August 15, 2024 • 57 mins
John reacts to the preseason game between the Patriots and Eagles and wonders why the hell the New England Patriots aren’t getting more game reps for #3 overall pick Drake Maye (7:30). Then, sets the bar for the Atlanta Falcons as playoffs or bust following their trade for Matthew Judon and signing of Justin Simmons (14:00).
John BLASTS the Cowboys and owner Jerry Jones for being incredibly cheap when it comes to spending CASH on their roster (23:15) weighs in on the firings at ESPN (30:15) and ends the pod with a mailbag where he answers listeners’ questions. (41:15)
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
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Speaker 1 (01:29):
What is going on? Everybody? John Middlecoff three and Out podcast.
Hopefully everyone's doing well on this food Gaza Friday. You
had a good week, You got a smile on your face.
The weekend is here or right around the corner, or
maybe not. Maybe you work weekends and you had a
good week growing around. But I just watched the first
(01:50):
half of the Eagle Patriot game. The Eagles, I mean,
don't really play anybody, so there's not much to take
away there. Something jumped out to me with the Patriots
and their core situation that just has me shaking my head.
The Atlanta Falcons, I think, are in a pretty unique
situation in terms of the pressure on the team for
someone that just has a first year head coach, right
(02:13):
or you know he's coached before, but you know what
I mean, this is his first year with the team.
I saw Mike Greenberg was on with McAfee and made
a comment about Jerry Jones and the Cowboys spending over
the last decade. I honestly couldn't believe it when I
heard it, but then I did a little digging and
it's pretty eye opening. And it's something I always say,
(02:35):
I judge you not by words, but by actions in life.
And I think this is something that probably doesn't get
talked about enough. And I think there's a narrative with
the Cowboys and how much money they have and how
much they would spend if a cap didn't exist, And
I wonder if that's really a giant fugazi because it's
not actually true by the way they operate. And I'll
(02:57):
hit you with a fugazi Friday as well as the
middle Cooff mail bag at John Middlecoff is the Instagram
fire in those dms, get your questions answered here on
the show and uh yeah. The plan next week, I'm
gonna do something with Colin on Sunday and then I
think put it out before we're gonna record before the
(03:18):
games Sunday night, there's bo Nick starting against the Packers,
So Nick Jordan Love Niners play the Saints not quite
sure how many starters for the Niners are gonna play,
but I would imagine the Saints play their starters a
little bit, especially because it didn't join practice. So I'll
probably do a podcast after that and react to whatever
we see in those two games. So yeah, and you
(03:40):
guys can keep firing in those dms. We'll do mail
bags next week as well, so at John Middlecoff subscribe
to the podcast if you listen on Collins. Also, everything
we do is up on the YouTube channels to go
check that out. And yeah, we got We had podcasts
all week, so if you missed any, we just go
to the feed press play. But before we dive into
(04:02):
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(05:07):
I think when you look at the preseason, it's changed dramatically.
A small percentage of teams play starting players, even though
they have a new offensive coordinator and new terminology. I'm
sure I don't have a problem with the Eagles not
rolling out Lane Johnson, Jalen Hurt, Saquon AJ Brown, DeVante
Smith totally get it. Not what Andy Reid or Belichick
(05:32):
or some of these other coaches do with veteran players,
but that's been their philosophy. I'm not gonna argue against it.
So there wasn't much to take away from Philly Kenny Pickett,
who I actually think, I mean, he was all over
the place in this game, playing with backup random linemen,
kind of running for his life. I think that's an
upgrade from what they had last year with Marcus Mariota.
(05:54):
But at the end of the day, your backup quarterback,
when you're paying your starting quarterback of premium, ideally doesn't
factor in much throughout the season. So the Eagle season
is gonna go, assuming their defense is gonna be better
with Fangio, which it will be. How Jalen plays and
how the offense plays, so we won't know really how
(06:14):
that is until we get to regular season games and
their first one Friday Night in Brazil against the Backers.
When you look at the Patriots, Jacoby Brissett is thirty
one years old. He started forty eight games in his
career forty eight games, so I mean that's several seasons
worth of starting. He's also backed up players like Tom Brady,
so he's a lot of experience in the regular season
(06:38):
and in the preseason. And this is a team who
even they know isn't gonna be that good this year.
That's why they just traded one of their better players.
You could argue their most talented player, though he's a
little older. They got rid of them. Why they're resetting
their deck. To me, starting Jacoby Brissette and playing him
in preseason games, especially for three series, is laughable. I mean,
(07:03):
what are you doing. He does not need the reps.
It's like, we're getting ready for the season to do
what win three games? And he looked like Jacoby looked
through an awful pick in the red zone that hit
the DV Maddox in the hands. I mean, just a
terrible pick. Got news for you? Jacoby turns the ball over.
(07:23):
This is a time when you have this project quarterback
in Drake may who played six snaps in the first
season game through three passes. How is he not playing
at minimum a half? Why wouldn't you play him the
whole game? I don't need to see Bailey's appy play.
(07:45):
We've seen that the previous couple years. This time of
the year, for a guy who ideally you don't even
want to play in the regular season, get him reps,
let him sink or swim to start to play Jacoby Brissette.
To me, the Patriots are taking a lot of shit.
A lot of people think they don't know what they're doing,
(08:07):
and that the head coach, and now that the crafts
have a very very strong hand in what's going on,
they're about to get really humbled. And you'd be like John,
they suck last year with Pelichick. I'm not acting like
it's been going well, but to roll out Jacoby Brissett
like he needs these reps, Like I'm sorry, start the
(08:27):
regular season, just let them roll. But shouldn't this be
a time to get this young player who is your
future all the reps humanly possible, because once the regular
season starts, at least up until you bench Jacoby, which
feels inevitable, he's not taking any of those first team
reps deson chance. He's out with the scout team running
the opposing offenses scheme. That's what he'll be doing. That's
(08:53):
usually in the NFL what backup quarterbacks do. That doesn't
mean you can't work on your craft and everything, but
you you are not repping your own offense once you
go to team periods in the National Football League. So
and I saw Lewis Riddick tweeted this, like Jacoby's third
series put Drake may in the game. That's the whole
(09:17):
point of this. None of this matters. This is all
irrelevant in terms of score, in terms of individual plays,
but it does matter for the repetitions for younger players,
and it does matter for the growth of someone who
you invested a boatload into. The Giants were willing to
trade you a bunch other teams were interested in trading up.
(09:39):
You're like, no, which I support? You? Like this player?
He plays a position in which you need. They mentioned
on the broadcast when he scored on a keeper to
score that you know, obviously not comparing him to Tom Brady,
but you know one day, when this guy's a starting quarterback,
it will add an element to their quarterback that they
haven't really had over twenty five years. A mobile guy. Now,
(10:01):
there's more to playing quarterback than mobility. But let him
get out there. Let him rep it out with at
least like high end guys, even if they're not starters,
guys that you might see on a potential Sunday down
the road. Because it is inevitable. Jacoby were sett it's
gonna get bench this year. I would bet a lot
of money that that's gonna happen. And I would tend
(10:24):
to lean with it's gonna happen sooner than later, So
you're gonna throw this guy out without repping much once
the regular season starts up until that moment, in a
shitty situation, your offensive line sucks, your team's probably gonna
have a losing record, and you're not even giving him
starts in the preseason games. That don't mean shit because
you want to get what Jacoby a sweat. I don't
(10:48):
get it. I just do not understand it. And listen,
I'm out on the Patriots shortened the Patriots, just big picture,
not that I'm anti Drake may. He showed like ball
was a little wobbly. It looked like a lot going on.
Of course, I mean he fucking played six snaps a
week ago. This guy's not used to being on the
(11:08):
field with other teams in the National Football League, So
I don't get it. Makes no sense to me, and
I think this shows that you just see an operation
that feels a little bit over their head. Okay, let's
talk about the Atlanta Falcons, who are in a really,
really rare spot. Most times in the NFL. College football
is different because I can sign a big name coach,
(11:30):
they get paid a ton, and the expectations are super high.
Right the moment Brian Kelly goes down as you Lincoln
Riley to USC that type stuff happens Jim Harbaugh in Michigan,
the big name guys moved the needle, and you expect
to win, and you expect to win immediately. In the NFL,
when you take over a job, usually the team's terrible,
they've lost, and you kind of get an open runway
(11:52):
year one. If you win, it's all gravy. Remember Andy
Reid took over the Chiefs, they drafted number one, had
him in the playoffs. Next year. People were like, damn.
But for the most part, you're not expected to win
your one. Last year Jonathan Gannon and the Cardinals, everyone
thought they were gonna sucks. Why Dave Ball got so
much credit. You're like, this team's honey good takes in
the playoffs. But this year, for example the Patriots, if
(12:16):
Drod Mayo were to win five games, he'd get Coach
of the Year votes. If he wins two or three games,
no one with a brain is going he should have
done more. That team sucks, right, because usually when you
take over a new team, the team is any good
Callahan and Tennessee he wins eight to nine or nine
and eight, you'd be like, that's a pretty good job.
(12:37):
But that's not the case in Atlanta. And I understand
position coaches and coordinators ambition to move up. It's very
lucrative going from the quarterback coach the coordinator doubles your salary.
And while you're making a lot of money, let's say
eight hundred grand is a quarterback coach, it's a lot
different making one point seventy five million dollars a year.
(12:58):
Just like if you're making two million dollars a defense
coordinator for the Rams, it's a lot different making nine
million dollars as the head coach. So I get it
in money and power. Given that you don't have to
take orders from anybody. You are the boss. You dictate
everything football wise in your organization. How we play, what
schemes we run, when we practice, who you want to practice,
(13:20):
who you want to play. It's it's a lot different.
You're no longer you know you're the top guy in
the organization chart when it comes to the football team.
The GM doesn't dictate the lineup, dictate, doesn't dictate practice,
doesn't dictate the schemes. That's not the way it works.
He doesn't even know the playbook most of the time.
So I get guys wanting to do that, and usually
you get all this money and you get a chance
(13:42):
to take a deep breath. If the Atlanta Falcons don't
make the playoffs this year, Raheem Morris head coach, hasn't
been won in a long time, where he kind of
flamed out in Tampa. Obviously older, more mature. Now it
is going to be viewed as a major failure. They
just traded a third round pick for Matt Judah, which
is the type of move you do around the trade
(14:02):
deadline because you think you're a Super Bowl contender. Now,
they made that trade deadline super Bowl contender move in
the middle of August, which I'm not against, but you
better be good because that those second day picks are
pretty valuable. And they also signed Justin Simmons, multiple time
Pro Bowler, former Denver bronco today to like seven and
a half million dollars. All guarantee. You do those type
(14:23):
moves when you think you're gonna be good, and I'm
telling you they think they're gonna be good. The betting markets.
Everyone's betting on them to win the division and be
a playoff team, which is fine, but based on previous history,
like they've been pretty average the last three years. Last
year was a big embarrassment, and you might just say, well,
their quarterback play sucked. Maybe it's just maybe that's it's
(14:44):
just that deep. It was just their quarterback play. But
there is tangible pressure on this team to make the
playoffs this year. Anything less, you don't have to win
the division, but you better be playing a game on
wild card weekend. If you were not, it just is
a failure. And that can't usually be said about first
(15:04):
year head coaching situations, so it's kind of unique. And listen,
Runnie Morris backed it up with saying, we have a
massive coaching staff. They're like why, because we're grooming people
to take over jobs when we win and they get plucked.
