien, the GM with Bill O'Brien, the coach? Yeah. Why aren't people expecting more of Houston when they have this good quarterback? Yeah. It's crazy to me. Yeah. I think the reason is because people do think it's a dumpster fire otherwise, that they're not doing enough to help him, that even the offense itself could be more

enterprising for whatever reason it's not, and that you're taking away his best receiver and you're mismanaging and the front office and this and that. I think that is a perception that, I think in fact, the reason he's tier one and actually goes ahead of Brady is because people think the house is on fire and he's still having a wonderful dinner, you know, in the house. Yeah. He's just so amazing and he's fireproof and he's the only thing holding this thing together. So I think that is what is going on. And that's probably why people then think, okay, even though he's that great, is he great enough to be able to overcome all that, you know, and have the team be, you know, win in 12 or 13 games. And what do you, do you think that they're, do you think they're actually better as a team around him than that? No, I just think to Sean Watson is really good. And I also think that schematically, Bill O'Brien is pretty good.

It's not like, again, I think we're conflating Bill O'Brien franchise manager with Bill O'Brien between one and one and four p.m. Eastern time on Sunday afternoons. Deshaun Watson, I agree with you. There is a fire and he's fine. You know, I play golf out here in Los Angeles. And there are a lot, a lot of times brush fires. And I've heard a lot of stories about people who just, there's a brush fire just just off the course. And people are just hitting their shots. They're not going anywhere.

They're fine. Fire's all around them. You've probably seen some photos of that. Hey, I pay him on 50 bucks. I'm going to finish this round. That's Deshaun Watson. He's just cool as can be. Doesn't see anything.

You know, I don't know how long this can go for. I don't know what the extension process looks like, especially with Mahomes getting half a billion dollars. And I don't know if that that's an outlier or that he tries to make a ton of money. we will see what happens with DAC there. But I think that Deshaun Watson is really freaking good. And I just think he is the type of quarterback. As you say, as per the parameters of this exercise, who can you can win because of him.

Because of. He wills that team, doesn't he? And that last game against Buffalo wasn't their last game. But you're down 16-0 against a good defense. And it wasn't pretty. It's the last game they want to remember. Yeah. But it wasn't pretty, was it?

I mean, it was not pretty? It was a slug fest, people where he was getting hitting over the head with bottles in the saloon. And he staggered out of there with his buddies over his shoulder and he carried him in the next round. So I think that's why he's tier one. And you may have a good point. I mean, that maybe our expectations for that team should be higher because that I happen to think that, you know, it's quiet around Indy right now. And I think Indy right as the better infrastructure. You talk about a team that I think sort of has the right sort of mix of old school with analytics, right?

like they're into stuff, but they also understand that there's a value to being physical and being built on the lines and all that. And river, they will get more from rivers. So the road may be a little harder out of there, but I agree with you. And in defense of Bill O'Brien, I know they had a better defense then, but he had a winning record with freaking Osweiler. You know, I mean, Ryan Fitzpatrick might have been 500 with them. You know, you what I mean? So they've done, they've done okay there. All right, Rappasberger.

Is this just a reputation thing, or do they think that? I think Rathusberger is actually quite good, but he didn't play last year. And the Steelers' expectations are interesting to me because obviously they had the fourth or fifth biggest decline in offensive history last year. And they still were in the mix for a playoff spot late into the year. What's the book on Rothesberger when you talk to guys around the league? I think people do think there's been some decline. line in consistency and there's some concern with him. You know, people used to say about him that

the minute he gets hurt, look out because he'll be 300 pounds, right? And that was what you're saying, I need to see if he's really swelled. But from what I've seen, just those, you know, quick videos and stuff, he doesn't look terrible to me. You know, he looks like he's at least in shape. So, but I do think people who see him more now as a high too. And if you go back, it seems like, maybe I didn't find this when I looked, but, you know, remember he had the five interception game. It seemed like his consistent excellence wasn't, it seemed a little more up and down, but still you're afraid of them, right? I think that was one of the first quotes in the pieces.

