The Ringer NFL Show - Training Camp Nuggets, Cam Newton Vs. Jalen Hurts, and More

Episode Date: July 31, 2025

Sheil, Steven, and Diante get together to debate and analyze some of the most intriguing training camp buzz around the league. Topics include: Matt Stafford’s back issuesChiefs Offensive LineAnthony Richardson's RedemptionNFC North QBsBig Contract UpdatesTravis HunterFeisty Matt LeFleurPittsburgh SteelersAiden Hutchinson and the Lions Sheil ends the pod with his take on the Cam Newton vs. Jalen Hurts debate currently burning on social media. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.rg-help.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Sheil Kapadia, Steven Ruiz, and Diante LeeProducer: Chris SuttonSocial: Kiera GivensProduction Supervision: Conor Nevins and Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's Danny Kelly, and it's officially fantasy football season, which means the Ringer Fantasy Football Show is back with the latest news from around the NFL and everything you need to get ready for the fantasy football season. So join us at the Ringer Fantasy Football Show on Spotify or on our new YouTube channel. Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. Shield Capadia here with Deonté Lee and Stephen Ruiz. The pads are on. The practice reports are coming in.

The quarterback stat debate is raging. It is training camp. We're going to talk about it, Deontay. How are we feeling? I feel good, man. Obviously, glad to have you back after your hiatus in the summer. I don't know if you saw my tweet, but I'm going to be true to form, man. We have got to end this podcast with your Hertz versus Newton take.

I've got to hear it. I've got to hear it. Don't care how milk toast, don't care how fired up it may be. The Philadelphia sports ecosystem needs this one maybe more than anything else. you're not going to believe me. You probably think I'm being like Bill Belichick when he names the social. I will actually need a refresher on exactly what the debate is where it started. But yes, I saw you tweet it.

And listen, it got the requisite amount of likes where I think we have to do it because people did, you know, there was some interest in there, Ruiz. So yes, I did, when I was away, I did delete, you know, some of the social media from my phone and tried to get away from it, Ruiz. It's a true pro right there. There's no escaping, you know? There's no escaping the debates, Ruiz. I've honestly tried to keep myself out of the Cam Newton, Jalen Hertz, debates.

I finally let off a tweet this morning, but it took a while for me to do my toast. And that went viral. So you're hitting, I saw that tweet. That's incredible. That was going all over the place. I turned off notifications. I checked the lights like an hour ago. I was like, are you guys serious?

I was surprised by that. I didn't think it was that good of a tweet. All right. So Deonté will fill me in. And then I don't even know. what the exact question is. So we'll, there you go. We'll get to that. It's long. It is very tangled. Like, this thing has probably left the rails come back and left the rails again on this for different occasions. So it'll be an interesting talk. I can't promise that it's not going to just be

like the end of the Sopranos where you're just going to see my screen go black when you start talking about that. Where she'll go? Oh, I guess the podcast is over. So yes, no promises. But let's get to the training camp stuff because I just spent the day looking at stuff that's going on around the league, what matters, what doesn't matter. That's kind of what we're talking about, what nuggets have our attention. Deonti, you're writing about this for the ringer.com. So why don't you start us off with a training camp nugget that has your attention? I think that we need to talk about what the Rams season might look like if Matthew Stafford's

back problems extend closer to the start of the regular season. And if this is something that's going to dog them throughout the season. So for people who aren't Rams fans who maybe haven't seen it, He hasn't really taken any real practices in training camp thus far. The first week he spent most of the time out on the field, but with the training staff, kind of doing some active rehab. And the thought at that time was that by this week, he would be back on the field, at least in some sort of light capacity.

And then at the start of the week, Sean McVeigh puts out a statement, letting everybody know that they're going to go week by week is the timeline that they offered. All they've said so far is that it's back soreness. I think that with most other players, you could take that with a grain of salt and just let it be, what it is. We do have to remember the fact this guy's had a spinal cord contusion that forced him to miss time in that disaster 2022 season for the Rams.

He's had broken bones in his back towards the end of his tenure in Detroit. So we're talking about a guy that is now approaching his late 30s, two separate back incidents and now got some back soreness, stiffness, tightness, however you may want to word it. And the thing that I think that

that I was kind of most drawn to was that they were very specific about this is only about getting him to week one, right? And to me, what that sounds like is, hey, we're already put this, whatever this is, it's bad enough that we're basically punting on training camp as is right now. I will be surprised if he takes any real practices from here on out, outside of maybe like some walkthrough stuff. But I kind of wanted to toss it to you guys to get a sense of how seriously are you taking this? And if this is going to be a back issue that

dogs them, what does that do for the ram ceiling? Because we usually view this team as one that gets hot towards the end of the year, and they're obviously going to need Stafford to be healthy to do so. I was kind of having the same discussion with myself earlier today, and I would have considered myself a Rams optimist coming into training camp in the last couple of weeks, but after this, I'm kind of pumping the brakes on that. It's not just that Matthew Stafford is at this advanced age, and you've talked about his injury history. It's like the type of quarterback he is, and I don't know if he could be the type of quarterback that we think of when we think of Matthew Stafford. If that guy is not 100% correct.

And if the Rams offensive line has been what it has been since really 2018 at this point, I don't know if he can carry them. A back injury is tough to overcome. And back injuries don't tend to get better over time. They tend to get worse. So, yeah, I am sounding the alarm. I'm really worried that we're going to see a lot of Jim Caraplo in this upcoming season. They're one of the toughest teams, I think, to figure out is I'm doing like you guys probably

are, who am I having in the playoffs? You know, getting the predictions already. We have time, but you're starting to think about those things. And the ceiling is not hard to get to. You know, they were a very good team last year. They have a veteran quarterback. You trust the coach. They upgraded the wide receiver.

I thought they did some creative things defensively. Good young pass rush. Like in a wide open NFC, I don't think it's very hard to paint a picture where, yeah, they're competing to get to the Super Bowl. But I'm also a little nervous about this because it's not just this. It is we can go back to the end of last year where they're going into week 18. I know we've talked about this before and they said, who cares about the seating? Let's get Matthew Stafford right.

And I think that was the right decision. You know, he had some amazing throws in that game against the Eagles. But even then the offseason where it wasn't like, hey, we're running this back with Stafford. It was like, all right, we don't know if we want to make a financial commitment and go test the trade market. It feels so long ago now. but they have all the information. And if you believe some of the reporting, this even goes back to last off season

where maybe there were some of those discussions about do we want to commit to Matthew Stafford still? So I think it was a tough decision for them. And I hope he's healthy because he has been so fun to watch and he continues to be so fun to watch. And I feel like if you told me one game, he's got to be right for. I feel like he could be,

look like one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL. But to your point, Deontay, now we're talking about getting through an 18-week season. and then the playoffs. And it just, it almost feels like a load management NBA situation where this is going to be an ongoing story. Maybe we'll be wrong. Maybe we'll get to week three and we'll be laughing and saying, I'll remember when we were worried about that in late July. But I'm kind of with you that it feels like something that might not be going away and that they have to monitor kind of all season long.

I don't think it's going away. And the name that I thought of when I was reading the initial reporting was Tony Romo. Like, I don't know if you guys remember when he had the initial herniated disc and then the traverse back injury and he ended up getting surgery. And it was just not the same. Right. And I'm not saying like Tony Romo was mobile, like functionally mobile. He was not the big. He wasn't the best at running around and extending.

But he lost that part of his game after back surgery a bit. And then you could just see every hit. You just felt like you were crossing your fingers that the dude was going to get back up. And he just kind of succumbed, I think, to the impacts that you have to take to be a true pocket. passing NFL quarterback. I think about the 2022 season, right? And it was a lot of that for Matthew Stafford. The offensive line was breaking down.

They were in more obvious passing situations more often, and that meant more hits, right? Like you look at his sack total that year. He basically took as much in that limited amount of time as he has in any full season that he's played for the Rams, kind of in that 28 to 32 range. So I am a bit concerned that, you know, if this is something that lingers going into the season, if he does get blindsided. Or maybe he tries to make a throw deep down the field and he tweaks his back. Or to your point, Shield, right?

