The Ryen Russillo Podcast - NFL QB Tiers With Mike Sando, and Do the Celtics Really Need Kevin Durant?

Episode Date: July 26, 2022

Ryen opens with the Celtics reported interest in trading for Kevin Durant and why they should really just run it back rather than overpay (00:32). Next, he chats with The Athletic’s Mike Sando about his annual NFL QB Tiers article, including the controversy around Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jackson’s rankings (12:44). Finally, he closes it out with some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (55:33). Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Mike Sando Producers: Steve Ceruti and Stefan Anderson Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

live from iceland let's do this durant to the celtics all the angles are trying to figure out what that trade would look like mike sandoz quarterback tears are out and people are mad we're gonna spend 45 minutes on that and life advice, wedding style. I'm going to start with the Durant news or at least the preview of news that Boston made an offer for him. A lot of teams

have lined up to make an offer on Durant. Every single team makes that call, tries to figure something out. I mean, hell, the Warriors, I don't know what the real flirtation was, but the fact that so many of the vets were like, yeah, we would do it again and see what would happen after they just won a championship without him, after he left and they tried to do everything to keep him because he didn't want to stick around. Again, I didn't really think that was super likely. I don't know how hard I would try if I were Golden State, but because it's Kevin Durant. So let's examine all of this. If you're talking about a trade being built around Jalen

Brown, which is what was reported today in The Athletic. If you're talking about a trade being built around Jalen Brown, which is what was reported today in The Athletic from Shams, that's a trade I would do. Yes. Now, of course, that's easy to say. If you look at Durant, you're talking about one of the three best players of his generation, somebody that could flirt with finishing as a top 10 player overall.

He's still got some work to do, I think, when it comes to that. He was in the MVP conversation this season. And I mean a real part of the conversation, not just DeRozan having an awesome week and then people claiming him. It's like getting mad about who's in third place for the MVP. The Nets were actually 29-16 at some point. And that was a season

where you still had James Hamstring Harden. That was before he had officially kind of quit on them. And the Kyrie back and forth of not knowing what you would do. And then, of course, we know how it all fell apart. But I'm not going to look at the first-round sweep against Boston and try to have this. I think the recency bias happens so hard now with some of these players

after just a bad postseason that we can kind of let that probably inaccurately shape the way we feel about players. So I think the world is a rant, not to say that there aren't some problems. So if you're talking about building a trade around Brown for Durant, then the complication becomes, okay, what other pieces are we talking about? Because a trade for Durant with that group, depending again on what they would give up, makes you the favorite in the East. I don't think that's a reach.

Yes, you're still going to be afraid of a healthy Milwaukee. You know, that would certainly take away Brooklyn as a contender. Philadelphia's going to be better. It's just a matter of what Harden looks like this season and how much trust you'll have in him. His playoff run has been so bad, it's almost like Harden's due for some playoff season that looks pretty good. So you add Durant to the group of Tatum and the other pieces,

you're a better basketball team. So I think that part of it's simple. But now we start saying, okay, Jalen Brown and what? Is it smart? Entitled defensive player of the year. I don't think he should have been defensive player of the year, but it's not like I left him off my ballot. Grant Williams, really nice player. Going to get better. He's turned into a hell of a shooter, can defend multiple positions, but we're still talking about somebody who's probably coming off the bench on a really good basketball team.

And then it gets to the draft picks, and this might be the most important part of the discussion because you're going to hear people screw this up because I've already heard it. Because if you look at the other deals and you think, well, if Gobert was this, or DeJounte Murray was this, or Paul George was this, then what's Kevin Durant going to be? 10 draft picks? Because we've seen these teams just fall over themselves to trade some of these picks. Some

teams, it's going to completely work out. You're going to go, you know what? A couple of years removed from this. It wasn't that big of a deal. All those picks landed in the late teens and 20s. You guys shouldn't have criticized us. Well, that's playing the results. It's just a fundamental belief of like some of the teams that are going to luck out. There's going to be other teams that get completely burned by just moving unpredicted picks four and five years from now. It's going to happen. But that would be making a mistake if you're saying, well, here are the comps, player, player, player, and six picks. You know, I'm already seeing, well, if Gobert gets you four, kind of five picks if you want to

include the Walker-Kessler part of the transaction. If DeJounte Murray is three, maybe four picks with a swap in there, two that are unprotected, one of the picks coming from Charlotte, then Durant's going to be worth like eight picks. No, that's a mistake because Jalen Brown is so much better than the other players that are coming

out. We're not talking about comparing Jalen Brown to Pat Beverly or Vanderbilt. Danilo was waived as soon as San Antonio got him. So that is a mistake to try to look at the draft landscape and do some kind of comp that if Gobert is this, then Durant is this. Because Jalen Brown by himself, if you just said, hey, tomorrow we'll trade Jalen Brown just for picks, he's three, maybe four picks, unprotected.

So I don't think it has to be some kind of deal where it's three players and an absurd number of picks just because Durant's name is attached to this. And I think people are going to keep making that mistake. And I'm just trying to tell you, don't make the same one. Durant for Jalen, if you look at Jalen on this part of it too, Jalen is arguably the most accomplished and considering you're getting him in his mid-20s, and yes, there's a contract extension coming. It makes no sense for Jalen to sign any kind of extension until he can play this out because he signed a non-max rookie extension, so the rules

work that way. It's just him, same as DeJounte Murray. It's not because I hate it here. It's because it doesn't make any sense for me to potentially leave money on the table by signing an extension earlier than I need to, which would be for less money. So Jalen not signing, I don't think, is some kind of warning sign for the Celtics.

But Jalen is, even if I don't think he's perfect, and I'm a little worried that the rest of the league's like, wait, this guy can't dribble? Because Golden State was terrific with it. They really were. Miami and Golden State, I think, just did a really good job of making sure that once Brown tried to initiate offense on his own, after you're playing the same team a few games in a row,

you get more comfortable figuring out how to attack. And beyond that, with his limitations, Jalen Brown's limitations as the ball handler, he still is putting up big numbers in score. I mean, it's one of the most absurd things from this most recent playoff run is to see somebody who had this real limitation that other teams are starting to figure out more and more and exploiting, and he couldn't really handle the basketball. Yet he's still putting up 30 in these playoff games. So Brown is, you know, you can talk about the Harden-Simmons component, but I'd rather have Jalen Brown than those players at this point. And Jalen at his peak has never

been Harden at his peak, but Brown is a really easy player to go, oh, wait, like we have something here. So this is just different than all these other trades for the disgruntled superstar that include a million picks and maybe not as many players or just players that weren't even disgruntled. Now, if the Nets say, because I'm sure the Nets asked for Tatum first, I feel pretty comfortable in suggesting that. Celtics say no. Nets say, okay, it's Jalen, it's Smart, it's Grant,

No. Nets say, okay, it's Jalen, it's Smart, it's Grant, it's five picks and then three swaps, so it could be eight, and we're just going to do all these crazy things. Then you just say no. It's super easy. You just go, okay, no.

The Boston Celtics say no to that. Because if you're the Celtics, just run this back. I thought Golden State was a better basketball team. Watching Boston's offense falter continuously late in games had to be really, really frustrating. But this wasn't like this totally fluky playoff run here. Boston has a really good team,

and they're going to be better. Adding Danilo, adding Brogdon. Health concerns, yes. Some of the age stuff with Horford and Danilo, what would you truly get out of that? But I think Derek White will probably be a little bit better. Smart still in his prime. You think Brown and Tatum together?

Just a little bit more seasoning in the kind of finals run there. Rob Williams, if he can ever stay healthy. And we talked about Grant already. Like, that's a really good basketball team. So you're not, if you're Boston, there's so many times in these trades where the team feels like they have no choice.

Like, the Nets probably don't have a ton of choices, a ton of really good ones. I mean, they could try to play tough guy with this whole thing, and I've wondered if they would say to Durant, hey, you know what? We didn't get enough offers that made any sense for us, so we're not going to do it. And that means we're going to just see what happens. Would Durant be the type to pull a Ben Simmons and say, well, something's wrong and I'm just not going to play? With Ben Simmons, it was mental health. The teams, and we've talked about this before, have always feared that the guy comes back and goes, you know, I got a second opinion on my knee and I'm just not 100% sure that I'm ready to go. And, you know, I'm not going to play.