I'm scared of that to play him. I think there's still that. There's still that on him, but maybe he's just not as quite as consistently excellent as the guys you put in the top tier. And then it gets reflected in the perception of him as a guy who is great, wants to be great, but he's not, he doesn't seem as outwardly maniacal about it. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Like TB12 or, you know, some of these. Breeze who's probably, you know, sleeping in a special chamber. You know what I mean? So I think there's just maybe a little more skepticism. He is not maniacal about his health. That is correct. Yeah, yeah. So what does that mean for him eventually?

I think people are a little less optimistic, but still a lot of respect. He got 38 votes in Tier 2, which is pretty good after missing a year. But there was 34 votes in Tier 2, but he got five threes. So, you know, I think there's some people that want to see it, but most people give him the bent of the doubt. All right. A couple more here. So break the tie for the 2016 class.

We flicked at it earlier when we were talking about the 2018 class, but you have DAC, Wentz, and golf. I understand the rankings. So you have Wentz 11th and then you have DAC and then you have golf, I think 16th. Yes, 16th. What is the book on all three of those guys within the league? And the kind of same question, if they all had to draft one of them for the next decade, who goes first?

Okay. If they were going to play 16 games every year. or whence would be the truth. People think that he can be the best of those three. People think Dak has actually been the best because he's been out there all the time and he's played pretty well, been productive. But the Lasteryx, a lot of great weapons around him

and support and that has helped him. And then Gough, they see is, uh, you know, is it more of the system? Yes, he makes some beautiful throws. I don't know that he can do as much to will his team and want to see him do more of that. So I think that's the quick rundown on those three. I feel like,

Yeah, like if I could change a couple things about the orders, I might put DAC just ahead of Wentz until Wentz proves it more. You know, you know what I mean? Yeah, I know, of course. I feel like Dak's a little underrated, but, you know, I think you can make a case for him being higher. But I do buy the, you know, I did a, this wasn't exactly, you know, going to put me on the stage at Sloan next year. But, but, you know, I just totaled up the number of starts you got by guys who went to a Pro Bowl. It was a fun column in the outseason. And Dak's like hundreds.

It's like 30% of the starch by everyone else on offense since he's been there. There has been someone who went to the Pro Bowl that year. And for the Jets, it's zero. Okay. So there's a huge difference in that makes a big difference. If Dak had gone somewhere, you know what I mean? So there's a component of that whereas I feel like Wenz had that in their Super Bowl year and he looked great. And then it hasn't been quite as good around him since then.

And he's been banged up and he doesn't look great. so there's some of that too. All right, you have Matt Stafford 9, Matt Ryan, 10, the maths, even though Matthew Stafford does not like to be called Matt. Make the case that the folks that were giving you tier one votes for those guys were making, is that just they've seen him, they've seen both of them put up huge numbers before and they think they could be elite in the right setup? For Stafford, people, there's people who thought he played, a lot of people, more than the

five who gave him tier one, thought he played that level last year and just didn't play the whole year. So you've got a little bit of concern on the injury. there's there's there's there's more love for stafford and everything he can do and then I'm always like yeah but after 10 years wouldn't you have won a playoff game I know it's a crappy place but then you know there's one coach since 1973 there who's a non interim coach who has a winning record and that's Jim Caldwell can you believe that one I also I mean I've said this a million times Jim Caldwell is a damn good coach when you look at the circumstances I'm very proud of when he got hired and people were crapping on it I actually wrote a column why are people saying this is a bad hire what this guy is great. I think he's really good. I'm with you. I think that everything that's happened in Detroit since then shows that. And I think that, listen, he's not the best coach in football, but he's damn better than a lot of them. I thought Green Bay should have hired him. Anyway, go ahead. I think it's interesting. Yeah,

it's an interesting idea. I talked to Daniel Lovsky about this last year and he said that, you know, one of the tantalizing things is thinking about what would have happened if Matthews-Dafford ever got a Kyle Shanahan or a Sean McVeigh or someone or and God forbid, Andy Reid, they would, they, you know, in 2009, if Stafford had found his way to, to Andy Reid, everything is different here, right? If Andy Reid was, if he was his quarterback for all of Andy Reed's career, I don't think he has less Super Bowls when he has now. Yeah.

I mean, it's, it's fascinating. It's a fascinating test case where just as far as football destiny goes about someone like Matthew Stafford. I take it, people, people find Matthew Stafford to be kind of more of a natural talent and what's then the take? on Matt Ryan. Matt Ryan has had an MVP season. So he's obviously, he's been consistent really good.

