October 16, 2020 • 41 mins
-It's not Brady vs Rodgers, it's all about Rodgers vs the Buccaneers defense
-The Browns are hiding Baker Mayfield
-CP3 to the Lakers would be a great move for LeBron
-What can Ty Lue really change with the Clippers?
Guests: Albert Breer, The MMQB
Jimmy Johnson, 2x Super Bowl Champion & Pro Football Hall of Famer
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the Best of Herd podcast. Be
sure to catch us live every weekday from twelve to
three eastern, nine to noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio
and FS one. Find your local station for The Herd
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is the Best of the Herd with Colin Cowherd on
Fox Sports Radio. Ah here we go on a Friday
(00:26):
that will include Hall of Fame coach Jimmy Johnson and
Blazing five live in Los Angeles. This is the Herd
wherever you may be and however you may be listening
Fox Sports Radio right here on FS one one hour
from now our Blazing five. It is the biggest NFL
weekend by far. We have classic rivalries Rams, Niners, Browns, Stealers.
(00:51):
We have iconic Hall of Fame level quarterbacks meeting Brady
and Rogers. And Joey Taylor looks like she's on Broadway today.
Look at Joy Taylor. Oh my god, I feel like
this is a Friday dress. It is. It is uptown,
Joy Taylor. The truth is it was stretchy and I
(01:12):
didn't feel like being uncomfortable you do not look like
a Pittsburgh girl this morning. It's great to have you
in so imut. Just want to talk about two games
to start. That's the two biggest games of the weekend
to me. To two, I can't wait to watch. These
are five soup games. I'm want to start with the
Tampa Bay Green Bay Tom Brady against Aaron Rodgers. So
change is really hard. Most Americans, they do study on
(01:33):
studies on this, don't want to change. We like habits.
Most Americans have jobs they have conquered, they have figured
out and they're not challenged. But the money's okay, And
change stinks. You gotta move offices, move bosses, change culture,
change cities. So most people in their lives stand jobs
(01:54):
that are beneath them. They're no longer challenged by. They're
certainly smart enough, people are certainly capable. But change his
heart and Tom Brady not only left a job he
had kind of mastered, but the best system in the league,
and he chose Tampa largely loose, not buttoned up, dysfunctional organization.
And he knew it was hard. He knew it was
(02:16):
a new system, and he knew they lacked discipline, and
he knew Bruce arians wasn't Bill Belichick. But I think
it's been harder than Tom thought, because Joy and I
were on the news back in like March or April
when the story broke in back we broke it Tom
to the Buccaneers, and we thought COVID would be done
by June or July. And it's still a pandemic and
(02:37):
the numbers are rising. And Tom Brady thought he was
going to get an ota. He thought he was gonna
get a preseason. He thought most of his young players,
young players don't get hurt as much. They'd always be available.
They're not again this weekend light practice. His players hurt.
Tom Brady is aspirational, and people that are take chances
(03:00):
and take jobs that are challenging. But Tampa Bay's offense
doesn't do anything well. They're twenty first in yards per play,
they're twenty first and third down conversion, and if you've
watched their offense this year, it's looked clunky, it's hard.
It looks like it's hard, it's undisciplined, twenty five offensive penalties,
(03:21):
and then here comes Green Bay. It looked easy. They
are top three and third down conversion, they are top
three in protecting the quarterback. They are number one in
yards per play. So when you've got a big game
and two great players and one we said this with
Lebron and ad this year, the chemistry just looked easy.
(03:42):
I probably should have picked up on this earlier. The
chemistry for the Clippers always looked hard, and in the
end the team were The chemistry just fit and it
worked and it was easy ended up winning the championship.
If you've watched Green Bay this year and they haven't
played very good at defenses, I mean they played sore
of weaker defenses, but it's looked easy. It's not just winning.
It looks like they're happy, they're functional. Davante Adams is healthy,
(04:06):
and for Tampa Bay, it has just looked hard. And
Tom loves challenges, but I think this is tougher than
he thought. The injuries, no OTAs, no preseason lack of
discipline has been alarming, and Brady talks about facing Aaron
who always makes it look so smooth. I think there's
(04:27):
a lot to like about his play and his ability
to pass football. He's um. I think everybody always is
pretty much in awe of how he makes it look
so easy. You know, just throwing motion, the velocity on
the ball, the placement of the ball. He's, you know,
(04:48):
one of the great quarterbacks ever played the game. Tom
needs for Aaron Rodgers to not make it look easy.
This game could be a blowout. It is all the
Fox romos or Aaron against Tom. No, it's really Aaron
Rodgers against Tampa Bay's defense. The only way Tampa Bay
(05:08):
wins this weekend if it's a little ugly for Aaron,
if there's pressure on him, and if the defense carries him.
Because Tom likes challenges, and when he signed with Tampa
he thought he was getting an ota a preseason and
young players who generally stay healthier than old players. None
of those have transpired. And I like the Packers this weekend.
(05:29):
Here is the other game. I'm really interested in Cleveland.
This is the best they've been since Belichick, and they
face the Steelers, and teams and coaches tell you what
they think of their quarterbacks by what they allow them
to do. Mike Zimmer does not allow Kirk Cousins to
(05:51):
do much. He's telling you what he thinks of Kirk Cousins,
and Kevin Stefanski is telling you what he thinks of
Baker Mayfield. They are number one in running the football,
and secondly, multiple times this year on big plays offensively,
they've let receivers throw the ball downfield. He's telling you
(06:11):
he doesn't trust Baker Mayfield to carry them, and why
should he? After all these games this year, five games,
we have a pattern. Game one they let Baker throw
thirty seven times. They were blown out. Games two, three,
and four they allowed him to throw twenty three, twenty three,
and thirty. They look good in all of them. Last
week they threw a lot in the second half, thirty
(06:32):
seven attempts and Baker almost blew it. That should have
been a blowout and not competitive. Kevin Stefanski is telling
you what he thinks of Baker. He's limited. Pro Football
Focus has him rated as the second lowest graded offensive
starter for the Cleveland Browns. Only a rookie left tackle
(06:55):
who's a poor run blocker is lower. And Greg Kosell
came on this. We can said, despite the glossy four
and one record, here's what the film says on Baker.
I quite honestly don't believe Baker Mayfield has played that well.
I think Baker is playing a little fast. Both mentally
and physically. I think he needs to slow down his
(07:15):
entire process. He's a very talented kid. I think he's
got a really good arm. We've seen him be exceedingly
accurate throughout his career at times. But I think that
for them to get to where they believe, I'm sure
they can get to, he's going to have to play
a lot better than he's playing now. And what do
the Pittsburgh Steelers do really well? They make you play fast.
(07:39):
They've got the best pass rush they lead the NFL,
and sacks with twenty and hits with seventy, and they're
gonna make Baker Mayfield play very, very fast. And PFF
and Greg Kosell and people that look at film tell
you when he plays fast, he's not very good. That's
why Stefanski has the Browns as the number one run
(07:59):
race in the league and why he is this year
more than once asked his wide receivers to make big
throws down field in big spots of games. Coaches tell
you what they think of their players by what they
allow them to do and not allow them to do. Stefanski,
(08:20):
ideally against Pittsburgh, would love to run the ball thirty
to forty five times, and he's not going to be
able to because nobody's going to run the ball successfully
forty times on the Steelers this year. I like Pittsburgh
and green Bay two favorites this weekend, and I generally
like underdogs, so a lot of different stuff on a Friday.
(08:42):
Dodgers continue to melt down. You know, it's interesting here
in Los Angeles, where Joy and I live Broadway star
Joy Taylor, that we've had a lot of successful teams lately.
The Lakers won the championship, the Clippers were very good.
Outside of the hockey team in this town, everybody's kind
of winning, and the Dodgers are. But you know it's
(09:04):
interesting with winning, is that Clayton Kershaw, who is beloved
in Los Angeles again last night melted down and it
was fascinating to watch Dodger fans fight amongst themselves last night.
He never gets support from the offense, he never gets
support from the manager. They didn't pull him fast enough.
(09:26):
Here's all I know. His regular season era two point four,
his postseason era closer to four point four. That's the data.
You can keep arguing about it, but we have seen
this in the NBA and We see it with baseball.
Some people are built for regular season. Some people slightly
unravel in the postseason. Westbrook, We've seen that hardened. Clayton
(09:50):
Kershaw is not the same pitcher in the postseason. That
is indisputable. He's just not be sure to catch live
editions of The Herd Weekdays and nun Easter Pacific on
Fox Sports Radio FS one and the iHeartRadio app. Here's
a rumor that's very interesting. Chris Paul. We thought his
career was done. Clippers. People were disappointed. Goes to Houston
(10:12):
really good, gets hurt, it's over. Goes to Oklahoma City. Wow,
shocking team of the year. But Chris Paul's always loved
Los Angeles. Reportedly wants to come back, wants to leave
Oklahoma City, and the Lakers are interested, and Chris Paul
wants to play with Lebron James. Two years left on
his deal, eighty five million. What are the Lakers care?
