And now move the sticks with Daniel Jeremiah and Bucky Brooks.
What's up everybody?
Welcome to move the sticks.
DJ Bucky together.
Bucky, have you had a chance to rest and kind of recover a little bit?
The draft is a little bit in the rear view mirror now.
You had any time to kind of, I don't know, just kind of get back to normal a little bit.
Okay, so DJ, I am not one to really like get into this conversation, but we're going
to have the conversation because the weekend, I didn't know.
But the Padres and the Dodgers.
Oh my God.
And so it was brought to my attention on Friday after the Padres won, they decided to do the
crying Kershaw meme and put it on the jumbo truck.
Now I am not one to like condone that kind of behavior, but I was like, really?
Is this what we're doing?
So on Saturday on my radio show, we didn't have to talk about the crying Kershaw meme
that I didn't know was a meme.
When do they catch Kershaw crying?
Why would the Padres put that up on the jumbo try?
And then I noticed they didn't win another game to rest of the season.
So a couple of things here.
I'm glad you brought this up as elephant in the room in our relationship.
So that meme came from when we knocked the Dodgers out of the playoffs last year and he
was watching us celebrate on the field.
So that's where the meme came from.
The second part of that is I'm amazed at the, at how offended the classy Dodger fans are.
They threw, they literally threw an inflatable steroid bottle onto the field where they
played the Padres last year.
So I don't know, spare me, spare me the, the how offended we all are.
And then the next thing.
Next from Brooklyn.
Buck how I went to, I went to the second game in the series to explain this to me.
This is why baseball is so infuriating to me.
And the last, in the last two games, first of all, Darvish wins the first night, gives
up one or a run.
Snell gave up one hit and lost.
Joe Musgrove gave up two hits and lost.
Mookie Betts and James Altman were 0 for 19 going into the ninth inning of that game.
And Mookie gets one and then Altman gets one.
I'm like, baseball is the weirdest thing ever.
We had two outs.
We're one out away from winning two out of three.
I'm going to come on here and I'm, yeah, I'm going to be a.
I know that's probably why it happened.
It's probably because that the universe knew that I would be just, you couldn't deal with
me if they had a one night game.
So because it snuck a ball me and then it was a Sunday night game.
And then I did see Tatis had a great catch and he's playing right field now.
Like that's what we were taking our best guy.
I went, we just go, park them in right field where they park the minimum, the minimum
play person in baseball and little league.
You just put anybody here.
That's where we're putting Tatis.
He just goes to right field.
Who's the best player on the Dodgers?
Buck.
Where's Mookie play again?
What position is he plays everywhere?
He plays everywhere.
He plays right field.
So best player in Padre history, Mr. Padre Tony Gwen, right field is a special place,
man.
You got to get this little league mentality out of your head.
We get rid of that little league mentality.
We're going to park him out there.
Oh, you should see, I was going back and forth.
All these Dodger fans, man, like, you know, you can imagine money.
He's just having so much fun with me, wearing me out in a group, in a group chat.
And one of them, one guy hit me up, a buddy hit me up and he was like, Hey, you know,
you guys win a playoff game, you know, playoff series for first time in 25 years.
You guys act like you've done something now.
And I'm like, Hey, we've only been financially competing for three years.
Okay.
I'm not counting the previous 22 when you guys had like 150 million more on your payroll
than we did.
So we're three years into this competition right now.
I'm not going back any further than that.
Anyways, enough baseball.
That's ridiculous.
I was, I literally told my wife last night, we'll get to football in a second.
I was like, I'm taking a week off.
She's like, what?
I'm like, I can't watch these games.
Like, why do I care?
Why am I getting so mad watching a baseball game?
Why do I care so much?
I've, I've told you that you're peeking too soon.
Like, we're just in the beginning of May, they're a little bit 62 games and you were
like, so he hit that he please start hitting at some point in time.
And I can always tell when you're going to it because like you quit tweeting for a little
bit, like you have a couple of days where you don't see anything about the darn place.
I know that it went a few and then you're back.
And I'm just like, man, he's, he's going to wear himself out.
Just the emotional rollercoaster that you're on.
I got to take a break.
I got, I told you, I said I got to take a break.
Got to take a week off, put myself in the hole for a week and then I'll come back and
jump back in.
So it's not just you, it's not you.
It's my producer on my Saturday show on Fox is Brandon Truffa is a Padres fan.
And it's funny because like he'll come in, you know, but all of a sudden when they're
winning, man, it's all brown stuff.
It's all Padres.
It's all this is all that.
Then Saturday he was fully charged up ready to go.
You know, it's funny, funny, give up.
How do you lose a game when you're starting pitchers?
Give up a combined three hits in two games.
Well, I mean, the, I mean, the Dodgers are a beer league softball team.
They just wait for the, the bases get loaded up.
And they try and hit home runs.
It's not like they're doing what all the other teams are doing, running around and still
in bases and manufacturing runs is, you know, it's barely.
One thing I'll say, only I'll say is.
Dodgers took two out of three hat tip golf clap, whatever you want to call it.