And I think some people, when they look at that position, it's can you handle all aspects of it, which is, which is all the pre-snap stuff and a heavy volume. And then when you're asked to really throw the ball. So, you know, he's been a borderline pro bowl level player for a long time. And so you may get some guys, you're going to get some guys with a little bit of a wider latitude, you know, on what a one is, right? some guys might have three ones and some guys might have six. And one guy might have eight, right?

So it could be the guy who has more ones, a polls in a Matt Ryan. I didn't sense any, I think people feel like he's more in a decline than they do for Stafford. And Stafford was really, Staffordshire only by some people are like, I just can't give him more than that because he's never won. And some, and then he had the back injury.

You know, that's part of it. But Stafford, I feel like he's going to be, I think there's a lot of people think Stafford's a one if he's helped. I'm one of those people. You're never going to ask me to vote, but I am one of those people. You could be hired. You could be hired by a team. It could happen.

If you get hired by a team, I'm going to have you in this survey. Thank you. Thank you. Every time, every time I think about it, like, every couple of years, I'm like, you know, what if I went to go for a team? And then I quickly realized that I'm not good at anything. And I feel like that. And then I decide that it probably wouldn't be very good.

And you don't have any relatives that are in teams. I'm not the son of a coach or a scout, and I wouldn't be a good scout. I feel like I would be a good, I could be great at being a GM who just delegates everything. And then like once a week, once a week, I come up like a very good. I'd be like a, I'd be an ideas guy, right? But I wouldn't actually be able to implement anything. And we'd be way behind on scouting for. Yeah, yeah.

It's just the reports. It's, you don't want to get bogg out in details. The paycheck would be great, but you don't want to get, that's, that's a details-oriented job, and it's best left for other people. And you can keep that job forever because you blame all those guys who really made the decision. So it's a good thinking by you. I completely agree. The best, the best guys are the guys who like, almost like Bruce Allen types, where they inexplicably becoming incredibly ingrained in the franchise. And then for like a decade, they're just untouchable.

Rich McKay. Rich McKay. Yeah. I think Rich McKay at least was, you know, is getting stadiums built and is. I'm not saying he doesn't deserve it. No, no, right, yeah, yeah. But he's in the, no one is writing about, when they lose a game, no one's like freaking Rich McKay.

You know, it's going to go to, it's going to go to Quinn. It's going to go to the coordinator. He's going to go to Mitt Ryan. He's going to Matt Ryan, it was going to go to Piaoli. You know, you know what I mean? It's there's a lot of, it's sort of like, you know, there's a lot of people who have to die before he's the president of the blame, right? You know what I mean?

I'm getting the blame. There's an old line in football that implies to other, in fact, I heard it applied to other positions to not just GM, but it is, it should be a GM rule too. Don't be the coaches guy. Be the owner's guy. And that's,

if you follow that rule, you will stay employed. The owner's guy scares the hell out of the coach, right? Oh, that guy who's in the Z. Because they're in the box. They're in the box. They can say,

oh, you know, they shouldn't have done that. The owner goes, what are we doing? And then that guy next time goes, yeah, instead of standing up for the coach,

he's like, I know, that's not ridiculous. Yeah. Oh, man, the owners, you got to watch the owner's, guy every single time. All right, we'll get you out of here on this. You have Kirk Cousins 15th. You

have Jimmy Garoppolo 17th. These guys are tied together in a sense that Kyle Shanahan likes both of them. And at one point, they were both rumored to be the 49ers quarterback and one of them became the 49ers quarterback. Which one, if you're looking at maybe you've been hypothetical, you put them both in Kyle Shanahan's offense or you just put them in a neutral offense, which one is the league generally higher on since we've seen Jimmy Garoppolo recently? with Kyle Shanahan. And we haven't seen Kirk Cousins with that kind of play caller. Kevin's Fancy is very good.