(10:32):
They just want one title in two years and they
just want a title. Many are surprised by you'd have
to give up Danny Green, Kyle Kuzman, Avery Bradley, and
Quinn Cook. Here's why I love this. Remember this championship
teams need to always tweak, they need to add juice
and energy. And I was reading a business book earlier
(10:52):
this year and they said, what kills every great company
is always the same thing. It's arrogance. It's this belief.
We've got it figured out, we've got it solved that
even when you're a championship team, it is the easiest
time to sell to your employees a tweak because the
bosses have to be smart. You just had great earnings.
It's very difficult to take your staff to take your
(11:14):
team when you're struggling and say, all right, this didn't work,
we're gonna try something new. That's tough. But when you're
a champion and you tweak, there's an understanding with the employees. Oh,
they know what they're doing. They just let us do
a championship. Michael Jordan's Bulls the first three pete in
the second three pete, they were different teams. The Warriors,
they had Shane Battier. They win a title, then they
(11:36):
add Ray Ound. They kept adding juice. The Warriors had
won a title loss, they bring in k d. They
win a couple of titles, but they bring in DeMarcus Cousins.
The Lakers need juice. That's not that they're not good,
but remember they flew through Portland and flew through Houston,
and they frankly flew through Denver and they ended up
(11:57):
beating Miami by like thirty points or twenty point although
it was a blowout. You have got to add a
dimension to this team, something else, and now is the time,
and Chris Paul is the perfect fit. Number one super
high IQ basketball player. Lebron has no interest teaching you
how to play basketball. This is a high functioning IQ
(12:18):
basketball team, Lebron the center of it. Adding Chris Paul
makes a lot of sense. Secondly, like Miami with Lebron,
this is a market that is attractive to free agents.
You start adding Chris Paul and Lebron Anthony Davis, that's
a championship team. You will attract older players who have
made their money. And only thing missing is a ring.
(12:42):
That's how you get like a Shane Battier. That's how
you get like a Warriors can get a guy that
will take a little less. So I think that Chris
Paul Laker rumors are real. Chris Paul loves la, Lebron
loves smart veteran players. And by the way, the Western
Conference is all about guards. Who's the emerging stars Devin
(13:03):
Booker and Jamal Murray guards? What does Chris Paul do
play defense? If you really look at the number one
threat next year to the Lakers, it's not the Clippers,
It's probably the Warriors. What are they built on? Stephen
Clay backcourt, a stingy, tough, physical guard and Chris Paul,
veteran high basketball IQ is a perfect fit for the Lakers.
(13:24):
He's sure to catch live editions of the Herd weekdayson
noon Easter nine a Empacific. Let's go to Albert Breer,
Senior NFL reporter, lead content strategist, Monday Morning Quarterback, brought
to you by Mercedes Benz the best or Nothing. So
you know, it is interesting. Every Fox promo it's Brady
against Rogers, but I really think, I really think it
(13:46):
is Rogers against Tampa's defense. Because Tom Brady knew this
was going to be difficult. Albert, he did. He's an
old guy. It's a new offense. But he didn't predict
no OTAs. He didn't predict no preseason. He didn't predict
this many injuries to skill people, and they don't. They're
not doing outside of the red zone. They're not very
(14:07):
good offensively. Do you believe that it's a little more
right now than Tom thought he'd have to dig himself
out of. Yeah, I think there's some degree column Tom's
learning how the other thirty one lives. You know, the
Patriots are so buttoned up and such a tight operation.
You don't have things like jumping offsides on fourth down.
(14:27):
You don't have things like blocked punts. You don't have
things like fumbled kickoffs. Those things generally don't happen in
New England, and you won't see those things happen multiple
times in a game ever with the Patriots, And so
I think there's been an adjustment from that standpoint for
Tom Brady, no question about it, you know. And they're
dealing with the injuries, which you know that's just more
bad luck than anything. But yeah, I mean, I think
(14:49):
there's now element of this that has taken some getting
used to. And I think before that Bears game, to
be honest with you, we started to see signs of
what it could be with Brady getting a little bit
more comfortable getting ball downfield. I think a little bit
of a great regression on a short week against the Bears,
but there are some signs that it's coming along. And
I do think, you know, like he said, he's playing
(15:09):
with an awfully good defense. That Bucks defense has been
playing well going back to the end of last year
under Todd Bowls, so Baker Mayfield will face the best
defense he has faced so far this year. Pro Football
Focus has Baker as the second lowest graded offensive player
for the Browns. Last week, again, when they ran it
early against the Colts, he was terrific. Second half, they
(15:31):
asked him to throw more, he got loose and actually
kept that game close. Is it fair to me? I
think that the Baker season has been a little bit
of a mirage that it's they're trying to become a
run team, and when they've been forced to throw it,
it's kind of gotten ugly so far for Baker. Well,
I think to some degree, the coaches that are trying
(15:52):
to rebuild Baker a little bit, and I'm not saying
he needs a complete overhaul, but I know one of
the focuses there. They wanted him to play calmer, They
wanted him to play a less frantic game, and you know,
to be fair to Baker, like that sort of style
of play really worked for him at Oklahoma. But you know,
they wanted him to sort of settle down, and the
best way to do that was to establish the running game.
(16:13):
And they started to see signs that he's getting there.
But this was always going to be a process, you know,
and I think that they felt like coming in establishing
the Shanahan run game was going to be huge for
him and so being able to do that behind Nick
Chubb before he got hurt now Kareem Hunt and fixing
the offensive line where job number one. And that's why
I think Baker's best friend has been Bill Callahan, the
(16:35):
offensive line coach who wherever he goes and you can
look it up, Washington, Dallas, wherever he's been, he gets there,
the offensive lines fixed, the run games fixed. And so
I think so much of this was about getting Baker
to settle down and doing that through the run game.
And I think now that they've established that to some degree,
they can start to build Baker back up, which was
part of the plan all along. You know, people will
(16:56):
bristle at this, and I do like Dak over Andy Dalton,
but we forget now that Andy Dalton is thirty two
years old. That's it. Okay, he's got he could absolutely
if he flourishes here in Dallas, there may be teams
that say, in the next year, we'd like to offer
him some money. I think in Cincinnati, I said this yesterday,
(17:17):
when he was asked to be a pass first point
guard to distribute the ball. In those first four years
in Cincinnati, he was actually very effective that I think
that's what he's going to be asked to do in Dallas. Now.
I think Dack's better. But I think it were being
hyperbolic saying the gap is large. I mean, you talked
(17:38):
to so I think Andy Dalton with this offense can
be a very highly functional player. Your thoughts, I mean,
I talked to Stephen Jones about this two days ago,
and he said that they felt incredibly fortunate based on
the way the quarterback market went for the first time
and forever there was more supply than demand out there.
They felt incredibly fortunate that they were able to get
(17:58):
Andy Dalton under the circumstances they wound up getting him.
And you're right, five years in a row, Colin five
years Cincinnati, he brought them to the playoffs, right, now,
I know they didn't win when they got there, but
you got to be pretty good to get him there.
And what you saw in Cincinnati, I think is exactly
who he is. He's an incredibly effective bus driver. When
you give him a good environment to operate in, he
(18:19):
can do it. When he had aj Green and Marvin
Jones and Mohammed Sanou, when the tackles were Andrew Whitworth
and Andre Smithy, he was a really good quarterback. What
happens when the offensive line crumbles, well then he crumbled
a little bit. So, you know, I think, as much
as anything else, the really interesting part about this colin
to me, this gives the Cowboys a great chance to
assess the rest of their roster because if you're good
(18:40):
around Andy Dalton, I think he's going to be just fine.
They've paid a lot of guys in that roster, obviously,
a Marii Cooper, Ezekiel Ellie at the offensive line. They've
invested a ton up there. This is gonna give him
a really good chance to kind of assess how good
the rest of their team is. Because if you're good
around Andy Dalton, I think he's shown he can do it.
So the Chiefs ad Lavan Bell. There's some gen X
(19:03):
stats that say he shot. He is he was McCaffrey
before McCaffrey. He's a great pass catcher out of the backfield,
and I think I think he made a really smart
decision to go to a highly functional, stable organization from
the Jets. That's why I never liked when he left
the Steelers. Do you think he shot what do your
sources say? I think is a red zone weapon. I
(19:25):
think he could be really interesting for the Chiefs. I
think he has something left. I think so much of
it about it for him is like he's gonna sort
of go the way the wind blows him. So if
he's in a good environment, like he'll go that way.
If he's in a bad environment, he's going to be
a problem. And so I think that's sort of what
you saw over the last couple of years with the Jets.
(19:45):
I don't think he's what he was four years ago
when he was averaging four point nine yards of carry.
That said, the Chiefs can really use him. They missed
Damien Williams in shortyard close to the goal on here's
the other thing. They love Clyde Edwards a lair and
they believe in Clyde Edwards Hilaire. But if you look
at Clyde Edwards Hilaire's history, he really only had one
(20:07):
year as the bell cow at LSU, and that was
with all these great things going on around him. And
so to ask him to be that guy in year
one in the NFL, I think was always a little
bit much. And so now what can they do? Now
they can pace them a little bit more, and now
this is going to allow them to get more out
of their first round pick when you get to December
and January, when you'd be worrying about him hitting that
(20:27):
rookie wall if you were really taxing him. Now you
can pull back a little bit on him and maybe
get a little bit more from him when you get
to the playoff. That's a really, really good point. Albert
Brer joining us so, I said this week Alex Smithelwin
comeback player of the year. I'll give Cam Newton camback
player of the year. I think he's been terrific and
I've been a doubter forever. And then he got COVID
and I thought, oh, brother, oh, don't don't lose Bill,
(20:49):
don't lose the locker room on this just don't And
then I thought to myself, I wonder, if you know, Bill,
his tolerance for stuff like that with veterans is pretty low.