And that's the power that the players have. And that's the thing that teams will always fear. They'll talk about it to you. Not on the record, obviously, but they just talk to you about it. Would Durant actually be that guy? A guy who loves to hoop? Would he do that? I mean, that'd be quite the bluff to call and say, we just didn't like the offers. Let's run it back. And then you've got the Kyrie component, which is still tough to try to

figure out where that's going to go. So the Celtics don't have a current problem. They're not trying to solve their personnel issue. They don't have a transactional problem. They have a really good basketball team, so they don't have to pay this exorbitant price because they feel like they're boxed in. They're checking on the price. Apparently, Brown was offered in it, and to me, that makes a lot of sense. And KD obviously doesn't come without his problems. He's played in 90 games with the Nets in three seasons. 90. How happy is Durant going to be in Boston? Four years left on the contract, but we know that doesn't

mean anything anymore. Would Durant come in for a year and then go, you know, I really don't like it here either? It's not an absurd thing to ask. We're talking about somebody who will be 34 in September. I love him to death. Love his game.

These are the kinds of players that you try to get on your team once, you know, one organizational run. You hope to one time have a guy like this. And yes, he's older and he has the injury history and all this kind of stuff. But I think at least those first couple of years, it makes you a better team that's fighting for a championship. And guys like Durant figure it out. a better team that's fighting for a championship and guys like Durant figure it out. I love my favorite basketball player is the player who can figure out how to get his offense on his own when everything else is breaking down in the highest, highest pressure moments. And Durant is at the top of that list. There's another part of this too, that I've already seen everybody freak out

about, which I get this part of it with Jaylen Brown tweeting out, shaking my head. That's SMH. about, which I get this part of it, with Jalen Brown tweeting out, shaking my head. That's SMH. It is kind of funny, though, and this isn't, you know, not everybody's path is the same here, so Jalen Brown can be like, look, I'm happy, and then I'm in this, and we just made this run, and we're a

couple games away from winning an NBA title, and all the bullshit have split those two guys up, which I think was just more of a discussion than a demand, and now you don't hear it anymore, and anymore and that's what happens winning cures some of that stuff and winning to the level that they won where you're not going to hear that this offseason going all these guys can't get it done together because they played in nba finals but as disappointed as he is it did make me laugh a little bit about how i've seen so many players people that are very pro player have no issue with any player wanting out of any situation

where I think everyone's situation here is different. I mean, there's an argument made here with Durant. It's like, dude, you just did the four-year extension and now you want out because the Kyrie part of this, is that really what we're supposed to believe? And I love Durant, but it also means you can criticize him for it, but it also would be a massive warning to the next team bringing him in, wouldn't it? But with Jalen Brown to go, you know, SMH with the tweet today, because he's involved in this rumor, it did make me think of, well, no, no, right now it's just the players taking back their power. That's all this is. Like, no, it's not, it's not all what it is. Like, oh, they can trade us whenever.

Like, okay, yeah, I get it. But that's the job like every job has its its things every job description is a little bit different and as great as it is being an nba player the part of it that kind of sucks is that you could be traded at any point so if the counter to that is well now we can just ask out whenever we want to and this is only going to get i don't know if worse is the right way to describe it but you're just going to have different tiers of players demanding out as this expands across the player landscape um it's like man we want our power back but also i would like to not be in a rumors unless i want to be traded and that's where we're at the ninth annual qb tears piece from mike sandoe one of my favorite things uh really when when i first learned about mike although i think i learned about you before that i was like man this is great

um so good to have you again from the athletic the piece is out today uh and it's already making the rounds so just to set it up for people that maybe haven't been following along over the years, you talk to how many different coaches, front office, executive scouts to make up what is then a four slash kind of five tiers of all the starters in the NFL. Absolutely. So it's 50 people every year. This year, I had six GMs, eight head coaches, 12 coordinators, six quarterback coaches. I think there were 10 I just called evaluators.

Could be like a personnel director or something like that. I had seven that are execs that could be in salary cap, analytics, game management. And then I actually had one team's pro personnel department, four guys, sent it about together. That was new. This year I may talk to them soon for something related to it. But that's how I do it. And you get a lot of different views. And sometimes it really coalesces around guys. And then sometimes there's some division. Yep. And that's what I think is always kind of important to remember throughout all this. Okay.

So the top tier right now, Rogers comes in first. Mahomes second. Brady third. Josh Allen fourth. Justin Herbert fifth. Burrow sixth. And the cutoff to Matthew Stafford is the seventh overall. So the top tier is those six quarterbacks. I'm going to start with, I was Herbert, fifth, Burrow, sixth, and the cutoff to Matthew Stafford as the seventh overall. So the top tier is those six quarterbacks.

I'm going to start with, I was like, okay, how long will I go before I get pissed off about a quote? And I made it about three paragraphs. When talking about Rodgers, you had somebody say, this is an offensive coach, that Brady has a more decorated career, but has he helped elevate every player on that offense? Brady when Nikhil Harry did not elevate his game. So because Nikhil Harry didn't fucking work out,

then all of a sudden all the other people, we got lacrosse players running for tight ends in postseason games. And look, Rodgers is better than Brady right now. I would agree. I have no problem with that at the top of the ranking. That quote, though, set me off for a good five minutes. You know, it's interesting

when you do a big piece, like you're always wondering what's the thing someone will latch on to. Like we did a big piece on Urban Meyer and everybody was like, what do you mean?

He didn't know who Aaron Donald was. And we should have anticipated that. But that was like, that's what everyone talked about the next day. So there's been a strain of some people like, I can't believe that.

So you talk to 50 people, you get 50 outlier reviews. Shoot, we had one guy put Deshaun Watson in tier five. Not a starter this year. Sorry. I'm like, what? Is that really what we're doing? So, yeah, I probably should have vetted. I mean, I think that I think you make a good point.

I mean, I don't know how much time I want to spend. I don't want to spend a ton on it. I mean, it's one of 50 people. But it is important, too. You know, I do try to choose the best stuff. And, you know, I mean, that's probably one that is harder to support. Okay, so maybe we got off on the wrong foot here. Let's go to Mahomes.

Let's go to Mahomes, then, in him. Because I think, unfortunately, it kind of turns into, like, pointing out the stuff that you're, like, negative about, which I don't want to make the entire process here. But Mahomes not being unanimous tier one. Um, that surprised me. Yeah. And, but you know, three, four years ago, Rogers had a couple of tier two votes, whatever, you know, I mean, it's, it's somebody who has a specific issue with how he was reading defenses and probably played them and said, you know, when we took away his first

read, I thought he was scrambling and rolling out. That's not how the tier one guys do it. So that's one guy out of 50. And like I say, you talk to 50 people, you're going to get people who, you know, believe the world's flat right now. Hopefully most of the people that I'm talking to aren't like that, but you get an outlier view and that's somebody who's a respected person. So I put it in there. I called him. I said, look, now you're not just going to do this to me. You got to explain it, put in a quote from them. And you know, I don't think it persuaded everybody. I also thought the, the other part of the Mahomes discussion that was really interesting was that, you know, there's, there was a sense of Mahomes last year where it's like,

look, we are giving you the underneath stuff and you're refusing to take it, which would go back to maybe the flaw that he had at Tech, which I always kind of thought, like, I'm not sure where his head's at with certain things, but then it was explaining to me to somebody else, like, that defense was so bad at the end that he kind of just knew I've got to, I've just got to

go for it, like total gunslinger. And that, then it felt like at least the way people were talking about Mahomes, although there was a little push nationally at some point. I forget, I think it might have been Jimmy Johnson who said he'd rather have Justin Herbert than Patrick Mahomes. And I felt like people were kind of getting off the Mahomes bus a little too soon. But that Hill

was something he was going to force no matter what. And that, was this an organizational decision? Granted, the money for Hill that he was going to end up getting, Kansas City was not going to do that for him. So they decided to go ahead and make that move. But there seems to be another part of the story, and I don't know how much of it influences this decision, but to kind of force Mahomes to maybe look at this differently than having this deep threat that just isn't going to exist out there now.

I don't think that they intentionally let him go with that in mind. I think they did want to keep Tyreek Hill, and he just got a certain point with the price. And other teams dealt with this, too. And Tennessee decided not to pay A.J. Brown for whatever reason as the receiver market really took off. So I think it's a byproduct of it, though, is, hey, look, there was probably going to have to be some kind of an adjustment anyway because teams did a better job of taking away the deep ball, not just for them, but it was happening in the league. There was stuff written about it throughout last season that, you know, kind of as teams were playing this Vic Fangio type defense to basically dare teams to run the ball, that it was harder to push the ball down the field. And I think now with Tyree Kill there, it removes any doubt of how they must

proceed, right? I think if Tyree Kill were there, you can coach Patrick Moems all you want, but as long as Tyree Kill's on the field, he's going to want to really make big plays down the field. It's just hard to avoid. I think now this forces a recalibration of the offense. It's definitely going to look different out of necessity and probably it needed to a little bit anyway. The rest of the group in that first tier after Brady, I'm not sure what can be said of Brady at this point. We've covered a lot of it, unless you feel like there's anything necessary to add. Yeah, I don't think so. Other than, you know, Herbert hasn't done anything from a team standpoint.