Usually people don't talk like that, And I got no
problem talking to talk if you're walking the walk. But
I'm interested to watch this team play. They definitely have
(15:27):
some talent, but we'll see that better come through or
it's gonna be problems. The other day I was at
(15:47):
the gym. I look up and they had McAfee on
and Mike Greenberg was on her and he was random
raven but it obviously it's just one of the big TVs.
I didn't hear what he said. Then I get home
and I scroll on Instagram and I see the clip
and I watched it, and Greenberg kind of went on
this rant that about Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys,
(16:09):
and he said, listen, no one can argue Jerry's fame,
his impact on the league for marketing, and how powerful
the Cowboys are as a brand, and the size of
their fan base. But it cannot be argued. It is
just objectively true. It's a fact that the Cowboys are
(16:29):
financially cheap when it comes to paying players. I was like, damn,
he's like, no team over the last eight to ten
years has spent more actual cash on players than the
Dallas Cowboys. Seriously, So this morning I went and I
googled it and I was reading about it because you know,
in football, the salary cap one hundred million, two hundred million,
(16:50):
two hundred fifty million. You can spend more actual cash
than the salary cap. I get front load contracts, I
can pay you huge signing bonuses and then it goes
on books as I amortized it over the life of
the deal, so you can and Jake Rosenberg, who was
on my podcast, discuss this. If your owner is all in,
(17:10):
you can manipulate the salary cap with actual money, actual money,
and turns out the Cowboys don't do that at all.
From twenty sixteen to twenty nineteen, the league average in
cash spending over sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen for four seasons
was seven hundred and four million dollars. The Cowboys were
(17:32):
dead last with six hundred and thirty four point four
million dollars over the last three seasons twenty one, twenty two,
and twenty three, and the Cowboys have been good. Dallas
was thirtieth in the NFL. The league average was six
hundred and twenty seven million dollars. The Cowboys spent almost
eight ninety million dollars less, with five hundred and thirty
(17:53):
four million. To put it in perspective two teams. They're
obviously the big rival in the Eagles and a team
that they've played twice in the playoffs. The Eagles were
tenth most cash spending at six hundred and fifty five million,
so spend eighty million dollars more. The Niners were six
hundred and sixty four million, seventh in the league. And
(18:14):
I started thinking, you know, Dabbo takes a lot of
shit because in his heyday, which wasn't that long ago,
and Clemson was kicking everybody's ass, transfer portal didn't exist,
and he had to draft in develop players, and he
recruited like he was Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Ohio State, and
he had teams full of NFL players and they won
(18:35):
national championships. And then the world changed and the transfer
portal happened, and you could sign a guy from another
school who'd already played, and you didn't have to sit out.
And all the best teams now dabbling that now they
don't take Deon Sanders forty transfers. But what Ohio State
(18:56):
this year do? This year they took the starting safety
from Alabama who look like a future top fifteen pick.
What did Alabama do a couple of years ago? They
took this guy, James and Williams from Ohio State because
he couldn't crack the lineup becausey had so many sweet
wide receivers. And then they just plugged a hole here
plugged the hole there, and Clemson has fallen behind. And
I started to think that Jerry. When Jerry became really famous,
(19:20):
right when he buys a team in eighty nine. Within
the next less than ten years, he's got three Super
Bowl rings, he has a household name in sports. He's
a famous rich guy. There are a lot of rich
people that you've never heard of. There are a lot
of people, not a lot, but there are people you know,
(19:43):
definitely in the nineties that had way more money than
Jerry Jones, and you couldn't point out of a lineup.
And I wonder if back in the nineties, and this
goes back to the rules in the NFL of why
you need to put money into escrow because way back
in the day, they wanted to prove that if you
were going to sign this contract you actually had the money.
That's a stupid, outdated, archaic practice. We know teams have
(20:05):
the money now, but Jerry's in this mindset of like,
I don't want to rob Peter to pay Paul because
in the nineties that would have been very, very risky. Obviously,
the salary cap got created what ninety three to ninety four,
Jerry hasn't changed his tactics. Obviously, Jerry pays his own guys,
but he made the comment we're all in, and he's
(20:26):
taken a lot of shit. Jerry's not all in because
to compete in this modern day NFL, you can use
cash to your advantage. The Dallas Cowboys were just valued
at ten billion dollars. Jerry is worth. I mean, I
can't even imagine how much cash that guy has in
the bank, how much money the Cowboys generate on a
(20:47):
yearly basis, and he's not using it to his advantage.
Part of having a successful business is reinvesting into that
business to keep growing it. And I do think it's
fair after looking at some of these numbers to go.
So the Cowboys have fallen behind, and it's not because
they don't have the resources. They have the cash. Whether
it's Jerry's old school mindset or it's just his unwillingness
(21:10):
to part with some of his money and up upfront
bonuses to certain players. But that's embarrassing. That should not happen.
They should be near the top in cash spending forever.
All we've ever heard. If there was and shit, I'm
guilty of this. If there was no salary cap, Jerry
(21:33):
would buy all the players. Then you look at the
data and you go, yeah, I don't know if that's true.
I don't I think Jeffrey Lurie would be much more
inclined to buy the players. The Cleveland Browns and New
York Jets were one and two over the last three
years in cash spending. You'd argue those two teams would
(21:53):
be much more willing to cut enormous amounts of cash
to players. I don't know if Jerry would because you
and this is what I think, so many people are
so phony in politics and living in California for so long,
like everyone talks a big game. I don't give a
shit what you say or what you post. I judge
you on how you act, so you can talk one way.
If you're living a different way, I think you're a fraud.
(22:16):
I think you're a complete phony. And Jerry has this
kind of way that we judge him and look at
him of like just this gun slinger throwing around his coins.
He's just paying this guy, paying that guy making shit happen.
Turns out no, he's not really, And a lot of
other owners are spending way more actual cash. Salary cap
(22:36):
can be whatever the contracts can be whatever, say it
all the time. Average per years can be super high.
Everyone's like average per year, how about this average per you?
I don't give a shit. How much money do you
actually have to pay the player? You can say, hey, John,
you know it's I hear you're making X per year.
It's like, well, I've actually only received this, so what
(23:00):
what does that mean? And I get why agents love
saying that I got my guy twenty seven million a year.
It's like, yeah, signing bonus was ten million dollars, and
the guarantees are not very high. If he does not produce,
they can cut them after a year. I just thought
looking at these numbers was pretty crazy. And I don't
know if Jerry's legitimately actually cheap, which I think is
(23:22):
fair to say after looking at these numbers. Stuck in
this old school practice of this mindset, Like when he
bought the Cowboys, he didn't have much money. Hard to
say that, because he's got hundreds of millions of dollars
put into a yacht, so he's not afraid to spend it.
He flies around a helicopter and I'm pro Jerry Jones,
but he ain't spending money like these other guys when
it comes to his team. I saw ESPN fired RG three.
(23:47):
I found RG three pretty annoying. I also Sam Ponder
got fired as well. I read she made seven million
dollars or excuse me, seven figures, so she made over
a million dollars to host and the NFL show in
the morning. That seems crazy to me. I mean, who
is signing these contracts for? And I'm not anti Sam Ponder,
(24:08):
but like what I thought, RG three was making seven
figures too. It's like, who is giving out this money?
These people don't work in jobs to generate revenue. You
could replace them with someone else and no one would notice.
Like I get why you pay Tom Brady or Troykman.
You feel comfortable their name. But for the most part,
people that call games, they can be replaced. If Penn
(24:29):
State's playing Michigan, regardless who's calling the game, I mean,
obviously it can't be terrible. But when it's a guy
of like RG three's level, like no one cares he's
calling college football games. He's last whatever three or four years,
It's like you can replace them with whoever. No one
would notice. Some of these people running some of these
operations are fucking morons and last but not at least,
(24:52):
Fugazi Friday. It kind of hit me the other day
I I don't think there's a service that you can
pay for that I don't pay for from obviously you know,
YouTube TV, to Netflix, to all the hits, the Amazon Primes,
Apple TV. But then the paramount plus is the max
(25:13):
is of the Hulus, the Peacocks. I mean, shit, I
got it all that there is not a streaming service
that has content that your boy doesn't have a credit
card information on file for. And it kind of hit
me the other day. I was like, laying in bed,
probably nine to nine thirty, we're looking for something to watch.
(25:33):
I'm like, there is never in the history of my life,
my time on this planet, and I've watched a lot
of television in my life, a lot of movies, a
lot of shows, especially at night. I'm like, I can't
find anything to watch. How can I pay? Who knows?
It's like I'm not doing the books on a monthly
basis on what I'm paying, but it's my guests would
(25:55):
be I don't know, three four hundred dollars. Couldn't find
anything to watch? Now, there is stuff to watch. It's like,
I don't really want to watch that. I don't really
want to watch that, And I think back to simpler times.
Let's just go fifteen years ago and listen. Cable was
screwing us, not necessarily me, because the bundle for me
made sense. I've watched a lot of sports, both screwing
a lot of people that didn't watch sports were getting
(26:17):
just railroaded. So I have no sympathy for that thing
just disintegrating. But in two thousand, let's just pick a
year two thousand and seven, you would just sit on
your couch or sit at your house on a night
but there's like no sports on or whatever, and just
find something to watch. There'd be a movie. They ah,
(26:38):
they're forty five minutes in a shaw Shank for all.
Old School is on for damn. I love Sean Connery
and the Rock and you just watched like forty five
minutes of it. I've said this before, but like the
one negative with YouTube TV, who I'm a huge fan
of and love it a lot, you don't scroll, so
I would never just see there's some movie play on
(27:00):
a station, right. I don't run into Shashank anymore if
I want to watch Shashank, I have to go seek
it out because YouTube is so genius. It knows like
the five channels I watch, it's just you know ESPN,
if a game's on golf channel CNBC, and then during
(27:21):
football season just the football games or you know, during
I guess the NBA finals whatever. It just it aggregates
that for me, I rarely have to go far. In
Food Network, I don't even have to go that far.
I just see what I'm gonna watch and I click it.
I never scroll, And I was always old school, like
I used to like the guide and see what was on.
(27:43):
But there's not really any need to do that any
And I think, and obviously when a good show comes out,
that Presumed Innocence show that was on Apple TV that
was entertaining. I watched the show last night on Peacock,
like The Biker Gang. I think how Hardy was in it.
It was kind of entertaining. I fell asleep halfway through.
(28:03):
It wasn't that great really, but it's just like you
really sometimes got a force like I guess I'll try
this out. It's like I couldn't have more options. I
have about seventeen apps on the home screen just provide
me with unlimited content. Yet when I'm looking, if there's
not like a super hot or popular television show or
(28:24):
like some documentary that everyone's talking about, you just keep
scrolling and I don't really want watch that. I don't
really want to watch that, you know, scroll that, like,
how is this possible? How is this possible? And yet
it is? Okay, Let's do a little Fugazi Friday mailbag
(28:52):
at John middlecop Instagram. Fire into those dms. Big fan
of the show, watching on the tube YouTube for a while.
