The Ringer NFL Show - Winners and Losers From the NFL Combine, and Kirk Cousins to the Rams or Vikings | GM Street (Ep. 242)

Episode Date: March 6, 2018

The Ringer’s Michael Lombardi and Tate Frazier discuss winners and losers from the NFL combine, including Shaquem Griffin (05:30), Josh Allen (10:15), Josh Rosen (12:30), Lamar Jackson (13:45), and Orlando Brown (19:40). Then they break down rumors about Kirk Cousins to the Vikings or Jets (26:00), the Rams trading Robert Quinn to Miami (29:30), and Russell Wilson playing with the Yankees (31:30). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to GM Street, part of the Ringer Podcast Network. It is Monday, March 5th. The NFL Combine just happened this weekend, and on the line back in its home state of New Jersey. Mr. Michael Lombardi, Lombardi, how you doing? You know, Tate Fraser, I'm doing good. I snuck into the state of Pennsylvania, had dark glasses on fake mustache and those.

I got through the Philly Airport, okay, so I was happy about that. Got down to the shore. It took the long way into Ocean City, so nobody would see me. Got through all the checkpoints, so I'm alive. I mean, I'm happy. I feel like I've gotten through. I feel like I'm in like a Homeland episode, actually, to be honest with you.

Well, I'm glad you survived. I was very concerned. I knew that you were heading back to the East Coast, and there's a lot of eyeballs, obviously, after all this Philadelphia stuff. But I will say, I was with an Eagles fan this weekend, one of my good friends out here in Los Angeles, and we were watching the Duke Carolina game, and he told me that he really appreciated you coming out

after the Eagles Super Bowl and defending your own opinion, but also understanding that Doug Peterson won a Super Bowl. And I just want to say, I think the Philadelphia fans, I think they have empathy, they have sympathy to the situation, and at the end of the day, they won a Super Bowl, so they're happy now. So no problems there. They should be happy. They should be delighted. I mean, it was the magical year, and it was perfect for the city.

I mean, everything was fell in order, and you can't be happier for them. They deserved it. They needed it. And now if we could just fix Markel's fault's shot, things on Philadelphia would be completely on the rise. But don't count that on the other factor. We just got blown out by the bucks last night. So anyway. It's all right. Those are two of the scariest teams in the East, the Bucks and the Sixers.

So I think a lot of people will have fun when the East turns around for the playoffs. Speaking of just, you know, the sports world in general, we're here at the NFL Combine. This is the main news story. There's been a lot of stuff coming out. We obviously know how we've touched on a little bit of how the Combine works. Obviously, measurable has become a big talking point. 40 times are obviously the biggest thing that come out and people freak out. And they start moving people and, you know, jumping them up to the top of the draft.

And speaking of someone that now is apparently at the top of the draft, and this is coming out of the Combine weekend, Sequin Barclay out of Penn State, the running back. A lot of rumblings have come out that he is now going to be the number one pick for the Cleveland Browns. Just your thoughts on the news cycle with this, and if that actually has some validity to it, if you're the Browns. You know, what correct you about the new cycle, Tad Frazier, is that we have such a short memory.

We watch the Eagles win a Super Bowl with a dominant defensive front. And then once the Combines start, we start romanticizing about skill players. And we lose sight of what the domination really is about football. It's about being able to have great defensive linemen and control the front. And if you want to borrow what Hallie Roseman did in Philadelphia

and you have to give them all the credit the world. Two years ago, I thought his defensive line ran out of gas. It was good. But by Adam Jernigan, by drafting Barnett, he improved his strength. He went strength to strength, which you have to do. And I think that that's why they were able to win and that's why they were able

to finish games off. They would They played very little defense. So this year, the Combine starts, and everybody wants to talk about Barclay, everybody wants to talk about the fastest guy. For me, you know, after four days of watching this, if Chubbs Bradley Chubb from North Carolina State, if he's not the first pick in the draft, that I don't understand football. To me, he's the guy that you put him along the other side of Miles Garrett,

and now all of a sudden you have two dominating rushers, and you walk onto the field at any time, and you can take over a game. And you start adding more defensive alignment. I think to me, Barclay could be great for you. Sure, it'll help you out. But we all romanticize about the running back. I mean, I still say this all the time.