I mean, he's 15 and 17 as a starter. And I think a lot of times with these guys getting into tier one, they want to see, you know, you elevate your team more than that. But the wow factor of him, you know, I think it's a little underrated that in two seasons, he's had two different coaching staff. No one talks about the, oh, he had changed staffs. It's been hard on Herbert. This is somebody who really, from a team standpoint, couldn't even beat the Raiders.

And people are, 36 out of 50 people are putting him in Tier 1 right now. You could say, what is Justin Herbert one? I'm not saying that, but you could easily say that tier one, this is the exalted group. I mean, we want to see some results beyond that. I think it's very telling how easy it was for people to do that after two seasons that, I mean, if he's not a tier one, he's fooling everybody. Look at the quotes in there.

We saw this guy live. I couldn't believe it. You know, that type of a thing. There's a wow factor with Justin Herbert that has pushed him up in there. And like, I'm not getting any pushback on it. He's 15 and 17 as a starter with two years. And no one's like, yeah, I'd like to see some more team success. Everyone just looks at Justin Herbert and goes, yep. Yeah, that's a good point. That's really good. It felt like if Burrow had been healthier, maybe he jumps ahead of Herbert. And basically, that's why I felt almost guilty to start this whole thing

with the first negative comment. I was like, why are you knocking Brady? But the raving about a Josh Allen. The Bills very easily could have been a Super Bowl, maybe even won the thing within just an all-timer game against Kansas City. So the Allen part of this now after some postseason success, like there's just not really any debate about it, but it felt like Burrow had a lot of the intangibles that may be physically

not as impressive as the other guys. I don't know if it's the recency bias of a Super Bowl appearance, but just feeling like that un, that unquantifiable it factor that you wanted your guy behind center and that Burrow seemed to have that and, and propped him up into this despite the injury stuff absolutely i think you can i sense that you could get a half a tier bump either way based on what people think about how you play the game and i'll give an example like derrick carr has always thought the idea that he won't stand in there right that he that he's

that he uh fades under pressure that that maybe andousins has a little bit of this too. Like, is he really the leader? Right. The, the, the top guys are, well, Burrow's like the opposite of that. Like Burrow in his rookie season, if you go back and read quarterback tears a year ago, you know, people were like, wow, my guys came back to me on the sideline and were like, this is a real dude. We are smashing the hell out of this guy. And he is standing in there. That is a real quarterback. So Burrow, because because of that then obviously getting to the super bowl with a bangles franchise that hadn't been going anywhere um i think that gives him the benefit of the doubt right on burrow i think burrow got the benefit of the doubt off of that i've always enjoyed your

stafford lack of support stuff and we will get to that with derrick carr here too as we work our way through tier two i you know i think stafford top second tier, but this was the thing with me with Stafford forever is that, yes, some people are in situations where they're really talented, and they don't have a lot of team success. It's okay to admit it, and I think we all, and when I say we, I mean all of us that talk about the NFL and talk about quarterbacks seem to struggle with that at times, and Herbert's probably a good example of that as well, but Stafford off the Super Bowl win I don't think he's any different I don't think he's any different and I know that it felt like some people were digging him at the end of the regular season what I heard he was really really banged up which also kind of makes that playoff run pretty

remarkable as he had been able to kind of find a way to just compete a little bit better physically but there were some times where it was like what's going on with this team which almost every good team has that three or four week stretch during a regular season. You just don't like to see it late. But I don't think Stafford is all that different, but it's just the way we are. More accepting of where his status is. It's extreme, though, circumstance change. You know, it's kind of like, remember when Jared Goff was there with Fisher

and people thought he would never play in the league, and then he goes with McVay and he's in the Super Bowl, right? So you go from Detroit, which is absolutely the worst situation. I mean, they've had, I believe since 1973, Jim Caldwell is the only non-interim coach there to depart with a winning record. Okay. That's how bad that organization is. They've had tons of coaches. You couldn't even name them all. Caldwell, the only one. And so I think Stafford there was swimming with a 50 pound anvil tied to his ankle that made it hard to fully evaluate. Oh, this guy's really talented, but we'd expect a tier one guy to produce better results anyway. But you can't really always account for everybody can't just how bad it was.

Now you go to a great situation. Their defense played lights out through the playoffs. Obviously McVay is winning a ton of games with golf even. So, you know, he moves a little bit up. I think he got 18 tier one votes, maybe only four last year. He got 15 tier one votes several years ago.

So some fluctuation there's that you may be right. I don't think he's changed a ton, but we're actually able to see him in a different light with a different setup, but it was an extreme good setup. So maybe he does it again, right? Maybe he does it again. He pulls eight more of those votes in and he comes into the bottom of tier one. Okay. So tier two Stafford, then we've got Russell Wilson. I feel like I'm higher on Russell Wilson the player than the general conversation around him although look anytime I get to read that he's annoying and may get fat I have to chuckle a little bit there um you will yeah I just couldn't believe that matter I mean

you know well I look I I think he's one of the most annoying interviews I've ever heard, but I also think he's a guy that has a little bit of that extra thing in him, you know, as a player. Some of the plays that he's kept alive, you understand his career probably better than most because you're so close to it. Yeah, I think he's great. I think he, like, has a really good chance of being a Tier 1 guy again,

and it feels like that's not how people look at him. I do, too. I feel like from the Tier 2, Russell Wilson and certainly Deshaun Watson is in his own category, but he was a Tier 1 barely last year. Those are two guys that could join this group easily off of this year. Obviously, Watson is not as easy if he doesn't play, but Wilson could easily kind of – I sort of equate it to this. Something was wrong the last year and a half in Seattle.

He didn't look as good to me. He didn't play as well. They weren't as productive. And you could say, well, the running game fell off. Or you could say Pete Carroll's an antiquated coach, but he was the same coach for all the years that Russell Wilson was great. And Russell Wilson's stats weren't bad, but something was missing. And so was this kind of the end of a bad marriage, right? Remember when Aaron Rodgers was with Mike McCarthy, the last couple of years,

people were, I mean, he got a couple of tier two votes. People were like, oh, what's going on? Is Rodgers winding down? And maybe he'd lost a little bit of the magic. And I think that Wilson has lost some of the magic. I just don't think he was as spectacular here the last year, year and a half, for whatever reason. He may be reborn now. You know, this may really be just what he needed to change the

scenery, get a boost. We've seen that with other quarterbacks, but there's also a possibility that instead of Pete Carroll and this run heavy offense holding back Russell Wilson, that actually he's been at his absolute best when the defenses did focus on a Marshawn Lynch, or even at the end of last season, when Rashad Penny was leading the league in rushing for the final five, six weeks, that if you take away that heavy run component, he's good, but he's not great. And that was part of the reason early on in Russell Wilson's career that he didn't go into tier one right away. It took a while. It took a while for the defense to fall off, maybe Marshawn Lynch to not be as good, and him to still really ride the bike without the training wheels to get into tier one. Now that maybe he's stumbled off the bike a little bit, maybe he has to show that again, right? In a different place where they're not going to have Marshawn Lynch either.

yeah I really that was one of my favorite parts of the whole piece is that he is he going to get his way which is actually going to work against him you know is he finally going to get his way as a quarterback not realizing that and that's what I never quite understood with his demands but I think I knew a little bit more about it I think there's there's a way he sees himself and that he wasn't going to reach the goals for his brand and who he wanted to be in Seattle. But I mean, granted being the Denver Broncos quarterback, but I always thought like big market wise that that was kind of a goal for, for like,

again, we're talking about somebody that expects like from what I've heard, moving towards the future of like being this mogul and like world brand and all of these things. And you hope that doesn't get in the way of him playing quarterback because go ahead. Yeah. And if he does, if that's not happening, then he has to change what's around him. Right. If that's not happening, he, he needs to get in a new,

in a new place to do that. And if I were Denver, I would be talking about how it's Russell's show and man, this is our guy. And then I'd be setting up the same infrastructure that helped him be really great, which did include the run game component. I don't think he's the same as all of those other guys in tier one.

I don't think he sees the field as well when he's just strictly in the pocket, just for natural reasons. He's not as tall. I think those outside the pocket things are big, but when you have to focus on a running back like they had in Seattle, he gets better coverages. He gets the single high looks a little bit more. I think that's a great benefit to any quarterback, but was what helped make him great. And why not recreate that, but just say it's Russell Wilson's show.