As a diehard Eagles fan, I feel like we are
honestly in a bad spot coaching wise. Fangio and Kellen
Moore both obviously have long term head coaching aspirations, and
(29:14):
if we have an eight to ten eight out of
ten season, as in we lose in the divisional or
NFC title game, I think losing in the NFC title
game is better than eight out of ten. It's obviously
not a ten out of ten. If winning the Super
Bowl is an eleven out of ten, Megan to the
Super Bowl is probably nine and a half. I'd say
(29:35):
Megan to the NFC Championship Game at minimum is eight
and a half. Nine as someone who worked there and
assuming a decent season and not a total collapse, when
obviously Sirianni would be canned. How do you think the
best way to handle head coaching position is going forward?
Do you think we have a standout offense this year
(29:56):
there's any chance Larry would evaluate Kellen Moore and get
rid of Sirianni or with Fangio if the defense is elite.
One thing you said about Fangio having head coaching aspirations, like,
I think those days are done. I think Fangio and
head coaching that shit sailed. He got a shot a
little later in life and it didn't even come remotely
(30:19):
close to working. That Fangio's never going to be another
head coach in the NFL. I feel pretty confidence saying that,
And I'm a Vic Fangio guy. I think excellent higher
for you guys, But I don't think you have to
worry about him. I think the question mark is the
head coach and the offensive coordinator. And if the offensive
coordinator has a lot of success with Jalen with the offense,
(30:41):
they're explosive. Spend a lot of money on these cats.
It's a pretty natural transition. If they feel comfortable with
him kind of leading the group right, which they'd have
to I guess project a little bit, but I would
say that he would have a strong chance. And I
was texting with someone the other night, a buddy of mine,
about hard knocks and maybe I mentioned this also on
(31:03):
a previous mailbag. But who would I hire? Like if
I was just needed a coach this offseason, based on
what we know right now, I think I'd hire Mike Vrabel.
I'd hire Vrabel over Belichick in the sense of he's
just way younger and I'm a Belichick supporter, and people
(31:24):
that act like he's the village idiot now I think
are complete morons. But it is going to be twenty
twenty five. The guy got in the league in nineteen
seventy five, So I would lean Rabel if the hard
Bob Rose, if Tomlin, Dan Campbell, like, I'm pretty confident
Vrabel can be a good head coach. Obviously, in a
(31:45):
perfect world, you know you hired the next McVeigh Shanahan,
But I don't know. I mean, Ben Johnson seems terrified
to be a head coach. How could I hire that guy?
Play scared? I dare you to take that charger's bet
you'll lose your money. They have zero weapons. I love
(32:06):
it when someone threatens you, when you publicly say you're
gonna make a bet, like I dare you to take
that bet. Like guys, I've been gambling for I don't know,
almost twenty five years if you count sneak it into
the Indian casino when I was like fifteen sixteen years old.
Been gambling on sports now for fifteen plus. You lose bets,
(32:29):
you know, it's part of the deal. It's part of
the fun. Get your juices flown. You don't win them all. Hell,
you're a legend if you hit like fifty five percent
of your sports betting. So yeah, I could bet, could
lose the money, also could win it. It's part of
why you gamble. I think there's nothing stupider than that one,
Like I dare you to do that. No, I'm gonna
(32:50):
do it where I was until Herbert got hurt. Now
it kind of freaked me out. But like you have
understand when you gamble, you're not afraid to lose the money.
Part of gambling. If I didn't want to lose the money,
I wouldn't gamble it. I know, you're a fan of
betting on season wins or division winners, I might change
my tune. I think I'm gonna do it this year.
(33:12):
I got a couple that I'm looking at. The Bills,
the Saints, and those Fresno State Bulldogs. Also tempted to
dabble a little on Oregon to win the Natty. I
kind of want to have a long term team to
win the Natty, but I don't know. I haven't decided
on that one. There seems to be a lot of
(33:33):
juice in a lot of these odds. Compared to the
MVPER Comeback Player of the Year, A lot of winners
of the award never seem very chalky either. Even parlaying
the team to make the playoffs with the Coach of
the Year seems like a worthwhile long bet. For example,
Doug Peterson winning Coach of the Year doesn't seem like
(33:54):
a stretch. Parlay it with the Jags to make the
playoffs and it would turn fifty dollars into eight grand. Thanks.
If you ever land in New Zealand, you will love
to Tasmania. Plenty of top links golf courses here. Yeah,
with shit love links golf. I do think it's difficult, right,
(34:15):
Like think about last year who won Coach of the
Year Stefanski, Well they didn't win the division. Who won
it the year before. I know what you're saying, and
I trust me. No one loves a fifty dollars bet
to win eight grand like your boy. I couldn't bet
on golf, just like get super aggressive. So I put
one hundred and fifty dollars and I did two fifty
(34:38):
dollars parlays, or actually I think a seventy five dollars,
a twenty five dollars and a fifty dollars parlay. One
was nineteen K, one was twelve K, and one was
a K. I need Maxiholm, but to play well this weekend.
I wouldn't mind Tommy Fleetwood winning either or more Kyle
will Get and Billy Horseell top tens in top twenties.
But I think it's it sounds a lot easier with
(35:00):
that strategy than it actually working, because when you just
look at the last two winners, Stayble and Stefanski, they
didn't even come close to winning their division. I mean
a couple of years ago the Giants day ball was
the right choice. How many games did the Eagles. What
was the difference? What were they nine and eight? Would
the Eagles go like, were they fourteen and three that year?
(35:21):
Talking about five game difference? So I hear you, and
it sounds great when you say it out loud, and
it sounds even better. You go to DraftKings and you
type in the two, You're like, holy shit, fifty to
win eight g's And then they're like, what's the likelihood
of this happening? It's just not very high. Multi year listener,
longtime fan, got a question that might stir up the listeners.
(35:46):
I go on Twitter and everyone acts this is about CJ.
Stroud like it's a no brainer. He's throwing five thousand
yards and fifty tds. Le Let me remind you he
had twenty three touchdowns last year and five in one game.
Let's throw in the five to ten percent chance that
Diggs ruins chemistry. I know we like the player and
(36:08):
love the coach, but can we damper the expectations for
this guy? They bolstered the run game with mixing and
won't have to be in shootouts. How do these outrageous
predictions make you feel? It's a good question. I I
think Tank dell is I put his over under on touchdowns,
(36:28):
assuming he plays seventeen games at like thirty. But I'm
with you people acting like it's gonna be fifty. The
other thing is Dimiko has said I've seen him say
this multiple times. Digs will not ruin our chemistry, AKA
it gets weird. We will cut him like there is
no rope here that there is no margin for. Yeah, well,
(36:51):
just he's having a rough rough week here with the boys.
That ain't gonna fly. It ain't gonna fly with Demiko,
and it's not gonna fly with Casserio. They took relatively
low risked situation, but I do not envision them letting
him cause problems now, it's part of taking him in.
He gets emotional. I will say this about Diggs. For
(37:15):
an emotional player that a lot of people think is
kind of crazy, he has been a winning player. He
was part of winners. He won in Minnesota, he won
in Buffalo as one of the better players on the team.
So sometimes you get these guys that have this negative
kind of just aura as I think the kids are
(37:35):
saying that this negative reputation and they're from they're just
losers because they've been around losing and they just that's
who they are. This guy's kind of a winner. Not
Super Bowl championships, but like, this guy's going to the
playoffs every single This guy's playing in a ton of
big games. I went to the Niners Vikings playoff game
in two thousand and what year was that twenty twenty.
(37:58):
First drive of the game passed the digs PI digg digs,
touchdown digs only points they scored all game. It was
like bang bang boom. It's like, ugh, how are the
Niners gonn cover this guy? He's I I wouldn't worry
as much about him because one, I think he's either
(38:19):
got to shape in it or he shapes out. There's
no begging him to stay. You know why they don't
need him? Tank Dell, dudes, the star, Nico Collins like
six three two twenty baller mail back hot take. Trent
Williams shouldn't be given a new contract. He was a
liability in the Super Bowl and his age has shown. Uh.
(38:41):
I will say this, he kind of has the Niners
by the balls end of the day. They don't need Ayuk.
I mean they want Ayuk. He helps them. He's a
really good player. But if push came to shove, they
could trade him. They can't do that with Trent Williams.
Even if Trent Williams isn't quite what he once was,
(39:01):
he is so much better then you can combine all
their offensive lineman. He's not as good as that guy.
I just think he's got him in a weird spot now.
Like you said, he's a little older. He had a
bad game. He also had a lot of great games.
So you don't judge a man on the one game.
I think what concerns one. I've heard he's asking for
(39:25):
a lot of money, as he should. I mean, if
I'm him, I want like at minimum these next year,
like two years, sixty million dollars all guaranteed. Whether we
just add more guaranteed to the money guarantee at all,
but like that's what I would need. What are they
gonna say? No, who you gonna play with? Jalen Moore?
What are you gonna do? That's where he really has
(39:47):
him by the balls. So you just say no, and
then you just hope. This is the hard part for
the Niners. They could just drive a hard bargain on
both guys. You know what, Brandon, you gonna play on
fourteen million dollar contract, fifth year option. You know what, Trent,
you're gonna play on your twenty million dollar contract. Name
me a human being behind Leveon Bell in the history
(40:08):
of the world. Maybe Dave Chappelle, whoever gives up a
combined thirty four million dollars, it wouldn't happen. But you
get angry guys who are two of your best players.
So this is just it's it's a complicated situation. You know,
it really is a question for the dog Pound. Do
(40:31):
you think Deshaun Watson has motivation anymore? Would love for
Stefanski to have a legit quarterback in his system. Also,
if you're ever in Virginia Beach, let's get a round in.
You know, there's something special about just people saying, hey,
if you're ever here, play golf. More than likely I
might never be there, and if I was, I probably
(40:51):
wouldn't remember the DM that I read during the mailbag.
But there's there's such a community aspect, like, Hey, come
to Arizon almost play some golf. Hey you're coming to
I had a guy reach out, Hey, you're gonna be
in Nashville in a couple of weeks, hit me up.
Let's play golf. You know, I know, we got a
bunch of wedding shit to do, but I'm gonna play
three rounds cause your boys already sneaking one in on Wednesday.
(41:16):
This is a picture. It's like someone with pebble beach.
Long time listener, I have a golf mailbag question. Thought
about hearing your open take about the tour playing more
link style golf. On the fourth of July, my buddy
and I played Chambers Bay. That's a course in Seattle area.
During our round, our caddie was saying that after the
(41:36):
twenty fifteen us opened, the USGA was upset with the
course and how tough it played. Chamber does not have
any major PGA events lined up for the next five
ish years. The tour could easily start playing a tournament
yearly there and give the fans TV audience a tough
link style course without super long travel or changing TV times. Plus,
(41:58):
it's downright gorgeous. He took me some pictures. Looks pretty awesome.
You know the problem. Let's use football as an example.
Do you think the Eagles? I was thinking about this
day in the shower, because whatever happens in the Eagles
Packers game, we're gonna have, you know, if the Packers
defense still looks crappy or something's off with Jalen, There're
(42:21):
gonna be a lot of takes flying from this podcast here.
But they're playing in Brazil, So is there a chance
that it is just really weird for one of the teams,
one of the players, some jet black whatever, just a
game in Brazil. But why are they playing in Brazil?