Did he lose any equity in the locker room? Is
everybody's still all in on Cam Newton in New England? Yeah?
I think that they are. You know, I look like
this isn't just a one year thing too. I mean,
(21:10):
I you know his history, if you really dig into it,
you talk to people in Carolina, he was actually a
really good locker room guy there. Like if you talk
to the Greg Olsens, the Ryan kali Ols, the Thomas
davis Is, the Luke Keekleys, the guys who were foundation
pieces with them in Carolina, they all love him. And
so yeah, I mean I think that the Patriots look
at Cam Newton as a guy who potentially could be
(21:31):
their quarterback for the next three, four or five years,
and at the very least could be somebody who helps
them get to the next guy, sort of the same
way that Alex Smith was for the Kansas City Chiefs
and getting them to Patrick Mahomes. And the Patriots are
in an interesting spot now. I actually think Colin this
is sort of an interesting twist the Dwayne Haskins benching
in Washington could reverberate in New England. Before you were
(21:55):
sort of wondering where's the market for Cam Newton going
to be after the season. Now Washington's future at quarterback
looks wide open. Their head coaches Ron Rivera, their offensive
coordinator Scott Turner, and now the Patriots actually have something
to worry about as far as where Cam Newton could
go after the year. And so I think this storyline
only gets more interesting as we go on. Yeah, I want,
(22:15):
I said this to Joy this week. If they I'm
not there yet, but I'm close. If Cam beats Denver,
if Cam pulled the next two weeks, plays really well
and I feel like, okay, I got a new guy here,
do they sit down and just offer him and just say, listen,
here's a two year deal. We may draft a quarterback. Cam,
We're gonna try to, but for two years we're building
(22:36):
around you. Do you think they would start talks in
a couple of weeks if he flourished against let's say
Denver this weekend. I wouldn't be surprised if they did
what they did with Jimmy Garoppolo and Jimmy Garoppolo. Before
they traded him, they'd offered him like a fair kind
of bridge deal, and he turned it down and he
wound up winning in that scenario, became a starter in
San Francisco, got paid there. But it wouldn't surprise me
(22:58):
if they offered him some sort of bridge that sort
of takes care of him the next few years, gets
him some money early, takes some of that injury rest
that he's spacing the rest of the year off of
his plate. And I think it would make all the
sense in the world to do that. Call um for
a couple of different reasons. Number One, the CAP's gonna
go down next year because of the revenue shortfall. So
if you can dump some money into this year where
(23:20):
you still have some cap space and they still have
like between twenty five and thirty million dollars in cap space,
I think you do it. And then it allows you
to sort of plan fiscally around CAM for the next
few years. And again I think the Alex Smith pomp
in Kansas City is the right one where it's we're
really happy with our quarterback right now, and maybe he's
the long term answer, and maybe he gets back to
being MVP Cam. But at the very least, we've got
(23:43):
a guy we're happy with for now that's going to
help us get to the next guy. That's why we
bring him on all sorts of good insight. Albert Breyer,
Senior NFL guy, Lead Content, Dude, Money Morning Quarterback, have
a great Wait, this a really good NFL weekend. There's
a lot of clarity this weekend. Thanks Albert. All right,
call enjoy the weekend. One More Heard. The Herd streams
twenty four hours a day, seven days a week within
(24:05):
the iHeartRadio app. Search Herd to listen live or on
demand whenever you'd like. Ty Lou is going to just
agree to a five year deal for the Clippers. And
a story came out yesterday that, according to a report
that players like Patrick Beverley and Montrese Harrold and Lou Williams,
we're not happy last year with Doc Rivers allowing Kawhi
(24:27):
Leonard to get special treatment, miss a lot of practices,
mix games, be late to flights. The issue here, and
this is not going to change much, is that the
Clippers were a bunch of underdogs. It's a bunch of
Patrick Beverley's, It's a bunch of Lou Williams, Montrese Harold.
It's a bunch of underdogs and that's what they created.
And let's be honest about this. Kawhi Leonard is sort
(24:49):
of odd. He's nonverbal. He's the only NBA star you're
not sure if he's going to play. He's different, He's
he's not real communicative. That's who he is. And we've
said this before. We know that Russell Westbrook, his intense,
no coach has changed him. We know Ben Simmons is
kind of aloof. No coach really changed him. What Kawhi
Leonard is is unique and non verbal. And Greg Popovitch
(25:14):
struggled with it. And what was interesting is he was
a mercenary in Toronto. He was just asked to come
score buckets, make defensive play. That's all he was asked.
He was not asked to be a team leader, be
a mercenary, and he was great. And in San Antonio
he was not asked to lead the team. They had Duncan,
they had veterans, they had pop, they had Tony Parker.
(25:37):
The challenge for ty Lou is this player is now
asked to be a leader and more verbal and more communicative,
and that's not really what Kawhi Leonard is he is,
That's not who he is. He's just a get a bucket,
get a stop guy, and he's fantastic at it, as
good as anybody in the NBA. But I do think
there is a certain tension in this organization. And when
(26:00):
your star is not overly communicative, is the only star
in the league that wants lots of days off. I
think that's a tense situation. I think it's like the
Rams with Todd Gurley. There's a little walking on eggshells
going on, and the locker room in the chemistry was
not right. Now, can Tylu forge through that? Tie is
(26:24):
very confrontational. Doc Rivers tends to more, He's more appealing
to veterans. He'll appease veterans. Tylu won't Tyle get after it.
He'll argue with Lebron, who get right in his face.
So I do think Jerry West talks Steve Ballmer into
this higher the owner wanted Jeff van Gundhi, Jerry West wanted,
according to reports, Tylu, and I would guess one of
(26:45):
the reasons Jerry West, like Tylu, is ties a little
more confrontational. He'll get after Paul George. He can get
after a Kawhi Leonard and get right in his face
and tell him what I need. And I think that's
probably the remedy for what ails this franchise. They're still
very good, but I've seen this a lot in pro sports,
is that personalities and are formed when your kids, Like
(27:06):
your personality, personality is largely formed by the time you're
nine years old. You could you could go ask a
child psychologist what you're at nine and ten. It's largely
what you are, different variations of it. You're more mature
obviously at twenty nine than nine. You know your brain
forms by twenty twenty one years old, but at nine
your personality is largely formed. Hyper kids are hyper adults.
(27:29):
You know. Nervous kids are nervous adults. Talkers are talkers
by nine, nonverbal nonverbal by nine. And I think I
think Kahi is a very unique personality. It's never going
to be easy. There will be walking on eggshells, but
I think Tylu is the kind of confrontational man that
can make it work. And my guess is they won't
be as disappointing next year. Be sure to catch live
(27:52):
editions of the Herd weekdays in noun Easter nine am
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio FS one and the iHeart
Radio Appjimmy Johnson's got all sorts of courage, two Super Bowls,
one of the best football coaches in the history of
this country, College Football National Championship Miami. He's now Fox
Sports analyst, obviously joining us live from the Keys in Florida. So, Jimmy,
(28:14):
the worst situation for a coach is you lose your
starting quarterback and you got to go to a backup.
But I said this in the offseason. I thought Andy
Dalton was a good pickup. He's grown up, he's from Texas.
He's all in on the Cowboys. Would you if you
ran the Cowboys, would you lighten it up? Would you
make which is simplify it for him? Would you? Some
(28:34):
of their skills are similar Dacks, I think a little
better athlete. What do you do with a playbook now?
For Dalton? Yeah, Colley, I think you adjusted a little bit,
you know, but I felt like they needed to adjust it,
even when Dak was in there. They needed to do
some things to protect that defense. That defense really struggling.