Like you said, we talked a lot about that going into the playoffs, that he basically needed week 18 as his kind of de facto first round by to kind of get his body back right. So that way he could compete at the level that the Rams needed them to make the run that they did. I do think, like Stephen said, if there's any hint that there's going to be an issue with this in September and October, I would not be surprised at all if we just start seeing them on Tuesday, basically as soon as practice to start opening up,

hey, this is probably not going to be a Matthew Stafford week. Or he's going to just start off the weeks, every week questionable. And we're just kind of going to be playing this on a week-by-week basis. And if that's the case, it's going to be hard to look at this Rams offense and expect them to be what we think they can be in the NFC West and certainly in terms of Super Bowl contention.

Yeah, it's going to be a big Sean McVeigh season, I feel like if Matthew Stafford is on and off the injury report week to week. But we kind of saw them making those changes down the stretch last year, kind of going back to some of the Jared Goff style of offense. And maybe that was them preparing for life after Matthew Stafford since, like Phil said,

like they were definitely discussing the possibility in January and February. What is your guys' thoughts on their ceiling or floor if Jimmy Goroplo starts 10 games next year? I feel like we haven't seen him in a bit, right? Jimmy, if he starts 10 games, so you're getting Stafford. He started, what, two years ago? It wasn't that long ago.

feels like long ago. Yeah. That's an eternity in the NFL, I guess. Let me see their schedule. Part of me wants to say that like, Sean McBake can go 500 with Jimmy Garapolo. That's what I want to say. I went to the Super Bowl.

The questionable offensive line, like I'm thinking of the 2019 season. Questionable offensive line, good pieces around him in terms of skill players, but not great ones. I think this Rams team kind of compares to them a little bit. Like, I don't think it's like a wide gap between the 2 through 11 on the offense compared to the 29th.

1949ers. But I think Jim Gropolo is not 2019 Jimmy Giroppolo. Right. I think that's a big thing. That's really the issue. Yeah. He's had injuries. What version of Garoplo are you getting? If he has to play 10 games, can he stay healthy for 10 games? But I don't think you're wrong that they could get

to the playoffs if he had to start 10 games. Like that wouldn't shock me if they went 9 and 8 or 10 and 7 and, you know, earned a wild card birth. I don't think that would. If he had to play the whole season, I would not be predicting that. But if you tell me he's going to start half the season, maybe. Let me ask another question.

Over under on Stetson Bennett appearances. He's a third string quarterback right now. Under. I'm going under also. I couldn't say healthy himself. I think she alluded to that earlier. So Stafford's like... I love Bennett at Georgia,

been to a couple of rounds practices. I think if it comes to that, they will be on the market to go bring in another guy as an emergency player. I will be very shocked if it came to it. John Wilson went. Yeah, we're going to go back to for days. Yeah. those. All right. So, Rams

a little, you know, I think if you're a Rams fan, I think we said it in this spring. It's like, man, the Rams off-season went great. And I still think it did go great. Because if they have a bad season, they go into next year's draft with two first-round picks. They have young players on defense. You know, they have Puka Nakua

who is a great, so they've got pieces. But this is kind of what they, why I thought it was a great off-season, because you were kind of gearing up for whether you make a run or whether your season goes sideways, you still have a path to kind of getting right back in there next year. So we'll see what happens with Matthew Stafford. Hopefully we get some good reports that he's feeling better,

that he's ready to go when the season starts. All right, Ruiz, what do you got? What's your first nugget? I'm going to go with the Chiefs' offensive line and just how that's been shuffled about during training camp. So I think we can lock in Josh Simmons, a number 32 pick in the last year's draft, into the left tackle spot.

And I think we know Creed Humphrey starting at center, or Trey Smith starting at right guard. But it's been interesting how they've been kind of rotating the players at left guard and right tackle. We have Kingsley, Sue Matia, and Jalen Moore essentially going head to head at left guard. But then he wasn't going to have Jailen Moore also competing for the right tackle spot with Jawan Taylor. And then Jowan Taylor this past, I think it was either two days ago or yesterday, took a rep at left guard. So we have these three players battling him out for two spots. And I feel like this is a big deal because I know when we talk about the Chiefs offense,

So we talk about their passing game and the lack of explosive plays. We talk about the wide receiver personnel. But I really think, like, the more I watched them from last year, I think the offensive line was the issue and was the main issue with them not being able to push the ball down field because they weren't able to call the plays that we typically see lead to explosive plays for offenses. So I just think this is something, one, they have to get right. They have the Jalen Moore signing has to work out or the Josh Simmons pick has to work out right away for them to get back to having a good offensive line.

And if that doesn't happen, I think we're going to be having the same conversations about this offense that we had last year, regardless of how Rice looks returning and Hollywood Brown looks returning. So I think this is a big thing to monitor as we head into the office, or not the offseason, the regular season.

Yeah, it feels like they felt like you do, Ruiz, you know, just with their actions. It's not like they went out and we're like, we got to go get a wide receiver. It was like, we are making big changes on the offensive line. trading Joe Tunney, drafting Josh Simmons, the big signing with more. I will say this with the rookie stuff, and you didn't do this, but I do feel like

there's too much like spike in the football with, oh, this rookie. I mean, we've literally had a week of practices for a lot of these teams, and it's like, oh, that worked out, you know, what a steal. And I understand with Simmons, it was, yeah, check it, you know, check the depth chart. Oh, they're fine there now. We've got to learn our lesson on this, you know, every summer. this happens. And so maybe I'm the curmudgeonly old, old guys.

No, you're 100% right. 100%. You look at the recent examples. It's like Rayshan Slater, Tristan Werfs, you can maybe say, and you could say like Joe Alt, as the guys who land in the league. And it's like, all right,

you're just going to be our book in and we're not thinking about it. And then that guy immediately delivers. Right. Like, and you look at what Kansas City's offense was last year. The level that not only Josh Simmons, but King Luzu and Mataia would have to be at, for you to actually wipe away the problems that they were dealing with in terms of pressures,

in terms of the amount of hits that Mahomes was taking, in terms of just how often they would have to create out of structure, you're talking, both these guys will basically have to be all pro players. And that's not a reasonable expectation for either of these guys. And you guys know, because we talked about it throughout the draft process, I was pretty high on Josh Simmons. I actually thought that in terms of just grading him out relative to his peers, he probably should have been a top 15, top 20 pick, obviously just the, injury that he dealt with that Ohio State, I think kind of knocked him down boards a little bit.

So I do think that he'll be fine, but expecting all the problems to be solved in that way is lofty. We still don't know what this run game is actually going to look like. They basically kind of had to abandon it in any game that was legitimately competitive that they were playing down the stretch because they just could not rely upon any early down yardage. And they've been over relying on the RPO game because they don't feel like they can get true dropback protection for their quarterback to able to push the ball down. downfield. And I think, and Stephen, I know you and I've kind of talked about this. Sheel, I know that like we talked about this going towards the end of the season. And it makes me concern that if Patrick Mahomes is married to trying to push the ball downfield more often and he's playing behind an offensive line that is not staying upright,

that now you are risking this guy taking on some kind of injury or just getting too far beat up or starting to turn the ball over because he's got to push the ball earlier than he would like to. and those are the kind of things that dismantle what would otherwise be an effective, healthy, stable offense on a week-by-week basis. So until I see this, week one, week two, week three, there's no amount of training plant clips you can show me in one-on-ones for Josh Simmons. That's going to make me believe that he's the guy already. The fact that they led the league in RPO, if that happens again this year, I think we're going to be talking about the Chiefs in the same terms. We talked about them last year. Like, they could not get four yards on first down reliably, and the only way they could do it was doing the RPA.

stuff. And I think the RPO stuff is a reflection of the offensive line. Like, if you felt comfortable that this offensive line, which they have invested a lot of money, even going into this year after the tuning move, they are second in terms of cap dollars allocated to the offensive line. Wow. And that $76 million in cap hits this year. So like this has to-Jaler Moore just kind of hanging out for like 15 plus million dollars. Yeah, he might be swing tackle again. Yeah. You know. They have a $15 million swing tackle perhaps. And like if that's what I, if they're running the RPO's as frequently as they did last year, it's going to be a problem. They have to be able to get to a spot where they can run the football because I think that's

the only way you really dictate the terms for the defense. Like when you're doing, when you're an RPO team, the defense essentially gets to decide what you're going to do on that play. We can take away the pass and then you have to hand it off. We can take away the run and you have to pass it. And I just think the chiefs have to get back to a spot where they're on the front foot and they're dictating terms for defenses. And they haven't been there since Tyree kill.