If Jacksonville drafts Watson over the running back, they're probably winning the Super Bowl, not participating in the conference championship game. And we've seen this before with the defensive ends. You know, we've seen Mario Williams go first in the draft. We've seen Joyce Peppers go second in the draft. Chub is sort of cut. We've seen Clownie go number one.

He's cut from the same cloth. when you see this guy work out. And I saw him first hand in the ACC a little bit this year. And he really is a force all by himself on the defensive line. And I think, you know, Barclay is the sexy pick because of, you know, all the measurable. His 40 time was amazing. People were freaking out that. It ran a 4-4.

But you have to be a little hesitant with these things, right? As these more measures, as the measurables come out and people see the numbers, it seems to just boost guys up. I mean, we remember when Chris Johnson ran the 4-28, it automatically seemed like he was going to be a top pick. as soon as that came out. Right. And look, I think that, you know, Barclay's a great player. Don't get me wrong.

I'm not distant Barclay. I think Barclay's tremendous. He's hard to tackle. He's like a Coke machine. He's fast. He can help on four downs because he's got returnability in terms of kickoff return so he can help you in the kicking game on certain times. He catches the ball really well.

He's a really good player. I'm not knocking him. I'm talking about impacting your football team. Remember, the draft is not about just collecting a bunch of players. the draft is building the best football team that you know you can win with over a sustained period. And having dominant defensive linemen is the greatest recipe of all.

So for me, it's not sexy, it's not easy to talk about. You know, but Chubb had a really good 40 times. Chubb, if everything possibly can do, hey, this Marcus Davenport from the University of Texas, San Antonio. He had numbers very similar that Jason Pierre Paul coming out.

So it's very, you know, and he's a very good player. I mean, he opened up against, I watched him against Baylor, you know, the opening game of the second game of the season. You could see he was the best player on the field against the top level competition. So there's guys that can impact the game on defense

that even though we're in an offensive league, you've got to take a close look at. Speaking of guys that could impact the other side of the football and the defensive side, Shaquim Griffin, who we remember from Central Florida, the amazing story, his brother on the Seahawks, Shaquille Griffin. He has

this amazing combine. He runs up 43840. People have talked about him. possibly. I think he was, you know, predicted to be a third round, fourth round pick maybe, but he's shooting up charts right now, shooting up draft boards, I should say. And we know the ailment with, you know, he does not have a left hand due to an illness, and he had to get amputated at the age of four. But just talking about Griffin's, I mean, we know he's resilient and he was amazing in their bowl game and led them to an undefeated season. But he really turned some heads at the combine. Now there's some talk where he may be a first

or second round pick just as an impact guy to have on defense. Well, you know how I feel about what we talk about draft To me, it's all about can the guy start or is a potential starter? And when you look at this guy at play, you have to clearly say he's a starter. Now, understanding he's not going to be able to have that hand and get off blocks, and it's going to be, there's going to be some difficulties to overcome, but he's overcome him. I mean, he's played at a fairly high level of football in Central Florida, and he's made plays. He's the conference player of the year.

He's got, he's met every hurdle, and he's jumped it. And we should say, you know he's going to jump in the next hurdle, right? Yeah, and I was going to say, as you mentioned hurdle, That's not even a metaphor. This guy is a track athlete that actually did do hurdles and won a state championship. He's a supreme athlete. Yeah, so, you know, his lineage is too good. And so, you know, and I could see where scouts would be skeptical to put a starter grade on them.

You know, they would be real – because what are you going to do? Have you ever seen a guy play without a hatcher with him? Well, I mean, you know, we're talking about Jason Pierre-Paul. He's playing without a bunch of fingers. It's almost like he's playing without a full hand over there. I mean, he's got it wrapped up so much. I mean, every Sunday – There'll be one player, at least in the NFL, who will have his hand completely wrapped up because he's broken a finger and they've got to cover it up.

And so that's really, you know, he can't use it. It's there, but he can't use it. And Griffin, you know, it's like I'm deaf in one ear. So you adjust to life without being able to hear out of your right side. That's what I've always done. And when you play football and you know you don't have a hand, you kind of adjust to it. You know how to get your body in position to make tackles. I mean, to me, I think the kid's work ethic, I think the kid's determination.