Because there is a governing body that is chosen by
(42:45):
the owners, starting with the Roger, who tries to do
things in the best interests of the business. So you
have cohesion from the top, even though no one's always
gonna agree. If I was on the Eagles or I
was on the Packers, the last thing in the fucking
world I'd want to do is to play a football
game in Brazil. I'd be like, this is so stupid.
(43:06):
Why couldn't we just play it? I don't know in Philadelphia,
But the league who ultimately is trying to make the
most money so the owners and the players profit, that's
all they care about. And you can say sometimes that's
not the right mindset to have, but it's the one
they have. Yet in golf, there is no cohesion. You
(43:29):
have all these independent contractors. Everyone complains, no one wants
to do this. Everyone bitches and moans about this course
is too hard. You know, we don't want to travel
to Europe to play the World Tour live, guys and all.
It's like we got too many cooks in the kitchen.
Say what you want about commissioners, and they take a
(43:49):
lot of heat. There's one guy making a decision. It
is everyone has a suggestion. It is much harder to
make a decision, and in golf, no one ever makes
a decision. Yeah, and all these other entities, you know,
in team sports, it's like, we're doing this whether it
works or not, but we're gonna try it out. The
Ncason Tournament, which everyone's circle jerked on Twitter. You couldn't
(44:12):
have paid me to watch, but at least they you
know what, we're gonna do this. We're all in. Everyone's
in and goes like, yeah, we'll try this. But then
now it doesn't really work, and this guy's pissed off,
and Tiger doesn't want to do this even though he
doesn't even play anymore and he's forty eight years old.
It's like, what's going on? They just feel like they're
lost at sea, and in twenty twenty five, you know
(44:35):
you don't want to get lost, cause you get lost,
might never see again. I will because I love it.
I was watching it today. But I'm not the minority,
or I'm not the majority. I'll promise you that much.
I'm a Titans fan. Sadly. I know it's early, but
if Will levis let's just say league average, and the
Titans end up with drafting the middle of the pack,
(44:57):
would you look at drafting another quarterback, which this would
be the third quarterback drafted by us in the first
three rounds in three years, or would you look at
drafting more help, whether it would be offense or defense.
I heard you say it'll be in Nashville at the
end of August. If you have time, I highly recommend
(45:17):
playing gay Lord Springs only ten minutes from the airport,
and it's a beautiful link Style seventy two, Part seventy two.
I think I'm playing with the guy in business at
Brentwood Country Club. At least that's the plan of right now.
I might only have time for one round because I
(45:38):
got other shit to do. Ideally like to get two in.
I played there before. Someone DM me their remember there,
but I played when I went out for a bachelor
party at a place called Legends. My brother's a member
at a truon course and made a call and I
pretended I was Sam and I played there. It was
a pretty sweet track. The thing with Levis, It's funny. I
(46:00):
in the game the other night Will Levis will not slide.
He won't slide, and Vrabel used to drive him nuts.
Then in the preseason game, he lowered his shoulder against
this guy named de Winners from TCUs like Drake Greenlaw
two point zero. Not as good as Drake green Law yet,
(46:21):
but just runs around tries to kill people. It's like,
will you are going to get injured slide, bro? Like
what are you doing that to me? Is the first thing, Like,
you cannot not slide in the NFL. This is not
the Mountain West, this hell in the SEC like this
(46:41):
is all these guys will break your clapical, they will
break your arm. That's my first thing. Second, I don't
think anyone in the building cares about Malik Willis being
drafted whatever he was third round a couple of years ago.
That's irrelevant. They took will Levis in the second run
this new GM did. But if he's not good enough,
(47:03):
he's not good enough, and he's gonna get obviously a
long lease this year. He's gonna be the full time starter.
They've added offensive weapons. How good are you or do
you show any progress? Do you have any you know future?
Like is it something to keep developing and keep working with?
(47:26):
But to me, if he's average, I think he'd be
done because this new coaching staff has zero connection to him.
Zero love the pod and watch every night to know
if certain, if you could have kept one team in
a certain location, who would you have chosen? Chargers, San Diego, Raiders,
(47:46):
Oakland Rams and Saint Louis. To me, it's a no brainer.
You needed a team in La the stadium suite hosting
Super Bowls. Saint Louis stole the Rams from Los Angeles.
That wasn't your team, Lois. Los Angeles got their team back,
so I'm putting the Rams in Los Angeles. Oakland couldn't
(48:07):
function any longer. They're the only team in my lifetime
who has lost three teams in like under five years.
And you can bitch and moan and give me all
these different reasons for every team I don't give a
shit if it was one team, I'd hear you all
three teams next year. A place when I you know,
(48:31):
was in radio. The Warriors played there, the A's played there,
the Raiders played there, and in twenty twenty five, none
of them will exist. The in and out down the
Street had to shut down. Why it's one of the
best businesses in all of California, because you get robbed NonStop.
That area is so shitty they had to go and
(48:51):
it's just it's not feasible. I would say Oakland, California,
would be one of the last places that have had
major sports teams that you would ever put a sports
team in in twenty twenty five. So I feel like
the Raiders in Vegas is a no brainer. Vegas is
a booming and that stadium is awesome. It changed their franchise.
(49:17):
Obviously they lost, you know, the home crowd, but financially
they couldn't function there and you couldn't function in the
area in which they were functioning. That Strip sixty six
in Hagenberger is just awful. I mean, it is an
absolute dump. So to me, it'd be the Chargers of
(49:39):
San Diego. But I don't think that that you know
people go, well, they ever go back. They're never going back.
They just spend hundreds of millions of dollars on this
new facility in southern California. They pay a dollar rent
with Kronkey. They're just never going back. First time, Mailbager,
(50:00):
you said you like the Saints to make the playoffs
this year, but are not a fan of Dennis Allen
or Derek Carr. Point at this point in time is
your career? What you're reasoning and trusting the Saints when
the two most important pieces of a franchise are a
big question mark. Well, Derek didn't play well. The first
half of last season. He played really really bad, And
the last half of the season, the last like five games,
(50:20):
he was really good. Well, this year he has an
offensive coordinator who's a real offensive coordinator and going to
run an offense that quarterbacks thrive in. In Clint Kobiek,
I don't like Dennis Allen a relative to like the
top head coaches. But he is a good defensive coordinator
and they went nine to eight last year. Their defense
(50:41):
is going to be solid. Their offense was an embarrassment. Well,
if their offense isn't an embarrassment, and they're good on
defense because Dennis is a good defensive coordinator. Couldn't they
be a ten to eleven win team. I just think
it's possible. Now. Part of the reason I like the
bet is the value. You can just get good odds,
Like there aren't good odds on the Atlanta Falcons winning
the division, and on paper you're like, ah, this team's
(51:04):
way better. It's true, but you just don't get very
good odds. I like the Saints simply because they went
nine to eight last year. They were literally a game
away from being in the playoffs, and the odds are
like they're more like a six to seven win team.
And to me, it's just Derek. You can't rely on
Derek to play like Tom Brady. If you're going to
(51:26):
try to have him throw forty times a game and
just pick you apart and carry you. That's not a
winning formula throughout a season. If you hit play action,
you get him on the move, you run the ball,
which this system is going to do, it will work
like he can be a top fifteen quarterback. So to me,
it's more of a value proposition than I like love
(51:49):
the team. A lot of people say that there are
two ways to build a Super Bowl contending team, the
young quarterback on his rookie contract with the stack team,
or a great defense with good quarterback play. What's your
thoughts on good quarterbacks like to a Dac and Cousins.
Then draft high end wide receiver and keep the offense
young and fresh. Never pay a running back because it's
(52:10):
more common than not after four years, you let them
walk with college producing consistently good skilled positions and seems
like you can get them all the way into the
third round. If you stuck to the plan, you'd never
get the awkwardness that forty nine ers are dealing with,
or the risk of paying a running back and getting
injured quickly after paying him a high contract. Well, here's
(52:32):
the problem with what you just said is you assume
you hit on draft picks. So it's like, just let
him go and draft a guy. Okay, Well draft a
guy like the Niners. Did I think they were like, Okay,
you might not sign this contract. Let's draft this dude
in the first round, Ricky Piersoll from Florida. Then he's
been hurt in OTA's in training game. So I'm supposed
(52:52):
to play real games when I don't even know this
guy can stay healthy. I'm just using the Niners example
because I just know like the detail of their they
drafted a running back really high, already injured. So you
can be like, oh, just let this guy walk. Draft
these guys. Teams do that all the time. Just draft
this guy, Okay, I hear you. Well, okay, we'll just
(53:13):
draft this guy in the third round. Well draft this
guy in the second round. Well does that guy Bobby
Wagner or Fred Warner or does that guy just turn
into a special teamers, average practice squad guy. Because when
you draft him, you're like, I really like him, hell yeah,
and then all of a sudden the games start and
you're like, this guy's not very good. I mean, it
(53:34):
happens all the time. That's why teams, once you have
a player who is good, usually pays them because there
is no guarantee. And I love the draft as much
as anyone, but just because you got I give you
three second round picks. If I gave you three second
round picks, whoever your team is, you play this season out,
(53:58):
you go like, shit, we got a couple guys we
don't we don't want to pay a running back let
him walk. Let's say we got Saquon and we got
some corner, let them walk, and we'll draft a corner
and a running back in the second round. What if
that guy's not any good. You're gonna think he's good
when you draft him, but then you actually have to
play in the NFL. So it's it's it's it's more
(54:21):
complicated than it sounds. It's so easy to talk, like
in theory, every professor thinks they're a genius on the
board in the classroom, it's like yeah. In reality, like yeah,
in theory, the supply demand, uh, you know, inflation all.
Then there's the real world, like no one's buying our products. Like,
(54:41):
what are we supposed to do? We did all, took
all the steps, followed all the textbooks. It ain't working. Hey,
let this guy walk. Use your second round pick on
a on a linebacker fill his role. Okay, we'll draft
this dude from Florida State or from Texas or wherever.
Then midway through training camp you're like, uh, you can't
(55:02):
really understand our defense. He doesn't know where he's going.
But hey, he was dominating against Oklahoma and Nole Miss.
It's just it's more difficult than that. Now, I hear
what you're saying. It's why it's hard. I would say,
in football, just like any business, to have like heart
set rules like no matter what, we will let this
(55:23):
guy go, no matter what, we won't pay this position.
And then you get Christian McCaffrey, or you get Alvin Kamara,
or you get whatever you name the position. Most teams,
like I don't love paying middle linebackers. I hear that
all the time. Well, have you ever played with Roquan
Smith on your defense? You had Fred Warner or Luke
(55:44):
Keigley on your defense, because put those guys in your defense,
see like, yeah, I just we'll let that guy walk.
We'll just draft a guy. It's just not gonna happen.
So I hear what you're saying, and I do understand
because it's easy to goo. Well, you haven't been winning
shit with Ceedee Lamb anyway, and Jared'd be like, well,
(56:06):
we're winning twelve regular season games, we can't win any
playoff games. But okay, so let's get rid of CD
because we haven't got over the hump. I'm just giving
a hypothetical trade them right now. Have some team give
you a couple ones. I mean, are you winning eight
games in the regular season. We don't wuldn't even give
ourselves a chance. You're like, well, use those picks, and
(56:28):
you're just trying to draft another wide receiver. That's the thing.
It's like, Okay, let's say the forty nine Ers trade
brand Iyuke this weekend. They just trade them, they would
need another wide receiver in the draft. Next year, they
would draft another guy who they'd be hoping to be
Brandon Ayuk. No different if you trade CD Lamb, I
(56:49):
know they're not going to or Jamar Chase or anything.