Gary Kubiak is very good, but they're not the elite, the elite, as Kyle Shanahan is. I would probably lean towards Garapolo. You know, I think that people see, and if you watch, if you just kind of watch them play, I think Garopolo has a little bit more sort of, you know, is it a improvisational ability or a wiggle or an all weird arm angle or a, you know, a little bit of action to his game, maybe, right, a little bit more pizzazzed to his throwing that some people may like that. That said, cousins came in, I know, a couple not just higher. I think their tiering was just about the same with the difference being, I think there was more

of a negative connotation on Garapolo for the way they handled him in the Super Bowl at the end of the half, right, not letting him play. And so sticks in people's minds, then in combination with, you're in this heavy play action offense, you threw eight passes in the game. And really, Shanahan would be even happy if you only threw six. It's this effort to minimize the position that works maybe against both of those guys. But just probably because Garoppolo's not played as much, I think people would then want to see if he could do more.

For us, they feel like cousins for sure 100% is already what he is. Mike, are we starting to let Garoppolo cook movement? We might. I think, though, Russell's so much more talented probably in his ability to throw. Let's not get the details. Let's not get into details that Russell. Wilson is significantly better. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So that is, that was, that is telling, though, when you watch, you watch how the coach handles a guy. I don't, I feel like Pete, people feel like Pete would be doing that because it's Pete's system and the way he wants to do it. It was worth with Kyle Shanahan. They're like, is that personal towards, you know, is that personal towards this, this quarterback of proopola? Yeah, and that was one of the things when we had Warren Sharp on a couple of months ago,

actually after the draft is one of the things he looks at, at the college level is how often a coach lets a quarterback throw aggressively in really big situations. And he sees that as proxy for a how much their evaluation. You know, it's, it's Edosron and Joe Brady's evaluation. If they let if they let Joe Burrow throw in third and nine versus run a draw play, then that's that's the simplest you're going to get. So I think it's fascinating. I think Shanahan's handling of, of Gropolo going forward is going to be fascinating to watch. All right, Mike, anything we didn't get to that you want to, you want to talk about. with quarterbacks on this quarterback episode.

You know, I got one guy for you that's really interesting to me. One more nugget for the road. One more nugget. So I think purely from a off-season checklist standpoint, the Tennessee Titans did what sort of they had to do, right? They retained their quarterback in Tanna Hill and they re-signed their running back. I think, you know, from a 30,000 feet perspective, we would say, okay, those were a couple guys that needed to take care of.

That said, you just... just put a boatload of money and you're basically going to have Ryan Tannale for three years. I mean, it's at least a two-year investment and it bleeds into the third year. Do you want that? Is that it? I mean, he's averaging nine yards and I mean, he's putting up numbers that like Mahomes won't do over the course of a season. So he's obviously not doing that. He's our regression candidate.

In fact, you can go back and tease to that when we're talking about who could regress. It's got to be him. even though he's probably about what he's been in previous surveys, right? Yeah. I just don't know if that's a great thing to be so invested in him for so long when we sort of know. Being invested in a regression candidate quarterback and a running back in general, that's tough.

I think that Mike Vrable is a good coach. I think Arthur Smith's a really good offensive coordinator. I agree with you. The numbers aren't going to be what they were last year, but I think they can be pretty good. I mean, I think that the one thing we have to remember is that it's not like the Titans magically got, you know, became a 12-win team last year. They were still nine and seven, same as they have been for a number of years. So I wouldn't be surprised, especially in that division, if they're a pretty good team this year and just don't make the playoffs.

I could definitely see that too. And I think that, you know, I spoke to people that, you know, there were 10 people that put Ryan Tanil in the second tier. And I know people who were with them in Miami. And, you know, there was a feeling there that in Miami, even with Adam Gase there, that they had a couple games where guys rushed for a lot of yards, you know, what was Jay Jhajai, had a couple 200-yard games. And it was, the light was starting to come. And people started to think that, you know what, he's going to hit stride.

And then injuries and everything fell apart. Did he just sort of get to pick up there this last year? And he hit stride. And he's going to be a tier two guy. I think there's, I don't want to put everything I own on that, but I think that could happen. Yeah. I think there's some variance there that is fascinating to watch.

And I think it'll be, it's going to be weird season, Mike. All right, Mike, we're going to have. you on again at some point. This was extremely, extremely educational. Thank you. Yeah, I'll do quarterback tiers revisited during the year. Maybe we'll have some to talk about that. Let's just keep doing it. Every week. All right, Mike, thanks so much, man. This is great. Thanks. See you, Kevin. Thank you so much for coming on the NFL show, part of the podcast network.