Ezekiel Elliott, Aaron Rodgers, Cleveland Browns and Kevin Durant

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to The Herd podcast. Be sure to
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Sports Radio. Ah. Here we go on to Thursday Pack.

(00:27):
This is the Herd. Wherever you may be and however
you may be listening. We are live in Los Angeles
on iHeartRadio, Fox Sports Radio and FS one Urban Meyer
and forty five minutes. Greg co Sell. Next Hour, Chris
Haynes on his interview with Kevin Durant stopping by today.
We're absolutely packed. Joy is on assignment. Veteran newsman John

(00:50):
Goulay will be updating us on an NFL trade that's
taking place today with the Browns and the Texans. It
is so great to have you in. Let me start
with this. I am really enjoying. I never knew that
Jerry Jones and Steven Jones were pro wrestlers, but they
are tag team partners. One day it's Jerry banging on Zeke.
The next day it's Stephen Jones banging on d then

(01:12):
it's Jerry banging on Zeke, and then Steven Jones banging
on Zeke. These guys are tag team partners w W,
which by the way, is coming to Fox very soon.
Let me go to the first thing. Jerry came out,
remember that, and Jerry said, you can win Super Bowls
without star running backs. And then Stephen came out and
said a couple days later, you know, any money we

(01:34):
give Zeke is just taken away from other Cowboys stars.
And then Jerry came out yesterday and said, al Alfred Morris,
the running back they signed, has the best feel of
any running back I've ever seen. And then Stephen came
out later in the day with Rich Eisen and said
he won't call us back here. Stephen Jones, how often

(01:57):
are you talking with Zeke's team? Very rarely. There's this
perception out there about negotiations that you know, there's these
ongoing talks and they go on hours at a time,
and you know that's just not the case. You kind
of set the boundaries of where you think it should be,
and certainly you know they're all represented by very sharp

(02:18):
people and they're trying to do the best for their client,
and you kind of sit there and you stew on it,
you think about it. You know, you're always trying to
think of something that might bridge a gap. Okay, so
remember this is the latest thing. It's a tag team partner, Jerry,
you can win super Bowls without great running backs. Steven,
you're just taking money out of dak in Amari's hands,

(02:40):
Jerry yesterday, Alfred Morris has the best feel of any
running back I've ever seen. And then Stephen Jones comes
out later and says, nobody's returning our calls. We're not close. Okay,
So this is tag team and Zeke. Are they getting nervous?
Are they getting anxious? Now? I've felt from the very
beginning Jerry and Stephen have been very shrewd their public comments.

(03:01):
But there is a reason they are going out in public.
They are trying to put pressure on Zeke. And I
think Zeke has two things going for him here, and
they're not the things that people think, well, he's a
great player, they needed you know, He's got two things
going for him. Number One, Jerry Jones is seventy six
years old. He didn't want to waste another season. When
you get older in life, you just don't have time

(03:23):
to waste. When you're on the back nine of your mortality,
you're not gonna waste time. You want to get things done.
You I can tell you the older I get, the
less time I'm willing to waste because I have less
time on the earth. That's an advantage for Zeke. An
older owner hasn't want a Super Bowl in a while. Finally,
as a roster, he doesn't want to waste a season.

(03:46):
And the second thing that I think helped Zeke is
in the division. Philadelphia is great, well coached Carson Wentz
and they have all their young stars signed. But even
out of the division, the FC is loaded. I'll give
you nine teams not in Dallas's division that I think

(04:06):
are capable of making the playoffs, the Falcons, the Saints
and the Panthers, the Packers, the Bears and the Vikings,
the Rams, the Niners, and the Seahawks. That's just out
of the Dallas Cowboys NFC East Division. So I think
those are big advantages. The NFC's loaded the division, Philadelphia

(04:28):
maybe a super Bowl favorite. Jerry is seventy six years old.
There is a reason that Jerry and Stephen on a
daily basis are coming out and doing a tag team
on Zeke. They're feeling it. This is this is not
a time to not have all the AMMO for the
NFC East, the NFC with an aging owner. So I

(04:51):
think it's a blast to watch. I think it's really fun.
By the way, Zeke has shut it down. Zeke's in Mexico.
Zeke's not talking, Zeke's not calling. Does Zeke understand he
has leverage here? Because this morning, when I see Stephen
Jones talking and Jerry talking about how great Alfred Morris is,
cowboy leadership getting a little tight, get a little closer

(05:13):
to games, they're getting a little anxious, kind of feels
like it this morning kind of feels like it. All right,
let me shift to this Aaron Rodgers time. You know,
I think Aaron Rodgers is great, But when the comparisons
were made years ago to Tom Brady, I said, well,
he's got a better arm. But I think there are
certain leadership skills that Tom has that Aaron does not have.

(05:34):
I think Aaron's talented, he's more mobile, maybe he's a
better athlete, he's got a better arm. I'm not disputing
that of course Aaron is thin skin and things I
don't like him. I think Aaron's great. It's one of
the ten best fifteen best quarterbacks in the history of
the game I've ever seen, and I've seen all of
them that matter. I'm not joking outside of Otto Graham,
Johnny Unitis. I think I've seen most of the great quarterbacks.
But it's interesting. Finally, another member of the immedia, of

(05:57):
the sports media, NFL media, is reckoning what I'm recognizing.
So Pro Football Talk came out yesterday and admitted Aaron
rodgers criticism of joint practices, which he did yesterday, amounts
to criticism of his new coach, Matt Lafleur. Pro Football
Talk also acknowledged in the last two weeks three weeks,

(06:18):
Aaron Rodgers has criticized his new coach twice, one on
the audible thing he didn't love the restrictive nature of
Matt Lafleur's audibles, and two by coming out and saying
and this is what Aaron said in the last forty
eight hours in regards to the Packers joint practices with
other teams. Quote, I don't think live special team drills

(06:38):
are smart. The kickoff, especially is dangerous. I just don't
think it's the best use of joint practice. So what
are he is saying? This is essentially the equivalent to
an eye roll to your coach. This is the equivalent
of calling your coach stupid. If Tom Brady came out
and said, you know, I think these joint practices, I
think these special team drills are not very smart. Would

(07:01):
he say that about Bill? What he questioned? Bill's audible system?
This is the eye roll. Two eye rolls before the
season starts. By the way, isn't Jeff Saturday, former Packer,
the one that came out and said Aaron would roll
his eyes at Mike McCarthy's play calls, didn't Aaron Rodgers

(07:21):
lead the NFL last year and throwaways by a mile,
basically acknowledging before the play started. I hate it. I'm
throwing the ball out of bounds. This is the gap
that I've discussed for years Brady and Aaron. Aaron is condescending,
Aaron goes public with it. Aaron takes shots at superiors.

(07:42):
I don't control practice. It's not very smart. That's the gap.
That is the gap. It's not talent. Aaron's got arguably
more of it. But I mean, ask yourself, if you
were a high school coach, you're a high school football coach,
and you're high school quarterback came out and said, yeah,
I don't think these joint practices are very smart. The

(08:04):
high school coach would go down and talk to us
high school quarterback. If Tua came out in college, if
they had college joint practices, and Tuah the quarterback at
Alabama said yeah, I don't think these joint practices are
very smart. Nick Saban would bring him into his office.
The difference here is Matt Lafleur or the new Packard
coach has to eat it because Aaron Rodgers is a

(08:26):
you know, he's an icon, and he's rich, and he's
got a Super Bowl ring, and he replaced FARV and
he's idolized and he's worshiped and he you know, mostly
he's one of the great talents of our time playing quarterback.
But make no mistake these comments. Thank you Pro Football Talk.
These comments were essentially the equivalent the audible comment publicly

(08:46):
and the special teams comment publicly. They're an eye roll,
which is all I've been saying for years. Aaron's talented,
but he's condescending. They did a study years ago at
the University of Washington years ago about why couples get divorced.
It's not cheating, it's not money. They could predict with
ninety nine percent accuracy why couples would get divorced. They

(09:09):
would interview couples, they'd sit them down for a couple
of hours, they'd ask the couples together all sorts of questions,
and they could predict with ninety nine percent accuracy if
they would get divorced. And do you know what the
factor was that the social scientists or the psychologists could
spot eye rolling, condescending, not respecting your partner. That just

(09:32):
led to a Packer divorce. And already in a relationship.
We're not even to the preseason games yet these are
calm waters. Already Aaron is doing what teammates have claimed
he did with Mike McCarthy. Sometimes you gotta eat it.
You don't want to go public. You could tell your
coach in private, but Aaron makes a point of going

(09:53):
out making it public, which essentially is kind of embarrassing
your head coach. I don't want this system. This is stupid.
Why are we doing this? Those are private conversations. So again,
Aaron just got a divorce from a football coach. Throwaways
led the league, eye rolling in the huddle. This is

(10:15):
what causes divorces in real life, and it's it's it's
just nice occasionally that I don't have to carry the
water for the criticism of Aaron Rodgers in America that
he's not perfect. I mean, we're always willing to say
Tom Brady's not very athletic. Tom doesn't get mad, he
let he makes fun of that on Twitter, he makes

(10:35):
fun of that. Does everybody have to say Aaron Rodgers
is perfect? Or can we acknowledge now more eye rolling?
Because that's all these quotes are. They're the equivalent of
eye rolling, which has been my primary criticism of Aaron
for a decade. We've got a trade coming in the NFL.
It just got finalized. I think it's very good for
both teams, and Kevin Durant sat down with Chris Haynes

(10:58):
and said a lot, we'll break down that all of
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to catch live editions of The Herd weekdayson noun Easter
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(12:26):
Geico dot com and see how much money you could save.
Urban Meyer in twenty minutes from now, Greg ko Sell
top of Next Hour, Chris Haynes stops by two to
talk about the Kevin Durant article. I got some thoughts
on that. So there was a deal made this morning.
The Houston Texans traded a fourth round pick, it's a
conditional fourth rounder, could become a third rounder to Cleveland.

(12:46):
The Browns now have nine picks going into next year's
draft as of now, and Cleveland gave Houston a really
nice I think number two running back in the NFL,
Duke Johnson. It's a very very high end number two
running back. Not sure he's one. Cleveland didn't need three
running backs. One of my criticisms of Cleveland is they
got too many mouse to feed. When Kareem Hunt comes back,

(13:08):
they're gonna have Kareem Hunt, Nick Chubb. They don't need
a third running back. They've already got more than enough
tight end talent, wide receiver talent, running back talent, get
some better offensive line talent. So I like to move
by Cleveland, move off a running back, get a pick
for next year. Accumulate draft picks. You can use them
or you can use them for a trade to get
a more veteran player later. Also, Houston is a very

(13:30):
good football team. People forget this. Houston won the AFC
South last year, not the Colts. Houston reeled off nine
straight win Houston got off to the bad start and
was really good at the end of the year. This
solves a realist issue for Houston, okay, because this team's
got great defensive line talent, great young quarterback, superstar wide receiver.