And him benched 20 on the bench press is one of the great stories of all the time. To me, I applaud the guy, and I think he'll come in and do the things he has to do to make his team better, which will allow him to become better. And we've seen support from so many guys in the NFL. I mean, Richard Sherman was probably the biggest name that came out and said that Griffin was a surefire, top talent in the NFL draft and deserves a shot. And most likely he will get one, it seems, from how we performed at the Combine. I want to talk about the pillar position that we have in football, the one that we came into with all the talk.

Everyone was trying to decide who was the top quarterback in this draft. And what we got to the combine was not a clear answer, right? Right, no answer at all. I mean, look, you know, I mean, you can go down the list. You know, talking to a bunch of people that interviewed Sam Darnel, right? Sam Darnel's not really – Sam Darnold and Josh Allen are working with Jordan Palmer. Okay, he's – Jordan Palmer is Carson Palmer's younger brother. he's had a quarterback camp.

Great guy, teaches quarterbacks, fundamentals have a throw. Josh Allen was looking forward to throw at the combine. He was encouraged to throw at the combine. No problem. Jordan wanted him to throw at the combine. Donald's telling people at the combine, he was advised not to throw by Jordan.

So, you know, the story's a little messed up right there, right? So he's trying to throw his quarterback guru under the bus, which makes you worried about it. And then, you know, he wasn't great. My conversations with teams wasn't great on the blackboard. didn't really, you know, wasn't like a fiery leader type of guy, disappointing to hear, because you're thinking Sam Donald's got all the way it is, bad body, not really tone, not a beach body.

I mean, I think he took some steps back. I really do. I think he's going to have to recover. And these are the things that are hard to recover from because you're going to turn over your franchise to this guy, right? You want this guy to be your leader. And when he comes in and he doesn't really give you that extra oomph, he doesn't give you that command, then you start to worry.

Josh Allen gave everybody that command. Josh Allen made everybody feel like, oh my gosh, this guy's the real deal. He was humble. He was willing to lead. He was accepting of what he was. I think he really had the most to gain at the combine, and he gained the most.

I mean, he right now has put himself from the interview room, and then he went out and threw the ball better than anybody else. And he also ran the third. And I think that really helped him. Yeah, and he had the third fastest 40 time with quarterbacks, I think, which turned a lot of heads because a lot of people sort of viewed him as a tall, lumbering type of quarterback. but then he, you know, ran a good 40 times, seemed like he was in shape, made some big throws.

I was going to say the one winner of the weekend, if you looked at the quarterback position alone, would have to be Allen. He seemed to be the one that everyone decided was right now the top quarterback in the draft, which is, you know, what Mel Kiper and some of these other draft pundits have pointed out before we even went to the combine. Yeah, no, I mean, McIper's been all over, Josh Allen, and he's been talking about him. And I've been reluctant to endorse Donald. I kind of liked him towards the end of the year. And then now, you know, it looks like everything about him is sloppy.

Maybe that's why he has such bad ball control in the pocket. Maybe that's why he doesn't do some things. Allen certainly helped himself. Baker Mayfield was Baker Mayfield. I mean, he came in kind of a cocky kid, you know, kind of like was almost like given the scouts, the, you know, it wasn't quite like he was really that in tune to it. It was like, you've got to recruit me. I'm not recruiting you. Completely the wrong approach.

But look, he's still a good player. They're going to spend some time and they're going to spend some time throw. And I think the one thing about quarterbacks that don't throw. in fairness to them. And I know Josh Allen did and did well. But sometimes the receivers and the routes they run are not really timed up. And the receivers that are catching the ball haven't caught the ball from the quarterback. So there's been no pre-practice of these drills.

It's just kind of where are you going to go. And sometimes the receiver bends it off a little bit too steep. Sometimes he takes it too high up the field. And it makes the quarterback look bad. So, you know, the throwing part, I'm not that really worried about it because you're going to go back and throw again. I mean, remember Teddy Bridgewater didn't throw well, then put the glove up better, made everybody feel better. So you can overcome the throw. And I think what's got to happen is you've got to prove that you're really in tune to it.