But that job, this Dodgers team does not look like the previous Dodgers teams who would
come in there and steamroll us with the, with all the thunder in their lineup.
I mean, it's just two, one game.
So it'll come on.
It's just, just, just getting better, get better at the end.
Just get better at the end.
There's a trade somewhere to be made something like that.
I will be fine.
Um, all right.
So for the remainder of this podcast, we can talk about football and I can try and get
myself back together.
We're going to, we're going to dig into a couple topics here.
One, you hit on, uh, in your, in your, uh, scouting notebook, talking about the traits
obsessed Colts.
Uh, we, we get a little touch on it in the last episode, but you did a deeper dive on
it here in the notebooks.
We're going to hit on that.
And then, uh, I went through, had fun just kind of going through the depth charts, which
is always a good thing to do after the draft, just to get a sense of what the teams look
like.
And I tried to find, you know, in addition from the draft that adds to an already loaded
position group.
So I picked one team per division that I thought really added strength to strength.
Um, so we'll go through those, uh, in just a little bit.
But first of all, but give me the, um, uh, the premise here for your piece and your, uh,
your homework that you did here on the Colts.
Okay.
So it's, it's funny, DJ, like now that everything is done when it comes to the draft, a lot
of the opinions and stuff that we, we kind of put out there, like it's kind of hard because
you don't know where a player is going to land.
And so a lot of this premise came from the conversation that we had last week where we
talked about Anthony Richardson and Yannis and how the comparison between him and Yannis
in terms of, Hey, this is more like an NBA draft for the Colts in terms of where you're
looking at traits, you're looking at potential more than the production and what they did
in college.
This is we want to take the best athlete with the best natural talent and we can teach
them the skills to play at a higher level.
This is what they do in the NBA all the time.
When you look in the playoffs, you look at the guys behind the bench, everybody has all
the skill development coaches.
You have a shooting coach, you have a ball handling coach, you have a coach that works
on the footwork when it comes to your post players, et cetera.
When the national football league, we never really thought about operating like that.
But now when you look at NFL staffs, they have more coaches than they've ever had.
You always have a position coach, then an assistant to the position coach.
Sometimes you have an assistant to the position coach and then you have a specialist.
So like you may have a pass for a specialist to develop a pass rusher.
So in thinking about what the Colts have done the last couple of years, they've drafted
these great athletes.
Like, I mean, just guys that at the top of the charts based on the next year and stat
stuff, like their potential score, their athleticism score and all that.
And then you think about the coaches that they have on their staff.
So you think about Gus Bradley, you've seen and been around Gus with the Chargers.
He is one of the best teachers when it comes to it.
The system is very simple.
So now you spend all your time refining the footwork and the fundamentals of how to play
the game.
That's the whole beauty of being simple.
Now you spend more of your time on fundamentals.
Then you think about what Shane Steichen has done.
You saw what he did with Justin Herbert.
We saw what he did with Jalen Hurts.
I would say that it appears that the system is kind of simple for the quarterback, but
it allows them to grow and develop.
Well, just imagine if you take all these great athletes and you put them in a developmental
system that teaches them learn skills where they can get better.
How good could that team be if everyone in the organization is on board?
And so now in thinking about what the Colts are doing, you begin to look at Anthony Richardson
as kind of like the ultimate experiment to this theory.
How great can you take someone who in college looked, the numbers aren't great, but when
you look at the athleticism off the charts.
I mean, off the charts in terms of super hero type athleticism that he brings to the table.
Well, if you put them with a great quarterback coach who can put a system that plays to his
strengths, how good can he be?
And so now I'm curious and I'm fascinated by how this might work because years ago when
we looked in the NBA, Janis, Kawhi Leonard coming out of San Diego State was a great
traits.
That's work coming out UCLA was all traits, even think about a guy like Devin Booker.
All traits didn't play much, but now you look at him with the sons, he is absolutely killing
it.
So I am fascinated by if the Colts are able to pull this off, does this completely change
the way that we talk about scouting going forward?
Not that it hasn't been done before, but to go all in like they've done, I think they
could be on the something that I won't say revolutionize the scouting community, but
certainly send some ripples through the scout community that you need to pay attention to
what is going on in Indianapolis.
Yeah, I mean, and you went through the list of guys, I mean, all the way down to the end,
I'm pulling up their depth chart right here.
Like Jake Witt, their seventh round pick was a workout warrior.
So if you look at, if you just look at the workout numbers of Blake Freeland and Jake
Witt, that's their fourth round pick and their seventh round pick.
Those might be the two most athletic in terms of testing offensive tackles in the entire
draft.
So it wasn't even just Anthony Richardson, what their first pick all the way through,
Adebare was an all time workout at the Combine, the D-Lime and Juju Brents.
We talked about his jumps and you mentioned it in a piece, you know, ridiculous.
Daniel Scott had an unbelievable Combine, Darius Rush ran in the fourth threes, so
adding those secondary pieces.
And then I started looking back through the rest of their roster.
And like you look at some of the guys that they have, DeForest Buckner is a physical
freak, like how big he is, how long he is.