(13:50):
Now they have two very capable running backs. They have
very athletic linebackers. Now, Houston, go out and solve your
other issue. Left tackle. Trent Williams has been a very
very good Washington Redskin for a long time. He's the
best player they have in their team, and he is
adamant he will not play for them. And Trent Williams
is a man. He is Washington's best player and he's

(14:12):
adamant I'm not playing. Houston needs a left tackle, okay,
because they have the other components. They have the other
Now they have two legit running backs, star receiver, athletic linebackers,
start young quarterback who I really like, Deshaun Watson, very
good athletic linebackers. They need a dominant, imposing force on
the offensive line. They've cobbled it together. It was putred

(14:35):
last year. Reports are it's better, but it would have
to be so I think for Houston this is a
win now move. This is a we're close, and I
agree with him. I think Houston is close. Now. Houston
doesn't have a history of winning those big games, especially
away from Houston, but this is kind of a win
now move. Deshaun Watson still on that young rookie contract.

(14:57):
This is what we see a trend going around the league.
Get young guys quarterbacks on that roster, bring in players now.
And when Cleveland's doing it with Baker Mayfield, Jets or
doing it was Sam Darnold. Rams have done it with
Jared Goff. Cowboys are have tried to do it last
couple of years, not as much as I would like
with Dak Prescott. All right, here's veteran newsman John Goulet.

(15:18):
No turn, this is the herd line news. So Colin,
we've all seen the disgusting pictures of Antonio Brown's feet,
which were reportedly damaged during cryotherapy session where he didn't
wear proper footwear. Yeah, you know, apparently if it's negative
two hundred, you want to have clothes. On ESPN South
Palestonio reported that Brown has extreme frostbite and there is

(15:42):
no timetable for his return sawn hard knocks. He practiced
one day and that was it. He can run really
fast in a straight line. Apparently, anything more than that
it's too damaging to his feet. I don't know how
there's extreme frostbite. I would think any former frostbite is
fairly extreme. Yeah. How much of a problem is this
going to be for the er? He has to learn
a new system. He has a new quarterback, there's all

(16:03):
new receivers around him. Well camp, Yeah, I mean running
back you can be late to camp. Wide receiver, you
should not. There's a reason Tom Brady takes his receivers
in the off season to work time, and those are
the ones he plays with every year. Yeah, this is
a totally new system for him. Baker Mayfield came to
LA to work with ob j and Landry look like
the quarterback. This is like a trend in the NFL.
A lot of the top quarterbacks go find their wide receivers.

(16:26):
They go on a vacation work vacation, and they work
with their They don't work with their running backs. They
don't work. They work with their wide receivers because it's
a timing position. So I think it is something well
and and he's the kind of guy though he wants
the ball right, he's gonna get upset if he doesn't
get the ball. How's Derek harging to trust thrown him
the ball? If he doesn't have any rhythm with him,
he's going to be more comfortable with Tywell Williams or

(16:46):
any of the other guys. Well, that's right, Tyrell Williams
is in camp. He was the Charger's third best receiver.
He will now be the second best receiver. And because
he's in camp in the timing, Derek probably trusts him
more early in the year. So many people know if
you're a fan of the show, that you love Jets
quarterback Sam Darnold and have always been a big fan
of his bad news though he may have finally done

(17:08):
something to make you mad. Darnold was asked to be
a part of a video wishing Tom Brady a Happy Birthday,
which other stars Drew Brees and Deshaun Watson agreed to
participate in, and Sam Darnold said no, he would not
wish Tom Brady a happy birthday. Why he's your rival?
Why would you wish? I totally love Darnold. Not. By

(17:28):
the way, Well, then you're gonna like this quote quote.
I'm going to get every competitive advantage I can because
he's going to do the same thing. He's the ultimate competitor.
He's exactly where I want to be when I'm his
age to chase that I can't be giving him any
I absolutely love this. By the way, you think Baker
would have turned it down? Of course, not it was
free publisher would have absolutely done it. Yeah, this is

(17:48):
Sam Darnold's like, I'm not giving you. He has already
looks at Brady as the enemy. He's not given Brady
any luck. He's not playing any Tom Brady games. I
totally agree with Sam Darnold. When I came into my business,
I wasn't wishing my rival's happy birthday. I mean, outside
of a car crash, I'm not rooting against them to
get hurt, but I'm rooting against my rivals. Why would

(18:10):
I why would I go and pay homage to my rival.
I'm not what if he says it says happy birthday.
Is that some advantage the Patriots. It's not even an advantage.
It's like, I'm not going to be part of Tom
Brady's festival. That's Tom Brady now Drew Brees. I get
they both have Super Bowls. Their legacies are framed and intact.

(18:32):
But this is why I love Sam. Darnold doesn't go
out parting on his birthday, is not on Instagram, does
not have a Twitter account, He is not go Look
at the history of great quarterbacks, they're generally what I
would call low profile for their position. You don't hear
about Jared Goff, considering how big Brady is until two

(18:52):
years ago with his documentary, you never heard about him
in the off season. I love it. I don't think
Darnold could do anything to upset you. Not at this point,
pretty sure, unless he goes full on Baker and crushes
a beer can with no, it was not that's not
who he is. It's not who he is. And finally,
Alabama fans and even Alabama staff have often used the

(19:15):
grind of playing in the SEC as an excuse for
week out of conference schedules or losses late in the season.
Clemson head coach Dabo Sweeney, he is not buying it.
He told ESPN, Well, they won buy an average of
thirty three point one points per games, so they ought
to be well rested. My thing is that, are you
serious they're tired. Then you look at Clemson. We won

(19:36):
by We won twelve games by twenty plus. Who really
challenged Alabama in the SEC? They didn't get challenged by
anybody until the Georgia game. Thank you very much, Dabo Sweeney.
Alabama is twenty six and one in the last three
years against the SEC. They're one and two against Clemson.
Right Alabama, Nick Saban made a decision in year four.

(19:56):
Alabama in year four he lost three games. He decided
that was like seven years ago. I'm not going to
go on the road out of conference. I'm going to
manipulate the schedule. Alabama this year has only eight conference games,
four cupcakes and a buye stop get in. By the way,
the SEC can be, it's a very very athletic conference,
but there's dysfunction in most of the good programs. Auburn

(20:19):
hates their coach Tennessee can't find the right one. Florida,
what coach are you on? What off field crisis do
you have? LSU's got low Bama self esteem. They're like
Bama's little brothers where they can't beat Alabama, Texas, A
and M. They had a Cotton Bowl win seven years ago.
Tell me the last three or four big bowl games
they've won. It's a conference with talent but riddled with
average coaching and massive dysfunction. Missouri's dysfunctional A and M.

(20:44):
I'm telling I'm being told again how great they'll be.
So I agree with that though, But let me just
play the other side of it. Should he be the
one criticizing conference schedule because remember, also, like the SEC,
the a SEC only plays eight conference games. And it's
not like Clemson has a lot of tough games conference games,
but at all. But Clemson didn't whine when they lost

(21:04):
to Alabama. They just lost to Alabama. Every time Alabama
loses a big game, there's an excuse. It's oh, our
players are tired, our coaching. Clemson lost and they just
kept quiet and they didn't make any excuses. They're not
talking about their schedule, you know. But Nick has made
and I like Nick, but for the last seven eight years,
Nick has manipulated the schedule only eight conference games. And again,

(21:27):
stop telling me how great everybody is in the SEC. No,
Aabama's great. Georgia can never beat Alabama. Okay, that's the
second best team the SEC. Fact, in the last three years,
Alabama is the only SEC team with a winning record
against top twenty five teams. That's it. And most of them,

(21:51):
most of them are like severely under five hundred. Yes,
if you took Alabama out of the SEC today, most
people would say, I like Georgia. Show me all the
great Georgia wins in the last twenty five years. They're talented,
They've always been talented. Good at almost beating Alabama. Yeah,
they almost beat Alabama every year. Well, Clemson does beat them.
Two it to the last three times they've played. Veteran

(22:14):
newsman John Well, that's the news, and thanks for the
herd Line news. I gotta go on a rant here.
I'm a believer that when you raise young people, you
gotta be careful about missing steps. I've said this about
the NBA before, This insistence that you find a high

(22:36):
school basketball or an AU player one year of college
get him to the NBA. You're skipping steps the maturity
process of college. You're gonna tell me a nineteen year
old wouldn't be better with one more year of Roy
Williams or Mike Zischewski or Jim Beheim or Bill Sell
for Mark Few or Jay Wright. Of course he would be.
We're skipping steps. That's why Adam Silver, says the commissioner

(22:59):
of the NBA, all my players are unhappy. That's why
there's so many busts in the NBA. You're skipping too
many steps, a maturity step. College is where we all
grow up. It's where you grew up. It's where I
grew up. I learned how to make my own dinner,
make my own budget, make my own class schedule, had
to figure out how to use time efficiently. College was
valuable resource, even though not a lot of the classes

(23:20):
did anything for my career. It was a maturity stage,
a maturation stage. You can't skip steps in life. When
you see these child actors in Hollywood, it all turn
out to be losers. They skip steps. They need to
go to summer camp, they need to be a kid.
I don't want to. I don't want a seven year
old to be on a movie set. That's why so
many to be a child actors or train wrecks as

(23:41):
human beings by twenty five years old. They're skipping steps.
Let a kid be a kid. Let them go to
hang out and be on an inner tube on a
lake and go to a birthday party and eat too
much candy and chocolate and get in a fight with
his brother and his sister, and you know, a normal
process for a kid to be a kid. Their brains
don't even form until here, like twenty four years old.