And you've got to really improved. You know, Rosen was good in that area. Rosen could handle that. Didn't throw the ball as nearly as well as everybody expected he would. Probably will do it much better at UCLA. The concern here is what kind of footballs are they throwing? At the combine, they're throwing the new footballs like they've got to throw in games. When you go to their workouts, sometimes they're throwing those old.

balls that they get their hands comfortable with, which you've got to be concerned about. And we should say Josh Rosen was another guy. I think there's been mixed reports leading into the actual Combine. There were teams that were worried about his makeup, was some of the stories that were coming out. And he tried to get ahead of some of that stuff. I mean, I saw some headlines leading into the Combine this past Saturday saying that Josh Rosen, you know, loves football. He wants to be, he's 100% in on football. I mean, did he help himself this weekend? I've seen some people that think that Rosen still may be a top pick.

I don't know if he did, Kate Frazier. I think to me, what I'm hearing was it was okay. I think he's going to have to prove it. You know, he's coming back saying he loves football. You know, I've talked to some people who he might like humanitarian work more than football. I don't know. Nothing wrong with that, but I don't know where his values really lie. I think this is a really hard quarterback class.

And then you got Lamar Jackson, who doesn't even have an agent, which is completely bizarre, right? Doesn't have an agent. When out there, he interviewed people were, you know, talked to him. You know, can he run the whole volume of the offense? Then he didn't throw the ball particularly. So he's got to come back and bounce back and do some things. I think there's a lot more work to do on these quarterbacks, which makes it frustrating because you've got free agency a couple weeks away,

and you want to be able to figure, you want to tie them both together. And when you still need answers on some of these questions after you leave the combine, it's hard to link it all together. And I wanted to touch on one thing I saw about Lamar Jackson. There were some teams that had requested for him to run some wide receiver drills. I didn't understand quite how that process works. I guess if a team, teams in general, if one team suggested, then every team can have him work out in a different position.

Is that correct? Yeah, look, it's the kid's choice, right? So he doesn't have an agent, but it's the kid's choice. And Charity's for Omar Dexon, he's a quarterback. I mean, nobody's going to look at him as a running back. Nobody's going to look at him as a receiver until he fails. I mean, that's Torel Pryor's whole existence. I mean, there was a lot of teams before the Browns moved him to the wide receiver permanently.

I mean, the Bengals did it, but there was a bunch of stops in between. Seattle had them. We had them in New England. He was ready to move to receiver in New England when we had them. We passed, made a mistake. But for the most part, you know, it has to go through the player first. I mean, Logan Thomas, you know, when he was coming out of college, he was a quarterback at Virginia Tech.

And he was an All-American tight end in high school that played quarterback. I don't know how it quite worked, but he played quarterback in tight-end. I was trying to get us to talk to him about being a tight-end. he had no interest. Three years later now he's playing tight end up in Buffalo. And so it takes some time to get to that point. You just can't make them a tight end, and you've got to put it in, and the kid's got to want to do it.

I mean, Lamar Jackson's no interest in playing running back because he clearly thinks he's a quarterback, and he is a quarterback. And it could be one of those things now where, you know, Lamar Jackson is a little bit off the radar as far as teams trying to pick a quarterback in the first round and decide for them to be the franchise quarterback. But like we've seen before, I mean, in the past few years, like a Dach Prescott, for example, or Russell Wilson, for example, some of these guys that fall into the third or fourth round that are quarterback, they have less pressure on them, and then they can come into an organization, and Lamar Jackson may get the keys right away and could take things over for a team like, say the dolphins. I've seen some people say the dolphins may have a chance at. I mean, the dolphins are all over the map.

I mean, they want a quarterback. It seems to me that they're interested in a quarterback. I mean, there's no doubt that they're all, you know, they're in the Baker Mayfield. they're talking about a bunch of different things. I mean, I don't know if anybody really knows what the dolphins are up to this offseason, whether it's the Jarvis Landry. He's going to sign the tender, and then we're going to be able to trade them. I mean, to me, there's a lot of things, and they don't have a bunch of cap rooms,

so they try to create cap room. They trade for Robert Quinn, which gives him another good defensive linemen, so they're building the strength there. I think this whole Miami thing is going to take some time to figure out. Yeah, absolutely. There's a lot of rumblings out of the Miami camp. We've talked about the Landry thing forever as far as, you know, what the direction is with him.