You know. They went from a four to three to
(28:55):
three to four and half the players really don't know
what they're doing and the defense has struggled. And so
how you protect the defense is you eliminate the negative
plays and you increase your time of possession by running
them football with Ezekiel Elliott. Now, I think Dalton, I
think he'll be a perfect fit. In fact, he will
(29:16):
help that defense as long as he manages the game
and utilizes that supporting cast. I think that they shouldn't
miss a beat. Plus, they're in the NFC East. You know,
if if you were the quarterback for the Cowboys, you
didn't win the NFC East. So I think they're in
good shape. So Lavian Bell got picked up by the
(29:37):
Chiefs when you were coaching, and you get a player,
and Levian may not be what he was five years ago,
but he's got a skill set. Jimmy, he can catch
the ball. This is a pretty good old line. How
much do you integrate him into the offense? First week,
second week, third week, because because he's a nice little
red zone asset here, would just slowly move him into
(29:58):
the offense. You know, Bell has been in the league
long enough that he's going to be able to adjust
to whatever Andy wants it to do. And you know
who's the best coach in the entire league as far
as utilizing his talent, and it's Andy Reid. You know Bell,
you know, like you say, he's an outstanding receiver. You
(30:19):
can split him out, you can do a lot of
different things with him. Now, he's not going to be
able to play in that first ball game, but you know,
you know, by the time he gets into the second
ball game into like a week and a half or so,
you know, they'll have a package for Bell. And I
think he'll do fine. I think, in fact, he'll do
a lot better for them than what he was doing
for the Jets, and it could be similar to what
(30:41):
he was doing. And they're with the Steelers, So Packers
Bucks is the biggest game of the day. And the
one reason I like Green Bay in this game. One
of the reasons I like it, I think they're doing
such a good job protecting Aaron Rodgers. He's not getting sacked,
he's got that extra beat, that extra three quarters of
a second, and Tom's offensive line has been heavily penalized
(31:04):
and it just looks like they're a little out of
sync now. Chris Godwin's supposed to play this week and
so he's fully practiced. So are you disappointed or is
Tampa offensive league kind of where Jimmy you thought they'd
be with no preseason. I actually thought Tampa would be
(31:25):
better than what they're playing right now. I think Brady
is frustrated. You know, you know, he's not converting on
third down, but most of his third downs or third
down and eight third down in nine right, they're a sloppy,
sloppy football team. You know, I've said for the last
couple of years, before Brady got there, I said Tampa
was the most exciting bad team in the league. You know,
(31:49):
here they led the league in offense, but they were
horrible and they turned the bowl over too much, made
too many mistakes. Now Brady has elevated them. They're better now,
but they still were a sloppy football team. Too many penalties,
too many negative plays, too many third and longs. You know,
I just see, you know, the Packers being a better
(32:11):
coach team right now. Now, I will say this, I
like their defensive coach. I think defensively they really do
a heck of a job. Yeah. I like Todd Bulls too.
I think He's as good a coordinator right now as
the league has to Pro Football Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson.
It's interesting, you know, Brady comes from that sort of academic,
rigid system in New England, very intense, and Tampa's always
(32:34):
been a little loose, and Bruce arians a little loose.
And Tom's yelling at teammates about ten days ago, and
it made a lot of news. I mean, Troy Aikman,
you had him, he'd bark at guys, Dan Marino would
bark at guys. I do worry a little bit that
it's a young roster. Tom's an older player and he's
losing patients. Should I at all be worried that it
(32:55):
got a little testy and talked about a little too
long when he barked last week? You know, Troy didn't
bark until after I left because he knew Barry wasn't
going to bark, and he didn't, and somebody needed to
bark at those players. Uh. I think just looking at Tom,
(33:17):
he looks frustrated. Uh, he looks, you know like Uh.
In fact, he made the comment after the ball game
that you know, you know, so many third and eights,
you know, it's hard to convert, and so, uh, they
are a talented enough team that they can win against
anybody if things fall right for him. But because they're
(33:39):
a sloppy team, they're not going to have the consistency
of a champion. And until they get that consistency, I'm
gonna be concerned about him. Yeah, you know, it's interesting.
I love Andy Reid um and but there's there is something.
Mahomes is facing more zone coverage this year, and he's
struggling a little bit with it. He is, he's struggling,
(34:02):
and they've gotten into a bad habit of starting slow.
And and I think about and I think to myself, well,
Andy Reid's a great play designer. Maybe he lets he
feels the game out. Pete Carroll can get into this
where Pete lets the game he feels it out, and
then he's a terrific halftime adjuster. Go back to your career,
did you ever have a team like the Chiefs that
(34:24):
could start slow and you always felt like you were
digging out of a hole a little bit? And how
do you correct it if that ever becomes the case? Yeah,
I think Kansas City falls into the category of having
success and maybe not being quite as hungry before they
had the success. You know, the biggest enemy of great
(34:49):
is good yea, And yeah, they are very very good now.
When you're bad, you know, you put in the extra
hours and you do whatever it takes to try to achieve,
you know, success. But they've had so much success it's
you know, it's almost like they're taking things for granted. Yeah,
(35:10):
I know. Terry Bratschall asked me. He said, you know
you were a complete you know, so ob to those players,
you know after that first Super Bowl. I said, yeah,
and I was a bigger one to second. He said,
if you state without veteran you lighten up when yea,
I said, no, I would have been an even bigger one.
You got to you gotta push those players. The more
success they have, the harder it is to push them,
(35:34):
you know, to get to that pinnacle. So I have
to ask you want to Every coach has a strength. Um.
You you had an eye for personnel that is second
to none. Um, you were an unbelievable recruiter and you
built you built a power at Miami. And it wasn't
all five star guys. It wasn't when you first got there.
You built a power with some three star guys. And
I have to ask you if the Jets or the
(35:56):
Giants got the number one pick and Trevor Lawrence sitting
out there, you're the GM of one of those teams,
do you move off of Jones or darneld this quickly?
What do you do? Terry? Because I think I think
that's what's gonna happen here. These are the Jets are
a bad, bad football team. They are a bad football team.
But you don't pass on a great, great quarterback. Uh.
(36:19):
You you know, if you're gonna have the first pick
in the draft, that means you're gonna have the first
pick in the second round as well, you know, and
the third and the fourth, and so you take your
Trevor Lawrence. Uh and then you know, you maybe trade
some other picks to try to build your team, but
you don't ever bypass on a you know, franchise outstanding
(36:39):
quarterback like Trevor Lawrence. Okay, And Aikman was like that,
right you You you with Troy Aikman, you felt you
were getting I felt that way. We had scouts on
our We had scouts that wanted to take Tony Mandridge. Uh.
I mean, you know, people have a selective amnesia. Right now,
everybody says, oh, you know, for sure we're gonna take
Troy Aikman. You know, you know, Troy didn't even make
(37:01):
All Pack ten. You know, Rodney Pete was All Pack
ten quarterback. So there were questions. There were questions on Troy. Now,
there were no questions on my mind. I'd been recruiting
Troy ever since he was a sophomore in high school.
He was in my you know, when he was a
sophomore in high school, he came to my camp at
Oklahoma State. We thought we had him signed at Oklahoma State,
(37:22):
and then at the last weekend he goes to Oklahoma.
So I've been working on Troy for a long time.
I knew he was going to be our guy. But
you know, if you look back during that period of time,
you know, they were a bunch of other players that
were questions whether or not, you know, they could be
the number one pick. A lot of people wanted Mandridge.
Did you fire those scouts who wanted Mandridge? To protect them?
(37:48):
I wouldn't mention their name. Now, I don't blame you,
by the way. One college football question, So Nick Saban
will not coach the game because he got COVID now
he was at Zoom practices, and it was so interesting
and so interesting to me that even though he's got
Steve Sarkisian who's been a head coach twice, and he's
got his defense installed for ten fifteen years, the game,
(38:11):
the line moved a field goal, and I'm like, Holy Molly, Jimmy,
when when you were when you were in a game,
where would you have been missed? As a head coach?
What what does a head coach do is at the
halftime adjustment maybe that a coordinator couldn't do well. You know,
I think the head coach, you know, really in college
(38:32):
and pro his biggest impact is on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
You know. Uh, it's during the week and preparing for
the ball game. That's his biggest impact. The head coach
owned game day, you know. Depend you know, some head
coaches call plays, which I don't agree with u some
(38:52):
coaches cold def I don't agree with that either. Now
it's more I think he has more impact in professional
football and college football. If you're at one of those
top ten schools, it's kind of like I said, with you,
you could be the quarterback for Dallas. And you can
still win the NFCA East if you're at Alabama. You know,
when you were the head coach, you're still gonna be
(39:13):
right there winning ten or eleven ball games. Yeah, you
never called plays once in your career, you even your
first year at Oklahoma. So yeah, and actually I called plays.
I called defenses three or four years. I called offensive
plays for two years at Oklahoma State. In fact, we
Ernest Anderson led the nation in rushing the year that
(39:34):
I called plays at Oklahoma State. Why did you give
it up? I don't think that's the way to do it.
I think you're a better head coach if you can delegate,
you can oversee, you can have your hand in the offensive, defense,
and special teams. I spent more time. I was in
all the special teams meetings. You know, I would pop
in and out of the offensive and defensive meetings. I
(39:56):
would set in all the defensive meetings and preparing the
game plan, you know, and so you know, if you
were wrapped up an offensive coordinator, his his mindset is
you know score. You know, he didn't talk about, you know,
managing the game timeouts, you know, working the clock. He
just wants to score. The defensive coordinator just wants to
(40:16):
stop him. You know, he didn't care about working the clock.
The head coach has got to manage the game. He's
got to tell the offensive coordinator, hey, start running the
ball more. He's got to tell the defensive coordinate blitz,
hey we can We can't give him any yordage here.