(24:02):
That takes a boy's brain twenty four So skipping steps
is generally you can succeed initially, but over time you
will pay a price for it. So there's an article
in Yahoo Sports and it just made me laugh yesterday.
I'm not going to pick on the writer, but Freddie
Kitchens is now managing the Browns with lessons he learned

(24:24):
from Nick Saban and Bill Parcels. Okay, time out. He
spent one year as a grad assistant with Saban and
Lsu and one year as a tight ends coach with
the Cowboys with Bill Parcels. He's not exactly a disciple.
He spent eleven years with the Arizona Cardinals. That's his resume,
that's his coaching experience. But what worries me about Freddie

(24:45):
Kitchens is, and I'm not saying he can't succeed, but
this article insinuates that he got great tutelage from Saban,
and he got great tutelage from Parcels. In fact, a
general manager, John Dorsey says, one of the things I
admire about Freddie Kitchens, He's got no ego. Well Parcel does,
Nick Saban does. He has nothing like those guys. But

(25:05):
what I worry about Cleveland is that Freddie Kitchens missed steps. Okay,
Cincinnati hired Zach Taylor, and people said, that's ridiculous, that's
a terrible hire. Who is Zach? Zach Taylor had been
a college offensive coordinator and an interim NFL coordinator, then

(25:30):
studied under the smartest young coach in the game, Sean McVay.
Then he got an NFL job. He didn't skip any steps.
People think Sean McVay of the Rams, he was like
the new hire. He came from nowhere. No, he was
an assistant position coach in the NFL for a year.
He was a position coach in the NFL for three years,
and then he was an offensive coordinator in the NFL

(25:52):
for three years. Then he got the head coaching job.
And he's like the guy that's considered a meteor a
rock to a head coaching job. Not to mention, he
had relatives who were in the NFL, so we hung
out in the San Francisco forty nine ers offices when
he was a teenager. Big advantage Freddy Kitchens did not.
Kyle Shanahan is considered and I think Kyle's as good

(26:13):
a young coach, including Sean McVay, as the league has.
Kyle Shanahan was a coordinator at four different teams. Kay
Jim Harbaugh, he was a played in the NFL most
Valuable position quarterback, then he was a position coach in
the NFL. Then he got a small college head job
and then a bigger college head job, and then he

(26:34):
then he went to the NFL. They didn't skip steps.
Nick Saban was a defensive coordinator in college. Then he
was a defensive coordinator, and then he got a college job,
and then he got a small college job at Toledo,
then Michigan State, then LSU, than NFL, then Alabama. There's
there's no step skipping Freddie Kitchens, and there'd been a

(26:56):
coordinator last year. He was thrust. He was a running
back coach for Cleveland, who is now the head coach.
I'm not saying it's impossible. I do think their roster
is really good. I think Baker Mayfield is going to
run most of that offense. But Baker's a kid, and
Baker needs tutelage, and Baker needs guidance. That's just a

(27:18):
reality for Baker. So does Sam Darnold, So does Josh Allen,
So does Josh Rosen, So does Lamar Jackson, so does
mister Bisky. So but I am a I see this
all the time. When I used to work at my
former employer, I was in local TV and radio for
almost a decade and a half before I got to
my former employer. So a the time I got there,

(27:40):
I had a game plan. I had a person. I
mean I had you know, I knew exactly day to
day what my brand was, what my belief system was.
I always tell young broadcasters, don't be in a hurry
to get to the network at twenty five years old.
Go make a bunch of mistakes. You're skipping a bunch
of steps. Go to Midland, then go to you know

(28:00):
an arbor, and then go maybe do weekends in Detroit
and then maybe a week day job in Chicago and
then you can go syndicated. Stop rushing to get the
big job. You're skipping a lot of steps. So when
I see this article on Freddie Kitchens to manage combustible
Browns with lessons learned from Nick and Bill Parcels. First
of all, combined, you worked for him for two years.

(28:21):
One is a grad assistant. His reality is Arizona where
he had a bunch of position and never a coordinator.
And John Dorsey because he doesn't want pushback from his coach.
That's John Dorsey's personality. That's why he and Andy Reid
did not get along because Andy Reid pushed back on
John Dorsey. So Andy Reid got him out of the facility.
John Dorsey hired a kid too to me as skip steps.

(28:44):
And I think if you look at camp so far
with Freddy Kitchens, I don't think he's done a bad job,
and I'm rooting for him. I'd like to see this
thing be I'd like to see the Browns not be
man overboard. I think they'll be good nine and seven.
But don't kid yourself. This is a hard team to manage.
O B. J. Baker Youngest ross Or high expectations, and
the very quiet Pittsburgh Steelers down the street are just
sitting there looking and rolling their eyes at the circus.

(29:07):
On a weekly basis, Cleveland is delivering to us the medium.
All right, good stuff, JOI will be back sometime next week,
So will I. Tomorrow's off, John, I'm gonna take one
of my last fridays off of the summer. I've taken
a couple fridays. Like how you're teasing, Like, don't worry,
Joil will be back. We don't have to hear from
from that guy again. No, I'm just saying we're we're

(29:29):
fridays in the summer. We tend to scale back a
little bit. It's about to be the time of the
year where there is no days off anymore, right right, model,
It's our tax season. If we were accountants, we got
six months coming up. We can't take a day off.
Urban Meyer, college football analyst for Fox National Championships all
over the place, will be joining us next. True Car

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(30:55):
visit the dealership. Be sure to catch live editions of
the Herd week days in New n Eastern nine m Pacific.
By the way, I just saw this came out this morning.
ESPN ranked all thirty two NFL teams by their under
twenty five talent. The top four are all AFC, eight
of the nine or top eight of the top nine
or all AFC, So the AFC's the younger conference, the

(31:17):
younger talents. Some of these are just bad teams that
will be building. What made me laugh is the bottom
two teams are my two favorites for the Super Bowl.
The Patriots are thirty one and the Eagles are thirty two,
So the teams I liked end up playing in the
Super Bowl. And, by the way, my dark horse team
in the NFL this year, the Tennessee Titans, is twenty nine,
so they don't have any good young players outside of

(31:38):
Corey Davis either, so I think I think young players
are good. I think Cleveland's number one, by the way,
Colts number two, Chiefs number three, Houston number four. I
like all those teams. Those teams are all winning record teams.
I mean, I think Kansas City could go thirteen and three.
I think I think Indian Kansas City could be you know,
like thirteen win teams, but a lot of them are
not very good. That's why they have all the young

(31:58):
twent because they've been bad and they got good draft picks.
All right, Big Noon Kickoff is going to debut August thirty. First,
that's gonna be Urban Meyer, Regie Bush, Brady Quinn, Matt
Line at rob Stone. Urban Meyer three national championships, twelve
and three in Bowl games is part of that show
and he is joining us now via the Coward Global

(32:19):
Satellite Network. All right, let's start with this. So we
get into camp, coach, how long is it easier for
a coach at this time of the year to spot
your weaknesses or to spot your strengths? What jumps out
in the first three weeks of practices the oh my god,
we're in trouble here. Oh, oh my lord, we're really

(32:40):
good here. You know, I was at practice the other
day and the transition or the difference between training camp
many many years ago, even ten years ago to now
five years ago to now that these players are actually
been getting coached all summer. So it's a much different
training camp than I remember. There's no more two a
day practice is most of the fundamental has been worked

(33:02):
on all summer. You're not trying to get them in
shape because they've been here all summer and for most teams,
and I know Ohio State and a lot of teams
have worked on scheme all summers. So you have a
pretty good field going into it right now, I would say,
especially because you've been around your players all summer. As
long as you stay healthy, you have a pretty good
indication what kind of team you're having. The one challenge

(33:23):
you have is what kind of toughness is there? Practice
is a change. You know, you don't just see the
physicalness that you used to see just because of health
of players, and you want to make sure you get
them to the dance or the first game. When you
were at Ohio State, did you, I mean the rest
of us were fans. We kind of look at a
schedule and we go, Okay, these games feel like ours.

(33:44):
These games are trouble spots. How do you focus on
the moment and the practice when you know your players
can go to the internet look at schedules. Do you
struggle with that? Nowadays? The social media aspect creating urgency
when everybody's always looking ahead. Absolutely, especially a place like

(34:04):
Ohio State where the social media and just media in general.
You build players up they're highly recruited players when actually
I haven't done a whole lot, and so I would
always my approach was is make practices as hard as possible.
I used to tell them, I said, if you're worrying
about anything other than survival and making into the next day,
because we're going to practice really hard. So that was
my way of the same thing during the season of practice.

(34:27):
That was our way of making sure that there is
focus and intention on detail and the win the moment now,
not worried about down the road or who you're playing.
So when you're at a program like a Clemson, like
Ohio State, Alabama, Oklahoma, Georgia, where you're going to be
favorite in maybe all your games or maybe up to one's,
that's the approach that we had, and that is certainly

(34:49):
a concern. By the way, speaking of concerns, players do
have more power today, I mean that this is the
world we live in has changed. As you said, you
don't have two ways two a days. Players don't hit
as much. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
I think it's just a new challenge for coaches. You
and I were to dinner not long ago with tom
Izzo and he talked about players transferring and players leaving

(35:11):
early in how it's harder to build culture. There's a
little bit of momentum. Jim Harbaught talked about it this
week about players skipping bowl games or do you worry
about that going forward for the sport? I worry about
it big time. I remember Denzel Ward came to me
a couple of years ago before the Cotton Bowl, and

(35:33):
I really I heard about it. I never had to
deal with it. This certainly isn't the opportunity to say
that I disagree with him, because when you start, you know,
you start talking about Nick Bosa's and top ten picks
like Denzel Ward. And I hate to say this, but
I understand it. I not necessarily agree with it, but
I certainly understand it. Am. I worried about I worry

(35:55):
about the non playoff bowl games, and we were very concerned.
We went to the Rosewar You kidding me? Oho stayed
going to the Rose bowing second time in the last
twenty five years, the legendary bowl game, and I was
very concerned that when we didn't make the playoffs that
we would the players sit out. We did not have that.
I know other teams had at times, even the New
York New Year's Six Bowl games, the Big Bowl games,

(36:17):
players would sit out. That's very alarming to me, and
I'm not necessary about the future of the game, but
I mean that's something we a have to be aware
of him. And it just it's when you when you
say the word team, you know, finish what you start.
And so I'm very concerned about that. Yeah, by the way,
Dabo Sweeney, I think he's incredibly likable. Maybe it's the
Southern twang. I think everything Dabo says makes me laugh it.

(36:40):
I found him incredibly likable. And yesterday he came out
and I don't think it was really the way he said.
It was incredibly charming. He said Alabama was tired. That's
why they lost to us. They won their games by
thirty three points. We won ours by twenty. You couldn't
be tired. You had six weeks to prepare for it.
But I do think he underscored an issue I have.