And I know like part of it has been, oh, we're trying to find a Tyreek replacement. and they keep getting these undersized speedsters. But I think their main issue is they haven't had that guy on the outside that can just win one-on-one and has a catch radius. I think that's been the issue. When you look at explosive plays in the NFL, explosive past plays, I think like 40% of them come on perimeter go balls.

And they haven't had a guy there that is able to win on those routes. Their guy on those routes has been Justin Watson over the past couple of years, and he's gone. Yeah, I love the point about I didn't realize that about the old line spending. I'm doing the math in my head. It's like, all right, Crete Humphrey and Trace Smith. All right, those are great players. John Taylor, which has been like a bunk signing from day one.

And that was aggressive at the time, by the way. That's not, you know, that's not sort of second guessing. Both Joanne Taylor and then the Jalen Moore signing this offseason. We talked to it was like, wait a minute. Wow, they're really, they're pro scouts. They must are putting a lot of trust that they see something that Kyle Shanahan did not see by paying this guy. So maybe it'll work out.

Hopefully Josh Simmons is hell. healthy and plays great. I'm just saying, yeah, to what these guys said. Let's see it in a regular season, what it looks like. Yeah. Let's wait. And then you got to also consider the fact that like Hollywood Brown got hurt in practice, hurt his ankle. Xavier Worthy is in concussion protocol after banging his head early a practice a couple days ago. Richard Rice is looming suspension. And then you look at their wide receiver depth chart because they've lost to Justin Watson, because Travis Kelsey probably has a foot and a half out of the door in the NFL, it's hard to find production. If a guy,

like Rice is not available. It's going to be even more difficult to find production. It's someone like Hollywood Brown, who has had a bunch of lower body injuries that has forced him to miss time over the last few seasons. If he's got to miss time again, a guy that wasn't there for basically the entire regular season with the chest injury last year, it gets really tricky trying to put together a viable offense around a quarterback that we think could be the best one that we've ever seen in our lives. And we said it at the end of last season, and I'm saying it now, I once see this guy get a just chance to be the kind of quarterback that we know he can be. And right now, the situation does not necessarily pretend itself

in that direction. I can't watch another version of this offense that we've seen over the past two years. Six yards, average depth of target. Yeah, I don't want to watch that. They were unwatchable last year on all. Their games, I know they won a lot of games. I won 15 games during the regular season, but they were just so hard to watch. It was not a point in viewing as it had been for whatever, before 2023 to four years before that. Because we've seen the A plus version. So, you know, even if you come down to the B, whatever that version is, and again, there's still probably a top eight offense statistically.

They won 15 games. They got to the Super Bowl. So listen, no one's saying that they can't do that. And also, no one come in with the day. Like, if you pick the Chiefs to go to the Super Bowl this year, no one try to sell it like you're doing something, you know. Oh, no one's picking them. I don't want to hear that.

It's like Lakers fans. We believe in the Lakers. There's nobody else thought we would do it. We would be here. You're not doing anything that crazy by picking up to go to the Super Bowl. We're just talking about the offense, what we watched last year and how it might look different this year. All right. Take a break.

We come back. I'll hit you with one nugget that caught my attention. All right. We're back on the Ringer NFL show. The Anthony Richardson Redemption Tour is on the arc. The Suruiz. I thought this was definitely going to be one for you. It was nice, welcoming me back from vacation and leaving it from me.

It was my second nugget. I was waiting. Okay. Your second nugget. All right, good. Then let's talk about it. So, Zach Kiefer, great reporter in the athletic wrote a piece on Anthony Richardson. Some stuff caught my attention there.

Richardson's healthy. He's practicing. He worked on his mechanics in the off season. According to the reporting out of Indy, he's been more accurate in camp. But there were just some things in this that really caught my attention. And a lot of it was organizationally and what we've talked about with the Colts. You know, Chris Ballard said in this piece, when you take a quarterback high, there's an expectation.

The pressure to play the kid is real. And I've said for, I mean, we've had this conversation before, but where was the plan with this guy? We all knew he played 13 college games. He was what, 21 years old? Like any team that drafted this guy, you can go back to like January of that draft cycle. Everybody agreed that if you're going to take a shot on his upside and there is upside, there are physical tools, you need to have a very good plan for kind of getting him

adjusted, getting him acclimated to life in the NFL because he's not just going to come in and play great right away. And it just felt like reading this story that they had absolutely no plan. It kind of just confirmed it really from what I was reading there. Now, Richardson saying all the right things. I still kind of laugh at the whole idea of let's light a fire under him. And you're lighting a fire by paying Daniel Jones $14 million. And they're talking about a wake-up call and all this stuff. And I'm just like, I don't know, man. Like, can we, am I just being too soft? Like, can we just throw some support behind the guy? Have a plan and see if it works or if it doesn't work. So I don't know if it's going to work or if it's not going to work,

but I guess if you still have some, a little morsel of belief in Anthony Richardson's tools, that at least for him, this has gotten off to a good start this summer Ruiz. I mean, if you watched him throw at the sticks, I understand why he refrained from doing so. The guy couldn't hit a pass under five yards, but it seems like his accuracy is better. He's showing up to practice a little bit early and going through the motions.

I don't know if you saw those clips. I know you're probably skeptical about those, given our conversation before this, before the recording. But I do think that them bringing in Daniel Jones, like I agree with you. I don't understand the Spark thing. They're paying him $14.5 million.

That is the 18th highest cap hit amongst quarterbacks in the entire NFL. Like, he's getting paid more than, Aaron Rogers this year, Sam Darnold this year in terms of cap it, not like actual cash. Russell Wilson is getting paid more than Anthony Richardson is in terms of cap hit. So I do think you're creating this like confounding situation where like you're paying this guy more to be a backup in theory or just to be motivation for Anthony Richardson. But I think the thing that stood out to me is that Daniel Jones has been apparently really bad in camp and has failed to capitalize on what was a slow start to camp for Anthony Richardson by all accounts. but Anthony Richardson has been coming on in the last few days. I think on Saturday was his best practice and he's kind of been stacking practices since then.

So I do think there was, they did go into this with the idea of having a fair competition, but it sounds like Anthony Richardson is at least winning that competition, which gives me more optimism for him going forward. Deonté, where are you out with this, Anthony Richardson, 2025? Now they did say, you know, the headline of the story was a make or break season for Anthony Richardson. That's not how the cult see it. And a lot of it was Chris Ballard saying, like, it's not just, you know, this year we are having the long-term vision in mind. And even if it doesn't work out this year, we're going to stick with him next year.

We'll see about that. But where are you with the potential for Richardson to kind of, you know, develop this year and have a better season? Well, I'll come back to what you said, right, which was quoting Chris Ballard talking about the pressure to play him because he was an early pick. And like, I'm going on time out on that. Like, come on, man. I was there. We were all there for that draft. If there was one quarterback in that draft that actually did not have any expectations to show up and play immediately and be an impact player immediately, it was Anthony Richardson because he had so few college dropbacks.

This was not like a Trey Lance thing, right? I think the Trey Lans situation was a little bit different because there was a brand of North Dakota State and Carson Wins had been successful. So it was like, oh, this guy has shown Polish, hasn't thrown a bunch of what we know that he can be something. with Anthony Richardson, everybody acknowledged from the gate, like physical specimen, obviously he has all the arm talent in the world, needs to clean up his footwork. And if that means he needs to sit for a year, I don't think any Coltsman would have been impatient with his developmental process,

knowing what the promise of what this guy could be. What this really comes across to me as is like Chris Ballard and people in our organization kind of have the New York Times data viz of the approval rating up, you know, and they're just checking it in like an hour by hour basis. And then they're going to give you whatever quote. they feel like it's going to swing it back in their favor because the Dana Jones thing, like it just reeks of that. Oh, we need a quarterback to push the guy.

Okay, let's go get a veteran. Well, this guy's a veteran. Let's bring him in. It doesn't matter that he's always hurt. It doesn't matter that his arm talent is diminished. It doesn't matter that he is not showing himself to be a reliable quarterback or reliable option. That's going to be the guy we have compete with him. But we're also going to say in public that we're giving Anthony Richardson every chance.

So it's just like, like you said, the messaging is all over the place. To interface with what we're actually seeing at training camp, though, A, it looks like he's in better shape than he's been, right? And sometimes I kind of roll my eyes at guys who are talking about how they've worked on their physique or made these changes physically. But you can look at him at the podium. You look at him at press availability. That looks like a guy that's clearly serious about his conditioning.