You just be trying to find another guy like that,
and there's no guarantee you can. So even if you
draft another ye receiver who knows the volume mhm
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Speaker 1 (01:29):
What is going on? Everybody? John Middlecoff three and Out podcast.
Hopefully everyone's doing well on this food Gaza Friday. You
had a good week, You got a smile on your face.
The weekend is here or right around the corner, or
maybe not. Maybe you work weekends and you had a
good week growing around. But I just watched the first
(01:50):
half of the Eagle Patriot game. The Eagles, I mean,
don't really play anybody, so there's not much to take
away there. Something jumped out to me with the Patriots
and their core situation that just has me shaking my head.
The Atlanta Falcons, I think, are in a pretty unique
situation in terms of the pressure on the team for
someone that just has a first year head coach, right
(02:13):
or you know he's coached before, but you know what
I mean, this is his first year with the team.
I saw Mike Greenberg was on with McAfee and made
a comment about Jerry Jones and the Cowboys spending over
the last decade. I honestly couldn't believe it when I
heard it, but then I did a little digging and
it's pretty eye opening. And it's something I always say,
(02:35):
I judge you not by words, but by actions in life.
And I think this is something that probably doesn't get
talked about enough. And I think there's a narrative with
the Cowboys and how much money they have and how
much they would spend if a cap didn't exist, And
I wonder if that's really a giant fugazi because it's
not actually true by the way they operate. And I'll
(02:57):
hit you with a fugazi Friday as well as the
middle Cooff mail bag at John Middlecoff is the Instagram
fire in those dms, get your questions answered here on
the show and uh yeah. The plan next week, I'm
gonna do something with Colin on Sunday and then I
think put it out before we're gonna record before the
(03:18):
games Sunday night, there's bo Nick starting against the Packers,
So Nick Jordan Love Niners play the Saints not quite
sure how many starters for the Niners are gonna play,
but I would imagine the Saints play their starters a
little bit, especially because it didn't join practice. So I'll
probably do a podcast after that and react to whatever
we see in those two games. So yeah, and you
(03:40):
guys can keep firing in those dms. We'll do mail
bags next week as well, so at John Middlecoff subscribe
to the podcast if you listen on Collins. Also, everything
we do is up on the YouTube channels to go
check that out. And yeah, we got We had podcasts
all week, so if you missed any, we just go
to the feed press play. But before we dive into
(04:02):
some football, you know, I got to tell you about
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(04:22):
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(05:07):
I think when you look at the preseason, it's changed dramatically.
A small percentage of teams play starting players, even though
they have a new offensive coordinator and new terminology. I'm
sure I don't have a problem with the Eagles not
rolling out Lane Johnson, Jalen Hurt, Saquon AJ Brown, DeVante
Smith totally get it. Not what Andy Reid or Belichick
(05:32):
or some of these other coaches do with veteran players,
but that's been their philosophy. I'm not gonna argue against it.
So there wasn't much to take away from Philly Kenny Pickett,
who I actually think, I mean, he was all over
the place in this game, playing with backup random linemen,
kind of running for his life. I think that's an
upgrade from what they had last year with Marcus Mariota.
(05:54):
But at the end of the day, your backup quarterback,
when you're paying your starting quarterback of premium, ideally doesn't
factor in much throughout the season. So the Eagle season
is gonna go, assuming their defense is gonna be better
with Fangio, which it will be. How Jalen plays and
how the offense plays, so we won't know really how
(06:14):
that is until we get to regular season games and
their first one Friday Night in Brazil against the Backers.
When you look at the Patriots, Jacoby Brissett is thirty
one years old. He started forty eight games in his
career forty eight games, so I mean that's several seasons
worth of starting. He's also backed up players like Tom Brady,
so he's a lot of experience in the regular season
(06:38):
and in the preseason. And this is a team who
even they know isn't gonna be that good this year.
That's why they just traded one of their better players.
You could argue their most talented player, though he's a
little older. They got rid of them. Why they're resetting
their deck. To me, starting Jacoby Brissette and playing him
in preseason games, especially for three series, is laughable. I mean,
(07:03):
what are you doing. He does not need the reps.
It's like, we're getting ready for the season to do
what win three games? And he looked like Jacoby looked
through an awful pick in the red zone that hit
the DV Maddox in the hands. I mean, just a
terrible pick. Got news for you? Jacoby turns the ball over.
(07:23):
This is a time when you have this project quarterback
in Drake may who played six snaps in the first
season game through three passes. How is he not playing
at minimum a half? Why wouldn't you play him the
whole game? I don't need to see Bailey's appy play.
(07:45):
We've seen that the previous couple years. This time of
the year, for a guy who ideally you don't even
want to play in the regular season, get him reps,
let him sink or swim to start to play Jacoby Brissette.
To me, the Patriots are taking a lot of shit.
A lot of people think they don't know what they're doing,
(08:07):
and that the head coach, and now that the crafts
have a very very strong hand in what's going on,
they're about to get really humbled. And you'd be like John,
they suck last year with Pelichick. I'm not acting like
it's been going well, but to roll out Jacoby Brissett
like he needs these reps, Like I'm sorry, start the
(08:27):
regular season, just let them roll. But shouldn't this be
a time to get this young player who is your
future all the reps humanly possible, because once the regular
season starts, at least up until you bench Jacoby, which
feels inevitable, he's not taking any of those first team
reps deson chance. He's out with the scout team running
the opposing offenses scheme. That's what he'll be doing. That's
(08:53):
usually in the NFL what backup quarterbacks do. That doesn't
mean you can't work on your craft and everything, but
you you are not repping your own offense once you
go to team periods in the National Football League. So
and I saw Lewis Riddick tweeted this, like Jacoby's third
series put Drake may in the game. That's the whole
(09:17):
point of this. None of this matters. This is all
irrelevant in terms of score, in terms of individual plays,
but it does matter for the repetitions for younger players,
and it does matter for the growth of someone who
you invested a boatload into. The Giants were willing to
trade you a bunch other teams were interested in trading up.
(09:39):
You're like, no, which I support? You? Like this player?
He plays a position in which you need. They mentioned
on the broadcast when he scored on a keeper to
score that you know, obviously not comparing him to Tom Brady,
but you know one day, when this guy's a starting quarterback,
it will add an element to their quarterback that they
haven't really had over twenty five years. A mobile guy. Now,
(10:01):
there's more to playing quarterback than mobility. But let him
get out there. Let him rep it out with at
least like high end guys, even if they're not starters,
guys that you might see on a potential Sunday down
the road. Because it is inevitable. Jacoby were sett it's
gonna get bench this year. I would bet a lot
of money that that's gonna happen. And I would tend
(10:24):
to lean with it's gonna happen sooner than later, So
you're gonna throw this guy out without repping much once
the regular season starts up until that moment, in a
shitty situation, your offensive line sucks, your team's probably gonna
have a losing record, and you're not even giving him
starts in the preseason games. That don't mean shit because
you want to get what Jacoby a sweat. I don't
(10:48):
get it. I just do not understand it. And listen,
I'm out on the Patriots shortened the Patriots, just big picture,
not that I'm anti Drake may. He showed like ball
was a little wobbly. It looked like a lot going on.
Of course, I mean he fucking played six snaps a
week ago. This guy's not used to being on the
(11:08):
field with other teams in the National Football League, So
I don't get it. Makes no sense to me, and
I think this shows that you just see an operation
that feels a little bit over their head. Okay, let's
talk about the Atlanta Falcons, who are in a really,
really rare spot. Most times in the NFL. College football
is different because I can sign a big name coach,
(11:30):
they get paid a ton, and the expectations are super high.
Right the moment Brian Kelly goes down as you Lincoln
Riley to USC that type stuff happens Jim Harbaugh in Michigan,
the big name guys moved the needle, and you expect
to win, and you expect to win immediately. In the NFL,
when you take over a job, usually the team's terrible,
they've lost, and you kind of get an open runway
(11:52):
year one. If you win, it's all gravy. Remember Andy
Reid took over the Chiefs, they drafted number one, had
him in the playoffs. Next year. People were like, damn.
But for the most part, you're not expected to win
your one. Last year Jonathan Gannon and the Cardinals, everyone
thought they were gonna sucks. Why Dave Ball got so
much credit. You're like, this team's honey good takes in
the playoffs. But this year, for example the Patriots, if
(12:16):
Drod Mayo were to win five games, he'd get Coach
of the Year votes. If he wins two or three games,
no one with a brain is going he should have
done more. That team sucks, right, because usually when you
take over a new team, the team is any good
Callahan and Tennessee he wins eight to nine or nine
and eight, you'd be like, that's a pretty good job.
(12:37):
But that's not the case in Atlanta. And I understand
position coaches and coordinators ambition to move up. It's very
lucrative going from the quarterback coach the coordinator doubles your salary.
And while you're making a lot of money, let's say
eight hundred grand is a quarterback coach, it's a lot
different making one point seventy five million dollars a year.
(12:58):
Just like if you're making two million dollars a defense
coordinator for the Rams, it's a lot different making nine
million dollars as the head coach. So I get it
in money and power. Given that you don't have to
take orders from anybody. You are the boss. You dictate
everything football wise in your organization. How we play, what
schemes we run, when we practice, who you want to practice,
(13:20):
who you want to play. It's it's a lot different.
You're no longer you know you're the top guy in
the organization chart when it comes to the football team.
The GM doesn't dictate the lineup, dictate, doesn't dictate practice,
doesn't dictate the schemes. That's not the way it works.
He doesn't even know the playbook most of the time.
So I get guys wanting to do that, and usually
you get all this money and you get a chance
(13:42):
to take a deep breath. If the Atlanta Falcons don't
make the playoffs this year, Raheem Morris head coach, hasn't
been won in a long time, where he kind of
flamed out in Tampa. Obviously older, more mature. Now it
is going to be viewed as a major failure. They
just traded a third round pick for Matt Judah, which
is the type of move you do around the trade
(14:02):
deadline because you think you're a Super Bowl contender. Now,
they made that trade deadline super Bowl contender move in
the middle of August, which I'm not against, but you
better be good because that those second day picks are
pretty valuable. And they also signed Justin Simmons, multiple time
Pro Bowler, former Denver bronco today to like seven and
a half million dollars. All guarantee. You do those type
(14:23):
moves when you think you're gonna be good, and I'm
telling you they think they're gonna be good. The betting markets.
Everyone's betting on them to win the division and be
a playoff team, which is fine, but based on previous history,
like they've been pretty average the last three years. Last
year was a big embarrassment, and you might just say, well,
their quarterback play sucked. Maybe it's just maybe that's it's
(14:44):
just that deep. It was just their quarterback play. But
there is tangible pressure on this team to make the
playoffs this year. Anything less, you don't have to win
the division, but you better be playing a game on
wild card weekend. If you were not, it just is
a failure. And that can't usually be said about first
(15:04):
year head coaching situations, so it's kind of unique. And listen,
Runnie Morris backed it up with saying, we have a
massive coaching staff. They're like why, because we're grooming people
to take over jobs when we win and they get plucked.