Deo Odingbo, who they got, who was coming off of injury coming out of college, he is
one of the, I think he's like 36 inch arms.
So just athletic, length, traits, could he pay, test it out, you know, out the gym?
They brought over Ebou Cam, I'd have to pull up his workout numbers, but I think he was
blazing fast.
You know, Shaq Leonard, you know, coming out in terms of the length as an off the ball
linebacker was unusually long.
It just, it goes all the way through kind of their whole group.
It's not just, you know, this draft, this was the explosion of it.
This was just the sheer numbers from start to finish, but they've built an entire roster
there.
Now the, the other side of it is, I always go back and we talk about how the evolution
of things and how this is the way the NBA is doing it.
The two things I would say that would be maybe, maybe let's be a little bit patient to see
how it all works out.
The two points I would make, number one is the limited time that you get with these guys
compared to what you did years ago.
So you had to be really efficient with your time on the grass.
You got to be really efficient because you just don't have simply as much time in the
off season or in season for those guys to develop.
You got to have excellent teachers who know how to not only teach, but set the schedule
so that they're maximizing their time on the grass.
That'd be the first and the second thing is, and we've talked about this for years, I always
go back to the training that I had in Baltimore where we talked about the STI and we said,
okay, speed, toughness, instincts.
If you look, you know, it's been a long track record.
If you get a fast team that's also tough, that also is very instinctive, those are the
best teams.
So they've added all these traits.
They've added all the size, speed, length, athleticism.
The T and the I are the two things that I'm curious about Buck is do those guys also possess
the toughness that you need and are they also instinctive enough to be successful?
That would be my counter argument to this whole thing.
And look, I think that's a great argument because the one thing that you can't teach,
you can't necessarily teach instincts.
You can teach somebody what they should be looking for.
It's another thing for them to see in and trigger like they're supposed to.
And so the instincts, that's something that I don't know if you can give someone who's
a great athlete, those instincts.
We've talked about it.
We've talked about looking at linebackers who are always a step late, but sometimes their
athleticism can make up for it.
And so yes, maybe that can cut the margin down if they're not as instinctive, but the
toughness is a big part of it.
Now, how Shane Steichen, how the co-score about building a tough team, are they in pads more?
Are they more physical than some teams when it comes to it?
Like as much as people talk about Andy Reid and they love the Xs and O's, if you ask anyone
who has been around him, he runs one of the more physical training camps that you can find.
You saw it when you worked with him in Philadelphia.
In training camp, they slobber knock.
They get after it.
And so that physicality, that stuff is something that you have to have.
But to me, at a time where we're seeing it's harder now more than ever to evaluate guys
because the college systems are so different than some of the game and the pros, you have
to be able to try and figure out what is my lane going to be?
Are we going to be more collegiate in terms of how we play?
Or are we going to be a developmental program that can take these players who may not have
been given all the skills that we would want in college and find a way to build them up
so they can play at a higher level?
To me, it's something where it has always been talked about when I was in Green Bay and
I worked for guys that worked under Ron Wolf in Seattle, John Snyder's and Scott McLoens
and even Scott Federer's of the world.
Everyone has always been on prototypes.
But to me, this is kind of like an even different prototypical thing because the Seattle Seahawks
have done it.
They had their developmental plan.
When Dan Quinn went to Atlanta, he had a thing called Plan D, which is Plan Development
where what they did is 10 minutes after practice every day, they would take all those young
guys and spend 10 minutes on the grass working on fundamentals.
And every day will be something different.
But if you kind of extrapolate those minutes over time, so you have four practices a week.
So that's 40 extra minutes you add that, multiply that time 16, 17 weeks in the season, all
of that extra time, those reps may allow you to play at a higher level when it's time for
those guys to play.
Yeah, but I think it has to be a concerted effort from everyone.
And to me, when I'm hearing from the Colts is Chris Ballot is at the top.
The owner understands it because you've heard him talk about Anthony Richardson and how
he needs to play right away.
Well if that is the case and if everyone is in agreement, now we're not looking at
results, we're focused on the process with the desire to get the results down the line.
Well, if everybody's in agreement, this kind of unlocks a lot of different things when
it comes to playing in those things.
Because DJ, we always talked about, well, we didn't want to play the young guy because
you worried, how can I win games with a young guy playing through mistakes?
But if everyone is like, oh no, we're putting all the young guys out there, not just Anthony
Richardson.
We're putting them out there and we're going to live through the rough moments because
we'll be better when we get to the other side.
Well now that's a completely different approach than what we're used to seeing.
I think you made a great point too when you said the simplification of the scheme.
So we can spend, if you look at our time like a pie chart on the field, most NFL teams,
there's going to be, what do you think, 15% of the time spent on fundamentals and 85%
of the time on game plan, scheme, assignment, you know, alignment, all that stuff.
I think when you can simplify things, maybe if you could take that 15%, maybe get it to
30%, maybe 40% where you are drilling fundamentals, we're teaching these guys how to play football
and then not having to devote quite as much time to teaching them how to learn and think
and react to what we're trying to put on their plate from a scheme standpoint.