And even if that's more like grandstanding because of the whole pulling myself out thing, and now I've got to make sure everybody knows I'm coming into training camp ready for that. I'm glad to see that because it does send them. the right message. And then like Stephen said, if you're checking the ball down, I think he noted, and Jim Bob Cooter, their office coordinator noted that it looks like he has more control over the ball. And a lot of that is because I think he's worked on his base. He's worked on his footwork. He understands that he doesn't have to throw every pitch in 95 miles per hour to be effective, right? And I think that as long as he continues to grow on those things, that actually kind of

walks down what he has to be this year. If we see progress in those types of facets, what the bullets are actually flying, then I'm willing to kind of extend him. It will be different if he came up to training camp, not in shape, or he was still having the exact same problems. Then it's like, all right, dude, you got to figure it out, right? It's kind of like a peer, get off the pot thing. But the fact that he's working at it, I'm willing to kind of extend this grace period and see exactly what it's going to look like.

And I'm interested to see how they handle the preseason and whether or not these hours are going to be taking active reps in games to as part of this quarterback competition because I would like to see what these two look like juxtaposal one or another. Let me ask you this. If I tell you I have a crystal ball and it tells me that the Texans are not going to win the AFC South and you have to pick another team who you think would win if the Texans do not on July 30th. As we record this, obviously can change your mind between now and week one, but on July 30th. The reason I'm asking the question is because I do look at the supporting cast and it's like the offensive line's okay. You got Jonathan Taylor, got Michael Pittman Jr. and Josh Dallens and Tyler Warren.

I'm not saying he's going to be Brock Bowers, but maybe it's like, I don't know. Is 9 and 8, 10 and 7 if Anthony Richardson makes a nice leap? Is it totally out of the question? So, all right, I'll just say I would pick the Colts over the Jaguars and the Titans right now if I had to answer that. I think I would pick the Jags. Just because I know for a fact they have a good quarterback. I know for a fact they have a good quarterback. I don't know what the Colts quarterback is going to look like.

see, I was going to take it for another reason. I'm taking the Jaggs because I know that they have a good play caller. Not that I don't think that Trevor is talented. I trust, right now, I trust William Collins as a play caller, much more than I trust Shane Steichen, something I never would have imagined saying after 2021 and 2022. But it has taken them so long to kind of download this offense around Anthony Richardson in a way that has been effective.

I would say with Trevor Lawrence has been a lot of, even while you had the same staff with Doug Peterson, and one year it's RPO's and a bunch of man-beaters. And then the next year, we're going under center, doing these seven and nine-step drops and trying to, you know, take the top off the defense all the time. I think that having Liam Cohen there, I feel a lot more trust with Jacksonville.

I do think that the depth chart in Indianapolis is a little bit better. But I'll take William Cohen, and I'll take what I think Trevor can be over Shane Seeking, who I don't trust right now, and Anthony Richardson that I absolutely am not going to bank on at all. I think there's a little, right at this moment. I think there's a little recancy bias there. with the play callers.

That's fair. Because you just saw Liam Cohen coming off having one of the best offensive lines. We know what we thought of Shane's psychic when he had one of the best offensive lines in the NFL. I am in, let's see you do it again, Liam Cohen territory. Now, I think it was great last year.

I'm not diminishing that, but I'm with you. Let me see you do it again. Could have very good wide receivers down there, but to Ruiz's point, if you don't have the offensive line, makes life a little bit harder. Can you scheme it up? So who knows?

Maybe we'll get some AFC sound. fireworks this year. All right, Deontay, what do you have? What's your next nugget? I want us to go to the NFC North really quick and just kind of get your guys a sense of what we've heard about the young quarterbacks there, right? Caleb Williams early in camp having some trouble, I think, kind of being able to communicate the offense and the huddle, he's had some turnover issues on a couple of days. And then with JJ McCarthy, the ball's been on the ground a bunch, right? You have the Justin Jefferson quote where he's out saying, like, hey man, this guy's not a veteran. He's effectively a rookie. I'm not putting a veteran

expectations on this guy. It's going to take some time. So I kind of wanted to see how you stack your expectations for the Vikings versus the Bears and for each quarterback in their respective situations and I guess quasi year ones for both of these guys. Man, it's, uh, those are also too. I just mentioned who was the team I was saying earlier that's tough to figure out that we were talking about. I can't even remember who it was. But I put both these teams. Yeah, the Rams. That's right. Yeah. I put. I put, I put both these two teams in that category, man.

I'm looking at the Bears going. Ben Johnson really was terrific with the Lions. I see the pieces around Caleb Williams. I think their defense has a chance to be pretty good. But the Bears, I'm almost like, I don't want to get fooled again. I think I was high on them going into last year. It didn't work out. That was a mistake on my part.

And then the Vikings, I mean, you look up and down the roster. If you just look at a depth chart or, you know, just a starting lineup and go on our lads, like, man, There's a lot to like about that Vikings roster, and they won a lot of games last year. So I think both teams have a chance to surprise and make the playoffs. I don't know that I'll be confident that it's really going to work with either quarterback to the degree where when you talk to me in a month, I'll be predicting that it is going to happen. So I'm kind of in wait and see the path towards both of them having good seasons this year with the coaching, with the pieces around them. but I don't have the confidence to say,

I feel great about it, and it's definitely going to happen. So I don't know where that leaves me, Ruiz. I feel like you're, do you expect sort of a breakout from Caleb Williams in his second season, or are you still like, let's let these pieces around him prove themselves a little bit.

I think I do expect it, but that's not just an expectation for Caleb. That's an expectation for the moves they made. I like the offensive line moves they made, obviously compared to last year, anything was going to look like an improvement over their offensive line. But it's also an expectation for Ben Johnson. And I think like one issue with like kind of interpreting these training camp performances

and you're comparing them across the league is like coaches have different standards for for what they are seeing on the field. And it seems by all accounts that Ben Johnson has been really, really adamant about them getting everything right down to the detail. And so what seems like a bad camp for Caleb could be a good camp elsewhere because the coach has lower expectations for the offense. So it's tough. And then with JJ, I'm kind of not surprised at all.

hitting the ground a lot just because of how that offense and that passing game operated a lot. It was a very high degree of difficulty passing game. I know I questioned Sam Donald throughout last year, but his throwing ability was beyond the approach. We know the guy can make the throws. And I think that's the question

mark with JJ McCarthy. But without being there, it's kind of hard to say because we don't know what kind of throws he's making. If they're running like the, we're holding your hand offense and the ball still hitting the ground, then I'm concerned. If they're really... That's an issue. If they're really pushing him and running a similar style of offense that you were running with Sam

Darnold, then it's not a big deal to me at all. And maybe it's impressive or a good sign that they are running that style of offense and they don't feel the need to hold his hand through this training camp. So it's really hard to say, but like in terms of expectations beyond what we're hearing out of camp, it's really hard because I have more faith in Caleb's talent, but I have more faith in the infrastructure around

JJ McCarthy, just because I've seen Kevin O'Connell do it in Minnesota and do it with these pieces and we know what he has. But yeah, I'm expecting both plays. players to play well. At the end of the year, I expect both to be in the top half of the league in terms of pass a rating. I don't know if that equates the,

I consider both of them top half of the league quarterbacks, but I think they are in systems that on paper could boost their production. I don't know if saying they could swing the league is too far, but they certainly could sort of... Oh, I don't know. They can, because that's like the most competitive division and we have championship contend, like,

the lines are a championship contender until proven otherwise. I know they have a lot of question marks going into the next season. The Packers are definitely, in my estimation, an NFC championship contender. And then the Vikings last year, they could have easily won the NFC. And then if the Bears take the leap that we all expect, they weren't far. They were like a hell Mary away from being five and two, if I recall correctly, lost a lot of games on the last play. So, like, I don't think that's an exaggeration at all.

Yeah. You got a few guys like that. I could even, you know, Michael Pennix. You know, there are just some unknowns there, especially, especially. in the NFC where, hey, if one of these quarterbacks makes a leap, surprises us, whatever, they could be the story in the NFL once we even get to week six, week seven, week eight, whatever. All right. Ruiz, what do you got? What's the next nugget that caught your attention? We talked about them earlier. I'm going to Jacksonville where Travis Hunter, they're actually doing the thing.