Usually people don't talk like that, And I got no
problem talking to talk if you're walking the walk. But
I'm interested to watch this team play. They definitely have
(15:27):
some talent, but we'll see that better come through or
it's gonna be problems. The other day I was at
(15:47):
the gym. I look up and they had McAfee on
and Mike Greenberg was on her and he was random
raven but it obviously it's just one of the big TVs.
I didn't hear what he said. Then I get home
and I scroll on Instagram and I see the clip
and I watched it, and Greenberg kind of went on
this rant that about Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys,
(16:09):
and he said, listen, no one can argue Jerry's fame,
his impact on the league for marketing, and how powerful
the Cowboys are as a brand, and the size of
their fan base. But it cannot be argued. It is
just objectively true. It's a fact that the Cowboys are
(16:29):
financially cheap when it comes to paying players. I was like, damn,
he's like, no team over the last eight to ten
years has spent more actual cash on players than the
Dallas Cowboys. Seriously, So this morning I went and I
googled it and I was reading about it because you know,
in football, the salary cap one hundred million, two hundred million,
(16:50):
two hundred fifty million. You can spend more actual cash
than the salary cap. I get front load contracts, I
can pay you huge signing bonuses and then it goes
on books as I amortized it over the life of
the deal, so you can and Jake Rosenberg, who was
on my podcast, discuss this. If your owner is all in,
(17:10):
you can manipulate the salary cap with actual money, actual money,
and turns out the Cowboys don't do that at all.
From twenty sixteen to twenty nineteen, the league average in
cash spending over sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen for four seasons
was seven hundred and four million dollars. The Cowboys were
(17:32):
dead last with six hundred and thirty four point four
million dollars over the last three seasons twenty one, twenty two,
and twenty three, and the Cowboys have been good. Dallas
was thirtieth in the NFL. The league average was six
hundred and twenty seven million dollars. The Cowboys spent almost
eight ninety million dollars less, with five hundred and thirty
(17:53):
four million. To put it in perspective two teams. They're
obviously the big rival in the Eagles and a team
that they've played twice in the playoffs. The Eagles were
tenth most cash spending at six hundred and fifty five million,
so spend eighty million dollars more. The Niners were six
hundred and sixty four million, seventh in the league. And
(18:14):
I started thinking, you know, Dabbo takes a lot of
shit because in his heyday, which wasn't that long ago,
and Clemson was kicking everybody's ass, transfer portal didn't exist,
and he had to draft in develop players, and he
recruited like he was Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Ohio State, and
he had teams full of NFL players and they won
(18:35):
national championships. And then the world changed and the transfer
portal happened, and you could sign a guy from another
school who'd already played, and you didn't have to sit out.
And all the best teams now dabbling that now they
don't take Deon Sanders forty transfers. But what Ohio State
(18:56):
this year do? This year they took the starting safety
from Alabama who look like a future top fifteen pick.
What did Alabama do a couple of years ago? They
took this guy, James and Williams from Ohio State because
he couldn't crack the lineup becausey had so many sweet
wide receivers. And then they just plugged a hole here
plugged the hole there, and Clemson has fallen behind. And
I started to think that Jerry. When Jerry became really famous,
(19:20):
right when he buys a team in eighty nine. Within
the next less than ten years, he's got three Super
Bowl rings, he has a household name in sports. He's
a famous rich guy. There are a lot of rich
people that you've never heard of. There are a lot
of people, not a lot, but there are people you know,
(19:43):
definitely in the nineties that had way more money than
Jerry Jones, and you couldn't point out of a lineup.
And I wonder if back in the nineties, and this
goes back to the rules in the NFL of why
you need to put money into escrow because way back
in the day, they wanted to prove that if you
were going to sign this contract you actually had the money.
That's a stupid, outdated, archaic practice. We know teams have
(20:05):
the money now, but Jerry's in this mindset of like,
I don't want to rob Peter to pay Paul because
in the nineties that would have been very, very risky. Obviously,
the salary cap got created what ninety three to ninety four,
Jerry hasn't changed his tactics. Obviously, Jerry pays his own guys,
but he made the comment we're all in, and he's
(20:26):
taken a lot of shit. Jerry's not all in because
to compete in this modern day NFL, you can use
cash to your advantage. The Dallas Cowboys were just valued
at ten billion dollars. Jerry is worth. I mean, I
can't even imagine how much cash that guy has in
the bank, how much money the Cowboys generate on a
(20:47):
yearly basis, and he's not using it to his advantage.
Part of having a successful business is reinvesting into that
business to keep growing it. And I do think it's
fair after looking at some of these numbers to go.
So the Cowboys have fallen behind, and it's not because
they don't have the resources. They have the cash. Whether
it's Jerry's old school mindset or it's just his unwillingness
(21:10):
to part with some of his money and up upfront
bonuses to certain players. But that's embarrassing. That should not happen.
They should be near the top in cash spending forever.
All we've ever heard. If there was and shit, I'm
guilty of this. If there was no salary cap, Jerry
(21:33):
would buy all the players. Then you look at the
data and you go, yeah, I don't know if that's true.
I don't I think Jeffrey Lurie would be much more
inclined to buy the players. The Cleveland Browns and New
York Jets were one and two over the last three
years in cash spending. You'd argue those two teams would
(21:53):
be much more willing to cut enormous amounts of cash
to players. I don't know if Jerry would because you
and this is what I think, so many people are
so phony in politics and living in California for so long,
like everyone talks a big game. I don't give a
shit what you say or what you post. I judge
you on how you act, so you can talk one way.
If you're living a different way, I think you're a fraud.
(22:16):
I think you're a complete phony. And Jerry has this
kind of way that we judge him and look at
him of like just this gun slinger throwing around his coins.
He's just paying this guy, paying that guy making shit happen.
Turns out no, he's not really, And a lot of
other owners are spending way more actual cash. Salary cap
(22:36):
can be whatever the contracts can be whatever, say it
all the time. Average per years can be super high.
Everyone's like average per year, how about this average per you?
I don't give a shit. How much money do you
actually have to pay the player? You can say, hey, John,
you know it's I hear you're making X per year.
It's like, well, I've actually only received this, so what
(23:00):
what does that mean? And I get why agents love
saying that I got my guy twenty seven million a year.
It's like, yeah, signing bonus was ten million dollars, and
the guarantees are not very high. If he does not produce,
they can cut them after a year. I just thought
looking at these numbers was pretty crazy. And I don't
know if Jerry's legitimately actually cheap, which I think is
(23:22):
fair to say after looking at these numbers. Stuck in
this old school practice of this mindset, Like when he
bought the Cowboys, he didn't have much money. Hard to
say that, because he's got hundreds of millions of dollars
put into a yacht, so he's not afraid to spend it.
He flies around a helicopter and I'm pro Jerry Jones,
but he ain't spending money like these other guys when
it comes to his team. I saw ESPN fired RG three.
(23:47):
I found RG three pretty annoying. I also Sam Ponder
got fired as well. I read she made seven million
dollars or excuse me, seven figures, so she made over
a million dollars to host and the NFL show in
the morning. That seems crazy to me. I mean, who
is signing these contracts for? And I'm not anti Sam Ponder,
(24:08):
but like what I thought, RG three was making seven
figures too. It's like, who is giving out this money?
These people don't work in jobs to generate revenue. You
could replace them with someone else and no one would notice.
Like I get why you pay Tom Brady or Troykman.
You feel comfortable their name. But for the most part,
people that call games, they can be replaced. If Penn
(24:29):
State's playing Michigan, regardless who's calling the game, I mean,
obviously it can't be terrible. But when it's a guy
of like RG three's level, like no one cares he's
calling college football games. He's last whatever three or four years,
It's like you can replace them with whoever. No one
would notice. Some of these people running some of these
operations are fucking morons and last but not at least,
(24:52):
Fugazi Friday. It kind of hit me the other day
I I don't think there's a service that you can
pay for that I don't pay for from obviously you know,
YouTube TV, to Netflix, to all the hits, the Amazon Primes,
Apple TV. But then the paramount plus is the max
(25:13):
is of the Hulus, the Peacocks. I mean, shit, I
got it all that there is not a streaming service
that has content that your boy doesn't have a credit
card information on file for. And it kind of hit
me the other day. I was like, laying in bed,
probably nine to nine thirty, we're looking for something to watch.
(25:33):
I'm like, there is never in the history of my life,
my time on this planet, and I've watched a lot
of television in my life, a lot of movies, a
lot of shows, especially at night. I'm like, I can't
find anything to watch. How can I pay? Who knows?
It's like I'm not doing the books on a monthly
basis on what I'm paying, but it's my guests would
(25:55):
be I don't know, three four hundred dollars. Couldn't find
anything to watch? Now, there is stuff to watch. It's like,
I don't really want to watch that. I don't really
want to watch that, And I think back to simpler times.
Let's just go fifteen years ago and listen. Cable was
screwing us, not necessarily me, because the bundle for me
made sense. I've watched a lot of sports, both screwing
a lot of people that didn't watch sports were getting
(26:17):
just railroaded. So I have no sympathy for that thing
just disintegrating. But in two thousand, let's just pick a
year two thousand and seven, you would just sit on
your couch or sit at your house on a night
but there's like no sports on or whatever, and just
find something to watch. There'd be a movie. They ah,
(26:38):
they're forty five minutes in a shaw Shank for all.
Old School is on for damn. I love Sean Connery
and the Rock and you just watched like forty five
minutes of it. I've said this before, but like the
one negative with YouTube TV, who I'm a huge fan
of and love it a lot, you don't scroll, so
I would never just see there's some movie play on
(27:00):
a station, right. I don't run into Shashank anymore if
I want to watch Shashank, I have to go seek
it out because YouTube is so genius. It knows like
the five channels I watch, it's just you know ESPN,
if a game's on golf channel CNBC, and then during
(27:21):
football season just the football games or you know, during
I guess the NBA finals whatever. It just it aggregates
that for me, I rarely have to go far. In
Food Network, I don't even have to go that far.
I just see what I'm gonna watch and I click it.
I never scroll, And I was always old school, like
I used to like the guide and see what was on.
(27:43):
But there's not really any need to do that any
And I think, and obviously when a good show comes out,
that Presumed Innocence show that was on Apple TV that
was entertaining. I watched the show last night on Peacock,
like The Biker Gang. I think how Hardy was in it.
It was kind of entertaining. I fell asleep halfway through.
(28:03):
It wasn't that great really, but it's just like you
really sometimes got a force like I guess I'll try
this out. It's like I couldn't have more options. I
have about seventeen apps on the home screen just provide
me with unlimited content. Yet when I'm looking, if there's
not like a super hot or popular television show or
(28:24):
like some documentary that everyone's talking about, you just keep
scrolling and I don't really want watch that. I don't
really want to watch that, you know, scroll that, like,
how is this possible? How is this possible? And yet
it is? Okay, Let's do a little Fugazi Friday mailbag
(28:52):
at John middlecop Instagram. Fire into those dms. Big fan
of the show, watching on the tube YouTube for a while.
As a diehard Eagles fan, I feel like we are
honestly in a bad spot coaching wise. Fangio and Kellen
Moore both obviously have long term head coaching aspirations, and
(29:14):
if we have an eight to ten eight out of
ten season, as in we lose in the divisional or
NFC title game, I think losing in the NFC title
game is better than eight out of ten. It's obviously
not a ten out of ten. If winning the Super
Bowl is an eleven out of ten, Megan to the
Super Bowl is probably nine and a half. I'd say
(29:35):
Megan to the NFC Championship Game at minimum is eight
and a half. Nine as someone who worked there and
assuming a decent season and not a total collapse, when
obviously Sirianni would be canned. How do you think the
best way to handle head coaching position is going forward?