It is.
And so here's the funny thing about that.
If you go back and you study the great NFL coaches in our past, right, like talking about
the greatest of all time.
When you look at the Don Schulers of the world, the Vince Lombardi's of the world, the Chuck
Knolls of the world, all of them say the same thing.
It's about your fundamentals.
It's about that part more so than anything.
It's fundamentals.
It's your conditioning.
It's simplified scheme and it's repetition over and over and over.
Whenever Chuck Knolls and those guys lost, they will come back the next week and do less
not more.
And so if the great coaches of the world that have told you, look, this is how you want
to tell the games in this league, tell you that it's about the fundamentals and simplification.
Maybe this is almost like a turn back the clock moment where you're saying, hey, we're
going to be simple.
We're going to be detailed.
We're not going to fool people.
We're going to work on execution and developing our players better than you do.
So over time, we'll just play the game better than you.
Yep.
I think it's really fascinating.
And you look on the other side of the ball, the offensive side of the ball.
We talked about that defense.
Jonathan Taylor, obviously.
One of the premier backs was a 4-3 guy coming out.
Alec Pierce and Michael Pittman, you referenced that in the piece.
Those are power forwards.
If you're going with the Get Off The Bus team, when you take Buckner and Odangbo and you
take these big receivers and the tight end, Jelani Woods, these guys get off the bus.
I don't know that there's, what do you think?
They've got to be top five in terms of the league of just the most physically impressive
teams as they get off the bus.
And so you're now putting it on the coaches.
And so I said this and you know it.
Like one of the things that you're doing scouting is not only scouting players, you've got to
scout the coaches.
So if you're Chris Ballard, when you're putting all this together, you want to make sure that
you have the right staff to do it.
Now I'll say this and I know this from a former coach who knows Ballard well.
Chris Ballard was always fascinated by Rod Marignelli from their time together in Dallas.
He loved the way that Rod Marignelli, it was either Dallas or Chicago.
Chicago.
Chicago.
He loved the way that they developed players on that side of the ball.
So let's go back to who was on those teams in Chicago.
Remember they had Lance Briggs and Erlacher.
I think Julius Peppers were there.
And you remember the great defense that they played all tricks, right?
And so his perfect world was, man, let me get the super athletes.
Let me find coaches that are able to take these guys, put them in a scheme and develop
them and how good we could be.
And so I think for Ballard, some of that may have started working with and around Lovey
Smith and Marignelli and those guys and seeing how successful it was for them, but
wanting to take it to another level where you just have a team full of super athletes
and you have a coaching staff full of great teachers that are able to take those guys
develop them and max out their talent.
Yeah, it's a really fascinating case study and we'll see how it all goes.
Now they need the trigger man to develop on a pretty good clip.
Hurry.
He's got to get going because that's going to make the rest of this whole thing go.
Have you seen any of the clips from this weekend?
And I know it's just on there.
I have not.
But I will say this, like, and I wasn't the biggest Anthony Richardson fan in terms of
the first run, but that's in the past.
Now he's there.
But DJ, when you see him, man, he throws it like a different dude now.
It's different.
They talk about him.
The other thing that I will say, his early appearances in press conference, he said all
the right stuff.
And I know when you talk to people that talked about the meetings that he was very impressive
from a football character standpoint, him and Josh Downs throwing balls in the parking
lot before their first practice says a lot.
If he's the kind of worker that is required, like a Jaylen Hurts kind of worker, yeah,
this could work out.
But it's all on him and how much he's going to put in.
But I will say he's off to a good start when you see the clips and how he's throwing it
and how the connection that he has with some of those guys.
Who knows?
He might work after that.
Yeah.
And we said that during the whole run up to the draft, the whole thing with him is we
don't distribute the talent.
Now it comes down to if you look at the guys with the talent and you start throwing in
the Jaylen Hurts, the Mahomes, the Josh Allen, the guys who have then developed further along
at the NFL level, it's because they had the combination of the work ethic and the intelligence.
We've heard good things about Anthony Richardson from both those areas of his game.
But you don't know until you know, like you got to get him out there and see how that
comes along and the work ethic and the intelligence has a chance to shine.
If he has those two things like those other guys do, I mean, watch out.
It is.
Yeah, watch out.
And then it becomes all those things.
Giannis and Jimmy Butler and Kawhi Leonard and how all those guys have been able to dominate
the NBA level.
Yeah.
Think about this as we're going to take a break here in a second and we'll get this other
topic.
But this draft, when you think about it, when we look back on it, Buck, this draft featured
the most unassuming quarterback, maybe in first round history, and Bryce Young, undersized,
narrow, you know, but instincts, intelligence off the charts with all that stuff versus
maybe the most physically gifted and talented quarterback we've ever seen in the first round.
One goes one, one goes four.
I mean, you couldn't get any more polar opposite than these two guys.
It's going to be fascinating to see how they develop.
It is and it'd be another great study for us when it comes to quarterbacks like what
we're really looking for because man, if Anthony Richardson pops, you talk about
completely upset the Apple court at the quarterback position.