And like I am excited to see them do the thing. But it sounds like they at least have a good plan in place. And what they're doing right now is they're putting him, if he's working with the offense during special team drills, then he does some defensive drills on the side and vice versa. So far, day one, wide receiver, day two, wide receiver. He got two straight days of cornerback after that and then went right back to wide receiver. It seems like they're pushing him towards the offensive side

and the defensive side is going to be a secondary type thing. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I think he's a better cornerback than a wide receiver, but I understand the thinking that if you're an explosive wide receiver and he does fill in those gaps in his game, that he could become a game-changing player, whereas a corner, it's harder to impact a game like a wide receiver can. But I'm just excited that one, that they're trying to do this, and that in two, to a week and a half so far, he hasn't tapped out.

And it seems like the guy's stamina. He's just built different. Like, I don't know how else to. It's hard to analyze with, like, past examples because we've never seen anything like this outside of like Pat Ricard and Scott Matlock, who were like defensive tackles and foolbacks. So it's going to be fascinating to watch. But it sounds like it's so far so good. Yeah. It's, you know, I rip them or one of my takeaways after the draft was like, I want Travis Hunter to be awesome.

I want to see him do something nobody else can do. And I don't have faith in this organization to have a plan for him to be able to do that because they've been, they've had the fewest wins in the NFL since Shod Khan took over. And so the infrastructure has been bad. Now, I'm with you. It's encouraging what we've seen so far. It does feel like there was a plan in place. Here's how we're going to handle this. If we're going to draft this guy, here's what it's going to look like.

Let's make sure we're not doing anything, you know, day by day, almost, rep by rep, maybe drill by drill, whatever it is from now until we get to the regular season to figure out what he can do and what he can't do. So I'm with you. It remains one of the most exciting storylines in the NFL, which is picturing week one, what does this guy look like? And I sort of get, based on the conversation we just had, why you would want him on offense a little bit more if you feel like your path to being a good guy.

team is for the offense to be good. If Liam Cohen's like, I can scheme this up. I did it last year, and I have Brian Thomas Jr. And Trevor Lawrence is healthy. And hey, we got to scheme around an offensive line that might have issues. You know, what would help with that if I had Travis Hunter as my other wide receiver. So they might be like, hey, let's get some turnovers on D. It might not look great. We might not be great. They were bad last year. But let's get this offense going. That's our path towards success. So yeah, Deont, I'm excited. There's no doubt about it just in terms of like stuff I'm looking forward to in week one of the NFL season, that's high on the list for me. 1,000 percent.

I think Stephen, Stephen redded it perfectly, right? The biggest thing was that we were able to get to training camp and he wasn't immediately like, all right, this is too much. The coaching staff didn't come right out the gate saying, all right, we were idiots for even thinking that we could do this in year one of a guy's career. We need to kind of tamp this down. The fact that they've been able to get through a week and a half up to this point of practices and they don't feel terrible about it and they're going to try this out in the

scrimmage, I think, at the end of this week. That's something I'm really going to be locked in on is what we hear, what we see from this JAG scrimmage where he's going to be playing on both ways. I think Liam Cohen kind of worded it as like, this is our temperature check for how much he can retain on the defensive side of the ball. I think they must feel pretty good about what they've asked of him as a slot receiver or just as a receiver, period. And they probably really want to get a gauge of can you actually be a manned corner when you're playing a bunch of offense? can you remember all this different stuff in terms of your role in the defense after you had full drives offensively what are you retaining what can you go out and replicate consistently so that's something

i'm going to have my eye on i will say the skeptic in me i think it's nice it's nice to believe that they have this grand plan for why he's starting out on offense and taking his time defensively the truth of the matter is that they had a bigger need for a number three receiver than they did for a number two corner they brought in jordan lewis to play in the slot so they're their defensive backfield is probably a little just more stable than the wide receiver room outside of Brian Thomas. And maybe that's for the better, right? Like because Travis Center can be a dynamic athlete, maybe getting, maybe getting him in early on the offensive side of the ball. You get the ball in his hands, probably on a bunch of screens and RPO's, the same way we saw Tampa Bay taking advantage of their slot receivers, especially Chris Godwin before he got hurt last year.

And that might be enough. And that's kind of what I've been expecting. I'm just fascinated to see what it looks like on the other side of the ball. man. I'm not concerned at all about what an athlete like Hunter can do offensively. It's going to be more about what he is or is not as a corner that's going to paint the picture for what a two-way player in the NFL can even look like because this is not even something I've ever had to conceive of before this guy got drafted. I feel like the Liam Cohen part is a good point that I kind of overlooked that you have this guy

that has proven. Well, he proved it for one year, but he did prove that he's able to generate targets and touches and space and put guys in the right position. And if you have a receiver who isn't taking on a full load and maybe doesn't understand the nuances of the position yet, that's the perfect play caller to have. And then another thing that stood out to me was, I think it was a month ago, I don't know when he said it, but Travis Kelsey

was saying, like, oh, if he's playing both sides and he's on defense, we're throwing go-balls that we're targeting him with go-ball, so he has to run, I think, was the implication. And if that's happening and teams are like going out of their way to kind of make Hunter's Day a living hell, I feel like the Jaguarers are already won.

You guys are altering your strength strategy. Yeah, if I'm breaking the game plan. Yeah. So, yeah. I don't know. I feel like this is going to work out. But my question to you guys both is, at what point, like, if he's still doing this in week X, will you believe, okay, this is going to be a thing all year long? And I'm buying into it.

I feel like Deonté needs more convincing than she'll at this point. When do they see the chiefs? Is that week five? You're saying the chiefs are going to break them? I'm saying if we can get, it's October 6th. So yeah, that'll be about the fourth fifth week of the year. If we can get through a solid month, if I have a representative sample size of at least a month

to kind of gauge exactly how much usage he's getting on both sides of the ball, and he's through that, then you might get a little bit of belief out of me. Before then, I'm going to be coping. I want everybody to know all the Colorado fans, all the Coach Prime fans that have been beating me down for my should doer takes and how I feel, how this ethical of Travis Hunter, I'm going to be coping all of September. If the guy puts up 120 yards, two touchdowns,

and gets two PPUs, I'm going to blame the opponents. I'm not going to credit Travis Hunter. I just want this to be out there in the open. I'm going to be as honest as possible, man. I'm not believing until we get a month into the year. Yeah, I mean, four to six weeks, I would be like, if he's able to do it for that period, then I would be like, all right, let's see.

It's like a streak. Let's see, can he do it another week? Obviously, see how the team is doing. How is he performing on both sides of the ball? Are they sticking with it that entire time? So, yeah, intriguing storyline, no doubt about it. All right, take one more break. We come back.

We'll get to a few more training camp nuggets. All right, we're back on the ringer NFL show. All right, mine, I'm going back to the NFC North. And Matt LaFleur is getting feisty. I don't know how much attention you guys have been paying to this. But this caught my attention. The athletics, Matt Schneidman had a terrific practice report detailing what happened. There was a little, you know, fight O-line, D-Line,

Rashid Walker, the offensive tackle versus Kingsley, Enigbari, kind of threw him to the ground. And in Schneidman's words, Matt LaFleur snapped. He was in his quote, he was enraged perhaps more so than I've ever seen in my prior six seasons covering him. So he makes Rashid Walker take a lap. I have four other players join Rashid Walker, show a little unity on the offensive side of the ball. They take a lap with him. But it's not just that one thing. LaFleur kicked cornerback Nate Hobbs out of practice for a low hit.

And then this might be my favorite one. He pointed out that Tucker Crest ball security needs to be better in a press conference. And Tucker Kraft couldn't hide that he was just, you know, disgusted by this, pointing out to reporters that defend this is going to grind Deontes gears that defenders can punch the ball out, but he's not allowed to use a stiff arm. And so, of course, they're going to be able to punch the ball out. Kraft said. And so he was asked about, you know, LaFleur kind of calling him out. And he said, that's just a yes, sir, no sir mentality with coach at this point. You want to obviously keep the ball in the offensive possession as long as possible. Bus fine, in my opinion, whatever. And they followed up, bus fine. What does that mean? And he said, throwing somebody under the bus, which he just did that to me, Kraft said lightheartedly. So interesting Packers camp so far. You know, I was thinking about LaFleur, and I think we all agree he's one of the better coaches in the NFL.