You know. He's got to tell the special teams coach, hey,
we're gonna run a fake punt, you know, if we're
if they don't make it this time. You know, I
want the head coach to manage the game, you know,
(40:39):
and manage you know, clock management. I see games loss
calling every single weekend where the head coach did not
manage the clock. Yeah, you know it's crazy. Yeah, boy,
you gave Dave Wanstad all that all that responsibility. Boy,
that's a lot of responsibility to give Davis. He was
with me about twenty years, so he knew what I
(40:59):
wanted to get done. The Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson,
great sceney coach. Okay, Colin
Thanks for listening to the Best of Herd podcast. Be
sure to catch us live every weekday from twelve to
three eastern, nine to noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio
and FS one. Find your local station for The Herd
at Fox Sports Radio dot com, or stream us live
every day on the iHeartRadio app by searching Herd. This
is the Best of the Herd with Colin Cowherd on
Fox Sports Radio. Ah here we go on a Friday
(00:26):
that will include Hall of Fame coach Jimmy Johnson and
Blazing five live in Los Angeles. This is the Herd
wherever you may be and however you may be listening
Fox Sports Radio right here on FS one one hour
from now our Blazing five. It is the biggest NFL
weekend by far. We have classic rivalries Rams, Niners, Browns, Stealers.
(00:51):
We have iconic Hall of Fame level quarterbacks meeting Brady
and Rogers. And Joey Taylor looks like she's on Broadway today.
Look at Joy Taylor. Oh my god, I feel like
this is a Friday dress. It is. It is uptown,
Joy Taylor. The truth is it was stretchy and I
(01:12):
didn't feel like being uncomfortable you do not look like
a Pittsburgh girl this morning. It's great to have you
in so imut. Just want to talk about two games
to start. That's the two biggest games of the weekend
to me. To two, I can't wait to watch. These
are five soup games. I'm want to start with the
Tampa Bay Green Bay Tom Brady against Aaron Rodgers. So
change is really hard. Most Americans, they do study on
(01:33):
studies on this, don't want to change. We like habits.
Most Americans have jobs they have conquered, they have figured
out and they're not challenged. But the money's okay, And
change stinks. You gotta move offices, move bosses, change culture,
change cities. So most people in their lives stand jobs
(01:54):
that are beneath them. They're no longer challenged by. They're
certainly smart enough, people are certainly capable. But change his
heart and Tom Brady not only left a job he
had kind of mastered, but the best system in the league,
and he chose Tampa largely loose, not buttoned up, dysfunctional organization.
And he knew it was hard. He knew it was
(02:16):
a new system, and he knew they lacked discipline, and
he knew Bruce arians wasn't Bill Belichick. But I think
it's been harder than Tom thought, because Joy and I
were on the news back in like March or April
when the story broke in back we broke it Tom
to the Buccaneers, and we thought COVID would be done
by June or July. And it's still a pandemic and
(02:37):
the numbers are rising. And Tom Brady thought he was
going to get an ota. He thought he was gonna
get a preseason. He thought most of his young players,
young players don't get hurt as much. They'd always be available.
They're not again this weekend light practice. His players hurt.
Tom Brady is aspirational, and people that are take chances
(03:00):
and take jobs that are challenging. But Tampa Bay's offense
doesn't do anything well. They're twenty first in yards per play,
they're twenty first and third down conversion, and if you've
watched their offense this year, it's looked clunky, it's hard.
It looks like it's hard, it's undisciplined, twenty five offensive penalties,
(03:21):
and then here comes Green Bay. It looked easy. They
are top three and third down conversion, they are top
three in protecting the quarterback. They are number one in
yards per play. So when you've got a big game
and two great players and one we said this with
Lebron and ad this year, the chemistry just looked easy.
(03:42):
I probably should have picked up on this earlier. The
chemistry for the Clippers always looked hard, and in the
end the team were The chemistry just fit and it
worked and it was easy ended up winning the championship.
If you've watched Green Bay this year and they haven't
played very good at defenses, I mean they played sore
of weaker defenses, but it's looked easy. It's not just winning.
It looks like they're happy, they're functional. Davante Adams is healthy,
(04:06):
and for Tampa Bay, it has just looked hard. And
Tom loves challenges, but I think this is tougher than
he thought. The injuries, no OTAs, no preseason lack of
discipline has been alarming, and Brady talks about facing Aaron
who always makes it look so smooth. I think there's
(04:27):
a lot to like about his play and his ability
to pass football. He's um. I think everybody always is
pretty much in awe of how he makes it look
so easy. You know, just throwing motion, the velocity on
the ball, the placement of the ball. He's, you know,
(04:48):
one of the great quarterbacks ever played the game. Tom
needs for Aaron Rodgers to not make it look easy.
This game could be a blowout. It is all the
Fox romos or Aaron against Tom. No, it's really Aaron
Rodgers against Tampa Bay's defense. The only way Tampa Bay
(05:08):
wins this weekend if it's a little ugly for Aaron,
if there's pressure on him, and if the defense carries him.
Because Tom likes challenges, and when he signed with Tampa
he thought he was getting an ota a preseason and
young players who generally stay healthier than old players. None
of those have transpired. And I like the Packers this weekend.
(05:29):
Here is the other game. I'm really interested in Cleveland.
This is the best they've been since Belichick, and they
face the Steelers, and teams and coaches tell you what
they think of their quarterbacks by what they allow them
to do. Mike Zimmer does not allow Kirk Cousins to
(05:51):
do much. He's telling you what he thinks of Kirk Cousins,
and Kevin Stefanski is telling you what he thinks of
Baker Mayfield. They are number one in running the football,
and secondly, multiple times this year on big plays offensively,
they've let receivers throw the ball downfield. He's telling you
(06:11):
he doesn't trust Baker Mayfield to carry them, and why
should he? After all these games this year, five games,
we have a pattern. Game one they let Baker throw
thirty seven times. They were blown out. Games two, three,
and four they allowed him to throw twenty three, twenty three,
and thirty. They look good in all of them. Last
week they threw a lot in the second half, thirty
(06:32):
seven attempts and Baker almost blew it. That should have
been a blowout and not competitive. Kevin Stefanski is telling
you what he thinks of Baker. He's limited. Pro Football
Focus has him rated as the second lowest graded offensive
starter for the Cleveland Browns. Only a rookie left tackle
(06:55):
who's a poor run blocker is lower. And Greg Kosell
came on this. We can said, despite the glossy four
and one record, here's what the film says on Baker.
I quite honestly don't believe Baker Mayfield has played that well.
I think Baker is playing a little fast. Both mentally
and physically. I think he needs to slow down his
(07:15):
entire process. He's a very talented kid. I think he's
got a really good arm. We've seen him be exceedingly
accurate throughout his career at times. But I think that
for them to get to where they believe, I'm sure
they can get to, he's going to have to play
a lot better than he's playing now. And what do
the Pittsburgh Steelers do really well? They make you play fast.
(07:39):
They've got the best pass rush they lead the NFL,
and sacks with twenty and hits with seventy, and they're
gonna make Baker Mayfield play very, very fast. And PFF
and Greg Kosell and people that look at film tell
you when he plays fast, he's not very good. That's
why Stefanski has the Browns as the number one run
(07:59):
race in the league and why he is this year
more than once asked his wide receivers to make big
throws down field in big spots of games. Coaches tell
you what they think of their players by what they
allow them to do and not allow them to do. Stefanski,
(08:20):
ideally against Pittsburgh, would love to run the ball thirty
to forty five times, and he's not going to be
able to because nobody's going to run the ball successfully
forty times on the Steelers this year. I like Pittsburgh
and green Bay two favorites this weekend, and I generally
like underdogs, so a lot of different stuff on a Friday.
(08:42):
Dodgers continue to melt down. You know, it's interesting here
in Los Angeles, where Joy and I live Broadway star
Joy Taylor, that we've had a lot of successful teams lately.
The Lakers won the championship, the Clippers were very good.
Outside of the hockey team in this town, everybody's kind
of winning, and the Dodgers are. But you know it's
(09:04):
interesting with winning, is that Clayton Kershaw, who is beloved
in Los Angeles again last night melted down and it
was fascinating to watch Dodger fans fight amongst themselves last night.
He never gets support from the offense, he never gets
support from the manager. They didn't pull him fast enough.
(09:26):
Here's all I know. His regular season era two point four,
his postseason era closer to four point four. That's the data.
You can keep arguing about it, but we have seen
this in the NBA and We see it with baseball.
Some people are built for regular season. Some people slightly
unravel in the postseason. Westbrook, We've seen that hardened. Clayton
(09:50):
Kershaw is not the same pitcher in the postseason. That
is indisputable. He's just not be sure to catch live
editions of The Herd Weekdays and nun Easter Pacific on
Fox Sports Radio FS one and the iHeartRadio app. Here's
a rumor that's very interesting. Chris Paul. We thought his
career was done. Clippers. People were disappointed. Goes to Houston
(10:12):
really good, gets hurt, it's over. Goes to Oklahoma City. Wow,
shocking team of the year. But Chris Paul's always loved
Los Angeles. Reportedly wants to come back, wants to leave
Oklahoma City, and the Lakers are interested, and Chris Paul
wants to play with Lebron James. Two years left on
his deal, eighty five million. What are the Lakers care?
(10:32):
They just want one title in two years and they
just want a title. Many are surprised by you'd have
to give up Danny Green, Kyle Kuzman, Avery Bradley, and
Quinn Cook. Here's why I love this. Remember this championship
teams need to always tweak, they need to add juice
and energy. And I was reading a business book earlier
(10:52):
this year and they said, what kills every great company
is always the same thing. It's arrogance. It's this belief.