And why not recreate that, but just say it's Russell Wilson's show. After Wilson at eight, we got Deshaun Watson nine. This is just, you know, as when you're trying to separate everything, when you're talking about him just as a football player, this is probably as low as he would ever be. Yeah, you're talking about Deshaun Watson? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And we didn't really have a ton of discussion about him because he didn't play last year. I mean, everyone kind of assumes he'll come back and be good. But I think most people put him in Tier 2 saying, hey, maybe they had him in Tier 2 anyway. But if you had him in Tier 1 before, some of those came off and just said, like, I got to put him in a 2 until we see him play. Everyone thinks he's a good player. But how do you make sense of that situation and if he's even going to play? This is where the headlines are picking up a lot of steam.

Lamar Jackson at 10. And it's not that he's 10 or that he's in Tier 2. And this is where, you know, it happens with basketball a lot. Like a good example would be like, I love Devin Booker. Every team would want Devin Booker. He's borderline, you know, at best, like top 10. You don't win a championship if Devin Booker is your one. You probably don't.

That's okay. that's okay that's okay and for lamar jackson i think there are still some limitations i think the playoff numbers are yeah to be nice pretty bad even in the game they won i didn't think he was all that great and i think that some of this is like still tbd with him but then it turns into this whole other conversation about how like unfair this becomes and maybe it's the quote uh because you had somebody chime in and say uh i don't care if he has 12 mvps right i'll give you the full quote here if he has to pass to win the game they ain't win the game uh another defensive coordinator said he's so unique as an athlete and he's a really good football player but i don't care if he wins the league mvp 12 times i don't think

he'll ever be a one as a quarterback. He'll be a one as a football player, but not as a quarterback. I think this, when people see the graphic, Mike, and they see the words, and then people are being way too literal about this, I think I get how this conversation happens. You and I didn't even talk about it, but it's very, like, this

is kind of how people talk, where I can just imagine the guy, the D-quarter, and you're going, hey, I don't care if he wins 12 MVPs, like, he's still not a one to me and then it turns into people actually breaking this down as if it's the most illogical statement when it's like yes just looking at it that way it would seem like this guy was too dumb to understood what he said but again i'm i'm suggesting or i'm guessing here but i think i know how people kind of talk when they're just absolutely making example well look at what tier one says be Tier 1, can carry his team each week. The team wins because of him.

You could say Lamar does a lot of that. Expertly handles peer-pass situations. No. No real holes in his game. No. So the question then becomes, do we need to change what Tier 1 is? And I say, no way. The peer-pass component is Tier 1, always has been Tier 1.

I don't care. You have to be able to do that. The game gets reduced to that in critical moments and in the playoffs when teams scheme your run game with all its bells and whistles, the quarterback has to be able to pass the ball at a really high level to be in a one. And I don't think that's going to change. It certainly hasn't changed in the view of the team. And that's what the person is saying when they say he's a great player, but that is a significant limitation for a quarterback to be in tier one. Great player. He'll kill you if you don't have a great plan for him. He'd be the best player on the field

for a lot of the game. But I think if he was expertly handing pure pass situations, we'd be asking which one of their Superbowl victories was the best one. That's if you want to put them ahead of Stafford, I wouldn't have a problem with it. The Deshaun part, when they're both normal, I still think I'd take Deshaun. If you want to put Lamar ahead of Russell Wilson, I guess

I personally would like for a season Russell Wilson. If I'm building a team, then I would talk about Lamar. Again, there's a stat that came out how quarterbacks perform in pure passing situations, which was in response to the article and this quote. And EPA, which you use a lot, it was Mahomes, Herbert, Stafford, and then Lamar Jackson was fourth in looking at basically what your expectations would be, right? EPA in these passing situations. I tried to do that seven, eight years ago.

I tried to put out the stats. You can look at third down or whatever. I mean, I don't think it's an effective way to do it i've tried it i mean uh do you think that lamar jackson is a great peer passer no okay yeah no i'm bringing i'm just bringing this because i saw a lot of this come up and it's like well look at this step because i've gone through it as i do with most of the guys in preparation for this, I'll be like, okay, do I disagree with this? Do I agree with this? I, I think people need to be way less emotional about if, if the NFL, if 50 people that do this for a living go,

yeah, we think there's like a handful of guys in front of him. That's not the end of the fucking world. And you don't have to agree. This is a market analysis of what the league thinks for better or worse. I don't agree with it all, but I think it's... I don't know what order I would change, though. Like, you might find a... Like you said, I could move this guy here or there.

Like, we wouldn't have a problem with it. But, like, when you look at the order, I wouldn't put Lamar Jackson over the guys in Tier 1, would you? No. So, you know, I don't know what to say about it. He got eight votes in tier one. He actually moved up from last year. Lamar Jackson moved up from last year.

He moved down in the rankings three spots, but his average went up. He just got passed by those that are younger guys. I do think that this EPA number two that I shared, that's from 2019 through last season, so three seasons. I think it includes rushes. So I don't know if that means an added part of it because he's so dynamic that it's like, okay, expected pass play, minimum 70 attempts. But some of the win there for him is also because. Yeah, so I have not seen what you're talking about because my mentions are on fire and I'm not reading them all. But I mean, at a certain point, you know, people are going to debate a quote in paragraph 37. Great. I mean, I'm interested in it, but I'm not going to spend all day on it. If they included rushing as a measure of pure pass, and I'm not saying that they did because I haven't looked at it if they did that would be a bad methodology for measuring pure passing ability okay yeah uh it was something that i saw because i went through a lot of it today because i think there i think with a lot of quarterbacks if you

want to you can you can frame some stuff where you're like oh and then your argument looks stronger because the guy that you're arguing is higher on this list. But then every now and then, like I saw something, there was something else where it was arguing Lamar was this, and he was that much better. But then Kirk Cousins was way up there. And so then you're like, okay, does that mean Kirk Cousins is awesome? Who's, you know, captain tier three who we'll get to shortly.

Yeah, but he's got tier two stats and everyone calls him a three, but people just sort of know when they see Kirk Cousins for different reasons. I mean, Kirk Cousins, when he's getting washed under the rush or has to create, it's not there. Yeah. And I actually thought Kirk had some better moments this season. I thought there were other games where this year, you know, I'm not a huge fan, but I would watch and go, oh, this isn't going to work out.

Like I used to always just feel like, oh, cool. You know, third and seven, you threw out the flat. Great. Completion's up. You're punting you know whatever like sometimes you actually have to force it in there and certain guys just are they'll have some awesome overall interception ratio td stuff stats you're like wow that was a hell of a year it's like okay but you gotta have some some balls in those moments sometimes

and when you're never really doing i thought kirk actually had a few more throws i didn't expect this season so you know but i still wouldn't put him any higher than any of the other guys we're talking about. I don't want to get too carried away with Cousins because we still have Derek Carr in Tier 2. You have him 12th overall. Can you share with us the lack of support? Because Derek Carr has now become the new age

Matthew Stafford, correct? I don't think he came in with the same... He wasn't the number one overall pick. I mean the lack of support profile for the team around him. Special teams, defensive, EPA. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I mean.

Absolutely, yes. So he would be the worst in the last 10 years of regular starting quarterbacks in terms of how bad his defense and special teams are when you combine their impact on the game from an EPA standpoint. So if you go to the top of that list, it's going to be the Joe Flacco's, right? They've had great defenses and,

and it made it much easier to win the game. So I think that Carr, Carr, Matt Ryan, Stafford, those guys have been in situations where it's just really hard. And maybe if they were truly a one, they would overcome it better.

And we certainly saw, have seen Mahomes do that at times with a spectacular offense when their defense wasn't very good. But it's really, really hard to do. And I think it does affect how somebody like Derek Carr's view. Let's face it, if Derek Carr had the Baltimore defense the last three years,

he'd have a better record, right? I don't know if he... I mean, Lamar Jackson, it'd be hard better record, right? Yes. Lamar Jackson, it'd be hard to beat Lamar Jackson's record, but he'd have a good record. He'd have a much better record. Yes, he's been the king of that. I think his defense special teams on average has averaged 25th in the league since he's been a starting quarterback. It's really hard

to win like that. So we got Dak 11. We just talked about Carr at 12. Kyler Murray, I've got to spend some time on him. He comes into 13. He just banked the huge extension. I thought this was very revealing and it felt kind of accurate from the quotes that you used

and kind of where he lands here. Yeah, Kyler Murray is obviously very talented and that's why he's in Tier 2. He does get respect for that. I think his inability to make it through a season and maintain his production and to be a consistent player, not only down to down, but you know, week to week, not only week to week, but down to down,