Do you think we have a standout offense this year
(29:56):
there's any chance Larry would evaluate Kellen Moore and get
rid of Sirianni or with Fangio if the defense is elite.
One thing you said about Fangio having head coaching aspirations, like,
I think those days are done. I think Fangio and
head coaching that shit sailed. He got a shot a
little later in life and it didn't even come remotely
(30:19):
close to working. That Fangio's never going to be another
head coach in the NFL. I feel pretty confidence saying that,
And I'm a Vic Fangio guy. I think excellent higher
for you guys, But I don't think you have to
worry about him. I think the question mark is the
head coach and the offensive coordinator. And if the offensive
coordinator has a lot of success with Jalen with the offense,
(30:41):
they're explosive. Spend a lot of money on these cats.
It's a pretty natural transition. If they feel comfortable with
him kind of leading the group right, which they'd have
to I guess project a little bit, but I would
say that he would have a strong chance. And I
was texting with someone the other night, a buddy of mine,
about hard knocks and maybe I mentioned this also on
(31:03):
a previous mailbag. But who would I hire? Like if
I was just needed a coach this offseason, based on
what we know right now, I think I'd hire Mike Vrabel.
I'd hire Vrabel over Belichick in the sense of he's
just way younger and I'm a Belichick supporter, and people
(31:24):
that act like he's the village idiot now I think
are complete morons. But it is going to be twenty
twenty five. The guy got in the league in nineteen
seventy five, So I would lean Rabel if the hard
Bob Rose, if Tomlin, Dan Campbell, like, I'm pretty confident
Vrabel can be a good head coach. Obviously, in a
(31:45):
perfect world, you know you hired the next McVeigh Shanahan,
But I don't know. I mean, Ben Johnson seems terrified
to be a head coach. How could I hire that guy?
Play scared? I dare you to take that charger's bet
you'll lose your money. They have zero weapons. I love
(32:06):
it when someone threatens you, when you publicly say you're
gonna make a bet, like I dare you to take
that bet. Like guys, I've been gambling for I don't know,
almost twenty five years if you count sneak it into
the Indian casino when I was like fifteen sixteen years old.
Been gambling on sports now for fifteen plus. You lose bets,
(32:29):
you know, it's part of the deal. It's part of
the fun. Get your juices flown. You don't win them all. Hell,
you're a legend if you hit like fifty five percent
of your sports betting. So yeah, I could bet, could
lose the money, also could win it. It's part of
why you gamble. I think there's nothing stupider than that one,
Like I dare you to do that. No, I'm gonna
(32:50):
do it where I was until Herbert got hurt. Now
it kind of freaked me out. But like you have
understand when you gamble, you're not afraid to lose the money.
Part of gambling. If I didn't want to lose the money,
I wouldn't gamble it. I know, you're a fan of
betting on season wins or division winners, I might change
my tune. I think I'm gonna do it this year.
(33:12):
I got a couple that I'm looking at. The Bills,
the Saints, and those Fresno State Bulldogs. Also tempted to
dabble a little on Oregon to win the Natty. I
kind of want to have a long term team to
win the Natty, but I don't know. I haven't decided
on that one. There seems to be a lot of
(33:33):
juice in a lot of these odds. Compared to the
MVPER Comeback Player of the Year, A lot of winners
of the award never seem very chalky either. Even parlaying
the team to make the playoffs with the Coach of
the Year seems like a worthwhile long bet. For example,
Doug Peterson winning Coach of the Year doesn't seem like
(33:54):
a stretch. Parlay it with the Jags to make the
playoffs and it would turn fifty dollars into eight grand. Thanks.
If you ever land in New Zealand, you will love
to Tasmania. Plenty of top links golf courses here. Yeah,
with shit love links golf. I do think it's difficult, right,
(34:15):
Like think about last year who won Coach of the
Year Stefanski, Well they didn't win the division. Who won
it the year before. I know what you're saying, and
I trust me. No one loves a fifty dollars bet
to win eight grand like your boy. I couldn't bet
on golf, just like get super aggressive. So I put
one hundred and fifty dollars and I did two fifty
(34:38):
dollars parlays, or actually I think a seventy five dollars,
a twenty five dollars and a fifty dollars parlay. One
was nineteen K, one was twelve K, and one was
a K. I need Maxiholm, but to play well this weekend.
I wouldn't mind Tommy Fleetwood winning either or more Kyle
will Get and Billy Horseell top tens in top twenties.
But I think it's it sounds a lot easier with
(35:00):
that strategy than it actually working, because when you just
look at the last two winners, Stayble and Stefanski, they
didn't even come close to winning their division. I mean
a couple of years ago the Giants day ball was
the right choice. How many games did the Eagles. What
was the difference? What were they nine and eight? Would
the Eagles go like, were they fourteen and three that year?
(35:21):
Talking about five game difference? So I hear you, and
it sounds great when you say it out loud, and
it sounds even better. You go to DraftKings and you
type in the two, You're like, holy shit, fifty to
win eight g's And then they're like, what's the likelihood
of this happening? It's just not very high. Multi year listener,
longtime fan, got a question that might stir up the listeners.
(35:46):
I go on Twitter and everyone acts this is about CJ.
Stroud like it's a no brainer. He's throwing five thousand
yards and fifty tds. Le Let me remind you he
had twenty three touchdowns last year and five in one game.
Let's throw in the five to ten percent chance that
Diggs ruins chemistry. I know we like the player and
(36:08):
love the coach, but can we damper the expectations for
this guy? They bolstered the run game with mixing and
won't have to be in shootouts. How do these outrageous
predictions make you feel? It's a good question. I I
think Tank dell is I put his over under on touchdowns,
(36:28):
assuming he plays seventeen games at like thirty. But I'm
with you people acting like it's gonna be fifty. The
other thing is Dimiko has said I've seen him say
this multiple times. Digs will not ruin our chemistry, AKA
it gets weird. We will cut him like there is
no rope here that there is no margin for. Yeah, well,
(36:51):
just he's having a rough rough week here with the boys.
That ain't gonna fly. It ain't gonna fly with Demiko,
and it's not gonna fly with Casserio. They took relatively
low risked situation, but I do not envision them letting
him cause problems now, it's part of taking him in.
He gets emotional. I will say this about Diggs. For
(37:15):
an emotional player that a lot of people think is
kind of crazy, he has been a winning player. He
was part of winners. He won in Minnesota, he won
in Buffalo as one of the better players on the team.
So sometimes you get these guys that have this negative
kind of just aura as I think the kids are
(37:35):
saying that this negative reputation and they're from they're just
losers because they've been around losing and they just that's
who they are. This guy's kind of a winner. Not
Super Bowl championships, but like, this guy's going to the
playoffs every single This guy's playing in a ton of
big games. I went to the Niners Vikings playoff game
in two thousand and what year was that twenty twenty.
(37:58):
First drive of the game passed the digs PI digg digs,
touchdown digs only points they scored all game. It was
like bang bang boom. It's like, ugh, how are the
Niners gonn cover this guy? He's I I wouldn't worry
as much about him because one, I think he's either
(38:19):
got to shape in it or he shapes out. There's
no begging him to stay. You know why they don't
need him? Tank Dell, dudes, the star, Nico Collins like
six three two twenty baller mail back hot take. Trent
Williams shouldn't be given a new contract. He was a
liability in the Super Bowl and his age has shown. Uh.
(38:41):
I will say this, he kind of has the Niners
by the balls end of the day. They don't need Ayuk.
I mean they want Ayuk. He helps them. He's a
really good player. But if push came to shove, they
could trade him. They can't do that with Trent Williams.
Even if Trent Williams isn't quite what he once was,
(39:01):
he is so much better then you can combine all
their offensive lineman. He's not as good as that guy.
I just think he's got him in a weird spot now.
Like you said, he's a little older. He had a
bad game. He also had a lot of great games.
So you don't judge a man on the one game.
I think what concerns one. I've heard he's asking for
(39:25):
a lot of money, as he should. I mean, if
I'm him, I want like at minimum these next year,
like two years, sixty million dollars all guaranteed. Whether we
just add more guaranteed to the money guarantee at all,
but like that's what I would need. What are they
gonna say? No, who you gonna play with? Jalen Moore?
What are you gonna do? That's where he really has
(39:47):
him by the balls. So you just say no, and
then you just hope. This is the hard part for
the Niners. They could just drive a hard bargain on
both guys. You know what, Brandon, you gonna play on
fourteen million dollar contract, fifth year option. You know what, Trent,
you're gonna play on your twenty million dollar contract. Name
me a human being behind Leveon Bell in the history
(40:08):
of the world. Maybe Dave Chappelle, whoever gives up a
combined thirty four million dollars, it wouldn't happen. But you
get angry guys who are two of your best players.
So this is just it's it's a complicated situation. You know,
it really is a question for the dog Pound. Do
(40:31):
you think Deshaun Watson has motivation anymore? Would love for
Stefanski to have a legit quarterback in his system. Also,
if you're ever in Virginia Beach, let's get a round in.
You know, there's something special about just people saying, hey,
if you're ever here, play golf. More than likely I
might never be there, and if I was, I probably
(40:51):
wouldn't remember the DM that I read during the mailbag.
But there's there's such a community aspect, like, Hey, come
to Arizon almost play some golf. Hey you're coming to
I had a guy reach out, Hey, you're gonna be
in Nashville in a couple of weeks, hit me up.
Let's play golf. You know, I know, we got a
bunch of wedding shit to do, but I'm gonna play
three rounds cause your boys already sneaking one in on Wednesday.
(41:16):
This is a picture. It's like someone with pebble beach.
Long time listener, I have a golf mailbag question. Thought
about hearing your open take about the tour playing more
link style golf. On the fourth of July, my buddy
and I played Chambers Bay. That's a course in Seattle area.
During our round, our caddie was saying that after the
(41:36):
twenty fifteen us opened, the USGA was upset with the
course and how tough it played. Chamber does not have
any major PGA events lined up for the next five
ish years. The tour could easily start playing a tournament
yearly there and give the fans TV audience a tough
link style course without super long travel or changing TV times. Plus,
(41:58):
it's downright gorgeous. He took me some pictures. Looks pretty awesome.
You know the problem. Let's use football as an example.
Do you think the Eagles? I was thinking about this
day in the shower, because whatever happens in the Eagles
Packers game, we're gonna have, you know, if the Packers
defense still looks crappy or something's off with Jalen, There're
(42:21):
gonna be a lot of takes flying from this podcast here.
But they're playing in Brazil, So is there a chance
that it is just really weird for one of the teams,
one of the players, some jet black whatever, just a
game in Brazil. But why are they playing in Brazil?
Because there is a governing body that is chosen by
(42:45):
the owners, starting with the Roger, who tries to do
things in the best interests of the business. So you
have cohesion from the top, even though no one's always
gonna agree. If I was on the Eagles or I
was on the Packers, the last thing in the fucking
world I'd want to do is to play a football
game in Brazil. I'd be like, this is so stupid.