It does seem like he is going to sign that franchise Tinder. Speaking of Y receivers from LSU, I want to bring up one guy that, it's a name that a lot of people didn't have on their radar. I don't think going into the NFL draft combine itself was DJ Chark out of LSU. He's been sort of the secondary guy at LSU the past couple of years. He had to play behind some bigger name guys like Malachi Dupree

that people remember that came out of LSU. But he runs a 4-3-4, the fastest 40 time for wide receivers, a 40-inch vertical jump, which was the best among wide receivers. And there's a lot of talk now where he could be potentially a first or second round pick at this point. Isn't that crazy that a combine results can jump a guy up and shoot him up to the top of the draft like this?

Well, he had a good senior ball too. So he's the MVP of the Senior Bowl, so that helps. It's like 160 yards and a touchdown in the Senior Bowl. Right. So that helps him too. And I think he played faster in the Senior Bowl than he really ever played at LSU because the hardest thing to do is evaluate college receivers. And it's hard for fans to evaluate, really, the question you have to ask is a scout is, does the scheme get the player the ball or does the player get open on his own?

And you've got to separate those two plays. You know, it's like in basketball, if a guy hits an open jump shot and he's not covered as opposed to a guy making a shot over somebody else. The degree of difficulty is different, right? So you've got to balance each. Same thing with receivers. I mean, when Brandon Marshall caught over 20 passes and set the league record for, catches. How many did the scheme give him and how many did he get on his own? And, you know, probably he got, you know, 18 of those catches were by the scheme design and the rest he made

because he's a great player. And I think when you look at Chark, I think you don't see him always explode off the ball, has trouble with press coverage. But that senior ball, he got better. So now all of a sudden you take the senior ball and you feel like, okay, this guy can grow, because we know this about LSU football, all due respect to those Caj and Tiger fans, there's not a lot of sophistication going on in the passing game down there, right? The kid hasn't really been coached. And this is why receivers in the sixth round, seventh round, the third round end up playing,

because it's the one position that's been undercoached in college more than anything because they're not dealing with press coverage in college. And you're also in a situation, too, with LSU that has struggled to find a quarterback. You know, we've seen the Brandon Harris situation there, and then he ended up transferring. And then you go down the line of some of these recent LSU receivers that were good when they were at LSU, but when they get to the NFL,

they take the jump to the next level. Even a guy like Brandon Lafell, you know, has become a perennial, you know, NFL player and, you know, basically found his spot in the league. He wasn't, he didn't blow people's mind at LSU, same with Landry and even OBJ had moments, but all those guys went to the league and really took it to the next level. So that's one thing to watch out for it.

And they were actually better offensively when Cam Cameron was one, you know, Beckham's offense and doing all that because he was able to at least find ways to get a, the ball. Now they struggle. I mean, they spend more time at LSU shifted in motion and they did actually try to throw the football. So, and then they had nobody, like you said, they had nobody to throw the ball too. Yeah, exactly.

I want to talk about a guy that didn't do so hot at the Combine this weekend, and that was Orlando Brown out of Oklahoma. He basically... You know, Baker Mayfield defended him, too, which was good to see. Yeah, Baker Mayfield stands up for his guy, which, if you're talking about a character test, that's always good to see. I'm just going to give a little

context on this. He gave Orlando Brown had a 19 and a half vertical would be the worst of any player ever drafted. He had an 82-inch brawl jump would be the worst ever drafted. A 5.850, which would be the second worst ever drafted, behind a seventh rounder in 01, and he just put up 14 bench reps,

which is tied for the fourth worst among offensive linemen. This is a guy that some people thought may be a first-round draft, a sure-fire first-round draft pick. No, no, no. This guy's the top. This guy was in, I've been looking at most of the marks. I got him in the top ten most of people, what I've seen, right?

Yeah, exactly. That's what I mean. He's pretty much locked into his first. There's going to be a lot of erasers coming out on this one now. I mean, there's a lot of erasers. And look, you can't. I'm telling you, people say, and I read Baker-Maithfield's comments, well, you know, Orlando Brown doesn't have to run a 40.

You know, he doesn't ever run 40 yards. Well, foot speed matters, right? Foot speed matters. And the best way to determine foot speed is, especially with offensive linemen, is with their 40-yard dash. and does arm length matter? Yes. Does quickness matter? Yes.