You go to his pro football reference page. You'll probably just be shocked. Like, oh my gosh, this guy, every season is good with different quarterbacks. He goes from Aaron Rogers to Jordan Love. But then I was thinking about how we talk about Kyle Shanahan so differently, where it's like, great coach, hasn't won it yet. It's wearing on him. And I was just wondering, is there a little bit of that with the floor? Like, he's won a lot of games, but he hasn't been to a Super Bowl. is the intensity ratcheted up a little bit, and maybe it's wearing on him. Maybe it's nothing.

Maybe it's just a regular training camp. But I did like to see a little bit of the personality, the anecdotes with Matt LaFleur and what's happening at Packers Camp Deontay. I'm with you. I'm not even going to interface at that Tucker Craft quote. Hey, man, practice rules. Practice rules, buddy. I'm sorry.

Forcing a turnover is much more valuable than your stiff arm. You're just going to have to deal. All right, we've got to get our work in on the defensive side of the ball. I will say, though, the thing that I was kind of pondering as you were speaking, is like how fascinating a situation it is to be as a coach when you know you have a young, but very talented team and you might feel like these guys need to grow up and turn a corner, right? And that's not to say that like all of the Packers are immature, but I think if you're looking at the fact that they haven't been able to close games

against the better teams that they've seen, we saw that often last year, even when Jordan Love was healthy, they kind of struggled being able to beat some of the better teams. I would say maybe their best or highest quality win. on the year was when they went out and beat the Rams. If I remember it, and that was relatively early in the season, I think that for me and what I'm looking for is, is a quarterback going to take, you know, the reins of this thing? They have a really young defense, so it's not like, it's not like Seattle, right?

Shield back in the Legion of Boom Days, where you have Russell Wilson has this very fresh face trying to figure out exactly what he wants to be as a quarterback with this already established identity and these strong personalities defensively that can lead the way, right? I'm sure that if you're Matt LaFleur, you're probably feeling like, hey, man, we know we're good enough to be able to go out and compete with Philadelphia because we did it twice last year. Right. Like we did it twice last year. And turnover's gotten our way in the second game when we were injured.

But we should feel like we could have done to them what Los Angeles did to them in a division around. And if that's going to happen, I do think that you probably do have to kind of crank up the intensity at practice. So I'm really fascinated to see if that changes the mentality and the approach for them. the rest of the way, right? Like I'm going to be listening and talking about buddy Justice Muscatah about quotes coming from players out of practice, right? Like we've heard about Miami talking about changing

their culture and trying to be very serious about trying to compete. I wonder if the Green Bay players see it the same way. I'm going to side with Tucker Kraft just because I've been on the wrong side of a training camp zinger from Matt LaFleur. I think it was like two years ago I asked them about Jordan Love.

And Deonti just mentioned Justice Mosquita. I actually clipped the thing. He's my friend if he wanted to make fun of me. But I asked him, I said, Jordan Love looks more confident. I think they just had to play a preseason game. He said it's the most confident he's looked since coming here. And then LaFleur just ripped. He was just like, how would you know?

Like you were. Yeah, like I've been here the whole time. He looks just as confident as he always has, which is fair. Like I didn't take offense to it. Next week, he goes, he says, Jordan Love looks more confident than ever. I was so pissed. But, but I, like, I, I, like, I, I, totally agree with Deontes.

And it goes back to my point about Ben Johnson and like the standard that he's setting for the Bears. I feel like that's what's happening here in Packers' Camp. They need to get their shit together. And I feel like they left so many games on the floor just by not doing the little things, not doing the little things, not making it and not avoiding big mistakes and big moments. And we saw that in the Eagles game. So if they're going to make the leap, I think they just have to be a more disciplined team. So it makes sense that the floor is taking this approach this year.

Yeah, and there's a lot of good happening there. Matthew Golden has looked good. Elton Jenkins is in camp. Jordan Love is healthy, so there's a lot of good happening there. But entertaining, entertaining camp, it feels like so far in Green Bay. All right, let's do one more each. If you guys have any leftovers here, I got a couple, so I'm happy to go to. But Deonti, you got one more nugget for me this week?

I'll package a couple up because it's kind of following the same storyline in the NFC. We can just kind of check in on the contract situations with the commander. and the Cowboys. You haven't been here to rail against Jerry Jones in a little bit. So, you know, I wanted to make sure I open up the floor for you to rip Jerry for his comments about Michael Carson's missing some time last year and that possibly being a reason why they're not in a hurry to pay the guy. And then obviously in Washington, you have Terry McCorn who just reported to training camp this week after basically taking the first week off. And I know he's kind of holding in and trying to work out his contract situation. So I guess I'll frame this as

which of these two do you think gets done first? And do you think that either of these guys get exactly the market value that they're after? I would probably say Parsons. The thing about the Parsons contract is, I don't, it should not be difficult. No, it's not difficult. That's what we were saying last week. It's like a note, he always complicates these. The contract is written for you already.

Why does he complicate these situations? I don't understand. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this one I really don't understand. It almost feels like they're going out of their way to antagonize. some of their best players. And Michael Parsons has been incredible for them.

See, I don't even have a rant in me on this one, Deonté honest. I just, I don't know what he's doing. I don't know if I should feel bad for him. Or, you know,

like what's going on there. I just don't understand what he's doing. But we've seen how these play out before. They eventually get done. These, their stars don't walk out the door. And I think that's what will happen with Michael Parsons. And it almost,

this summer especially, it almost feels like there's an understanding. Like, I can just picture, you know, Dak Prescott, CD Lam, Micah Parsons, whoever else. Like, they kind of have the understanding that we have about who Jerry Jones is and how he operates where it's almost like, you know, Michael Parsons just showed up to camp.

And he's like, all right, yeah, I understand who I'm dealing with here. It's okay. So I feel like that'll get done. The McLaurin one is probably a little trickier, but I still feel like that too. They'll find some sort of agreement. I would be shocked if that one, you know, carried a. over into the regular season or they thought about trading him or anything like that. I feel that way about almost every contract situation this time of year.

I mean, if you just look at it historically, the number of words we spend discussing these things in the spring and the summer and Trey Hendrickson even shows up today to Bengalscan. So I feel like most of them eventually get to a place where the player shows up for the team they're playing for Roos. Yeah. Mike is going to sign his deal like Wednesday before the first Thursday game. That's like how it happens.

I think it happened with Dak Prescott. Was it last year or two years ago? I don't remember when he signed. But the McLorian one is tricky because, one, I think he's the best, he's obviously the best skill player on the team. But two, he meets something to that franchise that kind of predates this new ownership group. And I wonder how that kind of gets factored in.

Like when he resigned last time, it was like all they had. It was like, all we have is Terry McLaurin right now. We got to pay him no matter what. And he's just been the consummate professional. You hear the players talk about him, you hear the coaches talk about him. I just don't see why they are stringing him along at all. If I was them, I would be in a rush to pay him. I get that he's getting up there.

He's getting closer to 30s. He's going to command a lot of money. And then you've got to think about Jaden Daniels' contract down the line and all that. But with him, this seems just as much of a no-brainer as to Michael Parsons thing. I know he's not that type of player, but what he means to you in the locker room, I don't know why it's gotten into August. Yeah, if I'm Terry McLauran, I might be a little annoyed. So I'm like, hey, don't wait until you get to me to all of a sudden be concerned about how much you're paying a 30-plus-year-old NFL vet.

You guys had no problem. No money. So all the other bets that are going to be playing on this team. So don't take your time with me now. I do think in some ways, it's almost even to me in trying to sort out who will get signed first. Because I think about Adam Peters as GM and coming from San Francisco. And obviously, we've talked a lot about San Francisco and how they handle their negotiations and they're never in a rush. to do these extensions. And I think that a lot of this is just kind of the way that they operate.