We've got it figured out, we've got it solved that
even when you're a championship team, it is the easiest
time to sell to your employees a tweak because the
bosses have to be smart. You just had great earnings.
It's very difficult to take your staff to take your
(11:14):
team when you're struggling and say, all right, this didn't work,
we're gonna try something new. That's tough. But when you're
a champion and you tweak, there's an understanding with the employees. Oh,
they know what they're doing. They just let us do
a championship. Michael Jordan's Bulls the first three pete in
the second three pete, they were different teams. The Warriors,
they had Shane Battier. They win a title, then they
(11:36):
add Ray Ound. They kept adding juice. The Warriors had
won a title loss, they bring in k d. They
win a couple of titles, but they bring in DeMarcus Cousins.
The Lakers need juice. That's not that they're not good,
but remember they flew through Portland and flew through Houston,
and they frankly flew through Denver and they ended up
(11:57):
beating Miami by like thirty points or twenty point although
it was a blowout. You have got to add a
dimension to this team, something else, and now is the time,
and Chris Paul is the perfect fit. Number one super
high IQ basketball player. Lebron has no interest teaching you
how to play basketball. This is a high functioning IQ
(12:18):
basketball team, Lebron the center of it. Adding Chris Paul
makes a lot of sense. Secondly, like Miami with Lebron,
this is a market that is attractive to free agents.
You start adding Chris Paul and Lebron Anthony Davis, that's
a championship team. You will attract older players who have
made their money. And only thing missing is a ring.
(12:42):
That's how you get like a Shane Battier. That's how
you get like a Warriors can get a guy that
will take a little less. So I think that Chris
Paul Laker rumors are real. Chris Paul loves la, Lebron
loves smart veteran players. And by the way, the Western
Conference is all about guards. Who's the emerging stars Devin
(13:03):
Booker and Jamal Murray guards? What does Chris Paul do
play defense? If you really look at the number one
threat next year to the Lakers, it's not the Clippers,
It's probably the Warriors. What are they built on? Stephen
Clay backcourt, a stingy, tough, physical guard and Chris Paul,
veteran high basketball IQ is a perfect fit for the Lakers.
(13:24):
He's sure to catch live editions of the Herd weekdayson
noon Easter nine a Empacific. Let's go to Albert Breer,
Senior NFL reporter, lead content strategist, Monday Morning Quarterback, brought
to you by Mercedes Benz the best or Nothing. So
you know, it is interesting. Every Fox promo it's Brady
against Rogers, but I really think, I really think it
(13:46):
is Rogers against Tampa's defense. Because Tom Brady knew this
was going to be difficult. Albert, he did. He's an
old guy. It's a new offense. But he didn't predict
no OTAs. He didn't predict no preseason. He didn't predict
this many injuries to skill people, and they don't. They're
not doing outside of the red zone. They're not very
(14:07):
good offensively. Do you believe that it's a little more
right now than Tom thought he'd have to dig himself
out of. Yeah, I think there's some degree column Tom's
learning how the other thirty one lives. You know, the
Patriots are so buttoned up and such a tight operation.
You don't have things like jumping offsides on fourth down.
(14:27):
You don't have things like blocked punts. You don't have
things like fumbled kickoffs. Those things generally don't happen in
New England, and you won't see those things happen multiple
times in a game ever with the Patriots, And so
I think there's been an adjustment from that standpoint for
Tom Brady, no question about it, you know. And they're
dealing with the injuries, which you know that's just more
bad luck than anything. But yeah, I mean, I think
(14:49):
there's now element of this that has taken some getting
used to. And I think before that Bears game, to
be honest with you, we started to see signs of
what it could be with Brady getting a little bit
more comfortable getting ball downfield. I think a little bit
of a great regression on a short week against the Bears,
but there are some signs that it's coming along. And
I do think, you know, like he said, he's playing
(15:09):
with an awfully good defense. That Bucks defense has been
playing well going back to the end of last year
under Todd Bowls, so Baker Mayfield will face the best
defense he has faced so far this year. Pro Football
Focus has Baker as the second lowest graded offensive player
for the Browns. Last week, again, when they ran it
early against the Colts, he was terrific. Second half, they
(15:31):
asked him to throw more, he got loose and actually
kept that game close. Is it fair to me? I
think that the Baker season has been a little bit
of a mirage that it's they're trying to become a
run team, and when they've been forced to throw it,
it's kind of gotten ugly so far for Baker. Well,
I think to some degree, the coaches that are trying
(15:52):
to rebuild Baker a little bit, and I'm not saying
he needs a complete overhaul, but I know one of
the focuses there. They wanted him to play calmer, They
wanted him to play a less frantic game, and you know,
to be fair to Baker, like that sort of style
of play really worked for him at Oklahoma. But you know,
they wanted him to sort of settle down, and the
best way to do that was to establish the running game.
(16:13):
And they started to see signs that he's getting there.
But this was always going to be a process, you know,
and I think that they felt like coming in establishing
the Shanahan run game was going to be huge for
him and so being able to do that behind Nick
Chubb before he got hurt now Kareem Hunt and fixing
the offensive line where job number one. And that's why
I think Baker's best friend has been Bill Callahan, the
(16:35):
offensive line coach who wherever he goes and you can
look it up, Washington, Dallas, wherever he's been, he gets there,
the offensive lines fixed, the run games fixed. And so
I think so much of this was about getting Baker
to settle down and doing that through the run game.
And I think now that they've established that to some degree,
they can start to build Baker back up, which was
part of the plan all along. You know, people will
(16:56):
bristle at this, and I do like Dak over Andy Dalton,
but we forget now that Andy Dalton is thirty two
years old. That's it. Okay, he's got he could absolutely
if he flourishes here in Dallas, there may be teams
that say, in the next year, we'd like to offer
him some money. I think in Cincinnati, I said this yesterday,
(17:17):
when he was asked to be a pass first point
guard to distribute the ball. In those first four years
in Cincinnati, he was actually very effective that I think
that's what he's going to be asked to do in Dallas. Now.
I think Dack's better. But I think it were being
hyperbolic saying the gap is large. I mean, you talked
(17:38):
to so I think Andy Dalton with this offense can
be a very highly functional player. Your thoughts, I mean,
I talked to Stephen Jones about this two days ago,
and he said that they felt incredibly fortunate based on
the way the quarterback market went for the first time
and forever there was more supply than demand out there.
They felt incredibly fortunate that they were able to get
(17:58):
Andy Dalton under the circumstances they wound up getting him.
And you're right, five years in a row, Colin five
years Cincinnati, he brought them to the playoffs, right, now,
I know they didn't win when they got there, but
you got to be pretty good to get him there.
And what you saw in Cincinnati, I think is exactly
who he is. He's an incredibly effective bus driver. When
you give him a good environment to operate in, he
(18:19):
can do it. When he had aj Green and Marvin
Jones and Mohammed Sanou, when the tackles were Andrew Whitworth
and Andre Smithy, he was a really good quarterback. What
happens when the offensive line crumbles, well then he crumbled
a little bit. So, you know, I think, as much
as anything else, the really interesting part about this colin
to me, this gives the Cowboys a great chance to
assess the rest of their roster because if you're good
(18:40):
around Andy Dalton, I think he's going to be just fine.
They've paid a lot of guys in that roster, obviously,
a Marii Cooper, Ezekiel Ellie at the offensive line. They've
invested a ton up there. This is gonna give him
a really good chance to kind of assess how good
the rest of their team is. Because if you're good
around Andy Dalton, I think he's shown he can do it.
So the Chiefs ad Lavan Bell. There's some gen X
(19:03):
stats that say he shot. He is he was McCaffrey
before McCaffrey. He's a great pass catcher out of the backfield,
and I think I think he made a really smart
decision to go to a highly functional, stable organization from
the Jets. That's why I never liked when he left
the Steelers. Do you think he shot what do your
sources say? I think is a red zone weapon. I
(19:25):
think he could be really interesting for the Chiefs. I
think he has something left. I think so much of
it about it for him is like he's gonna sort
of go the way the wind blows him. So if
he's in a good environment, like he'll go that way.
If he's in a bad environment, he's going to be
a problem. And so I think that's sort of what
you saw over the last couple of years with the Jets.
(19:45):
I don't think he's what he was four years ago
when he was averaging four point nine yards of carry.
That said, the Chiefs can really use him. They missed
Damien Williams in shortyard close to the goal on here's
the other thing. They love Clyde Edwards a lair and
they believe in Clyde Edwards Hilaire. But if you look
at Clyde Edwards Hilaire's history, he really only had one
(20:07):
year as the bell cow at LSU, and that was
with all these great things going on around him. And
so to ask him to be that guy in year
one in the NFL, I think was always a little
bit much. And so now what can they do? Now
they can pace them a little bit more, and now
this is going to allow them to get more out
of their first round pick when you get to December
and January, when you'd be worrying about him hitting that
(20:27):
rookie wall if you were really taxing him. Now you
can pull back a little bit on him and maybe
get a little bit more from him when you get
to the playoff. That's a really, really good point. Albert
Brer joining us so, I said this week Alex Smithelwin
comeback player of the year. I'll give Cam Newton camback
player of the year. I think he's been terrific and
I've been a doubter forever. And then he got COVID
and I thought, oh, brother, oh, don't don't lose Bill,
(20:49):
don't lose the locker room on this just don't And
then I thought to myself, I wonder, if you know, Bill,
his tolerance for stuff like that with veterans is pretty low.