(37:00):
And this is not to pick on Nick Saban, who
I think we both think is an amazing coach and
I like Nick. I've talked to him many times. But
I do think there is this theme constantly that the
SEC is so great that, oh lord, you can't play
a ninth conference game. You gotta have buys, you gotta
play cupcakes. Is it possible you can be two things
at once. You could be the best conference. But we

(37:22):
could be overstating how rigorous it is in the SEC.
There's no question. I spent six years of my life
in the SEC. There is an absolute truth though, that
from the top to bottom, that is the best Conference's
you know, you don't have a gimme. You know, a
game that you think that you're going to go in,
you just roll out the ball and you're much better
than that team. That's very rare in that conference. When

(37:44):
you start thinking about teams that maybe have struggled in
the past, every one of them a very talented players.
You know, they're in the talent rich part of the country.
So I see it at times, I put it more
on the media than the coaches, that you build up
a conference to be the best there is, which there's
a lot of truth to that. However, we also know

(38:04):
there's other truths. You gotta go play that bowl game,
and you know that's why they keep score. At the
end of the game. If one team is better than
the other, that's who wins. Yeah, the one thing I
always felt, you know. I mean, let's be honest, Urban,
the Big Ten, you can get popped in that conference.
I saw you guys go to Iowa a couple of
years ago and struggle. There was a game against Purdue,
So it's not like the Big Ten. I mean, let's

(38:25):
be honest about it. You're the dominant. You were the
dominant coach in the Big Ten for years. You got
trapped a couple of times on Saturdays. But I don't
think we look at the Big Ten as as dominant
as the SEC. But I'll tell you this, Urban, I
think the coaching in the Big Ten now is very good.
And I think you could you you probably would admit
that there were saturdays that you were halftime of a

(38:46):
football game and thought we're in trouble here. Could I
not say the Big Ten coaching is better than the
SEC coaching, which I believe it is today. I think
that's a great question. I can't. I haven't coach in
the in the SEC seeing quite a while. However, I
have coached in the Big Ten. And if there's a
better coach conference in the league in the nation. You know,

(39:06):
I'd like to have that conversation. I just think top
to bottom, the Big Ten made a decision. You know
in two thou twelve when I first won in the league,
that the league really made a You have to give
the administrator's credit. The league made drastic changes. They put
more emphasis. Just look at their seven teams in the
preseason Top twenty five and Big Ten. Yeah, recruiting has
really taken off over the last few years. There's investments

(39:30):
in the stadiums and these huge arenas in the crowds,
and so you have to give a first of all,
Commissioner Laney, but the higher ups in our conference, I
just noticed a complete transition from two thousand and twelve
to twenty eighteen nineteen, where you're you're seeing a commitment
to become the best league in America. Okay, by the way,
the kid, you're the last guy i'd want to replace.

(39:52):
Ryan Day replaces you at Ohio State. What will be
the difference between an urban camp and a Ryan Day camp. Well,
I was out there. It's very similar. It's I think
I use the term elite whenever I talk about coach
to day practice schedules are very similar. Staff transition on defense,
there's a lot of different coaches. Offensively are very similar.

(40:13):
It's very similar. You know. I think there's a culture
at Ohio State that is going to carry on. I
think Ryan's going to add his own piece to it.
And he's already done it. Can see that, and I
think he's very confident away he goes about his business.
So to answer your question, I see it being very similar.
All right, well, Urban you look rested. You're not going
to look as rested in a month when we're putting
you to work and you gotta watch thirty five games

(40:34):
on Saturday. So it's great seeing you again. Well I'm
looking forward to and thanks Colin, You've bet Urban Meyer
big noon kickoff Saturday eleven Eastern on Fox. Debut is
a Saturday, August thirty. First. You know, I got listen.
You can be two things at once. You can be
the best conference in college football and you can be overstated.
What the SEC is because of its intensity, is wildly dysfunctional.

(40:58):
Wisconsin Football's never really dysfunctional. LSU football, Oh Miss Auburn,
Tennessee A and M I mean every Florida when's Florida
not dysfunctional. So the SEC I don't think has the
best coaches. I mean, look at how many SEC coaches
have gone on to succeed in the NFL. Let's start
with zero. Okay, the PAC twelve, the Big ten. You've

(41:19):
had coaches leave those conferences go to the NFL and
succeed in the NFL. Is the best coaching. I don't
think the SEC is the best coaching. And I think
there's massive because of the intensity and passion of the fans,
there's massive dysfunctions overreactions. So you can be the best conference.
But Bamma's twenty six and one. It's last twenty seven
games in conference, most by blowout. They're one and two

(41:41):
against Clemson. So let's not go crazy on how great
the conference is. It has the most NFL bodies in it. Absolutely,
but when you add a lot of times average coaching
and major dysfunction in athletic departments, that also brings it
down to earth. Okay, that brings it down to earth.
All right. Next, we're coming up Greg co Sell, Chris

(42:01):
Haynes Rocking from Kevin Durant Interview Talk and Greg's my guy.
Our two coming up in La Live. It's the Herd,
one more Herd. The Herd streams twenty four hours a day,
seven days a week within the iHeartRadio app. Search Herd
to listen live or on demand whenever you'd like. Ah,
here we go our two live in La This is

(42:24):
the Herd. Wherever you may be and however you may
be listening. We're on iHeartRadio, Fox Sports Radio, and f
S Juan Joy Taylor back on Monday, I got tomorrow off,
so we are loaded today, Greg co Sell. In five minutes,
Chris Haynes sat down with Kevin Durant. Long interview published yesterday.
He'll be on the show today. T J Hushman's on
a final hour in Jason McIntyre Tomorrow's headlines today, the

(42:47):
last segment of our show on Thursday. I absolutely love that. So,
by the way, before we get to Chris Haynes. In
forty five minutes, he sat down with Kevin Durant and
Kevin Durant. Remember when Kevin Durant got hurt and then
he came back in the final what was the first
reaction by the NBA media. It's the warrior's fault. They
pressured him. It's the doctors, it's the training staff. NBA media,

(43:12):
in my opinion, coddles its players because stars run the
league and none of the reporters want to get ghosted
by the top players, so they suck up to him.
So when Kevin Durant got hurt, even though he's a
grown man, the immediate NBA media reaction is the Warriors

(43:32):
made him play, and the doctors made him play, and
bad training staff. And Kevin Durant yesterday dispelled all of
that nonsense and came out and said, hell no, the
Warriors pressured me in the getting back. Nobody ever said
a word to me about rehab. When the series started.
I targeted Game five. Hell nah, just happened. It's basketball man,
blank happens. Nobody was responsible for it. So the entire

(43:55):
narrative and that was the first reaction by the media
that covers the NBA, which is coddle baby, protect the stars.
This is why Adam Silver says, our players are not happy.
This is why therapists tell you don't overcompliment your kid
because when they face crisis in life, they won't be
able to handle it. Stop coddling the players. They're grown men,

(44:18):
they love basketball, They want to play basketball. NBA media
because their beholden to a handful of really popular stars,
their initial reaction to anything is coddle. Kevin Durant wanted
to play. Wasn't anybody's fault. He wanted to play basketball

(44:40):
because he's a basketball player. And by the way, the
NBA media I bring him on all the time, I
like him, But I mean that was just basically a
nonsense take. Kevin said none of it. By the way,
the other thing is, you know this kind of leads
into I didn't think Kevin duran took enough heat for

(45:01):
leaving Golden State. He left for a weaker roster, less money,
worse head coach, unknowns in the front office. Why would
you do that? And if Tom Brady left Bill Belichick
and Robert Kraft five years ago, six years ago, in
his prime because he wanted to be the man in Jacksonville,
we'd make fun of him. If Derek Jeter in his
prime left the loaded Yankees to go to the Kansas

(45:23):
City Royals to be the man, we'd make fun of him.
We'd give what an idiot Kevin Durant left more money,
current dynasty, great GM, better roster, amazing teammates for a
bunch of unknowns for the second most popular team in
New York. And basically it was like, well, he wants
to be the man. It's not a good move from

(45:44):
a business decision. It's not. We would crush Derek Jeter
leaving the star studded Yankees. We'd mock Brady for leaving
Bill Belichick. But again, everybody's petrified of offending the NBA star.
They're grown men. They make their own decision. They can
handle criticism. Kevin Durant, nobody forced Kevin Durant to play

(46:05):
Kevin duransomn He's like, by the way, he has his
own doctors and trainers with the Warriors, they're like, go play.
Sometimes injuries happens. Nobody's fault. They just happened. Guys get
hurt all the time, all right. And with that, with that,
one of my favorite guys thirty plus years at NFL Films,
Greg Kosell, is joining us on the phone today. Okay,

(46:29):
so Greg, today we're gonna look at two divisions in
the NFL NFL, the NFC East and the AFC East.
So let's start with the NFC East, which is Philadelphia, Dallas,
New York and Washington. So let's start. You've looked at
a lot of tape on the NFC East. People have
said Zeke is crucial for Dak, but yet Dak was

(46:51):
seven and two when Amari became part of the offense.
When you look at the Cowboys, are we understating the
value of Amari Cooper to Dak Prescott. Well, I think
a really good receiver always helps, But I think Colin
you have to talk about their philosophy and their approach.

(47:12):
There are quarterbacks who will play well in any given system,
but this is a system that is that starts with
the running back. That's their philosophy of playing the last
three years basically since Dak got there, now, he's been
efficient at times within that system. There's other times he's
not been efficient. Certainly, you add a quality quarterback, quality receiver.

(47:34):
But what what struck me is fascinating and watching a
lot of tape over the summer of the Cowboys, particularly
since a Mari got there, is they didn't necessarily feature him.
In other words, they would often line him up as
the X receiver, the single receiver to the boundary, the
short side of the field that is sort of the
main receiver in offenses. They didn't automatically throw him the ball.

(47:56):
I don't know whether it was a coaching thing. I
don't know I know the answer to that, but I'd
be very anxious to see how it plays out this
year now that he's there through an off season. Right,
But this team is not built or hasn't been for
the last three years on the quarterback. The quarterback is
a complimentary piece. Yeah, we're watching some video of Amari Cooper.
I do think some of that was he was injected

(48:19):
into the offense mid season. Now they've had an entire offseason.
I would think that Amari Cooper would be more, they
would focus more, I would I would think. So he's
very talented. Yeah, all right, let's go to the Philadelphia Eagles.
I think they're my Super Bowl favorite. I do have
questions about Carson Wentz and his health and durability. Do

(48:39):
you are the injuries avoidable or are they just happenstance
with Carson Wentz. Well, I think though that the ACL
is just one of those things that happened. I don't
I know his back. Apparently he's had back in back
problems for four so we don't know about that. I
did talk to a GM earlier this week who came
right out and told me that the two best jung
quarterbacks in the NFL hands down our Homes and Wentz.