So if you don't have great foot speed, maybe you've got lower body explosion. But when you watch Orlando Brown play, he leans on people a lot. He's a pusher, not a not a not a not a thruster. And so he doesn't really just explode into people. He uses that massive body to create the power, to create the movement, not his force. And so you can see that lack of athleticism on tape. If you study them closely, you can see it. I mean, you could really see he's got no chance to play left tackle in the NFL.

And now that the way the game has opened up with both formations, it's going to be hard for him to play right tackle. I mean, this guy, unless he makes a tremendous improvement, and now that people are going to go back and start watching his tape, they're going to see this lack of foot quickness, they're going to see this lack of strength. I mean, how does an offensive line that have 14 reps and a guy with one hand benched at 20 times?

What does that tell you, Trey, Trasier? It tells you, one guy's locked in the wayroom. Yeah, exactly. I will say this about Orlando. this is just sort of a larger question to ask. What is the difference between, like, as far as impacting draft stock, is it the combine results or is it a Laramie-Tunzel situation where there's character issues, or is it we do have these combine results to lean on,

but we want to go back and watch the tape to see if this really matches up and is really going to affect his draft stock. Common is going to go back and look at the tape and see if you can see some of these things in the tape. Like, Chark, you can't really always see him explain. He has trouble getting away from press on LSU tape. When you watch him, he's not exactly. If he has free access, he has a little, you know, he can get into it. He doesn't have great quickness in terms of breakdown.

He's not great at the top of the route where he's really selling it. He's got a long way to go to learn how to be a wide receiver in the NFL. He does skill, but he needs work. Brown, when you watch him, he never really bends. He's always leaning and pushing. So you see it on tape. You see the lack of foot speed. I mean, he gives up sacks.

I mean, he's not like he goes in there and pitch a shutout. So his lack of foot speed shows up, his lack of explosion. this. One of the things offensive linemen have to do, what you always want in offensive linemen is you want to find a guy who's a great shot putter. What that tells you is got quick feet. Shot putters generate their power

from their lower body, from their foot quickness to throw the shot. And so most shot putters are always defensive linemen. That's why wrestlers are good. Wrestlers are usually good shot putters. They have good balance, and they can move their feet. They have quickness. It's going to be hard for Atlanta to overcome this. And his daddy, who I signed

for $100, I beat Worldwide wrestling for. Okay, we beat him in Cleveland. His daddy was gone country in Cleveland, and we would give him a tryout, and we said, okay, look, if you get through the tryout, then we will he did. We saw him. He did not run well. He did not run well, but he was a massive man with incredible power. Like he could bench press the world, right? He was as strong as an ox. And he worked those two things that, okay, Pat Hill, who was the former head

coach at Fresno State for years. he was the second line coach. He took Orlando Brown into the old facility and just started working the hell out of him and made him into an offensive lineman. He hit the Kirk Burns, and they made him into an offensive alignment. This kid doesn't run well,

has no lower body strength. It doesn't look like he's worked out a day in his life at Oklahoma. And now you have to worry about whether he has work ethic. Those are all the things you don't want in an offensive lineman. Yeah, and we should say Orlando Senior, right? His nickname was Zeus. He was like, ended up in him. The Houston, yeah.

Atlanta, Senior was Zeus, yeah. He was Zeus. And, you know, and then he ended up, we got him. And we ended up, the first time we brought him into the indoor facility, at one of it we called it the few, the proud of the free, the equipment manager was holding a bag. And so Orlando was lined up at right tackle. And he had the hardest time getting in the stance because he was really stiff in his hips.

And so he's trying to get into his stance. And he finally gets into it. But when he came off the ball, he took that equipment manager, and he lifted him off the ground. And I think the kid was in the air for at least five yards. And the poor guy landed on his hand. I thought the guy was hurt, you know, and he was just like a young equipment assistant. And, you know, but he was just so powerful in his hands.

His son doesn't have quite that power, and near that power. And yes, he's played at a high level of comp, and he say, well, you know, you're just being too hard on the kid. No, I mean, you can see it on the tape if you pay attention. This is why it's so hard sometimes for scouts when they just follow what the perception of the players are. I mean, Orlando Brown is a great example. Grade what you see. It's the most important thing in scouting is grade what you see. Don't grade what you think because somebody's telling you the guy's good,

great what you see. Absolutely. And you mentioned shot putters. He should go watch him tape of Jason Brown. Great shot pillar, great center in the NFL for a few years. Just, you know, the Brown connection there. He can go watch him tape on that guy. There you go.