you can see it all from him, right? I think his highlight tapes as good as anybody. It's unbelievable. If you look at his highlights from last year, but when you really watch the full body of work, there's a lot of, uh, there's a lot of sloppiness with, uh, you know, the cadence, the line of scrimmage and guys jumping. And and then he gives off the impression, which people are taking into, you know, that that you question or at least people have questioned just what kind of driven competitor or leader he is, right? You don't get the same vibe with him. It could be a personality thing. It may not matter in the end, but it's a part of this. I think, like I said, it's one of the reasons Joe Burrow got the benefit of the doubt a little

bit, even a year ago, because people just watch him play. They're down in the field and they say, wow, look at the way that guy leads his team. And that hasn't been something that they've seen from Kyler Murray to this, this point in his career, even though his numbers have gotten better every year. And that's why he's ascending. He's ascended every year in the tears. I don't know if he has to be,

you know, it's great when the personality is, is the perfect guy, you know, the other players looking at him in the huddle, total belief, having his back. Um,

you know, when you mentioned Wentz later on in this piece that we'll get to, it seemed like nobody really cared, you know, and that's, I don't know if it's accurate or not, but that's a book on Wentz and Murray coming out of school. There was definitely that concern, like, all right, what's, what's his deal? What's he about? Now, do you have to be someone that everybody in your teammate would die for? Cause you have to have the respect of every single guy out there. You know, I don't know. It's nice if you have to be someone that everybody in your teammate would die for because you have to have the respect every single guy out there you know i don't know it's nice if you have it but it doesn't seem to be the case here but you know when you look at the first half of the season

the second half of the season stuff and then seeing him last year you know you got his ankle rolled up was it the green bay game and he just he just wasn't the same for weeks after that and you know russell wilson we've talked about this before we kind of made even the joke here like he may be shorter but he is strong he is thick he has those baseball hips and even though murray's this baseball player he's just slight he's just slight and i thought the quote about him being incredibly dangerous because he has moments you're right some highlight moments you're like oh my god but i don't know if he holds up the way he needs to, because we've just seen them fall off a cliff.

It feels like, and when Hopkins isn't playing, he's just not the same guy. So, yep. I bet you can see the way I was looking at this. Ryan was really, if you're a quarterback in the top two tiers,

your team is going to pay you and want to keep you. You get that feeling. Now, Matt Ryan's right on the border. Matt Ryan, like was right on that border. Like two boats would come in and you go to tier three. And then it would come in and he'd go to keep you. You get that feeling now? Matt Ryan's right on the border. Matt Ryan was right on that border. Two boats would come in, he'd go to tier three. Another would come in, he'd go to tier two.

But he's right on the border. But if you take those guys above that, we obviously tier one, but look at tier two, Stafford, Wilson, Watson, Lamar, Dak, Prescott, Derek Carr, Kyler Murray. Those teams aren't actively trading their guy or they're not drafting a guy right now. But when you start getting below that into tier three and Murray's above that,

you get into the cousins is in Garoppolo and Tannehill and Mac Jones, Mac Jones is the young guys who Baker Mayfield Wentz. Those are kind of the guys where, yeah, you might be able to have them as your starter, but you're kind of have one eye on like who's coming out in the draft. And I think for Arizona with Kyler Murray, you know, if you're in that bucket where we're keeping our guy, which I think they clearly are,

I mean, I wouldn't advise that they draft a quarterback really and start over, then you're going to pay your guy. If you want to have your guy, you're going to pay your guy. And those guys usually do filter into the top five.

You know, they may not pass the top guy, but those guys, Derek Carr did it a few years ago, remember? And Lamar Jackson's going to do it. And we can all debate, is that the ideal calibration of the salary based on your ability? But that's not really how it works. If you have a guy, you're going to pay a guy. Tier three, Ryan rounds out the end of tier two, which I was maybe a little surprised, but it just feels like people, do you have a quick thing on Matt Ryan there where it felt like maybe just the Colts part of this is why he's hanging on a tier two? I think

he's glass half empty in Atlanta where everything's falling apart around him and not even Calvin Ridley's playing versus Indy where they're perceived to be. They were a borderline playoff team close to it last year. The glass could be half full for him. So people definitely think he's declining. If you look

at the thing that shows his past marks, you know, it's going So people definitely think he's declining. If you look at the thing, it shows his past marks. It's going down every year, and he's just hanging on, just hanging on. And we'll see if he can have a revival. Not everyone's betting on it, but he should be better. All right, so Tier 3, Cousins, we already touched on that. Garoppolo, I think it's pretty self-explanatory. Tannehill, you know, Tannehill was always a frustrating one because you were like, I know the stats kind of almost flirt with like

tier two plus. Oh yeah. But that's not how it felt. And then Henry's gone. He lost, you know, weapons wise, they were hanging on by a thread there towards the end to get Henry back. He has a disastrous playoff game, so it's not like all of a sudden I thought he should be 25th here.

But I think he's landing. It also speaks to the depth of this position now, Mike, too. You look at just some of the raw numbers of some of these guys. And Garoppolo, who I think the team resume is a little better than who he is as a quarterback. This is a really strong group, and this is who we're talking about. So I think we've talked about those guys so much. Give me a little bit of the response on mac jones of the younger guys being 18 and again i'm talking about like the next

unproven younger guys not the young guys that are studs at the top uh but it felt like real concern now post mcdaniels yeah i think people see him as kind of a finished product early and that's why he was so good uh to come in as a rookie he was ready it wasn't too big for him think, you know, he, he seemed like he was a pro quarterback, but no one's anticipating that. Wow. He's got these skills that are going to take him high into tier two. This is kind of what he is. And now you have the coaching situation where Josh McDaniels leaves and there they've got all these guys in positions who are not offensive, have not been offensive coaches. It's not like they went out and hired, you know, the next Josh McDaniels there. They've got Joe Judge or Matt Patricia kind of in the mix here. And I think that does raise some concern because people thought Josh McDaniels did a really

good job, was creative, used his personnel well, was a really good offensive coach. That's why he got not only this head coaching job, but he was basically hired by the Colts and he was hired by Denver off of not his head coaching ability, right off of his offensive acumen. So to just shrug when he leaves and put a couple other guys on, it was concerning to people, not because they're down on Mac Jones. They're worried about kind of what's this going to look like? Is this going to put Mac Jones in his best possible position? going to look like? Is this going to put Mac Jones in his best possible position? Baker 19,

Jalen Hurts and Wentz tie for 20th. The Hurts thing, I can summarize real quick, kind of a wait to be seen. I actually thought that was a decent number for him just because there's uncertainty, but it feels like unless it improves dramatically, he's going to be somebody that wants to be, that a team would

maybe look to replace. The Wentz stuff, though, this is really starting to come down to just exposing, like, if you're Frank Reich's guy and you go to the Colts, and we know the overall stats look nice, but they're post-Philly, there was kind of this weird rumbling of like, wait, was he somebody that just is not a connector? And then to have it not work out with the Colts, I'm wondering how much of this is the mistakes

and how much of it's his personality. And clearly it's both, but I don't know how. Yeah, so go ahead. I think there's an accountability thread through it all. And, you know, one of the things that was alluded to in there, and I'm just going to speak in general about people coming up, is, you know, you get kind of anointed. I think he got anointed.

It looked easy for him at North Dakota State. Big fish, small pond. Goes has good success with the eagles early it's a good team now around them but oh we got our guy they pay him the owner's talking about him and at no point along the way has he had to necessarily focus inward on um hey here's what i gotta do to get better so when things don't go well he, he's on to the next thing. I think the Colts really, if you read between the lines and what was said there, they were wanting a more accountable leader. You didn't see Carson Wentz saying, my bad, I've got to play better.

This is unacceptable. This is not up to my standard. Like a lot of quarterbacks will say that even when it's the team that lost the game, right? You just never sense that coming from Wentz. And I think that is a part of leadership. That's what a good coach does, right? You just never sense that coming from Wentz. And I think that's part, that is a part of leadership, uh, to get, that's what a good coach does, right? The good coach stands up and says, you know what, this is on me. I'm the head coach of this team. Get off my quarterback, right? Or whatever. I think that you don't see that gene with, uh, uh, with Wentz. And it doesn't matter if he plays great, but there's been enough up and down and certainly

some downs along the way to how he's played that is why he's in this situation with three teams, 13 months. That said, I think the Colts went over the top and Ursae went over the top, made him seem like the worst quarterback ever, and I don't think it was that. Trevor Lawrence comes in at 23. This feels negative, not because of the number,

because what are you supposed to do? It's one year in, probably about as bad of a time as one pick and have it's oh my gosh going on around it uh mike as you've written about but this felt it it felt like it was a preview of i don't know how many of the 50 people, but there was a general disappointment to the tone. So it wasn't the 20. I have no issue with 23. If I'm a Jags fan reading this and maybe it's way too reactionary, it just feels like, wait, are you telling me I might be let down by this guy that was supposedly one of the great quarterback prospects that we've seen? That's what it's like. I was contrasting him, Ryan, with Davis Mills. Davis Mills came in with no expectations. People like,, oh, I love me some Davis Mills, man. I was really impressed. Man, the kid was good.