(49:02):
So you know, I think if Wentz stays healthy, he's
a really good player with a chance to be absolutely special.
They've got a lot of weapons. I think you'll see
them be incredibly multiple with their use of personnel on
their formations, and they'll present a lot of different looks
and put a lot of pressure on defenses. Washington with
Dwayne Haskins, I like some of the things he does,

(49:26):
but when I watched him this year, when you make
him move off his spot, yea, his accuracy dips. I
think he needs to be coached up in the NFL.
How close is he'd a ready to play a starting
quarterback role in this league, in this tough division. Well,
you know, Colin, we always say that quarterbacks are not
ready and then they play, So you know, that's a

(49:46):
tough question to answer. I remember when Trubisky played his
rookie year and everybody said there's no chance, and then
he started whatever, twelve games, whatever it was. So Haskins
will play, whether it's Week one, we don't know the
answer to that. The bigg shoe with Haskins is when
there are bodies around him, his feet get a little heavy,
he loses his mechanics and fundamentals, and he tends, as

(50:08):
you said, and you're one hundred percent right, to lose
his ball placement. So in the NFL you tend to
have to throw with bodies around you far more than
you do in college, where at Ohio State he basically
ran a quick game offense, so they'll try to do
a lot of that with him, but there will be
situations where he's going to have to take deeper drops
and they'll be pressure. He's a pretty good thrower of

(50:30):
the football, so you know if they can protect him,
and that's the critical part here. Yeah, I had an
NFL general manager tell me about it was a dinner
about a month ago. He makes enough NFL throws in
college that you know he's a franchise quarterback, but you
just don't know much beyond that. Correct, he does have

(50:51):
the arm, he does have the size. Let's go to
the New York Giants. Now. My takeaway is before their
cluster injuries at wide receiver that they have done over
the last two years, Dave Getleman's taken heat. But I
do believe they've elevated their offensive line over the last
two years. I feel that now I don't think their
defense is as good. Some players like Olivia Vernon just

(51:12):
left to Cleveland. They'll miss him. Giants offense in this
division with high powered Philadelphia in the NFC with high
powered offenses, do the Giants Are they a pop gun?
Do they have the ability to get in shootouts and win?
I don't know if they have the ability to get
in shootouts. I think that Dave Getleman's approach and then
maybe their defense is not quite good enough. Now is

(51:34):
that you build through the offensive line the defensive line.
It's an old school approach. Now, if you're going to
have the foundation of your offense be the run game,
then your defense theoretically, theoretically gets to play fewer snaps.
It's the Cowboys approach. You build through the run game,
you control the pace and tempo of the game. Your
defense plays fewer snaps. Maybe you can camouflage and compensate

(51:55):
for some of the weaknesses in your defense. The question
is can they do that? You know, throughout the course
of sixteen games, you know, it's really interesting when you
look at Eli Manning and these are just cumulative stats,
but when you look at a lot of his stats situationally,
he did not have a bad year last year. You know,
there's the sense that he's terrible, but cumulatively the stats

(52:16):
indicate that he was pretty good in most situations. Now
he needs to be I think controlled a little bit.
And that's the whole point of Barkley. All right, let's
go now to the AFC East. We won't start with
the Patriots. We'll finish with them. Let's start with Sam
Jarnold and the Jets. You were at Jets camp. They've
got some new faces. Laban Bell, CJ. Moseley are very

(52:38):
high end players. What is your get not? Now? You
told me last week that their offensive line, and you
told me this before they added Ryan Khalil, that it
was a little better than people like me think. And
so I would imagine if the old line is better
than we think and they've added Ryan Khalil, you're fairly
hopeful with this offense. Well. They also added Alex Lewis,

(53:00):
who was a starter with the Ravens and then came
out of Nebraska a few years ago. So they have
really good old line depth right now. Their big issue
is skill position players. They're lacking in that area. They're
trying to make Robbie Anderson a much more complete receiver.
He's a big time vertical dimension, so that's their main issue.
They know that's their issue. Now. I think you can

(53:20):
work around that to some degree, and Adam Gas is
a very good offensive coach, but obviously there are times
when you can't work around that. So that's a little
bit of an issue for them. And then defensively, where
they're lacking and don't have depth is at corner, another
important position in the league. They're well aware of these
two major issues. The question is how can they work
around them. Their front seven is very very good. Yes, yes,

(53:43):
it's very very good, and I think they're trying to
make up with their deficiencies in the secondary with a
great pass rush, and I mean it feels like to
me they'll be very good upfront. Greg Williams is very
aggressive as a defensive coordinator, so they'll try to add pressure,
which limits their susceptibility in the back end. Let's go
to Buffalo. Don't talk about him a lot. Josh Allen

(54:03):
was mostly what I thought big arm, talented, great size,
but inconsistent. What do you make of him and the Bills. Yeah, well,
what they did last year, which they tried to play
to his strength, which was a lot of intermediate and
deeper route concepts, particularly a normal down in distant situations
where they'd protect and let him drive the football down
the field. He ran the ball extremely well. Yeah, he

(54:26):
actually ran it. Some could argue he ran up better
than Lamar Jackson. Now again, then you get into that
debate about it. You know whether you can live like
that in the NFL. We'll leave that alone for now.
But I think that Josh Allen will improved incrementally last year.
I think he'll probably continue to do so. They've added weapons.
It's actually a team that has pretty good weapons now.
So if they can protect him, I think you'll see

(54:48):
continued incremental improvement and they'll be better on offense. Nobody
ever says this. I thought they were a really well
coached bad team. I thought they were well coached. I
just couldn't agree more. Okay, it's funny. I tucked the
offensive coaches who say that Sean McDermott, whenever they play him,
he gives you something a little different, and he's very
tough to play against. Let's go to Miami. Some suspect

(55:09):
their tanking. I don't think NFL. I don't think you
can do that in pro football. But is it a
total rebuild or do they have players? I don't think
they have a lot of really good players, you know,
I think again that's always hard to say. The big
question is who will play quarterback. I think when all
said and done, it's going to have to be Josh Rosen.
Whether he starts Week one, who knows, but they have

(55:31):
to play Josh Rosen. Ryan Fitzpatrick has had an amazing
career coming out of Harvard, but Josh Rosen was a
high pick and a very talented player, a very good
throw over the football, very smooth. He needs to play.
He needs to be out there. By the way, their
offensive line isn't great. Rosen's not overly mobile. Is is

(55:52):
that an issue? To some degree? You think tonsils on
his way to being the best left tackle in the league.
But besides that, they have a lot of moving parts
on the offensive line that need to be worked out.
That is an issue. Rosen is a rhythmic player. He
needs to feel comfortable let's move to New England. That
was tough for me to have to get and wait

(56:14):
on New England because I love talking about him. Bill
Belichick told a friend of mine who's close to the organization,
this is going to be one of my more athletic teams.
Not only do I think their first five draft picks
will play, but they're three of their top four draft
picks last year who had good camps got hurt. So
they may have like seven or eight new faces. Kill Harry,

(56:35):
the wide receiver from Arizona State, obviously is going to play.
I think they're gonna be a little younger than most
Patriot teams. What do you think, Well, let me ask
you this. I mean they drafted Damian Harris out of
Alabama in the third round. Okay, when you draft a
running back in the third round, my guests, as you
expect him to play. Last year, they drafted Sony Michelle
in the first round. Now, I know he's coming off

(56:57):
an injury, but he'll be ready to go barring any sets.
So now they have two pretty big time backs. Is
there going to be a continueation of what they did
sort of toward the end of last year where they
kind of evolved into somewhat of a running football team,
playing with the fullback devil and playing with what we
call twenty one personnel two backs. Is that going to

(57:17):
be more of their m O. I'm not saying they're
going to move away from Tom Brady and make him
just a little piece here, but is this going to
be sort of a transition given the fact that Brady,
I don't want to say he lost it, but I
thought there was There were some parts of his game
towards the end of last year that I didn't think
were quite as good as the great Tom Brady. Yeah.

(57:38):
I think the last two years it looks like to
me they have added to their offensive line. They have
added running backs. By the way, even their top receiver
pick this year is not a burner. He's an intermediate
route guy. Tom gets rid of the ball. He's a
very good hard way He's a little bit like a
poor man's Juju Smith Schuster. In my opinion, they're going

(57:59):
to have to scheme him open. Yes, so I do
think they're making a transition Bill Bill sees his personnel,
they'll become more run centric, more power over finesse, I
would agree, and by doing that they'll give a guy
like Harry a chance to be a factor, because you
can't line Harry up on the outside and say win
one on one with isolation and individual routes. He won't

(58:20):
do that. He didn't do that in college. No, all right,
Greg Kosell, NFL Films, NFC East, AFC East this week.
We'll talk to you in one week. My friend can
appreciate it. Thanks. Oh my lord, was that fun? That
that meats? I'm stuffed. I just had a huge meat
sandwich for lunch. I am stuffed. I mean that was

(58:43):
that was pastrami on rye bread stacked a mile high.
That's what you got right there. I hope you could
handle it. A lot of you couldn't finish the sandwich.
I finished all of it, all right. Chris Haynes is
not long from now talking about that sit down with
Kevin Durant interview in Los Angeles. It's The Herd. Be
sure to catch live editions of The Herd week days
in noun Easter nine am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio

(59:06):
FS one and the iHeart Radio app. By the way,
I gotta say, I just love what Dabo Sweeney said.
Pokin Nick saman in Alabama in the SEC came out
yesterday and he said, you know you're all telling me
Alabama lost to us because they were tired, and they
won their games by thirty three points. And you know
they had four cupcakes, they had a bye week. They
won their twenty six and one in their last twenty

(59:28):
seven games in the SEC, almost all of them by blowout,
and yet you keep telling me how great they are.
And Dabo Sweeney came out and said, we won our
games by twenty we weren't tired. And this is my nut.
The SEC as the most good college football players. I'm
not disputing that, but the conference is riddled with dysfunction.
Tennessee dysfunction. Auburn can never get the right coach, Old

(59:51):
Miss cheats, everybody knows it. Florida, what coach are they on?
What off field crisis do they have? Texas A and
M Oh, please give me a break. How many years
are you gonna tell how great Texas and M's last
big Bowl when they had was seven years ago in
the Cotton Bowl. I mean, the conference has talent, I'm
not disputing that, but when you're throw in the buy
a week every year right before LSU, when you put

(01:00:12):
in four cupcakes that other conferences don't have. It makes
it easier. And frankly, a lot of the coaching in
the SEC it's bad. The talents good, but it's bad.
I mean even SEC programs. Now we're complaining about attendance.
Why because the schedules are so weak. There's a huge advantage.
I mean, the Pac twelve and the Big ten in

(01:00:32):
the in the in the Big twelve may not be
as good as the SEC, but when you have to
play a conference team one more week, when you get
one less buyer, one less cupcake, guys get hurt. It's
it's not a week off. So I mean, let's be honest.
LSU and Georgia after Alabama are the best programs in
the conference, and their bragging rights are we almost beat
Bama every year. Well Clemson does, so you know and Nick, Nick,

(01:00:57):
you know, Nick's complaining about the transfers and he does
like this, and my team is tired and the staff
didn't good enough job. The truth is Nick Saban about
seven eight years ago, he was in his i think
his fourth year at Alabama and they lost three games,
and he's like, I'm not going on the road for
Big games anymore. He made a decision. Georgia didn't. They
went to Notre Dame. You know, Oklahoma. They'll go to

(01:01:18):
Ohio State, Ohio State, We'll go to Oklahoma. Alabama made
a conscious decision years ago to lighten up the schedule.
Cupcakes buys perfectly placed, and we're not going on the road.
Why don't you go on the road. Why don't you
go to Seattle next year? Now they finally recently signed
his home and home with Wisconsin after guys like me
hammered Alabama. But I'm not saying the SEC is not