There you go. Let's talk about a little bit of free agency stuff. We have a little bit of a Kirk Cousins update. What's going on with Kirk? You know, for the Combine, I think people think there's sports. teams in it. I'm told there's really going to be it's going to come out of two teams. I told it's going to be Minnesota and it's going to be the Jets.

And so it's going to be those two teams. I don't know if Denver's going to be able to get into it. Arizona's going to try whether they have enough cap room. That's the four teams people are talking about with Kirk Cousins. I think it's really Minnesota and the Jets. I think at the end of the day it'll be Minnesota. They could do it, but I think the Jets are.

And if the Jets don't get them and if if Denver doesn't get them, then we're looking at a whole round. It's going to become different with quarterbacks. because all those teams, the Jets and Denver need a quarterback. I mean, they can't play next year without a quarterback, so they're going to have to figure that out. So it's all tied to Cousins and how it all works out.

And obviously, Cousins is the premier guy, and that's the first domino that falls, and that leads to the fallout around the rest of the league with those teams needing quarterbacks. But, you know, the Super Bowl winning quarterback and the MVP of the Super Bowl, Nick Foles is there. Obviously, he's still on his deal currently with the Eagles, but there could be some moves to be made if Denver needs a quarterback

and they want to go after Nick Foles, right, if they don't get cousins to sign. You know, look, if you're Denver and you say, look, we've got the, what they have the fifth pick in the draft, and you tell Philly, you can have the fifth pick in the draft for Nick Bowles, you do it? I mean, do you do it? I mean, they're not taking a two for the guy, right?

So they're not going to take a two. And, you know, Philly does need cap room. I mean, they're trying to get, of any carry you take a reduction. They can't sign a bunch of their good players because they need the cap room. I mean, they're not going to be as good a team going in the next year because they're going to have to create some cap room. They can do it, but they probably won't be as good of a team.

And the one asset they do have is Nick Foles. So they trade Nick Foles. Does somebody come in and make them an offer? And I think the best thing that the Philadelphia can do is wait. And then they're going to have to capitalize. If they wait too long, like the Patriots did, they'll end up with not as good a deal. But if they wait at the right amount of time when they get the right offer, now they want a deal similar to what Sam Bradford got, which is a one and a four, you know, perfectly.

I think, you know, you take that deal when somebody puts it on the table and when somebody will put that on the table to be desperate. You have to think Arizona is not going to get left without a quarterback. I mean, we know New Orleans wants a quarterback. We know Miami wants a lot of teams want a quarterback. We know the Browns want to sign AJ McCarran. I mean, that's a marriage

that seems destined to be happened, right? And so once they do sign him, do they draft a quarterback or do they go with a runnerback and a defense alignment or how do they work up their situation? I think all this quarterback thing has got everything in gridlock right now. Quarterbacks draft,

quarterbacks in free agency. It's going to be fascinating to see how it all plays out. All right, Lombardi, it's time for ZipRecruiter's smartest move of the week. This is the smartest move of the week, brought to you by ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. The move that was made, Robert Quinn, defensive end for the Los Angeles Rams, traded to the Miami Dolphins for a couple mid-round picks. This is a move that the dolphins make to try to bolster up that D-line with Indomacan Su in the middle.

And then you've got to look at the Rams side of things. We're trying to get some more draft picks. They're obviously making a lot of trades this offseason. So Lombardi, what do you think about this move for the dolphins and for the Rams on both sides? Well, I think there's twofold here. I think for a guy that, you know, the guy's been injured the last couple seasons. The Rams know something that perhaps Miami doesn't know as much, but they know something, right? So they're getting rid of a guy who's been one of their sack leaders, who's played well for them,

has been hurt a little bit, but has played well for them. And really played, you know, I think he had eight and a half sacks last year. So he's played well last year, and it's been the strength of their team. I mean, let's be real honest. I mean, the Rams won last year because of the running game, and the Rams won because they were able to create pressure with their defensive front, and they were able to get, and Wade did a great job on defense. And, you know, Sean did an incredible job of helping the quarterback,

but getting the ball to girl, you know, but they've got cap issues. That's the problem with the Rams. They're going to have to figure this out. Now, do they think they can live with Ethan Westbrook's at defensive end and Matt Longacre or whomever else they're going to decide to put in there? I think it's going to be a little bit more difficult. Well, maybe they put Connor Barwin down.