Did he lose any equity in the locker room? Is
everybody's still all in on Cam Newton in New England? Yeah?
I think that they are. You know, I look like
this isn't just a one year thing too. I mean,
(21:10):
I you know his history, if you really dig into it,
you talk to people in Carolina, he was actually a
really good locker room guy there. Like if you talk
to the Greg Olsens, the Ryan kali Ols, the Thomas
davis Is, the Luke Keekleys, the guys who were foundation
pieces with them in Carolina, they all love him. And
so yeah, I mean I think that the Patriots look
at Cam Newton as a guy who potentially could be
(21:31):
their quarterback for the next three, four or five years,
and at the very least could be somebody who helps
them get to the next guy, sort of the same
way that Alex Smith was for the Kansas City Chiefs
and getting them to Patrick Mahomes. And the Patriots are
in an interesting spot now. I actually think Colin this
is sort of an interesting twist the Dwayne Haskins benching
in Washington could reverberate in New England. Before you were
(21:55):
sort of wondering where's the market for Cam Newton going
to be after the season. Now Washington's future at quarterback
looks wide open. Their head coaches Ron Rivera, their offensive
coordinator Scott Turner, and now the Patriots actually have something
to worry about as far as where Cam Newton could
go after the year. And so I think this storyline
only gets more interesting as we go on. Yeah, I want,
(22:15):
I said this to Joy this week. If they I'm
not there yet, but I'm close. If Cam beats Denver,
if Cam pulled the next two weeks, plays really well
and I feel like, okay, I got a new guy here,
do they sit down and just offer him and just say, listen,
here's a two year deal. We may draft a quarterback. Cam,
We're gonna try to, but for two years we're building
(22:36):
around you. Do you think they would start talks in
a couple of weeks if he flourished against let's say
Denver this weekend. I wouldn't be surprised if they did
what they did with Jimmy Garoppolo and Jimmy Garoppolo. Before
they traded him, they'd offered him like a fair kind
of bridge deal, and he turned it down and he
wound up winning in that scenario, became a starter in
San Francisco, got paid there. But it wouldn't surprise me
(22:58):
if they offered him some sort of bridge that sort
of takes care of him the next few years, gets
him some money early, takes some of that injury rest
that he's spacing the rest of the year off of
his plate. And I think it would make all the
sense in the world to do that. Call um for
a couple of different reasons. Number One, the CAP's gonna
go down next year because of the revenue shortfall. So
if you can dump some money into this year where
(23:20):
you still have some cap space and they still have
like between twenty five and thirty million dollars in cap space,
I think you do it. And then it allows you
to sort of plan fiscally around CAM for the next
few years. And again I think the Alex Smith pomp
in Kansas City is the right one where it's we're
really happy with our quarterback right now, and maybe he's
the long term answer, and maybe he gets back to
being MVP Cam. But at the very least, we've got
(23:43):
a guy we're happy with for now that's going to
help us get to the next guy. That's why we
bring him on all sorts of good insight. Albert Breyer,
Senior NFL guy, Lead Content, Dude, Money Morning Quarterback, have
a great Wait, this a really good NFL weekend. There's
a lot of clarity this weekend. Thanks Albert. All right,
call enjoy the weekend. One More Heard. The Herd streams
twenty four hours a day, seven days a week within
(24:05):
the iHeartRadio app. Search Herd to listen live or on
demand whenever you'd like. Ty Lou is going to just
agree to a five year deal for the Clippers. And
a story came out yesterday that, according to a report
that players like Patrick Beverley and Montrese Harrold and Lou Williams,
we're not happy last year with Doc Rivers allowing Kawhi
(24:27):
Leonard to get special treatment, miss a lot of practices,
mix games, be late to flights. The issue here, and
this is not going to change much, is that the
Clippers were a bunch of underdogs. It's a bunch of
Patrick Beverley's, It's a bunch of Lou Williams, Montrese Harold.
It's a bunch of underdogs and that's what they created.
And let's be honest about this. Kawhi Leonard is sort
(24:49):
of odd. He's nonverbal. He's the only NBA star you're
not sure if he's going to play. He's different, He's
he's not real communicative. That's who he is. And we've
said this before. We know that Russell Westbrook, his intense,
no coach has changed him. We know Ben Simmons is
kind of aloof. No coach really changed him. What Kawhi
Leonard is is unique and non verbal. And Greg Popovitch
(25:14):
struggled with it. And what was interesting is he was
a mercenary in Toronto. He was just asked to come
score buckets, make defensive play. That's all he was asked.
He was not asked to be a team leader, be
a mercenary, and he was great. And in San Antonio
he was not asked to lead the team. They had Duncan,
they had veterans, they had pop, they had Tony Parker.
(25:37):
The challenge for ty Lou is this player is now
asked to be a leader and more verbal and more communicative,
and that's not really what Kawhi Leonard is he is,
That's not who he is. He's just a get a bucket,
get a stop guy, and he's fantastic at it, as
good as anybody in the NBA. But I do think
there is a certain tension in this organization. And when
(26:00):
your star is not overly communicative, is the only star
in the league that wants lots of days off. I
think that's a tense situation. I think it's like the
Rams with Todd Gurley. There's a little walking on eggshells
going on, and the locker room in the chemistry was
not right. Now, can Tylu forge through that? Tie is
(26:24):
very confrontational. Doc Rivers tends to more, He's more appealing
to veterans. He'll appease veterans. Tylu won't Tyle get after it.
He'll argue with Lebron, who get right in his face.
So I do think Jerry West talks Steve Ballmer into
this higher the owner wanted Jeff van Gundhi, Jerry West wanted,
according to reports, Tylu, and I would guess one of
(26:45):
the reasons Jerry West, like Tylu, is ties a little
more confrontational. He'll get after Paul George. He can get
after a Kawhi Leonard and get right in his face
and tell him what I need. And I think that's
probably the remedy for what ails this franchise. They're still
very good, but I've seen this a lot in pro sports,
is that personalities and are formed when your kids, Like
(27:06):
your personality, personality is largely formed by the time you're
nine years old. You could you could go ask a
child psychologist what you're at nine and ten. It's largely
what you are, different variations of it. You're more mature
obviously at twenty nine than nine. You know your brain
forms by twenty twenty one years old, but at nine
your personality is largely formed. Hyper kids are hyper adults.
(27:29):
You know. Nervous kids are nervous adults. Talkers are talkers
by nine, nonverbal nonverbal by nine. And I think I
think Kahi is a very unique personality. It's never going
to be easy. There will be walking on eggshells, but
I think Tylu is the kind of confrontational man that
can make it work. And my guess is they won't
be as disappointing next year. Be sure to catch live
(27:52):
editions of the Herd weekdays in noun Easter nine am
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio FS one and the iHeart
Radio Appjimmy Johnson's got all sorts of courage, two Super Bowls,
one of the best football coaches in the history of
this country, College Football National Championship Miami. He's now Fox
Sports analyst, obviously joining us live from the Keys in Florida. So, Jimmy,
(28:14):
the worst situation for a coach is you lose your
starting quarterback and you got to go to a backup.
But I said this in the offseason. I thought Andy
Dalton was a good pickup. He's grown up, he's from Texas.
He's all in on the Cowboys. Would you if you
ran the Cowboys, would you lighten it up? Would you
make which is simplify it for him? Would you? Some
(28:34):
of their skills are similar Dacks, I think a little
better athlete. What do you do with a playbook now?
For Dalton? Yeah, Colley, I think you adjusted a little bit,
you know, but I felt like they needed to adjust it,
even when Dak was in there. They needed to do
some things to protect that defense. That defense really struggling.