(01:01:38):
the best conference. I watched the heck out of it.
I love it. But there's dysfunction everywhere in this idea
that it's impossible to beat these teams the minute. These
Southern teams all missed a couple of years ago, came
west and lost to cal If you get out of
your zip code, occasionally, it's not as easy to win
on the road for nineteen year olds and twenty year olds.
When you play all you're out of conference games at home,
it's much easier to win. Veteran newsman John no No,

(01:02:03):
this is the herd Line News. So Colin, we had
a little bit of breaking news this morning, the Browns
traded running back Duke Johnson to the Texans for a
fourth round pick, which can become a third round pick
if certain things happen. After signing Kareem Hunt, Johnson would
essentially be the third string running back when Hunt comes
back from suspension behind Nick Chubb. Member Baker Mayfield too,

(01:02:25):
also kind of criticized Duke Johnson for wanting a trade.
Even though Duke Johnson showed up to camp. He didn't
hold out. He just said, I don't want to be
here because he wants to play. I think it's a
reasonable request. The only the only downside for Cleveland if
Nick Chubb got hurt in camp or got hurt early
in the first month, they don't have a legitimate, big
time back up until Kareem Hunt comes back around Thanksgiving. Sure.
I also though a fourth round pick, maybe a third,

(01:02:47):
for a guy that might be your third string running back,
that's a kind of too good of a deal for Cleveland,
a pass up. The Texans needed some depth. They got
rid of Deontay Form and they cut him a few
days ago, so right now they just have Lamar Miller.
Duke Johnson is a hell of a pass catching running. Yeah,
it's very good at that. He is really good. The Texans,
to me are that team that could be really good
and we might kind of go, wait, why didn't we

(01:03:08):
talk about them more? They have a great they want
a division last year. They have a great young quarterback,
they have amazing skill at wide receiver, and they have
a great defensive line. They've got all sorts of defense.
They have secondaries week, but their old line in their
secondary or concerns. I think you could solve one of
those by signing Trent Williams, who was adamant he won't
play for Washington and he's their best player. Well, and

(01:03:29):
here's what I thought was interesting about the trade. Ian
Rappaport of NFL Network reported that Bill O'Brien made this trade.
They don't have a GM right now, so this was
Bill O'Brien dealing with John Dorsey. If the head coach
is making deals like that, I mean, he knows he
has to win this year, otherwise he might be out.
I don't think that's out of the realm of possibility
that Bill O'Brien says, you know what, let's just go

(01:03:49):
for it all this year. Let's trade let's make a
deal with the Redskins and let's get a Pro Bowl
left tackle to protect my young asset at quarterback before
I have to pay to Shaun Watson. This is what
the Eagle have done. This is because remember Carson Wentz,
his new deal doesn't start for two years. This is
what the Rams have done. This is what you do
when you have young quarterback. This is what Cleveland's done.
You go out and you get players. You gave up

(01:04:10):
some draft picks, should pay for guys. You get veterans
in the league and you win. Now. I believe six
of eight divisions last year won by quarterbacks on rookie deals.
Ye right, I mean that's how you win. Yesterday at
forty nine Ers camp, second overall pick Nick Bosa got
hurt again. Their GM John Lynch gave the latest on
the Bosa injury on cambr in San Francisco this morning.

(01:04:32):
It's a significant ankle spring and it's got you know,
there's that dreaded high ankle sprain. He doesn't have a
full blown one, but it has some components of that.
So as for timing, it's safe to say we won't
see him in the preseason and then We're gonna be
very prudent. Yeah. I mean they've they've drafted this position
over and over and over, and he has not played
a game for the forty nine ers. This is his

(01:04:52):
second injury already, coming off of a senior year at
Ohio State where he got hurt early and didn't play again.
So that's three injuries in not even a calendar year.
Ye Are they that team that has potential but just
can never get everyone on the field at the same time. Well,
they they I think their offense will be fine. I
like Garoppolo, Dante Pettis, good draft pick. They upgraded at

(01:05:12):
running back. Offense is great if everyone's healthy. Yeah, they're not.
They're They're very weak at corner. That's why they need
a pass rush. They're a little like Houston. They're a
little like the Jets. The Jets, Houston and San Francisco
have good pass rushes and they need them to mask
very weak corners. So I think in that division with
Sean McVay and Russ Wilson and maybe, you know, we'll

(01:05:34):
see what Arizona is. I think they're they're not capable.
They're gonna have real issues if Bosa can't play because
they went and got d Ford and Kwan Alexander. They
wanted athletes and speed and I and I think if
Bosa can't play, I mean, they have Bruckner. They like
him as a pass Armstead hasn't been much. They like Bruckner, right,
He's the one guy they like. They have a lot

(01:05:54):
of guys that they seem to like, but it doesn't
seem to amount too much. That's kind of the problem
they have. You know, last year we liked a lot
of players that they had, but they didn't win very
many games with them. I mean, yeah, this Joey Bosa
is needs to play in that division with those quarterbacks.
He needs to be healthy. Nick Nick what I call
him Joey? Yeah? Sorry, his dad played, his grandpa, the

(01:06:16):
whole family's played in the NFL. And finally, Colin, we
have a really cool announcement to make. On August thirteenth,
next year, the Yankees and White Sox will play a
regular season game in Iowa at the site of the
nineteen eighty nine film Field of Dreams, and Aaron Judge
is already getting in on the fun. Hey is this

(01:06:37):
Heaven no Iowa. Later this month, MLB will begin construction
on a temporary eight thousand seat ballpark and at the
Dyersville site, a pathway through the cornfield's gonna take fans

(01:06:59):
to the ball park, which will overlook the famous movie
location the right field wall. They're gonna put windows in
so everyone can see the corn Watching Aaron Judge hit
home runs into an Iowa cornfield where they shot Field
of Dreams is about as cool as they could get
for me. I love Field of Dreams. Oh look at this.
Look at this. Nice job by Fox. So they're gonna
construct Oh my god, this is great. You're gonna have

(01:07:19):
the cornfield all through the outfield. Yeah, that's fantastic. It's
really cool. This will be the first Major League game
ever held at a movie location and also in the
state of Iowa. MLB's been doing more this right they
we had we had London games this year. They've played
in Omaha where the College World Series is. They've done
games with the Little League World Series. Wasn't so it's
the Yankees and the White Sox. Those were the favorite

(01:07:42):
teams of of like Kevin Costner's dad, right, wouldn't that well?
Obviously in the movie it's the the White Sox of
the team that comes out of the corn right, the
Black Sox scandal Yankees might just be because right, and
I mean, that's gonna suck me in more I would
say than other teams. But really cool. By the way,
the hockey did this. Remember the outdoor games in hockey. Yeah,

(01:08:05):
they played in snowstorms. Yeah, it was great. It was
great in football stadium. Yeah, Now they kind of they
kind of played it out. It kind of played itself out. Yeah.
I don't think there's gonna be a team at the
Field of Dreams field in Iowa that's going to play.
I think it's fun as a as a one off
kind of thing, but I don't know it's It's one
of my favorite sports movies ever. It's the most inexplicable,
if I told If you tell someone the plot, it
sounds like the dumbest movie ever. Yeah. Oh dead baseball

(01:08:27):
guys come out of a cornfield and play so he
can talk to his dad. It doesn't make any sense.
It's an amazing I think Field of Dreams is my
second favorite sports movie ever. First is you'd be shocked
it's a hockey movie miracle. I don't know that's not
shocking that has the best, the best sports movie speech
possibly ever. Yeah, so Miracle is my favorite sports movie ever.
I think Field of Dreams is my second favorite. Well,
this will be really cool next year in Iowa. That

(01:08:50):
is great. Veteran newsman John Goula, Well, that's the news
and the herd line. By the way, my former employee.
It ranked all thirty two NFL teams by their under
twenty five talent Browns, Colts, Chiefs, Texans of the top
four all AFC teams. Eight of the top nine are
AFC teams. The bottom two are my Super Bowl favorites,

(01:09:10):
Philadelphia and New England that don't have a bunch of
young guys. A lot of NFC teams middle and bottom,
a lot of AFC teams near the top. I think
the NFC's are much better. Listen, we know in the
NBA we watched Toronto, a veteran team, beat Golden State,
an old veteran team. Is that young is hype and
optimistic and fun in the media. I love young teams,

(01:09:32):
you know, like Atlanta Hawks this year in the NBA
are gonna be young and fun. They're gonna be terrible.
They're gonna win thirty games. Max, So I mean Basically,
if you look at the bottom five teams under twenty
five talent, I like all of them. I love the Eagles,
I love the Patriots. I think the Vikings have one
of the top five rosters. The Titans are my dark
horse team in the AFC this year, and I think Seattle,

(01:09:54):
you know, is going to be in a playoff pursuit
late in the year. I don't know if they make it,
but they'll be closed. So these are the bottom five
teams under twenty five talent. Now the top teams I
like some of them too. I liked the Colts at
number two, in the Chiefs at number three. I think
the Colts just had one of the great drafts of
all time, not this year, the previous year, and that
puts them in that class when they got two great
offensive lineman and Darius Leonard three star two stars and

(01:10:18):
three really really good players. So the top five teams
under twenty five are Cleveland Colts. I wouldn't I wouldn't
argue with that, Chiefs, Texans on the New York Giants,
who who do they have as the Giants? Good young players,
Sequon Barkley, Will Hernandez, left guards, really good. They put
Daniel Jones in that I wouldn't go crazy on I
don't know what I get from Daniel Jones. Does anybody

(01:10:38):
know what they get from Daniel Jones? I watched them
in college a bunch. I thought he was okay. I
didn't he was, you know, great? All right? Um T J.
Hushman's Auto Last Hour, Jason McEntire Chris Hayes around the corner.
So he sat down with Kevin Durant and it was
a probing interview and Kevin Durant talked a lot, and
it was a little cocky, was a little fun, and

(01:11:01):
I think it's worth talking to Chris about what he
took away from the interview with Kevin Durant, who left
a dynasty to go to the world of the unknown.
Brooklyn the second most popular team in New York. That's
coming up with Chris Hayes. We've been telling you about
M Drive for a long time. Gary, the scientist in Arizona,
got into his fifties. His kids were still active in

(01:11:21):
their twenties and he felt like he was losing some
energy as his testosterone levels dipped, and he didn't like it.
So Gary went out and created M Drive. He's a scientist.
That's what they do. One of the products within the
line is called Boost and Burn M Drive Boost and Burn.
It's clinically tested ingredients that basically burn fat because they

(01:11:41):
boost healthy testosterone levels, which we all have in our bodies.
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(01:12:02):
get twenty percent off your first order. Take a couple
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The code is h E r D. Be sure to
catch live editions of the Herd week dayson noon Easter
nine am Pacific. By the way, if you haven't heard

(01:12:24):
at the Houston Texans made a deal landed Duke Johnson,
who was number eventually he was number two right now
in the rotation for Cleveland running back would be three
after Kareem Hunt and Nick Chubb, both excellent running backs.
Duke is a very good pass catcher, running back, number
two running back in my opinion, maybe he is a
number one. Feels like a two to me, but a
very very good two or a decent one. Houston needed

(01:12:46):
a running back, Lamar Miller, I believes in the last
year of his contract. I like what Houston did. I
like what Cleveland did. Now that Cleveland now has nine
draft picks in next year's NFL draft, they're accumulating draft picks.
That's not a bad thing. You can pick them, or
you can trade them to get better and players, and
so Cleveland's a very very young football team. I thought
they were crowded at running back. I didn't think they
needed Duke Johnson, and I didn't think that situation would

(01:13:09):
play well over time. The kid needs carries. The only
danger for Cleveland if Nick Chubb got hurt. We hope not.
You don't get Kareem Hunt until Thanksgiving. It's not a
great offensive line that can take an average back and
create big yards. It is a very loaded defensive front
in Cleveland and a loaded wide receiving corps. They're running
backs now until November, not as deep. But I thought

(01:13:31):
it was a good move for Cleveland. I thought it
was an essential move for the Houston Texans, a team
I think won the division last year and could be
in that eleven twelve win category this year. Go signed
Trent Williams Texans a left tackle because that position concerns
me with Deshaun Watson's injury history and with that. Chris Haynes,
Yahoo Sports senior NBA insider sat down recently with Kevin Durant.