I mean, it's, it's for that.
It's just, though, man, all these things are great.
So it'll be great to watch.
We're great to watch them over the course of the preseason and in the regular season.
No doubt.
All right.
Take a quick break.
We'll come back and we'll jump into some of these position groups that are absolutely
stacked by division.
We'll do that right after this.
All right, Buck.
So here's what I did.
I just went through division by division and I tried to find one position group that just
jumped out in terms of adding strength to strength.
And I figure we'll start here on the AFC and just want to get your thoughts on kind of
what these groups look like and why it makes sense with what they did.
So if we start in the AFC East, I gave consideration to a couple.
I mean, you know, Kincaid joining Knox is interesting, you know, pairing there, the tight end room
and Buffalo.
You think about Miami and their running back room, just with the sheer speed they have
with most of Jeff Wilson and now a chain jumping in the mix like that's an intriguing one.
I ended up going with the Jets with their Ed Drushers just because, and you touched on
this and your piece, but when you have Will McDonald, John Franklin Myers, Jermaine Johnson,
you've got Bryce Huff, you've got Carl Lawson, you've got Clemens who did some good things
like that's, that's six Ed Drushers that they've got.
And Alfa, Bravo and what do they call the Charlie, I guess is what the code.
Yeah, I mean, they've got three, three full groups they can roll through there now.
You know, DJ like is so it's always funny, right?
Because we always get asked to grade drafts and do all this other stuff.
And it's not until one you come out of it and you begin to listen to the presses where
you hear the coaches in the gym express the plan.
Here's what the plan is for McDonald.
And so to hear Joe D and here, Robert Salah talk about why will McDonald was the pick
and how they were saying, oh man, we felt like he was the best pass rusher in the draft
in terms of his explosiveness and what he brought to the table and how we will bring
him into the rotation like, yeah, he needs to be better at first and second down.
But this was about waves, waves of brushes.
This also to me, when it comes to the Jets, we talk about team building.
Well, when you get Aaron Rodgers and you're looking at it from an optimistic standpoint,
you think of what we're going to score a ton of points.
We're going to score points and we're going to make people chase points.
So yeah, people, they can say they're going to run the ball.
But you can't run at us when you're down 14 points.
So what we're going to do is now we're going to load up on pass rushers like the Eagles
were able to do and we're going to hunt when it's obvious passing downs.
And so I love it from that standpoint.
And if the offense clicks like it could click with Aaron Rodgers and the young wide receivers
that they have, well, now we'll look back and they'll say, man, the Jets, Regina is
to take another pass rusher who has the ability to just heat them up because remember, they
don't want to blitz.
They want to rush with four.
And so to rush you with four, man, you've got to have a lot of bodies that are coming
every other down to continue to keep that that pass rush pace at a high level.
So it could work.
And but you're right.
They're loaded.
They're loaded outside at the edge rush response.
And one of the things you saw with him, which we saw with the Georgia guys, we seen it with
the Georgia guys the last couple of years, but scheme wise, I meant you could, you would
know this better than I would, but it's curious to me, like how many of these college schemes
and they play with like a four I where you've got a undersized edge rusher, but he's playing
on the inside shoulder of the tackle.
Like, and I think Sol even said it like, Hey, when he made the draft call, I say, Hey, man,
we'll get you out of that for you.
You're up.
Get you out in that wide nine and cut you loose.
So that to me, like we talked about Trayvon Walker was the same thing.
All those tight alignments like that when they let him get out there, you saw some good stuff.
You just get a chance to do it all that much.
Yeah.
So just so everyone understands the reason why they're putting guys in four eyes, like
Iowa State was a really like a three, three, three team, like a three, three, five team.
They played like a three safety look and they were put their defensive ends on the inside
eyes of the offensive tackles.
And the reason why is because they want the ball to bounce to the sideline.
And then they'll chase it down with their speed.
And so you have a guy like Will McDonald, which is great.
And that that he's pinching inside.
He's diving down inside.
You're making it run to hump and you're saying, we got all these little guys on the field
to chase it down.
We're in the pro game, man, you line up in that they're going to run it down.
I mean, they're going to absolutely literate you.
Yeah.
Not there.
And so it's the outside zone every step.
And so it's going to require McDonald to make a position change and put them in a wide
nine.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
And so it's going to be a good one.
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But he's even different than what they have.
Because Tyler Boyd is a true chain mover possession guy.
Charlie Jones has juice.
His beat, his right now.
He has speed and quickness.
And I can just see what you can clear the zone with him and have T Higgins or
Jamar Chase running up underneath.
And even though Higgins has the vertical thread on the outside, it's different when
you have a slide guy that can kind of take the top off the defense.
Jones's speed and stuff is spectacular.
And I will give the Cincinnati Bengals credit.
I think they do a really good job of drafting and drafting with an eye towards the future.
They're one year ahead of those things.
Think about last year and when it takes Dax Hill and then they lose both of the
safeties, Jesse Bates and Von Bill.
Well, who slides in?