But he was impressed for someone who was a third-round pick. I think the letdown a little bit with this with Trevor Lawrence, while everyone allows screwed-up situation, everyone says you can't judge the guy. But then they go, you know what? I kind of wished I would have seen a little more, right? And you could say that about an NBA player, too, on a bad team. Second-row Kings pick a guy. You could sort an NBA player too in a bat on a bad team Sacramento Kings pick a guy you could sort of tell even if he's on a bad team you'd want to

be able to see some amazing plays and I think people maybe saw as many kind of you know misses or not as good plays as they found special ones and so it doesn't mean he's not going to be a good player but people didn't come away from this going like Burroughs rookie year it doesn't mean he's not going to be a good player, but people didn't come away from this going like Burrow's rookie year. ACL doesn't finish the year that he has. They have a bad record. People were talking up Joe Burrow. Now they were like, ooh, this is a real guy, right? There was no one ripping Lawrence, but they just didn't come away feeling like, you know what?

This guy is going to be a one. I can see it. So after Lawrence at 23,ston rounds out the rest of tier 3 at number 24 so starting at tier 4 which is usually guys that we can't believe this is our starter or this player is so young we have nothing else to go on yeah so maybe a small victory that lawrence was still even at the end of tier 3 I want to focus on Fields at 25, Tua at 26. We mentioned Davis Mills at 27, but then Zach Wilson at 28. And the reason I want to talk about those guys is that it already feels

Tua's in a different group because he's been around a little bit longer. But give me kind of the breakdown of, like, is there hope? Is there more hope for one of the three? Is there more doubt for one of the three? Is there more doubt for, for one of the three more than the other two guys? Yeah. So of those four guys, two has played the most and they don't feel the best about them. Isn't that interesting? The more you play, sometimes the more they realize they'll put him to the side.

And then I sense probably positivity on, on fields. Now, no one was absolutely down on Zach Wilson, but I think people with Justin Fields at least feel like the makeup and his ability to do it and that it's not too big for him type thing and that they know he's going to really work at it i think there's a little bit more confidence i sense a little bit more confidence in fields combination of talent and the person does that make sense whereas i think davis mills is just still no one would no one's going to put him on that level. But Zach Wilson was the one where, you know, I don't know if they do.

They feel he's quite as solid just all the way around his fields. Maybe not. Yeah, I thought the field stuff was complimentary. Yeah. Where the Zach stuff wasn't, you know, I feel like. How many guys do you think in the Zach Wilson conversation hated him as a prospect and then got to vote for this as well? That could be that they didn't like certain things about him. That's a huge thing when guys haven't played a lot.

That college eval doesn't get overtaken right away, right? And so there's no doubt that comes in on some of these younger players. And I think if you like, like if you like Jack Wilson coming out, there's nothing that happened in his rookie season that, so now that you wouldn't like him, right. By the same token, if you weren't really sold on him and thought he was over-drafted, you didn't watch the first year and go, wow, I was wrong. So yeah, I think you're, you're probably onto something there and it could have been a little bit of a

mixed bag on him. And then with the young guys too, you just get a lot of fours because, Hey, we didn't play the know i didn't really look at them so it's a lot of provisional fours for the guys who had played like because after we had mahomes in this after one start people liked him but they you can't give them a three or a two after one start so you just give them a four zach wilson played more than that there wasn't enough great for people to put him in a three only five people did so um wouldn't you agree just kind of looking at his rookie year you wouldn't come away from his rookie year feeling overwhelmingly strong either way would you no but it's it's the same thing in any draft thing

uh it's unfair but if i didn't like the prospect and then they didn't play well i wouldn't be fair i might try to be fair but most people are not going to go well this guy didn't play well, I wouldn't be fair. I might try to be fair, but most people are not going to go, well, this guy I didn't like had a bad season, so let me remain open-minded. Yeah, I don't know how invested people are on their Zach Wilson evals, though. You know what I mean? You talk to 50 people, sure, there might have been a GM or two that had to make a decision on that, but there's a lot of people just watching from afar who didn't evaluate him

or maybe who did when he was coming out. Maybe the quarterback's coaches did, but some of them even didn't if they already had a guy. You know, I don't think there's as much. I don't think those biases are like so strong that people can't, you know, that people are going to be unreasonable about it. No, and I thought it was really revealing too in the Herbert stuff that you were talking about, the wow moments and how often that was being brought up and i'm thinking

like well wait the biggest knock on him was his personality was demeanor coming out of oregon people were like you know i'm not because athletically he did everything he would ever want so then when i hear defensive coordinators being quoted i'm thinking like oh wait this isn't they just the guy the guy's defensive. He's not spending time prepping for the draft for Justin Herbert. He doesn't care about that. He's bottom lining it. Yeah. So I'm reading that going, how does a guy working on a defensive staff in the NFL not

realize what Herbert looked like at Oregon? And I'm thinking, well, I think that's kind of the point is that he just be, why would I spend more hours on something? Absolutely. And I think it just shows too, Ryan, it's so hard. The evals coming out of college are so hard that way. You're trying to find out, is he a good guy? Is it going to work?

All of that. And those evaluations so many times coming out of college, that's why I don't put rookies in here. It's just they're all over the map and they're hard. I think once they get in the NFL, it gets a lot easier, a lot more quickly to see whether someone has it. And if Justin Herbert had been with the Jets this last season, I guarantee there'd be people going, wow, that was really this guy's something. We played him and I know they had a bad record, but this guy, this guy showed me something special. And I do think it's telling when you have guys down there who have played a little bit and you don't run across people who said that you do have on Zach Wilson. This guy's got all the tools.

He really does. But you didn't hear people going, you know what, when he played him, he showed me there's a couple of plays there. I was like, whoa, this guy, you know what I mean? Just like if I'm sure in any other sport, you could tell when somebody, you can't say he's not going to be great, but you can tell when somebody has something special sometimes. Yeah. And we just didn't see any of that. And it might just been a disaster for you.

Yeah. This is the thing on Lawrence too. We just, and look this year, there's not even a rookie starting probably. So Lawrence, even in the games I watched and I wouldn't sell any of my Trevor Lawrence stock, but I was, I was disappointed at times like going, what are you like? How do you not understand on second down in the red zone? Like you can't make that throw, you know?

And again, I maybe, you know, if somebody goes through the entire game log, you're like, oh, that throw is on third down or whatever. There, there's just some throws. You're like, how are you, how are you this confused? And maybe it was just that bad of a situation. So, yeah, there were some, huh? Throws within as And maybe it was just that bad of a situation. Yeah, there were some huh throws within as opposed to more wow. Yeah, that's Mike Sando, the athletic, at Sando NFL.

You can follow him on Twitter and see all the amazing reaction to this as well. Remember, it's 50. That really is slash 53 people chiming in. So a variety of opinions. I look forward to it every year. So well done once again. Great, Thank you.

You want details? Fine. I drive a Ferrari 355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you can possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid. So now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Live from Iceland. Life advice. Lifeadvicerr at gmail.com. My last night, so by the time this is released, I'll be back in Los Angeles.

A good run here. I did the entire outer ring, uh, drove it a lot of driving. I've never driven as much, uh, in my life for vacation. People would say this is classic me vacation. I did not just hang out at a beach and relax. Uh, I was intense. I was trying to get to as many places as I could. I would get out and I always kind of laugh about European vacation with Chevy chase where he's like, all right, cool. And then you just kind of like look at something and he nods his head.