(01:13:55):
He's on our phone right now. First of all, Chris,
were you surprised at how talkative Kevin Durant was? No. Once,
once I knew, you know, once I knew he was
gonna grant the end, I knew he was gonna. I
knew he was gonna talk. You know, either he hasn't
spoken in too much. Uh. He never addressed it. He

(01:14:18):
never addressed the media after his injury. Obviously never addressed
it when he when he left, and so I hadn't.
Once I got him, he was gonna he was gonna
be really good now. He dismissed the idea that the
Warriors forced him to play. I never bought into the
idea that the training staff forced him. Kevin Durant's a star.

(01:14:39):
He's a grown man. He had his own trainer. Were
you surprised that he said Golden State had no culpability
in that? No, I wasn't. I wasn't surprised with that.
Nou the part that that that shocked, he woll just
to laugh it on that though, I wouldn't sprise. Uh.
He said that turning for game five was always the plan.

(01:15:03):
That was, that was what what he targeted, and he
was going to come back on the game five was
brought us with the circumstances the Warriors were still alive
and uh so, Uh, the part I was surprised about was, uh,
you know, he said that if he left the Warriors,
the team that he was always thinking about what the

(01:15:24):
det So basically it was a two team race. That
that that that kind of sucked me more than anything. Yes,
he and by the way, we know he likes David
Fizdale the Knicks. According to your article and interview with
Kevin Durant, the Knicks were never in the running um
And it also sounded like he didn't make his decision
on the Brooklyn Nets until June thirtieth, So whereas many

(01:15:48):
people were insinuating that he'd made his mind up, it
felt like to me that he gave it some deep
thought after the regular season and after the finals. Yeah, yeah,
that's that's what he said, you know he uh you
know I know from Afar uh because you know I
talked to him throughout throughout the season. You know, he

(01:16:09):
was very high on Bookman. But it was he was
just talking about the personnel and the young guys they
were able to nurture and mature, and the draft kicks
they made. Uh. You know, so I knew he was
calling it the personnel. But you know, we always talked
about basketball before and other players, so I didn't think
anything of it. Uh. So, you know that was that

(01:16:31):
was a shot, you know, the fact that he you know,
he said, um, you know if he if if he
was going to leave awards, it was always going to
be for the Brooklyn Nets. So you gotta get them props,
Sean marks them guys props over there for you know,
it's still a culture that that's conducive to winning, and
it's such a short time by the way. Um, I

(01:16:52):
was guilty of this, I thought when Draymond called him
out last year publicly and called him a name that
set felt very personal to me. They he and Draymond
may have had some simmering, not public, but simmering resentment.
Can you clarify his thoughts Kevin's on Draymond Green in
that relationship today. Look, I'll say this, and this is

(01:17:13):
my personal thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they're cool, They're they're
at peace. But I would be lying here if I
if I didn't say I don't think that that wasn't
a factor. I obviously do think that was a factor.
Of course this season, Uh, you know, even to the
point where and I won't to see my stories. You know,

(01:17:34):
Kevin Durant, it was a point where he just stopped
talking to to you know, he didn't he didn't talk
much to his teammates. You know, he was really on
the island there. He really didn't have to buy that
he was close on that team. The only person was
like Quinn Cook, and that's you know, that's from the
same area. But you know, Quinn's a younger guy. Uh,

(01:17:55):
that doesn't have much clout with the within the franchise.
And so you know his point when after this Raymond
stuff went down and then um, you know, the New
York Knicks shatter started just going haywire. You know, Kevin
Durant just you know, he stopped, he stopped talking. You know,
he felt like if he if he said something and

(01:18:15):
you know it, it will give it would give a
lot of creetmans to uh give it rob a creus
to people saying that he's only thinking about the agency
when it's March February. So he just shut up and
he just focused on basketball and kept it on that.
And you know, you would see Kevin Durant leaving the
arena by himself, come entering the arena by himself, really

(01:18:36):
not speaking to anyone to the point where a war
is official went to him and on a few occasions
and or its text him, you know at saying that
you know, we need you to, you know, you know,
come with a better, a cheerful disposition. Uh he needs
you to, you know. And so from his standpoint, you know,

(01:18:58):
he's looking at that like, look, you know, I'm playing,
I'm balling, I'm you know, I want the first to
get the practice one of you know, last to leave.
You're talking about my disposition like this is this is
why we're not you know, playing up the far. You know.
So there's a lot of things going. Oh man, you
could you could tell everybody to the right was on
the wall early on. Uh that you know that that

(01:19:20):
that was going to be his last season for war
is not definitely too sick. That's Raymond Green situation can't
be dismissed. Finally, Chris Haying's Yahoo Sports senior NBA insider,
as we read the article as a staff this morning,
and I've said this, I don't think Michael Jordan would
have left the Warriors dynasty. I don't think Kobe would
have Magic Bird Lebron wouldn't leave it. He left Miami

(01:19:42):
when't they lost the finals and they looked old Kevin Durant.
Our takeaway and Kevin Durant is he's he's different. I mean,
I took for a star player on a dynasty to
leave to go to an inferior what we think is
roster coach stars. It's different. Um, when you're in when

(01:20:03):
you're interviewing Kevin, does he feel different than interviewing the
other stars you sit down with, Yeah, he does, he does.
He's he's a low maintenance guy. You know. Kevin's like,
all he wants to do is who All he wants
to do is play basketball, and he wants to play basketball.
In a drama free environment. That's that, that's him. He

(01:20:23):
hates like stories about you know, especially during a regular season.
You know, he can't stand stories about you know, free
agency talk, what's going on, what's going to go on,
you know in July, when we're in December and Jane Wood.
You know, he can't stand that he's a future basketball
player like you know, he's not. You know, Lebron you know,

(01:20:44):
has his intended and a whole bunch of different things. Katie,
he's a hooper and uh, you know that's how That's
why you knew. That's how you knew that. You know,
with all the stuff that was going on, you just knew,
like this was it it. He's not coming that and
that's why the wars are so such a desperate state

(01:21:05):
last season. Is trying to do what they could to
appease him. But you know, a lot of damage has
already done. Yeah, Chris Hayes, Yahoo Sports, good stuff, Chris,
congrats on the article. Fascinating look at Kevin Durant and
his decision. Thank you, thanks, thank you for the record.
The Knicks were never, ever, ever, even a tiny bit

(01:21:25):
in the equation according to the article. I have said
for years. Find me the great free agent in his
prime who truly considers the next Lebron. Never did we
never did. I mean, they got a Marie Stodemeyer with
bad knees. Stefan Marberry was already seen in the league

(01:21:46):
as a bit of a head case and hard to
play with. And I'll go back. I think it's a
James Dolan issue. I think when you start looking at
this league, it's it's a player's driven league. Players have
never had more power. There's nothing wrong with that. It's
different culture than other sports. But I do think, and
I think I speak for everybody watching this show. I

(01:22:09):
do think in college basketball, in college football recruiting, you
can have great facilities, but ultimately you're putting your trust
in Dabo Sweeney, Chris Peterson at Washington, Lincoln Riley at Oklahoma,
Nick Saban at Alabama. You know, Kirby Smart at Georgia,
Jim Harbon Michigan. The coach, the guy that runs the

(01:22:30):
program is getting you there. It's not their academics, it's
not their facilities. Everybody's got great facilities. Now, who has
bad facilities? In the top twenty at college football leadership,
I think players are getting smarter, and it matters, like
like when you get recruited, if you don't connect with
a coach or at least the coordinator or position coach,

(01:22:51):
you don't go there. And I think in the NBA,
players look around and with very few exceptions, who owns
this team? Who runs this team? Um? You know, And
that's why I think Kevin Durant leaving is shocking to me.
It's very I mean, I can't I Michael Jordan left
the Bulls and he couldn't stand his ownership. He left

(01:23:14):
the Bulls, went to baseball, but he came back to
the Bulls because Michael knew that was the best coach
and that was the best group of talent. Kevin Durant
just left. Maybe the best coach in the league, maybe
the best GM in the league with him on it,
the best roster in the league, I would say, the
smartest system offensively in the league. Um, that's that is rare.