They're never going to be hurried up in their timeline. I think if there is going to be a hang-up, it ultimately comes down to, right, to use like a real estate as an analogy, what exactly like his comparable value is for Terry McLaurin, right? Like, who do you view as his peers? Do you view him in the same breath that you would view a Tyree Kill on this side of his 30s, a Mike Evans on this side of his 30s, a Devante Adams. right, those guys who are going to get about, you know, 15 or so million guaranteed per year and about 20 to 25 per year overall in terms of their cap figure. And I think if I'm Terry McClorin, I want to get as close to the top of that market as possible, right? You're not going

to pay them exactly what you gave some of the younger guys, right? Like, D.K. Metcalf's contract extension, I don't think should really factor into this, even though Terry McClellan, I think, is a more reliable number one receiver than DK has been. Obviously, you've got an age advantage there. But I think if I'm Terry McLauran, I should be able to go in and ask for 45 to 48 million over the next two years, guarantee me 15 million per year. And I'll be able to show up to camp for that. For Michael Parsons, I mean, I'm shrugging this off to shame the same as you, Sheel. The contract's written already. Honestly, if I was the Cowboys salary cap guy, the saying that the T.J. Wad deal got done. I know he just had to throw his head back and just

scream at the ceiling. It's like, oh my God, now we've got to start this thing. Roll over again. Why didn't you listen to me, Jerry? I told you. We get a done this two months ago, three months ago after the, after the Miles Garrett deal. And really, you have Miles Garrett and Nick Bosa's deal to use as your framework before the TJY deal. And now a guy who's older and worse than Michael Parsons can say, hey, if they can pay him $110 million guaranteed, basically, you definitely got to do that for me. Right. And that's just over three years for a T.J. Watt. So he should be able to blow that NFL record for non-quarterback contracts out the water.

And I think that all of this just comes down to a bunch of bluster. which we know Jerry Jones is an expert at it and making himself the center of attention for this. And I wouldn't be surprised at all. Like Stephen said, no deal throughout the preseason, first week of the year. They come to practice on Tuesday.

Contracts on the table. He signs it and we can just say, all right, this guy set the record and we can move on now. No, Jerry's different. That's the thing you have to realize. Jerry's different. Never mind the fact that everybody that he ends up signing

for above market rate deal, but Jerry does it differently. That's what I was going to say. We've got a six-year contract. I will, after the six-year deal for Ezekiel Elliott, he can never tell me again about how shrewd of a negotiator he is. No, it always works out for the player because, you know, if you're the player, now maybe you're annoyed by him, but the longer you wait to Deontes point, other deals get done. And now your price is just going higher.

I mean, like, if Michael Parsons... Seedulam got to wait for Justin Jefferson. Yeah. It was just like, give me a million dollars less and I'll show up. And that's basically what happened. They built that facility, the star, whatever they call it. I think it's in Frisco or whatever. And they use it as like a thing.

This is like an amenity for players and they'll take less money because they have these business opportunities. There's like a lot of businesses that work out of there and they introduce them to players and all that stuff. So it can help you. And I feel like Jerry built that thing and paid all that money for that and really just wants to leverage it in one contract. He wants to get one below market deal just so he'll get like, see, it was a great

investment. I think he's forcing the issue. Yeah. Who knows? It'll get, I'll be shocked. if it didn't get done. All right, Ruiz, what do you have? What's your last one here?

My last nugget is that there is no nugget coming out of Pittsburgh. We talked about this before the show, but there's been nothing, no turmoil in Pittsburgh. Apparently, Mike Tomlin called his relationship with Aaron Rogers a bromance. And I want to be fair to Steelers fans. I want to be fair to Aaron Rogers earlier. I think it was a couple months ago whenever he signed, I said, if we get past the first week in training camp,

and there is no discussion of turmoil with him and Arthur Smith and who has controlled the offense and audibles, that I will be a little more optimistic about the Steelers. And we can have through, and there hasn't been anything like that. And Arthur Smith is apparently cooking. He's got Jono Smith playing running back in some reps. So I do think I hold some optimism for the Steelers' offense. That it's not going to be a bottom 10 unit,

that it might be hover around league average. So far so good. Quiet. You know, Rogers had the response to the Bradshaw thing and all that. So we shall see, like you said, you know, a week in. and no issues. Bromance. It has been sort of a quiet,

you know, other than like the contract stuff, it's been pretty quiet around a lot of the NFL. But yeah, Deonté, are you, are you giving it two weeks?

Where are you with this? Nobody's dropped a pass on third and six yet. It's easy for it to be a bromance for now. Nobody has a reason to be cranky. We're all happy. We traded for, we traded for Jalen Ramsey and basically exchanged our other headache.

So now we're clearing things out in this room. T.J. Watt has paid. and happy. Everybody's got all the reason in the world to be having a good time. Easy to feel that way in July. We will see in three weeks, let alone a month, where things stand. Let me say this. They opened up with the jets, then they played the Seahawks, and then they played the Patriots. That sounds like it could be a three and no start. No, I don't think so. One thing Steelers are good at doing, it's racking up wins to fool you and thinking that there's something that they're not. I was thinking one and two when you read that

out loud personally, but we'll see. All right. My last one will end on a positive. Aidan Hutchinson looking great for the Detroit Lions via the athletics. Colton Pouncey, they had a scrimmage this week. Hutchinson had at least three sacks, according to Pouncey, best player on the field. He's going up against Ponceau and winning his fair share of battle. So that Lions defense, the most injured defense in the NFL last season, obviously had the coordinator change. And you're just kind of wondering what's it going to look like here.

I feel like there's some fatigue with the Lions, honestly, this year where people are like, you know, they've been a really good team, but are we going to pick them to get to the Super Bowl? I don't know. And I was just thinking like the margin for error for that offense to drop off a little. Can that be, you know, accounted for with the defense being really good? And the defense was good last year, despite those injuries. But like Hutchinson and then you have the safeties, Brian Branch, Kirby Joseph, Joseph, can you get something out of your corners?

Like there's a blueprint there where it ends up being a pretty interesting. defense and Hutchinson looks like he did before the injury last year where he looked like one of the best defensive players in football. So it's a good sign out of Detroit who they've had some, you know, injuries here and there on both sides of the ball. But I think just the fact that Hutchinson looks like this so far is a great sign for that. 1,000 percent. I mean, it was the most productive pass rusher in the league. I think like two, three, four weeks after he had broken his leg, right? And that speaks to just kind of how far ahead of pace he was and how effective he's been for this defense. So if he's best, he's best, he's

and moving anywhere close to what we saw last season, that is going to be a big boon for this defense. The biggest issue is just they've got to get to January healthy. After seeing what we saw last year, and we're already starting off training camp, no Taylor Decker, Alie McNeil is down. They've got, you know, you go on there are lads and they've got red lines through names all over the place.

So you've got to just be a little bit concerned about what that's going to look like in season. Like you said, as long as these guys hit the field, I do think that people are a little bit, a little premature and moving on from Detroit, given the way that they looked in the playoffs. I don't know if that was an accurate representation of what we saw all year. Definitely was an accurate representation of what we saw from them all season. I'm still pretty bullish on what this team can be.

If Jamison Williams is anywhere close to the wide receiver that they drafted, that they thought they were drafting, this offense is going to be just fine, even with the loss is up front to the offensive line. And defensively, I think a lot of this kind of weighs on Kelvin's shoulders. But if all he does is copies and paste, what Aaron Glenn did, that was good enough for them to go 15 to 2 last year. And basically be the best team in the NFL up until like the last couple weeks of the season.

Yeah, I definitely like can see a situation where we're thinking, oh, if they had last year's offense with this year's defense, like this, they would really have something going. But like the offensive line, the interior offense line is what gives me balls, just because of how that affects Jericho, how that affects his pocket. We know he needs a clean pocket. We saw that in the Washington game. But I do think their ceiling last year was higher just because we had so much faith in that offense.

And when you have a great offense like that, I think you have a higher ceiling just naturally, just because defense is just, you know, it's volatile week to week. We can't count on it. And then one or two injuries, as we saw in Detroit, could take you down. So I'm still bullish on them. I want to ask you guys right now make a pick in the NFC North. Are you guys taking Detroit or another team? I'm still taking Detroit.

I'm still taking Detroit. I will say this is as close as margin as it's been since Ben Johnson took over his offensive coordinator, but I'm still taking Detroit, man. I've got to see this offense take a step back before I jump off the bandwagon. I feel like me and Shield pick the Packers with NFC every year. You still on that train?

Yeah, I'll stick with it. Yeah, we definitely did. And we did that in the spring, I think. We did our NFC North. But I do feel the way Deonté feel when, you know, I just have my preseason spreadsheet where I'm going through every team and trying to predict how many wins are, you know, and add it all up.

And I went through the Lions thing and I'm just like, they still look like a Super Bowl contender to me, you know, when you add it all up that they've got that ceiling. I just think there's a bit of fatigue. I think the Packers are going to be really good too. So we'll see where I land once we see these injuries throughout the, and where everyone is at the end of August. But yeah, I think those are, you know, two of the better teams in the NFC for sure.