He's like, all right, we got it. And so, uh, there was a couple of, I did a six part travel podcast on it. So each segment's like,

I don't know, seven to 11 minutes. I think how it plays out. I sent Saruti a couple of the files already. I've taped almost all of it. I just have the final part, but yeah, tonight's the last night I get an early flight back and, uh, I'll release that. I think, uh, when I go on another trip in August. So yeah, we're, we're in Reykjavik right now. I'm at a sick hotel that I definitely didn't want to spend this much money on, but it was the only thing that was left because guess what? There's a million tourists here, uh, because this place is awesome. And if you don't listen to the Travel Podcast,

I'll just say this. This has been one of the coolest trips I've ever taken in my life. This place is, I mean, you can't say it enough. The scenery here. Now, if you don't care about scenery, don't come here. If you're into the scenery, if you're into the nature, the historic part of it, there's a glacier, the volcanic part, the black sand beaches, these scenes that are straight out of Game of Thrones, a couple film spots of Interstellar were here. It's unbelievable what this place looks like. So if you do like scenery and you like places that look unlike anything you've ever been around before in your life, then you will enjoy it. And certainly plenty of people do because they're not screwing around with the tourism part of this so never never been heard it's fantastic uh i would go just for the interstellar vibes because

you sent me a couple pictures of like what was that it was the ice planet the one uh the one that uh not to not to ruin anything spoiler alert if you haven't seen the movie which is ridiculous by now but matt damon's character shows up and it's that ice planet it's like straight up a picture off of like the cover of the actual uh of the actual movie poster so it was pretty sick yeah did a little glacier hike sounds a lot more badass than it actually was but we cover all of this in the iceland you're not like having pics and stuff and like working your way up how did it work no the guy was pretty funny because they give you you know ice packs and the guy's like hey you know it's sort of there to help you assist you to climb because you get crampons on and the whole deal and

yeah it's not like we're wasn't like it was some super intense hike honestly the whole thing was like scheduled out for three hours they could have done it in an hour i was like all right we could probably keep like i was like all right i got it but that was the 10 hour drive day so i hiked a glacier in the middle of 10 hours of driving, which originally the plan was four and a half hours to the glacier from this forest that I stayed in. Not a lot of forest here. We cover that again.

I don't know, because I imagine a lot of people are going to listen to both. But yeah. Yeah, we'll leave it to that. I listened to episode one earlier today. It's like, you know, it's just Russillo Kappen's log, essentially. Just taking you through the excursions, which is actually, I think people are going to like it. It's like, you know, it's just for Scylla Capon's log, essentially just, just taking you through, through the, uh, the excursions, which is actually, I think people are going to like, it'll be fun. Yeah. I got to thank the audience again. I just, I don't do enough, but I'll admit like, as I'm taping those and I'm going over my notes,

like I would recap, I'd either do it in the car in the morning before I would head out on my venture for that day. Or I would do it like at night like the last one I did it after the only night that I went out and I actually ended up back in Reykjavik earlier than I planned originally but it ended up not being that big of a deal but I couldn't find a hotel like I could not find a hotel so when I left the glacier I was like all right I'll stop here I'll stop there I was like what are you gonna stop in every fucking town you stop in every fucking roadside and go hey do you have a room and i know what everybody's saying is you should have just booked it all ahead of time that's just not how i roll i just because i can show up to a town uh you know

i guess you show up to a town and be like oh i kind of like this town a little bit more than i thought i would so i'm just gonna stay here an extra night but this was quick we had a we had to get up and go and that's where we're at all right so uh let's go here life advice first one hello uh my name is yours and i'm emailing in from accuary my neighbors and i have a dispute over sheep. Oh, this is okay. We originally were going to do an Icelandic themed life advice, but that's for the travel pod. Okay. We had a lot of people chime in on the Airbnb stuff. We got a lot of Airbnb experts out there. Tons.

As you can imagine, some people were super prideful about Worcester. This is what I don'tful about Worcester. Uh, some people, this is what I don't like about people in general, about like, whatever has worked for you is awesome that it has worked for you. And the things that have not worked for you, that is too bad that those things did not work out for you. But to take the sample size of one and suggest that because it worked or didn't work for you, then everybody else should either follow or not follow your path. I don't know. I don't think that's really the way we should make decisions. So I thought we were actually really nice about that guy. If you're

going to think about buying an investment property in New England, when you live in Texas with a six month old and you suggested Worcester, that was about as nice as we could possibly say, this is probably a stupid fucking idea. All right? Yeah. Simply, we could have just said no, but we at least gave it like five to ten minutes of banter. Five to ten.

Yeah. We went so long on that one. So we did have somebody check in who's six foot seven, so we're going to listen to him. He said, I was listening to the last pod while driving. Yeah. Yeah. Van Pelt identifies as six foot six,

but he's taller. He's taller. Uh, let's see here. Um, he was driving back to Worcester from his Cape house and he was wearing a shirt that says Worcester, uh,

which is a bit like the Supreme logo. They just threw a Worcester on it. I love that part. Couldn't believe the Worcester Airbnb talk. I love that part. Couldn't believe the Worcester Airbnb talk. I might be one of the biggest Worcester guys out there. I own multi-families in Worcester.

And this guy thinking about getting an Airbnb in Worcester might be one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. Now we had other people saying it wasn't super dumb. Then somebody else chimed in being like, well, dude, if he doesn't in Portsmouth. Hey, look, if you can afford a house in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and you want to go through the hassle because it is always a hassle to manage a property, especially when you don't live near it. Then you got to trust somebody.

Then they're cutting into your overhead on what you're, you know, sometimes when I like rented out a property and I was like, what's the management fee on this? And they're like, Oh, like, you know, and you're just like, wait, what? Why am I doing that? Like 11 months out of 12, you're never going to do anything. So I don't want to do that. So, you know, look, I appreciate all the, we had a ton, a ton of Airbnb feedback. And, you know, sometimes it's just like, all right the airbnb worked out for you but i thought we were pretty nice about what seemed like an absurd idea yeah and the fact that he he'd said thinking about worcester like i could have if he said port smith i mean it's tough because it's seasonal right and all the times you're going to want to be there is likely the times you're gonna have to rent it out portsmouth awesome yeah it's incredible port portland portsmouth burlington was just there

they're all incredible spots if you want to buy a house around there uh but you have to understand if you're going to be renting that out there's like what a six month window where like it's going to be popular and you know during the winter kind of lean months like not many people are going to be buying so is that the time that you want to spend at your house like i don't know you have to think about these things but when it comes to worcester there isn't like a people don't vacation to Worcester people like end up in Worcester you know there's not it's like a layover city there's not you might be going to a concert in Worcester but like there's really not like a long-term vacation scene and if a guy wearing a Worcester t-shirt who has multiple

properties they're telling us that you should not do this then I don't think we need to say anymore well said all right uh getting to the life advice ones here let's see um all right destination wedding hey checking in 30 years old six foot 155 i like my evening runs through the neighborhood but my knees are slowly starting to give out. One of my best friends, let's call him Mike, is getting married next year in Tulum. Saruti and I have both been to Tulum. Love Tulum. Great spot.

Congrats. It's just so different in Tulum. Yeah, it's off the path. It's fucking the most tagged spot. It's influencers only. In the new Americas. Alright. The resort they choose, tag spot in the new Americas. All right. The resort they chose

looks amazing. He's got some cool expeditions planned. Mike is one of five guys in our core group. Oh, core group guy. All right. We all grew up together, went to college together. We've all been in each other's weddings. Mike's a great dude. And we've known each other since third grade. As we roomed together in college, this is a core guy. I feel a strong obligation to be there on his wedding day. The only problem is I'm not sure it's realistic. My wife and I are both teachers and we're currently doing a massive remodel on our house. So we don't exactly have a ton of expendable income sitting around for a trip like this. Also, we were trying for our second child, so my wife will hopefully be pregnant or will be caring for a newborn during

the time of the wedding. I haven't given up hope that we'll be able to pull it off, but the odds are not good. My question is, am I being a lousy friend if I don't go? And if we choose not to go, how should I tell him? I don't want to seem like we're making excuses and I don't want to guilt him by telling we can't afford it. What's the move? All right. The money thing's a real issue. It's not going to be cheap to go down there. And depending on what time of the year that you go, I mean, it's not just the airfare and the transport from Cancun, which isn't cheap and the hotels that are all like kind of sweet. So they're expensive. Um, and they don't have the all inclusive vibes really there at all. So it's not, you're, you're paying for every individual thing. Yeah. And like, you're going

to be going out to dinners and all these really sick places. And I imagine it's probably more than just a two night stopover in Tulum. So it's not going to be cheap. So there's a couple of factors here, but the number one overall thing that I believe in, I believe in this. If you decide to have an expensive destination wedding, you cannot get pissed at me when I don't go to it. All right. When you're the person deciding that you're going to have it here, then you can't get mad at people for not showing up. And that's part of the challenge. And honestly,

I think some people do the destination wedding to bake in cutting down that guest list, hoping people don't show up. Obviously I don't believe that with the guy, Mike getting married here to the core emailer, but like, look, there was,

um, it's not my immediate family, but it was the next range of cousins there was one who i loved to death who got married uh this was the weird deal where the groom was taking over the planning and it was a massive caribbean destination thing it was like extended days and fuck it sounded like a fucking festival and i didn't even like my dad's like so what's what's the story here like i gotta pay for three people to go to this thing my dad was pissed he was like oh this is cool he's like so gift yeah right and i wasn't i was not in good enough standing with

the family at that point that they were going to pay for me to go to this thing so i didn't go uh uh good sitting with my immediate family like my father at that point that they were going to pay for me to go to this thing. So I didn't go, uh, uh, good sitting with my immediate family. Like my father at that stage of my life, wasn't really doing me any favor, sending me to the Caribbean for a couple, a couple of grand. So, you know, we always kind of joked. I was like, I wonder if they did that. They, cause they, I think they did do it. I think that other side of the family was marrying into this side of the family. I think they may have done it to weed out the wife's family and mission accomplished because it was really, really expensive. So I don't think that's what Mike is doing here to you. He may be doing it to other people. He can't get mad at you. There's another way where you could just try to, I don't know how

science works. Saruti is going to be a dad soon, but you could try to time this out, man. I was going to say, it sounds like you have a perfect excuse built in here. Right. And by the way, no one, friend group or not, no one can go, oh, wait, you're having a kid and you're not coming or you just had a kid two weeks ago and you're not coming to Tulum. Now, if you wanted to, I don't know what the situation is with your wife. Is there a way you can go solo? Now, if she just has a kid, probably not. If she's ready to have a kid at any point, there's a window there where this is probably non-negotiable whatsoever. I think some guys are listening right now being like,

I have less of a chance going by myself than I would say the two of us, than I would say you married wrong. I don't know. I have what I could... I'm not trying to brag, but I have what could be argued as the coolest wife there is. She's very cool. I would back you up on that. It would not be cool.