They're going to need to get another defense then. But what they needed more than anything, Treyfrey was Caprum. They've got to get some Capron. They'll cut Tayon, Austin. They still have to eat some cap room on that. You know, they can't. They got rid of Tremaine Johnson's numbers, so they're going to put Marcus Peters in there.

That's a help for them in terms of trying to keep it. But they're trying to keep all the cap room because, look, let's face it. They're going to have to sign Donald to a huge contract. This quarterback market is headed is you're going to have to plan for what you're going to pay these young quarter. I mean, we know Rogers isn't going to do his quarterback deal until after Cousins gets his deal. We know Matt Ryan's not going to do his deal until after that happens. And once those guys do their deals, that's going to take the market up.

It's going to make the franchise tag even richer. And then all these guys in their fifth year, you can extend them, but then you're going to have to get another contract here. The Rams going to have to plan for that. That's what I think they're doing right now. All right, that is the smartest move of the weekend. That was brought to you by ZipRecruiter. 80% of employers who post on ZipRecruiter find a quality candidate through the

in just one day. Try it free at ZipRecruiter.com slash ringer NFL. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash ringer NFL. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. All right, Lombardi, one last thing before we get out of here. Russell Wilson is a quarterback that is currently playing baseball in the Yankees Grapefruit League. He played against the Braves on Friday. That was its first at bat since June 2011.

Just as a GM, just from a GM's perspective, when you have your franchise guy like Russell Wilson going over to baseball, play at a different sport, is it endearing to you? do you enjoy your quarterback doing this, or do you have a little bit air of concern just for the fact that he's out and about playing another sport in the offseason? No, you know, I think it's probably good for him

to get it out of the system. You know he's going to be in shape to do it, and he can't be around your facility anyway, right? Yep. So you can't have him come in until the third week of OTAs or whatever it is. So I think for the most part, you know, he's safe to do that.

And then once they determine the rosters, I don't think Russell's going to be wanting to ride buses through the Carolina League. I'll do respect you, Tate Fraser. A little homecoming for him. Get down to Virginia. Yeah, it would be great. But, I mean, you know, you've got to go out and get ready for your season

because your paychecks depended upon you earning and playing well. So I think this is a good thing for him, keeps him in shape. But I think once it gets past, once opening day happens in baseball, I think now it's time to start playing football again. Yeah, it's a nice little throwback, too, to some of the old days where we had guys playing baseball and football. It's always a good combination, especially, you know, with the quarterback position because you do throw the ball quite a lot in both sports.

Any final thoughts before we get out of here, Lombardi? No, Treyfresia, I'm ready next week. We'll start doing a bunch of draft previews. I'm looking forward to it. I think free agency is coming. I think this is a great time of the year. Build your team, see what we do, kind of how teams address it. Remember this, though.

I gave a talk in Philadelphia the other day. 50% of the teams that make the playoff this year won't make them next year. And a lot of that is due to poor decisions and poor planning. And this is really where it all starts and happens. This is why you've got to look at it closely and really understand and try to figure out what teams are trying to do. Hopefully we can provide those answers. Absolutely. And you've got to get ready for this NC2A tournament, my man.

I'm jacked for you. It's all coming up. It's all at the same time. Yeah, this week. It starts all the big major tournaments, obviously, other than the Big Ten all this week. And then Selection Sunday is this Sunday. It's creeping here very quickly. Selection Sunday is this Sunday?

We've got daylight savings time. I mean, a lot of stuff's going on. I mean, you know, I'm jacked for you. I'm excited for you to do it. You know, you've got two podcasts that are doing well. So you're big time. I love it. No, you're big time.

You're making me big time. So I appreciate you. Let me ride your coattels, Michael Lombardi. Yeah, right. Yeah, you're right. I'll see you next. I'll be back tomorrow. Perfect.

Perfect. And this has been another edition of GM Street, part of the Ringer Podcast Network. We are on Mondays. GM Street. Stay tuned in for the offseason. We've got a lot more coming, and we appreciate you listening, as always.