Like they do a really good job of identifying.
Here's where we could be weak next year.
Let's go ahead and get a player in now so we can groom him.
But when he has to take a bigger role in year two.
So that to me is a smart team building is what you should do.
And they do Tobin and that staff has done a really good job of putting it together.
Yeah, no, I'm with you.
I think it's really a look towards the future there.
Let's keep it going through the AFC, Tennessee and their running back room.
You've already got Henry.
You've got Haskins who's a physical runner.
Like those guys pair off each other quite well.
And then Taijay's spirits throw him into the mix to that running back group.
I think he's an unbelievable player.
We talked about it.
We mentioned it by name.
We don't ever want to see anybody dropping the draft.
But there was a lot of talk and talking to teams that he could slip a little bit because
of a knee.
And then he still went in a pretty good spot.
I think we've gone a little bit higher if he had been clean medically through the whole
process.
But you cannot debate the fact of his skill set and what he brings to the table.
So when you add Taijay's spirits to a running back group that already has, maybe the, well,
he has been the most productive runner in the league.
And there are Henry over several years now in Hassan Haskins.
And I think that's an interesting position group.
Dave Amast there.
Oh, it's a very interesting position.
I think it's one that you want to continue to work on.
You want to continue to build that stuff up.
And so to me is super smart for them to take that approach is super smart for them to do
exactly what they've done.
And why wouldn't you want to do it?
I just, man, I just love how like certain teams know that I didn't, they know who they
are.
And so when I think about the depth that you have in a big back, in another back that
can come in and play physically and entage the spirits who to me is in every downback.
You know, I know people worry about the, the, the concern.
But when you watch him play, to me, he's a three down back and he has a little juice
that those other guys don't, uh, there's going to be a problem when the Tennessee Titans
commit to running the ball like, like they can and like they have.
It's going to be a challenge dealing with them.
No doubt.
Um, all right.
Let's get to the West.
There was actually three teams I was going to mention and then we'll circle and we'll settle
in on one.
We're receiving cores of Denver and the Chargers.
So Denver was Sutton Patrick Judy Callaway who has experience in this offense in New Orleans.
KJ Hamler.
And then they bring in Mims who is a player that we both liked coming out of Oklahoma
as a good player.
Hamler's going to end up getting traded.
I would, I bet you money that he's, you know, I'm guessing he'll probably be gone here by
the time we get to the regular season.
He'll be the odd man out, but that's a loaded position group.
And then the Chargers, they add Johnston from TCU to a group that includes Mike Williams,
Keenan Allen, Josh Palmer and Jalen Gaiton.
So those are two teams with stack receiver rooms, but the one I'm going to settle on here
that I'm curious about because of the youth when you have the Kansas City Chiefs who already
had Joshua Williams and Jalen Watson, Sneed, McDuffie, they, they draft Chamari Connor who
can play in that nickel.
He's literally going to back up McDuffie as a nickel.
Like all these guys are first couple of your players, Buck.
Like I don't know if there's a better young position group in the NFL than what Brett Veach
has been able to amass in their secondary over two year period of time.
Yeah, DJ.
I don't know.
And here's the thing.
I don't know if you saw some of the stuff that came out where Brett Veach sees Cadair
is telling me as a number one receiver and for them to pick him up for a third rounder
for them to say, you know, here's the thing.
And I like to transparency.
He was like, just because we haven't seen him play and do the vertical stuff and do that.
He hasn't played with a quarterback.
That's like our quarterback that will allow him to expand his game.
And so we've seen him do the gadget stuff, the catch and run stuff, the jet sweeps, the
reverses and all that.
Maybe there's more meat on the bowl when it comes to how he can play.
And so in our offense with our quarterback, we will give him every opportunity.
And I wouldn't bet against him because considering what they were able to do with Tyrekeel and
Tyrekeel is a, is a freakish talent.
I remember they took him in the fifth round and I don't think any about it.
We can talk about the character stuff or whatever.
I don't know if anyone when he was getting drafted thought that he would be a number
one wide receiver.
And so give the Chiefs credit for their development and their ability to have an imagination for
what he can do.
Maybe Cadair is Tony plays that number one and all of these other guys filled into these
roles that I mean, let's be honest, they have a ton of playmakers on this thing.
How did they put it together?
But it's a very deep and talented group.
Now it's just a matter of what roles and responsibilities do you give every player so
they can be at their best when it comes to their talent.
That's one of the things that's a great assignment for us.
We can do it on a podcast going forward would be to kind of rank some of these position
groups by division.
Like if you just looked at the past catchers in the AFC West, like how would you say there's
one to four?
That's, we'll say we'll put a pin in that because that's got, we'll do that in a future
podcast.
But that's a fun conversation.
Let's get over to the NFC.
A couple in the, in the East, I thought were fascinating.
When you look at the Dallas linebacker group, I thought that was kind of underrated.
When you have LVE, DeMone Clark, Jabriel Cox, and then over shown goes into the mix, all
big long kind of body types.
Interesting how they kind of have collected a bunch of these different guys that can
all run.
They're all big, they're all long.