It would not be cool if I was like, hey, can I just go solo? After she has a kid or while she's pregnant and you already have a kid, there's no universe. I'm ruling that part. I'm ruling that part.

If it's an acceptable window, can i go to tulum for a couple days to see my lifelong best friend so you think it's a no well this is why people are gonna be like unless you do a trade-off like maybe you say you can go like you know i'll do this for a couple days and then i'll you know some other date i have an iou why is this a fucking indian trading company you know i mean just it's just i i just don't think it's gonna i don't think it's fair to even ask your wife to do that that just that just seems i mean maybe maybe you have the coolest wife in the world and she wouldn't mind but it doesn't sound like it here it doesn't sound like either of you really are that excited about it um and

it's stressing you out so i don't know built an excuse of just like have a kid around then and then there's zero chance that anyone's gonna expect you to go all right all right i don't know i i'd love to think that you know there's a little bit more freedom but i i know people are like yeah as you do this from a fucking icelandic hotel room by yourself again you weirdo so the problem is like tulum too like if it was in cancun or like one of those other places like you just fly in it's all inclusive Like you know what you're paying when you get in Tulum is just not really like that And I'm just warning you now It's like it's not going to be just straight up air

Flight and hotel It's going to be a bunch of other stuff even if you're there for like two three Days yeah the gym jungle gym Shout out you're going to pay a day pass For that one I know there may be Some let's just cut this off right now at the Pass don't email in oh just stay In Cancun and then go to the wedding and reception Okay, day pass for that one. I know there may be some, let's just cut this off right now at the pass. Don't email in, oh, just stay in Cancun and then go to the wedding and reception,

then stay at a cheaper hotel in Cancun. Nobody wants to do that. Sounds like two hours away, so yeah. Yeah, it's so funny. It's not going to work. Bad email, don't send it. Okay, this one just says, ring, speaking of getting married. What's up? 6'5", 235, Ken Dunk.

Nice. Well well it looks like she'll probably say yes then girlfriend says her mom would be okay with me using her grandmother's ring this ring would be almost twice as much as the one i can currently afford and wouldn't put me in a spot to dip into my future house fund. Is this a poor person move? But he's just straight up asking, is this a poor person move or should I drop my ego and use the ring? He also added that his girlfriend said that she would be fine with it as well. So you already have her sign off on this look i if i were female not named pam beasley if i were female and somebody were like i want to make sure the down payment for our house gets us in to a better house than you having something sparkly on your hand i would be like that's fucking awesome square footage

no cap I love this idea unfortunately that's not really how the world works it doesn't seem to be the world works that sparkly thing they like to post it and show it off to their friends when I tried to get married I actually had

a hand me down ring because I was poor I was poor. I was able to return it two days later. Didn't go over super well. Didn't go over. You know, we already know the story, but I saved a ton of money, you could say, but I didn't. If she's okay with it and it's a family heirloom like this does actually happen and the fact that she's and again if she's telling you the truth uh i don't know why your ego would be involved here i

mean honestly like in a private moment you should be fucking pumped i don't tell anybody but just like maybe one of your buddies but like what like you are lucking out here man this is a kind of engagement ring lottery. So if it's a family thing and I don't know, you need to clean it up a little bit, something, bring it in some place, get a nice fresh sheen on that. I don't know what the counter to this would be unless it's that she's lying.

And because she knows, like, look, if she's going to marry you and she already knows you're kind of, you know, you're at the very beginning of your financial journey here uh i think this is a big win for you and i wouldn't i wouldn't even think twice about this you should just be pumped and i'm not a cheap person but there's a reality to this and those rings are really really expensive and instead like what you can afford and if it probably isn't that sweet i would imagine most women would be like oh cool so i get to wear something that's like you know it's just have you ever see a really small small engagement ring on a woman it's like oh you know it's gay

like or something you know it isn't it's just it's just not expensive i would say it depends on her tone like the way he said it, like she's okay with it. Did she sound enthusiastic about that or was she just like, yeah, it's fine because those are two very different things, okay? Or, and even if you're still self-conscious about it, you're like, hey, I just feel weird about doing this. Here's what you could do. You use that ring

and you still buy her a really nice wedding ring because there's still two rings involved in the situations. There's the engagement ring and there's the wedding ring. So, you know, for example, my wife did almost the exact opposite. My wife did the exact opposite. Like she had some diamonds that were part of her grandmother's jewelry when she passed away. And we turned those into the wedding ring. But I did buy the engagement ring. You could just do the complete opposite of that. And you use the

family heirloom engagement ring and buy a nice wedding ring for her. And honestly, it could be a really nice wedding ring and it's still not going to touch what a nice engagement ring is because you're not some massive diamond on it. So I think that's the route you go, or you can buy her like another sort of gift, maybe buy her a bracelet or buy her things as you get older,

um, to kind of show your appreciation. But I think you're fine here. As long as her tone was that she was enthusiastic about it, not just like, Oh yeah, it's fine. Yeah, or you could, you know, renew your vows 10 years from now and annoy all your friends. They have to spend more money on something else that's stupid.

And you can get her right. You know, doing Tulum. If she truly, truly is OK. Now, that changes everything. If you had no idea how she felt about it, the answer to this would have been different. All right? But this is common. It's smart.

And the fact that you're saying, hey, we want to be able to put down some more money on a house or at least get a house sooner because I don't want to have to spend eight figures plus here. You know, and again, I don't know. I don't know what they go for. I haven't been in the market for one for a long time. So, you know, I don't want to have to spend eight figures plus here. And again, I don't know what they go for. I haven't been in the market for one for a long time. So, I don't know. I also think it's kind of weird. How much did you spend? How much did you spend, Sruti? I don't want to say, but I do think it wasn't a ton.

It wasn't a ton. I mean, I don't know what the rule is. What was it, like three months salary? I don't even know if I did that properly or not. But I do think it's kind of weird. Like have you know in my friends group my wife's friend friend group we have you know varying sizes of rings and i don't know it's just like kind of a hard-on move when you buy your wife like a massive ass ring i just kind of feel like that's not even like unless you have fuck you money and you just don't even need it like some of these

guys they do well but it's like, you could probably buy something way cooler than just like this three carat ring that's massive on your finger. Obviously, I know it's a statement piece. It is what it is. But I think, you know, something within your means that's nice, you know, I think is totally fine.

You don't have to buy some like ridiculous gaudy ring because sometimes I think that has the opposite effect. Kind of makes you look like a tool is what I'm trying to say. Noted. People are saving money here i knew you probably weren't going to tell me how much the ring cost i just had to it's you know it's my interview yeah it's all good i had to go it wasn't insane but i you know i spent a good chunk of change especially at the time i mean this was what 2017 did i buy it yeah 2017 2018 i mean i wasn't i certainly wasn't killing it. You know, I had I had enough money to buy like a decent one, but it's not

you know, if I had if I say I got married now, I probably would have gotten something a little bigger. But honestly, I don't know. It doesn't if I bought a bigger ring, I don't know if I feel any better about myself. My wife certainly wouldn't be like more pumped or less pumped to be married to me. So I don't know. No, she married you for your hair. We all know that. All right. That's it for the

podcast. We'll be back in the states we'll have the Icelandic part the six parter coming out I don't know soon shouldn't be a tough edit and thanks to Steve no Kyle this week Stefan filling in so

there you go we'll be back and ready to go on Thursday please subscribe to the Ryan Rusillo podcast.