(43:06):
Why couldn't we just play it? I don't know in Philadelphia,
But the league who ultimately is trying to make the
most money so the owners and the players profit, that's
all they care about. And you can say sometimes that's
not the right mindset to have, but it's the one
they have. Yet in golf, there is no cohesion. You
(43:29):
have all these independent contractors. Everyone complains, no one wants
to do this. Everyone bitches and moans about this course
is too hard. You know, we don't want to travel
to Europe to play the World Tour live, guys and all.
It's like we got too many cooks in the kitchen.
Say what you want about commissioners, and they take a
(43:49):
lot of heat. There's one guy making a decision. It
is everyone has a suggestion. It is much harder to
make a decision, and in golf, no one ever makes
a decision. Yeah, and all these other entities, you know,
in team sports, it's like, we're doing this whether it
works or not, but we're gonna try it out. The
Ncason Tournament, which everyone's circle jerked on Twitter. You couldn't
(44:12):
have paid me to watch, but at least they you
know what, we're gonna do this. We're all in. Everyone's
in and goes like, yeah, we'll try this. But then
now it doesn't really work, and this guy's pissed off,
and Tiger doesn't want to do this even though he
doesn't even play anymore and he's forty eight years old.
It's like, what's going on? They just feel like they're
lost at sea, and in twenty twenty five, you know
(44:35):
you don't want to get lost, cause you get lost,
might never see again. I will because I love it.
I was watching it today. But I'm not the minority,
or I'm not the majority. I'll promise you that much.
I'm a Titans fan. Sadly. I know it's early, but
if Will levis let's just say league average, and the
Titans end up with drafting the middle of the pack,
(44:57):
would you look at drafting another quarterback, which this would
be the third quarterback drafted by us in the first
three rounds in three years, or would you look at
drafting more help, whether it would be offense or defense.
I heard you say it'll be in Nashville at the
end of August. If you have time, I highly recommend
(45:17):
playing gay Lord Springs only ten minutes from the airport,
and it's a beautiful link Style seventy two, Part seventy two.
I think I'm playing with the guy in business at
Brentwood Country Club. At least that's the plan of right now.
I might only have time for one round because I
(45:38):
got other shit to do. Ideally like to get two in.
I played there before. Someone DM me their remember there,
but I played when I went out for a bachelor
party at a place called Legends. My brother's a member
at a truon course and made a call and I
pretended I was Sam and I played there. It was
a pretty sweet track. The thing with Levis, It's funny. I
(46:00):
in the game the other night Will Levis will not slide.
He won't slide, and Vrabel used to drive him nuts.
Then in the preseason game, he lowered his shoulder against
this guy named de Winners from TCUs like Drake Greenlaw
two point zero. Not as good as Drake green Law yet,
(46:21):
but just runs around tries to kill people. It's like,
will you are going to get injured slide, bro? Like
what are you doing that to me? Is the first thing, Like,
you cannot not slide in the NFL. This is not
the Mountain West, this hell in the SEC like this
(46:41):
is all these guys will break your clapical, they will
break your arm. That's my first thing. Second, I don't
think anyone in the building cares about Malik Willis being
drafted whatever he was third round a couple of years ago.
That's irrelevant. They took will Levis in the second run
this new GM did. But if he's not good enough,
(47:03):
he's not good enough, and he's gonna get obviously a
long lease this year. He's gonna be the full time starter.
They've added offensive weapons. How good are you or do
you show any progress? Do you have any you know future?
Like is it something to keep developing and keep working with?
(47:26):
But to me, if he's average, I think he'd be
done because this new coaching staff has zero connection to him.
Zero love the pod and watch every night to know
if certain, if you could have kept one team in
a certain location, who would you have chosen? Chargers, San Diego, Raiders,
(47:46):
Oakland Rams and Saint Louis. To me, it's a no brainer.
You needed a team in La the stadium suite hosting
Super Bowls. Saint Louis stole the Rams from Los Angeles.
That wasn't your team, Lois. Los Angeles got their team back,
so I'm putting the Rams in Los Angeles. Oakland couldn't
(48:07):
function any longer. They're the only team in my lifetime
who has lost three teams in like under five years.
And you can bitch and moan and give me all
these different reasons for every team I don't give a
shit if it was one team, I'd hear you all
three teams next year. A place when I you know,
(48:31):
was in radio. The Warriors played there, the A's played there,
the Raiders played there, and in twenty twenty five, none
of them will exist. The in and out down the
Street had to shut down. Why it's one of the
best businesses in all of California, because you get robbed NonStop.
That area is so shitty they had to go and
(48:51):
it's just it's not feasible. I would say Oakland, California,
would be one of the last places that have had
major sports teams that you would ever put a sports
team in in twenty twenty five. So I feel like
the Raiders in Vegas is a no brainer. Vegas is
a booming and that stadium is awesome. It changed their franchise.
(49:17):
Obviously they lost, you know, the home crowd, but financially
they couldn't function there and you couldn't function in the
area in which they were functioning. That Strip sixty six
in Hagenberger is just awful. I mean, it is an
absolute dump. So to me, it'd be the Chargers of
(49:39):
San Diego. But I don't think that that you know
people go, well, they ever go back. They're never going back.
They just spend hundreds of millions of dollars on this
new facility in southern California. They pay a dollar rent
with Kronkey. They're just never going back. First time, Mailbager,
(50:00):
you said you like the Saints to make the playoffs
this year, but are not a fan of Dennis Allen
or Derek Carr. Point at this point in time is
your career? What you're reasoning and trusting the Saints when
the two most important pieces of a franchise are a
big question mark. Well, Derek didn't play well. The first
half of last season. He played really really bad, And
the last half of the season, the last like five games,
(50:20):
he was really good. Well, this year he has an
offensive coordinator who's a real offensive coordinator and going to
run an offense that quarterbacks thrive in. In Clint Kobiek,
I don't like Dennis Allen a relative to like the
top head coaches. But he is a good defensive coordinator
and they went nine to eight last year. Their defense
(50:41):
is going to be solid. Their offense was an embarrassment. Well,
if their offense isn't an embarrassment, and they're good on
defense because Dennis is a good defensive coordinator. Couldn't they
be a ten to eleven win team. I just think
it's possible. Now. Part of the reason I like the
bet is the value. You can just get good odds,
Like there aren't good odds on the Atlanta Falcons winning
the division, and on paper you're like, ah, this team's
(51:04):
way better. It's true, but you just don't get very
good odds. I like the Saints simply because they went
nine to eight last year. They were literally a game
away from being in the playoffs, and the odds are
like they're more like a six to seven win team.
And to me, it's just Derek. You can't rely on
Derek to play like Tom Brady. If you're going to
(51:26):
try to have him throw forty times a game and
just pick you apart and carry you. That's not a
winning formula throughout a season. If you hit play action,
you get him on the move, you run the ball,
which this system is going to do, it will work
like he can be a top fifteen quarterback. So to me,
it's more of a value proposition than I like love
(51:49):
the team. A lot of people say that there are
two ways to build a Super Bowl contending team, the
young quarterback on his rookie contract with the stack team,
or a great defense with good quarterback play. What's your
thoughts on good quarterbacks like to a Dac and Cousins.
Then draft high end wide receiver and keep the offense
young and fresh. Never pay a running back because it's
(52:10):
more common than not after four years, you let them
walk with college producing consistently good skilled positions and seems
like you can get them all the way into the
third round. If you stuck to the plan, you'd never
get the awkwardness that forty nine ers are dealing with,
or the risk of paying a running back and getting
injured quickly after paying him a high contract. Well, here's
(52:32):
the problem with what you just said is you assume
you hit on draft picks. So it's like, just let
him go and draft a guy. Okay, Well draft a
guy like the Niners. Did I think they were like, Okay,
you might not sign this contract. Let's draft this dude
in the first round, Ricky Piersoll from Florida. Then he's
been hurt in OTA's in training game. So I'm supposed
(52:52):
to play real games when I don't even know this
guy can stay healthy. I'm just using the Niners example
because I just know like the detail of their they
drafted a running back really high, already injured. So you
can be like, oh, just let this guy walk. Draft
these guys. Teams do that all the time. Just draft
this guy, Okay, I hear you. Well, okay, we'll just
(53:13):
draft this guy in the third round. Well draft this
guy in the second round. Well does that guy Bobby
Wagner or Fred Warner or does that guy just turn
into a special teamers, average practice squad guy. Because when
you draft him, you're like, I really like him, hell yeah,
and then all of a sudden the games start and
you're like, this guy's not very good. I mean, it
(53:34):
happens all the time. That's why teams, once you have
a player who is good, usually pays them because there
is no guarantee. And I love the draft as much
as anyone, but just because you got I give you
three second round picks. If I gave you three second
round picks, whoever your team is, you play this season out,
(53:58):
you go like, shit, we got a couple guys we
don't we don't want to pay a running back let
him walk. Let's say we got Saquon and we got
some corner, let them walk, and we'll draft a corner
and a running back in the second round. What if
that guy's not any good. You're gonna think he's good
when you draft him, but then you actually have to
play in the NFL. So it's it's it's it's more
(54:21):
complicated than it sounds. It's so easy to talk, like
in theory, every professor thinks they're a genius on the
board in the classroom, it's like yeah. In reality, like yeah,
in theory, the supply demand, uh, you know, inflation all.
Then there's the real world, like no one's buying our products. Like,
(54:41):
what are we supposed to do? We did all, took
all the steps, followed all the textbooks. It ain't working. Hey,
let this guy walk. Use your second round pick on
a on a linebacker fill his role. Okay, we'll draft
this dude from Florida State or from Texas or wherever.
Then midway through training camp you're like, uh, you can't
(55:02):
really understand our defense. He doesn't know where he's going.
But hey, he was dominating against Oklahoma and Nole Miss.
It's just it's more difficult than that. Now, I hear
what you're saying. It's why it's hard. I would say,
in football, just like any business, to have like heart
set rules like no matter what, we will let this
(55:23):
guy go, no matter what, we won't pay this position.
And then you get Christian McCaffrey, or you get Alvin Kamara,
or you get whatever you name the position. Most teams,
like I don't love paying middle linebackers. I hear that
all the time. Well, have you ever played with Roquan
Smith on your defense? You had Fred Warner or Luke
(55:44):
Keigley on your defense, because put those guys in your defense,
see like, yeah, I just we'll let that guy walk.
We'll just draft a guy. It's just not gonna happen.
So I hear what you're saying, and I do understand
because it's easy to goo. Well, you haven't been winning
shit with Ceedee Lamb anyway, and Jared'd be like, well,
(56:06):
we're winning twelve regular season games, we can't win any
playoff games. But okay, so let's get rid of CD
because we haven't got over the hump. I'm just giving
a hypothetical trade them right now. Have some team give
you a couple ones. I mean, are you winning eight
games in the regular season. We don't wuldn't even give
ourselves a chance. You're like, well, use those picks, and
(56:28):
you're just trying to draft another wide receiver. That's the thing.
It's like, Okay, let's say the forty nine Ers trade
brand Iyuke this weekend. They just trade them, they would
need another wide receiver in the draft. Next year, they
would draft another guy who they'd be hoping to be
Brandon Ayuk. No different if you trade CD Lamb, I
(56:49):
know they're not going to or Jamar Chase or anything.
You just be trying to find another guy like that,
and there's no guarantee you can. So even if you
draft another ye receiver who knows the volume mhm
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