I thought that was interesting group.
I ended up going with Philly though in their defensive tackles, not the edge rushers.
We talk a lot about the edge rushers and they've got a good group there.
I had no one smithing to that mix, but when you've got DTS, it's hard to find town and
DTS.
And when you've got Fletcher Cox, Jordan Davis, Milton Williams, who if you look, go look up
his workout number.
He's a very talented player.
Now you drop Jalen Carter into that mix.
I don't know.
There's a better rotation of defensive tackles in the league.
No, I mean, let's be honest, they added the best defensive prospect in the draft in Jalen
Carter.
I'm talking about the concerns about the character on and off the field, but when you turn on
the tape and you watch and play, there are not many guys on earth that can walk around
and do the stuff that he does on the football field.
So now you put them along at Fletcher Cox.
You talked about Milton Williams.
You've seen some of the other guys that are in their rotation.
It's a problem to deal with them.
And one of the reasons why the eagles were so successful defensively lashes was what
Javan Hartgraves gave them on the inside.
When they were talking about a better prospect than Javan Hartgraer, he's not a better player
yet, but he's a better prospect than Javan Hartgraves was coming out.
And so you put these guys together.
It can be a nightmare and a handful.
And we said the best way to pressure quarterbacks is right up the gut because they feel that
pressure immediately.
They now have the ability to not only stop the run on early now, but they can create chaos
in the pocket because they have dominant guys on the interior.
No doubt.
It is a loaded group.
We get to the north.
I ended up going with the Packers wide receiver group for this reason.
It's the exact same thing I just said about Kansas City and their DBs.
Now you look at Green Bay.
This is a two year group.
These are all first and second year players now.
When you look at Watson, Dobbs, you got Jaden Reed gets drafted, Wicks gets drafted and Dubos
gets drafted.
They drafted three wide outs this year after having drafted two last year.
Now I put that down there because it's interesting to me just having all these young players
at one position.
My question to you because you've talked about this in the past and we've had this discussion.
Young quarterbacks pairing with veteran wide receivers seems to be the secret sauce as
they get established.
Now you can mix in the younger guys.
They are going to have and even though he's been in a league a few years, Jordan Love
is a first year starter with all first and second year receivers.
I'm curious to see how that works.
The young players and normally I would say I wouldn't like it.
And the reason why I don't like it is because with the young quarterback, he needs stability
and consistency.
And when you have veteran receivers, route running is consistent.
And so he's going to know when I get to the top of my drop and I throw to this spot because
now you throw the spots instead of throwing to people, I'm going to let it go to the spot
and my veteran receiver is going to get there.
We have seen the jumps that guys have made when they've had veteran additions come, Josh
Allen jumping significantly when he has Stefan Diggs.
Jaden Hertz taking a significant jump when AJ Brown comes over.
It's just something different.
The only time we've really seen it work with young players is if there was a history.
And so Joe Burrow, Jamar Chase, they knew each other from LSU.
They had thrown the ball.
There was a chemistry and a connectivity that was already there.
Even Jaden Hertz and Devonta Smith, chemistry and connectivity.
It's just harder for everybody to grow and develop at the same rate.
That would be the only worry and concern that I would have by the Packers receiver group.
All of these guys are learning on the fly and I don't know how that chemistry is going
to be when you have a bunch of young guys.
You don't have that old leader that can be the reliable threat while the young guys are
developing as the wide receiver two or the wide receiver three in those roles.
Yeah.
I mean, and you look at obviously with my homes coming to the league, having Kelsey already
in place.
Look at Herbert coming to the league, having Kean and Allen and Mike Williams like a lot
of these guys that have popped have had those sure reliable veteran dudes, man.
Trevor Lawrence.
Justin Trevor this year with Christian Kirk and Zay Jones and Evan England guys that
have been around the block a few times.
He's just game should go up another notch with Kevin Ridley coming on board.
There is something about the security of having veteran receivers that you can trust
and rely on because it is all about trust that connection between quarterback and pass
catch.
Yep.
100%.
All right.
The Falcons running back room.
Be John Robinson joining Algier in Cordell or Patterson.
I thought that wasn't intriguing just with all the different skills you have there.
All the different skills and there's some people that hate this big that hate them taking
and running back.
But when you hear Arthur Smith talk about he's a home run hitter and the way that he
can impact the game and so many different areas.
You understand why they were so fascinated with be John Robinson.
But then let's go back and look at now.
I think this is the 10 as maybe top five and Russian last year with Tyler.
As years, Cordell Patterson playing that little, I don't know like Twitter.
Aaron Patterson is playing like I wanted him to play when he first entered the league after
we did the report at Tennessee.
He just, he's decided now in his mid 30s that's the player that he's going to become.
And yeah, all those guys bring a different style to the position.
But man, you can just see how Arthur Smith is going to utilize this.
I mean, it's going to be a nightmare to defend this Falcons offense despite a young quarterback
still trying to find his way.
Their running game, their running back room is going to be problematic for people to
match up.
No doubt.
It's going to be a fun group to watch.