You know. They went from a four to three to
(28:55):
three to four and half the players really don't know
what they're doing and the defense has struggled. And so
how you protect the defense is you eliminate the negative
plays and you increase your time of possession by running
them football with Ezekiel Elliott. Now, I think Dalton, I
think he'll be a perfect fit. In fact, he will
(29:16):
help that defense as long as he manages the game
and utilizes that supporting cast. I think that they shouldn't
miss a beat. Plus, they're in the NFC East. You know,
if if you were the quarterback for the Cowboys, you
didn't win the NFC East. So I think they're in
good shape. So Lavian Bell got picked up by the
(29:37):
Chiefs when you were coaching, and you get a player,
and Levian may not be what he was five years ago,
but he's got a skill set. Jimmy, he can catch
the ball. This is a pretty good old line. How
much do you integrate him into the offense? First week,
second week, third week, because because he's a nice little
red zone asset here, would just slowly move him into
(29:58):
the offense. You know, Bell has been in the league
long enough that he's going to be able to adjust
to whatever Andy wants it to do. And you know
who's the best coach in the entire league as far
as utilizing his talent, and it's Andy Reid. You know Bell,
you know, like you say, he's an outstanding receiver. You
(30:19):
can split him out, you can do a lot of
different things with him. Now, he's not going to be
able to play in that first ball game, but you know,
you know, by the time he gets into the second
ball game into like a week and a half or so,
you know, they'll have a package for Bell. And I
think he'll do fine. I think, in fact, he'll do
a lot better for them than what he was doing
for the Jets, and it could be similar to what
(30:41):
he was doing. And they're with the Steelers, So Packers
Bucks is the biggest game of the day. And the
one reason I like Green Bay in this game. One
of the reasons I like it, I think they're doing
such a good job protecting Aaron Rodgers. He's not getting sacked,
he's got that extra beat, that extra three quarters of
a second, and Tom's offensive line has been heavily penalized
(31:04):
and it just looks like they're a little out of
sync now. Chris Godwin's supposed to play this week and
so he's fully practiced. So are you disappointed or is
Tampa offensive league kind of where Jimmy you thought they'd
be with no preseason. I actually thought Tampa would be
(31:25):
better than what they're playing right now. I think Brady
is frustrated. You know, you know, he's not converting on
third down, but most of his third downs or third
down and eight third down in nine right, they're a sloppy,
sloppy football team. You know, I've said for the last
couple of years, before Brady got there, I said Tampa
was the most exciting bad team in the league. You know,
(31:49):
here they led the league in offense, but they were
horrible and they turned the bowl over too much, made
too many mistakes. Now Brady has elevated them. They're better now,
but they still were a sloppy football team. Too many penalties,
too many negative plays, too many third and longs. You know,
I just see, you know, the Packers being a better
(32:11):
coach team right now. Now, I will say this, I
like their defensive coach. I think defensively they really do
a heck of a job. Yeah. I like Todd Bulls too.
I think He's as good a coordinator right now as
the league has to Pro Football Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson.
It's interesting, you know, Brady comes from that sort of academic,
rigid system in New England, very intense, and Tampa's always
(32:34):
been a little loose, and Bruce arians a little loose.
And Tom's yelling at teammates about ten days ago, and
it made a lot of news. I mean, Troy Aikman,
you had him, he'd bark at guys, Dan Marino would
bark at guys. I do worry a little bit that
it's a young roster. Tom's an older player and he's
losing patients. Should I at all be worried that it
(32:55):
got a little testy and talked about a little too
long when he barked last week? You know, Troy didn't
bark until after I left because he knew Barry wasn't
going to bark, and he didn't, and somebody needed to
bark at those players. Uh. I think just looking at Tom,
(33:17):
he looks frustrated. Uh, he looks, you know like Uh.
In fact, he made the comment after the ball game
that you know, you know, so many third and eights,
you know, it's hard to convert, and so, uh, they
are a talented enough team that they can win against
anybody if things fall right for him. But because they're
(33:39):
a sloppy team, they're not going to have the consistency
of a champion. And until they get that consistency, I'm
gonna be concerned about him. Yeah, you know, it's interesting.
I love Andy Reid um and but there's there is something.
Mahomes is facing more zone coverage this year, and he's
struggling a little bit with it. He is, he's struggling,
(34:02):
and they've gotten into a bad habit of starting slow.
And and I think about and I think to myself, well,
Andy Reid's a great play designer. Maybe he lets he
feels the game out. Pete Carroll can get into this
where Pete lets the game he feels it out, and
then he's a terrific halftime adjuster. Go back to your career,
did you ever have a team like the Chiefs that
(34:24):
could start slow and you always felt like you were
digging out of a hole a little bit? And how
do you correct it if that ever becomes the case? Yeah,
I think Kansas City falls into the category of having
success and maybe not being quite as hungry before they
had the success. You know, the biggest enemy of great
(34:49):
is good yea, And yeah, they are very very good now.
When you're bad, you know, you put in the extra
hours and you do whatever it takes to try to achieve,
you know, success. But they've had so much success it's
you know, it's almost like they're taking things for granted. Yeah,
(35:10):
I know. Terry Bratschall asked me. He said, you know
you were a complete you know, so ob to those players,
you know after that first Super Bowl. I said, yeah,
and I was a bigger one to second. He said,
if you state without veteran you lighten up when yea,
I said, no, I would have been an even bigger one.
You got to you gotta push those players. The more
success they have, the harder it is to push them,
(35:34):
you know, to get to that pinnacle. So I have
to ask you want to Every coach has a strength. Um.
You you had an eye for personnel that is second
to none. Um, you were an unbelievable recruiter and you
built you built a power at Miami. And it wasn't
all five star guys. It wasn't when you first got there.
You built a power with some three star guys. And
I have to ask you if the Jets or the
(35:56):
Giants got the number one pick and Trevor Lawrence sitting
out there, you're the GM of one of those teams,
do you move off of Jones or darneld this quickly?
What do you do? Terry? Because I think I think
that's what's gonna happen here. These are the Jets are
a bad, bad football team. They are a bad football team.
But you don't pass on a great, great quarterback. Uh.
(36:19):
You you know, if you're gonna have the first pick
in the draft, that means you're gonna have the first
pick in the second round as well, you know, and
the third and the fourth, and so you take your
Trevor Lawrence. Uh and then you know, you maybe trade
some other picks to try to build your team, but
you don't ever bypass on a you know, franchise outstanding
(36:39):
quarterback like Trevor Lawrence. Okay, And Aikman was like that,
right you You you with Troy Aikman, you felt you
were getting I felt that way. We had scouts on
our We had scouts that wanted to take Tony Mandridge. Uh.
I mean, you know, people have a selective amnesia. Right now,
everybody says, oh, you know, for sure we're gonna take
Troy Aikman. You know, you know, Troy didn't even make
(37:01):
All Pack ten. You know, Rodney Pete was All Pack
ten quarterback. So there were questions. There were questions on Troy. Now,
there were no questions on my mind. I'd been recruiting
Troy ever since he was a sophomore in high school.
He was in my you know, when he was a
sophomore in high school, he came to my camp at
Oklahoma State. We thought we had him signed at Oklahoma State,
(37:22):
and then at the last weekend he goes to Oklahoma.
So I've been working on Troy for a long time.
I knew he was going to be our guy. But
you know, if you look back during that period of time,
you know, they were a bunch of other players that
were questions whether or not, you know, they could be
the number one pick. A lot of people wanted Mandridge.
Did you fire those scouts who wanted Mandridge? To protect them?
(37:48):
I wouldn't mention their name. Now, I don't blame you,
by the way. One college football question, So Nick Saban
will not coach the game because he got COVID now
he was at Zoom practices, and it was so interesting
and so interesting to me that even though he's got
Steve Sarkisian who's been a head coach twice, and he's
got his defense installed for ten fifteen years, the game,
(38:11):
the line moved a field goal, and I'm like, Holy Molly, Jimmy,
when when you were when you were in a game,
where would you have been missed? As a head coach?
What what does a head coach do is at the
halftime adjustment maybe that a coordinator couldn't do well. You know,
I think the head coach, you know, really in college
(38:32):
and pro his biggest impact is on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
You know. Uh, it's during the week and preparing for
the ball game. That's his biggest impact. The head coach
owned game day, you know. Depend you know, some head
coaches call plays, which I don't agree with u some
(38:52):
coaches cold def I don't agree with that either. Now
it's more I think he has more impact in professional
football and college football. If you're at one of those
top ten schools, it's kind of like I said, with you,
you could be the quarterback for Dallas. And you can
still win the NFCA East if you're at Alabama. You know,
when you were the head coach, you're still gonna be
(39:13):
right there winning ten or eleven ball games. Yeah, you
never called plays once in your career, you even your
first year at Oklahoma. So yeah, and actually I called plays.
I called defenses three or four years. I called offensive
plays for two years at Oklahoma State. In fact, we
Ernest Anderson led the nation in rushing the year that
(39:34):
I called plays at Oklahoma State. Why did you give
it up? I don't think that's the way to do it.
I think you're a better head coach if you can delegate,
you can oversee, you can have your hand in the offensive, defense,
and special teams. I spent more time. I was in
all the special teams meetings. You know, I would pop
in and out of the offensive and defensive meetings. I
(39:56):
would set in all the defensive meetings and preparing the
game plan, you know, and so you know, if you
were wrapped up an offensive coordinator, his his mindset is
you know score. You know, he didn't talk about, you know,
managing the game timeouts, you know, working the clock. He
just wants to score. The defensive coordinator just wants to
(40:16):
stop him. You know, he didn't care about working the clock.
The head coach has got to manage the game. He's
got to tell the offensive coordinator, hey, start running the
ball more. He's got to tell the defensive coordinate blitz,
hey we can We can't give him any yordage here.
You know. He's got to tell the special teams coach, hey,
we're gonna run a fake punt, you know, if we're
if they don't make it this time. You know, I
want the head coach to manage the game, you know,
(40:39):
and manage you know, clock management. I see games loss
calling every single weekend where the head coach did not
manage the clock. Yeah, you know it's crazy. Yeah, boy,
you gave Dave Wanstad all that all that responsibility. Boy,
that's a lot of responsibility to give Davis. He was
with me about twenty years, so he knew what I
(40:59):
wanted to get done. The Hall of Famer Jimmy Johnson,
great sceney coach. Okay, Colin
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