So we shall say you're still with the Packers, Ruiz. I'm going to stick with the Packers. But I do agree that the fatigue thing is definitely affected with the lines. Like, we have a short attention span in the NFL media space. Like, you don't do it for two years. You're done. Like, we've written on, Lamar Jackson's never winning the Super Bowl. The bills are never winning anything.

The lines are done, apparently. The Bengals are cooked. Everybody's done. Yeah. It's just going to be chiefs and Eagles for the next four years. All right, Deontay, as promised. So give me the background. What happened?

The firestorm, I missed. online and what is the question that I have to answer about Cam Newton and Jailner. Now, I will say, you know, I'm an older guy. I'm at the, I don't have to partake, you know, so I reserve my right, but I'm going to try to be a good, you know, podcast partner here and answer the question. So go ahead. Fill me in. Okay. So again, there's a lot of like exposition that's been tied to this because this thing has drawn, been so out protracted, like back and forms between Cam Newton and a bunch of people who are not Jalen Hertz, which is a whole other separate thing. But Cam has kind of made a big content thing out of breaking his top 10 quarterbacks.

He usually does it before every season, in the middle of the season, and then throughout the playoffs. And I guess earlier in the year, in the wake of Philadelphia's Super Bowl victory, his comments at that time were kind of typically that Jalen Hertz should be considered as being kind of in that elite class. And a lot of that was credit to, you know, he doesn't turn the ball over. he shows up in the playoffs. Clearly there are some leadership skills and things of that nature, right? He does exactly what the team is asking him to do.

I'm paraphrasing. I want to say, was this at the beginning of June? God, it's been so long. I don't even remember when the initial video came out, but he does an updated top 10 quarterbacks, and Jalen Hertz is not on it. And he kind of said like, hey, man, like we're talking about tools.

We're talking about what guys can do on a snap-by-snap basis and throwers on the ball. What they're asked to do, I think, was really what he was, harping on. And it's like Jalen has the offensive line, the running back, the wide receivers, the defense that he does. And I will say, like, obviously I've been more sympathetic to Cam's position,

but this is an objective truth that I think is being lost in this because people are attacking Cam. I did not really hear him insult any piece of Jalen Hurts's game when he was saying why he's not top 10. All he was saying is that the guy is not asked to do what Justin Herbert or Joe Burrow or Patrick Mahomes or Lamar Jackson or Josh Allen are asked to do. And I think that even with Stephen and I were having our conversation, like Jalen Hurts not being behind guys like Jordan Love and Jane Daniels, I think really kind of miss Eagles fans given the team success.

So we established that as what was happening at the beginning. Ryan Clark, Dan Orlovsky, basically the entire like national NFL media apparatus all come down on cam. And it's the same thing you always hear. You didn't jump on the fumble. Yeah, one high year. and then you never were able to do again what you did in 2015. He's a winner, you're not.

So now Cam has been kind of shooting back at all these guys. I don't necessarily need your opinion on where you stand with that. That's just theater, you know, typical social media theater. Okay. I want shields. You don't have to give me a full top 10. I need to know if Jalen Hertz is in your top 10. And if you could cherry pick the absolute best of Jalen Hertz,

how does that match up against the best of Cam Newton in your mind? Okay. Well, listen, if I am actually asked to do a ranking, then I'm not doing to do it right now. I did a fake breaking for you. And if we want to do that on a few, what's that? I did a fake top 10. We did it. Yeah, we gave you a fake top 10.

I saw that. I was getting tagged on. What's going on here? What are what is doing to me? So it didn't look that bad, you know, some of it. I'm like, oh, yeah, I could talk myself into that. So I don't know if anybody actually wants me to do that. But if you give me guidelines, is it, am I, is it expansion?

Is it with their team right now? Is it accomplishments? Then I'll be happy to do that. League average NFL roster. League average NFL roster, you've got this guy for the 18 weeks of the season. Yep. Okay. We'll give it some thought.

I'm not answering on the fly. Listen, I live here. I got neighbors, you know. I'm coaching the girls softball. I'm not crazy. Okay? I'm not doing it. So I will give it some thought and can answer it in a future episode.

I think at the peak of their powers, I think Kim Newton, that 2015, season I would take over the best we've seen out of jail and hurt so far. You know, looking at Cam Newton's just recently for something, just his pro football. I forgot how short lives, sort of the injuries taking a toll and then him moving on. And I remember he had the one season where I was very impressed

because he was just like checking. Ruiz, you probably can give me more details. But he wasn't able to throw the football downfield, but he was still kind of making things work. Yeah, offensively. So I think 2015 was kind of, you know, that's kind of a one of a kind player in a one of a kind season where I don't know that we've seen that, you know, that level that high from Jalen Hertz yet. Now, Jalen Hertz said, you know, was in the MVP running for one season. He's been to two Super Bowls.

He won the Super Bowl. I think there are a lot of things that Jalen Hertz does well. And I am kind of like, it has been a weird off season for like the Jailen Hertz discourse. I feel like just coming off of a Super Bowl, the conversations around him. So I'm sympathetic to that. Now, I think when you look at entire career accomplishments down the road, like he definitely has a chance, I think, to have a better career. For sure.

Kim, you know when you take longevity and everything into account. So I don't know if I ducked your, I answered your question. No, I think you answered it honestly. Yeah. Which, yeah, I think you answered that honestly and earnestly. And it's funny, like, I think that Jalen Hertz is just so emblematic of all the trappings of trying to talk about quarterbacks in the NFL, period. Like, he and Brock Purdy have done.

just been the exact kinds of quarterbacks that are going to have everybody tripped up on a year by year basis. And the fact that he won now is obviously, I think, just kind of magnified that. And then winning in Philadelphia's and I've got this big national fan base who's loud. And I think the biggest thing has probably just been for me that there are a lot of Eagles fans who want the rest of the league to bend the knee, which I get. I totally get because a lot of people had a lot to say after 2023 and the disaster that they were down the stretch and coming back and won in a championship. So I get that point.

I do just think that people get so hung up on not necessarily knowing which guidelines to your point shield they actually want to evaluate these quarterback. Yeah. And the debate just got weird. It ended up being like the 2015 Panthers were one of the best teams of all time and they were loaded and they had Mike Tolbert, who was an all pro, never mind the fact that it was a fullback. It was just a weird discussion that I think was so detached from reality.

But it speaks to your point. It's like very difficult to talk about Jalen Hertz in very objective terms. either you're underrating him or you're overrating him. I feel like he's one of the hardest quarterbacks to evaluate just because of the situation he's in. I'm not taking anything away from his performance, especially in the Super Bowl. He was lights out in the Super Bowl. It was lights out in the NFC

championship game. Don't think that eliminates the first 18 or so weeks of the season when even Eagles fans were questioned him. I was on the Eagles Reddit. Hate scrolling. So I know what you guys are saying. Don't play that game with me. I can bring up the receipts.

Well, it reminds me, like, I do understand a fan base defending their guy. You know what I mean? Like I was that guy with Donovan McNabb in high school going like, look, man, look at what happened when he got Terrell Owens and now look at his numbers and look he's throwing at James Thresh. Like that was me as a middle schooler, high schooler, early years of college. It's just so different now because I'm yelling that at, you know,

friends in person talking. Now I'm showing how old I really am. And now it's like Cam Newton puts out a video and now, like, our producer for Ringers Philly Special, you know, Cliff was telling me that just like, he's on vacation and his group chat's just going crazy about this. And he's like,

everybody go outside, take a walk, touch grass. We don't need to be arguing about this right now. So it's just a very different environment with those debates now for the worst probably, but also we're in the content game. So maybe for the better for us and putting food on the table.

We can't complain. So there you go. We got to it. Deante promised you. We did it. And we'll see if we have to continue this in future episodes with rankings. Please know. Yeah, please know.

Okay. It is July 30th. It's over. We are turning over into real NFL season. Once a season starts. Let's bury this here. There we go. All right.

Thank you to Deonté Lee and Stephen Ruiz. Thank you to Christopher Sutton for producing Kira Givens on social. I'm Shield Capadio. We'll talk to you next time on the ringer NFL show. Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in D.C. Gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler or visit RG-Hallh-RG-Helpsheap.com. Call 1-88-88-789-7777 or visit CCPpG.org

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