I'm excited to see how that group kind of comes together.
I think it's a good pairing when you have Arthur Smith knows what to do with these guys
too.
So I think that'll be fun.
Last one will get out to the West and we could go a couple different groups with Seattle.
Obviously when you bring in JSN and you put him in the mix with Tyler Lockett and Metcalf,
I think we've talked a lot about that.
I came away looking at it though, kind of more intrigued by the completeness of this
running back group when you throw in Sharbenay and McIntosh into this mix, Sharbenay who
can be a four minute back.
McIntosh, you can really catch the ball to the backfield and then you mix them in with
Kenneth Walker.
Again, all first and second year players running back to young man's position.
They've got three good young ones.
And what I love about this, I feel like Pete Carroll the last two years has been like,
you know what, if I'm going to go out, I'm going to go out doing it my way.
Yeah, I'm going to do it my way.
We're going to run the ball.
We're going to do play action.
We're going to play back to playing good defense, but running the ball, the thing that has hurt
them is since the loss of Marshall Lynch, right?
Marshall Lynch was a rarity in terms of being a three down back who was not only physical
and aggressive as a runner, but also was really good.
If you go back and look at Rosa Wilson's early career, Marshall Lynch was the ultimate
belt out player in terms of catching the ball out the back.
Well, what you can't get in one more shot and you can't get in three different players.
And so you get the size and physicality, and Zach Sharbenay who also can catch the ball
out the backfield.
You get the juice and explosiveness and Kenneth Walker.
And you have like, let me talk about McIntosh being special out the backfield.
You now have given Geno Smith the ability to continue to allow this team to play Smash
by ball while letting Geno play action, check down screen swings, utilize the entire field.
The wide receiver court is terrific, but now these guys that he has behind him, they
never have to change their style.
And so the Seattle Seahawks can be more explosive, but equally as efficient while still kind
of remaining that ground in pound ball control unit that P. Cara wants them to be.
100%.
I think you're right on.
And I think the other thing I would add to that is they hit the tackles last year, two
starting tackles with Lucas and Cross.
They drafted two interior linemen, this draft with Ola with Timmy and Bradford that could
end up being starters.
So you could end up having four young offensive linemen.
And I do like the fact of all offensive line, getting this be together for a long period
of time.
Potentially this group could be together for a long time.
It can be together for a long time.
And so right in front of us, DJ, what's crazy?
They've done a makeover.
They've done a rebuild on the fly while still going to the playoffs when no one thought they
could go to the playoffs.
And so you look back and you, Pete Carroll and John Snyder are laughing because they were
able to pull it off when no one thought that they would be able to move on from Russell
Wilson and become a better team.
This has the potential to be much better team, not only in 2023.
But when you look at 2024, this is when this team really could pop when these guys settle
into their roles.
Yeah.
No, it's, it's, it's really a unbelievable turnaround in remaking that entire roster.
John Schneider and Pete Carroll hats off to them.
And hopefully Gino can continue to play at the level he's playing at.
So, you know, we'll see what that looks like going into the future.
All right, Buck, that was a fun exercise, man.
Anything else you want to add before we, before we get out of here?
No, not baseball.
Not baseball.
You can't say anything.
Not baseball.
Not baseball.
I get myself a week in the hole.
It's like just giving yourself a week in the hole.
I'm out.
Oh, so you doing like a little Aaron Rodgers darkness retreat from baseball?
I'm doing a pod rate.
I'm doing a, I'm doing a pod rate darkness retreat.
Yes.
You are.
You are.
You are.
But you'll be back.
You'll be back tweeting scores and once over his like a grandslam and you'll, you'll,
I would love it if you would.
It would be nice to see, but I'm not, I'm not, I'm giving, I'm firing myself from it.
We, we, we, we're watching some Premier LaCrosse or something like that.
You know, everybody, Mark Brady holding it down.
No, over there.
All right, man.
This has been fun.
I hope you guys have enjoyed this and want to congratulate by the way, before we leave,
I do want to congratulate our producer, Nabil, because after a long successful run as a
Packer fan to have, uh, have successfully made the transition into a Jets fan, just
like that, Buck.
I mean, that's hard to do.
It's hard to take a lifetime of allegiance and just throw it out the window.
And now all of a sudden become a Jets fan, but it's an impressive feat.
I want to congratulate him on that.
It is an impressive feat somewhere.
Vence Lombardi is rolling over in his grave trying to figure out like what in the world
like this has a long time Packers fan and he just has decided to just jump ship with
the quarterback.
Come on, man.
It's team to team to team.
Yeah.
No, it's unbelievable.
Just, just, just rifting wherever the wind takes it.
So unbelievable.
All right.
By the way, congratulations to him on the bucks.
When do they play again?
Buck, do we know?
Oh, man, not only that.
And then they got the coach fired and everything else.
Like it's just man, tough time, very tumultuous time up in Wisconsin right now.
I hear you.
All right.
That's going to do it for us.
Hope you guys have enjoyed this one.
We'll catch you next time right here.
I'm with the sticks.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
I'm going to do it for you.
you
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