(01:23:37):
So I think some of this is Kevin's just different.
Kevin's a different bird, you know. He remember when the
reporter came on the show and called him a wanderer.
Lee Jenkins came on like a year ago and he said.
All I'm gonna say is Kevin Durant is a wanderer.
He didn't want to go into details, but I think

(01:23:58):
I think Lee Jay saw it now. A Clipper employee
saw it before everybody else. Our three coming up. We
are packed. It's the Herd. One more Herd. The Herd
streams twenty four hours a day, seven days a week
within the iHeartRadio app. Search Herd to listen live or
on demand whenever you like. We are live our third

(01:24:21):
hour today first two flew by with Urban Meyer, Greg
ko Sell and Chris Haynes. This hour three is the Herd.
Wherever you may be, however you may be listening. We
are on iHeartRadio, we are on Fox Sports Radio. We
are right here on FS one. It's my last hour
of the week. We are loaded in this hour. Then

(01:24:42):
I take off tomorrow. Last couple of Fridays. I've just
enjoyed family time. I'm doing the same tomorrow. We're getting
very close. Games ramp up. This is my this is
a really good time of the year to talk football.
I'm all excited about it. Got Dabo Sweeney, ripping, Nick
Saban and everything so much fun. Can't wait Labor Day
we got big college football Auburn Oregon will be a

(01:25:03):
great day. I'll put Bruce feldon, by the way, on
my Saturday podcast. We're gonna talk about college football on
the radio podcast side my Saturday podcast this week, so
we're all geared up for it. Now. Coming up in
fifteen minutes, t J Houshmnzada is Freddie Kitchens in Cleveland,
Gonna get overwhelmed. He's never been a coordinator of this team.
Has all sorts of drama. In forty five minutes, Tomorrow's

(01:25:24):
Headlines Today with jamac The j Mack Journal Jason Mcintiret's
one of my favorite segments every week. But first, okay,
the NFL preseason here we go. It is quickly approaching,
and Zeke Ezekiel Elliott is still not in Cowboy camp.
And I gotta tell you, I am really enjoying the
Cowboys off season drama, all right. I never knew that

(01:25:46):
Jerry Jones and Stephen Jones were pro wrestlers, but they
are tag team partners. One day it's Jerry banging on Zeke,
the next day it's Stephen Jones banging on d Then
it's Jerry banging on Zeke and then Steve even Jones
banging on Zeke. These guys are tag team partners WWE,
which by the way, is coming to Fox very soon.

(01:26:06):
Let me go to the first thing. Jerry came out,
remember that, and Jerry said, you can win Super Bowls
without star running backs. And then Stephen came out and said,
a couple of days later, you know, any money we
give Zeke is just taken away from other Cowboys stars.
And then Jerry came out yesterday and said, Alfred Morris,

(01:26:28):
the running back they signed, has the best feel of
any running back I've ever seen. And then Stephen came
out later in the day with Rich Eisen and said
he won't call us back. Here's Stephen Jones. How often
are you talking with Zeke's team? These very rarely. There's
this perception out there about negotiations that you know, there's

(01:26:49):
these ongoing talks and they go on hours at a time,
and you know that's just not the case. You kind
of accept the boundaries of where you think it should be,
and certainly you know they're all represented by very sharp
people and they're trying to do the best for their client,
and you kind of sit there and you stew on it,
you think about it. You know, you're always trying to
think of something that might bridge a gap. Okay, so

(01:27:13):
remember this is the latest thing. It's a tag team partner, Jerry,
you can win super Bowls without great running backs. Steven,
you're just taking money out of dak in Amari's hands, Jerry, yesterday,
Alfred Morris has the best feel of any running back
I've ever seen. And then Stephen Jones comes out later
and says, nobody's returning our calls. We're not close. Okay,

(01:27:35):
so this is tag team and Zeke. Are they getting nervous?
Are they getting anxious? Now? I've felt from the very
beginning Jerry and Stephen have been very shrewd with their
public comments. But there is a reason they are going
out in public. They are trying to put pressure on Zeke.
And I think Zeke has two things going for him here,
and they're not the things that people think, well, he's

(01:27:57):
a great player, they need it. You know, He's got
two things going for him. Number One, Jerry Jones is
seventy six years old. He didn't want to waste another season.
When you get older in life, you just don't have
time to waste. When you're on the back nine of
your mortality, you're not gonna waste time. You want to
get things done. I can tell you the older I get,

(01:28:18):
the less time I'm willing to waste because I have
less time on the earth. That's an advantage for Zeke.
An older owner hasn't want a super Bowl in a while. Finally,
as a roster, he doesn't want to waste a season.
And the second thing that I think help Zeke is
in the division. Philadelphia is great, well coached Carson Wentz

(01:28:39):
and they have all their young stars signed. But even
out of the division, the NFC is loaded. I'll give
you nine teams not in Dallas's division that I think
are capable of making the playoffs. The Falcons, the Saints,
and the Panthers, the Packers, the Bears, in the Vikings,
the Rams, the Niners, n Thecahawks. That's just out of

(01:29:04):
the Dallas Cowboys NFC East Division. So I think those
are big advantages. The NFC's loaded the division, Philadelphia maybe
a super Bowl favorite. Jerry is seventy six years old.
There is a reason that Jerry and Stephen on a
daily basis are coming out and doing a tag team
on Zeke. They're feeling it. This is this is not

(01:29:27):
a time to not have all the AMMO for the
NFC East, the NFC with an aging owner. So I
think it's a blast to watch. I think it's really fun.
By the way Zeke has shut it down. Zeke's in Mexico.
Zeke's not talking, Zeke's not calling. Does Zeke understand he
has leverage here? Because this morning when I see Stephen

(01:29:50):
Jones talking and Jerry talking about how great Alfred Morris
is cowboy leadership and getting a little tight, get a
little closer to games, they getting a little well, ANKI
kind of feels like it this morning, kind of feels
like it. All right, let me shift to this Aaron
Rodgers time. You know, I think Aaron Rodgers is great.

(01:30:10):
But when the comparisons were made years ago to Tom Brady,
I said, well, he's got a better arm. But I
think there are certain leadership skills that Tom has that
Aaron does not have. I think Aaron's talented, he's more mobile,
maybe he's a better athlete, he's got a better arm.
I'm not disputing that. Of course, Aaron is thin skin
and things I don't like him. I think Aaron's great.
It's one of the ten best fifteen best quarterbacks in
the history of the game I've ever seen. And I've

(01:30:30):
seen all of them that matter. I'm not joking outside
of Otto Graham, Johnny Unitis. I think I've seen most
of the great quarterbacks. But it's interesting. Finally another member
of the immedia, of the sports media, NFL media, is
recognizing what I'm recognizing. So Pro Football Talk came out
yesterday and admitted Aaron rodgers criticism of joint practices, which

(01:30:53):
he did yesterday, amounts to criticism of his new coach,
Matt Lafleur. Pro Football Talk also acknowed knowledge in the
last two weeks three weeks, Aaron Rodgers has criticized his
new coach twice, one on the audible thing. He didn't
love the restrictive nature of Matt Lafleur's audibles, and two
by coming out and saying, and this is what Aaron

(01:31:14):
said in the last forty eight hours, I don't think
doing live special teams drills are very very smart. I
think you know, the PA is going to look at
that for sure. I don't think it's you know, that's
one of the kickoff especially, is one of the most
dangerous plays in football, and that's why they've tweaked different
things over the years to do close to a live

(01:31:36):
kickoff drill. I don't think it's the best use of
inter squad practices like that. So what are you saying?
This is essentially the equivalent to an eye roll to
your coach. This is the equivalent of calling your coach stupid.
If Tom Brady came out and said, you know, I
think these joint practices, I think these special teams drills
are not very smart. What do you say that about Bill?

(01:31:58):
What he question Bill's audible system? This is the eye roll,
two eye rolls before the season starts. By the way,
isn't Jeff Saturday, former Packer, the one that came out
and said Aaron would roll his eyes at Mike McCarthy's
play calls. Didn't Aaron Rodgers lead the NFL last year
and throwaways by a mile, basically acknowledging before the play started.

(01:32:21):
I hate it. I'm throwing the ball out of bounds.
This is the gap that I've discussed for years Brady
and Aaron. Aaron is condescending. Aaron goes public with it,
Aaron takes shots at superiors. I don't control practice. It's
not very smart. That's the gap. That is the gap.

(01:32:45):
It's not talent. Aaron's got arguably more of it. But
I mean, ask yourself. If you were a high school coach,
you're a high school football coach, and your high school
quarterback came out and said, yeah, I don't think these
joint practices are very smart, the high school coach would
go down and talk to his high school quarterback. If
Tuah came out in college, if they had college joint practices,

(01:33:08):
and Tuah the quarterback at Alabama said yeah, I don't
think these joint practices are very smart. Nick Saban would
bring him into his office. The difference here is Matt Lafleur,
the new Packer coach, has to eat it because Aaron
Rodgers is a you know, he's an icon, and he's rich,
and he's got a Super Bowl ring, and he replaced
FARV and he's idolized and he's worshiped, and he you know,

(01:33:28):
mostly he's one of the great talents of our time
playing quarterback. But make no mistake these comments, Thank you
Pro Football Talk. These comments were essentially the equivalent the
audible comment publicly, and the special teams comment publicly. They're
an eye roll, which is all I've been saying for years.
Aaron's talented, but he's condescending. They did a study years

(01:33:50):
ago at the University of Washington, years ago about why
couples get divorced. It's not cheating, it's not money. They
could predict with ninety nine percent accuracy why couples would
get divorced. They would interview couples, they'd sit them down
for a couple of hours. They'd ask the couples together
all sorts of questions, and they could predict with ninety

(01:34:11):
nine percent accuracy if they would get divorced. And do
you know what the factor was that the social scientists
or the psychologist could spot eye rolling, condescending, not respecting
your partner. That just led to a Packer divorce. And
already in a relationship, we're not even to the preseason games,

(01:34:32):
yet these are calm waters. Already Aaron is doing what
teammates have claimed he did with Mike McCarthy. Sometimes you
gotta eat it. You don't want to go public. You
can tell your coach in private. But Aaron makes a
point of going out making it public, which essentially is
kind of embarrassing your head coach. I don't want this system.

(01:34:55):
This is stupid. Why are we doing this? Those are
private conversations. So again, Aaron just got a divorce from
a football coach. Throwaways led the league, eye rolling in
the huddle. This is what causes divorces in real life.
And it's it's just nice occasionally that I don't have

(01:35:19):
to carry the water for the criticism of Aaron Rodgers
in America that he's not perfect. I mean, we're always
willing to say Tom Brady's not very athletic. Tom doesn't
get mad. He let me. He makes fun of that
on Twitter, he makes fun of that. Does everybody have
to say Aaron Rodgers is perfect? Or can we acknowledge
now more eye rolling? Because that's all these quotes are.
They're the equivalent of eye rolling, which has been my

(01:35:41):
primary criticism of Aaron for a decade, And of course
he doesn't love criticism. Certain guys don't. Kevin Durant, Aaron
Rodgers little more thin skin, a little more sensitive. That's
not a negative. That's a very good quality. Maybe in life,
more sensitive people would probably a better earth. So even
as I criticize him for being a little sensitive. You
know that's not a terrible quality to have. Goolay is

(01:36:02):
very sensitive, breaks down regularly on the shows. Very nice
young man. I'm a crier. He's a crier. I mean,
that's just the way it is. Join on so much.
Goulay got a towel on hand. Twenty four to seven
guys just weeping all the time. We got t J.
Hushman Zatta stopping by Jason McIntyre as well. I just
this last hour's fun for me, just talking cowboys and

(01:36:24):
Aaron Rodgers and Cleveland Browns and then get banging on
sabing with Dabo Sweeney. Dabo is becoming my favorite college
coach period. Indians take on the Twins in our Discover
Card key matchup tonight, go further with it than ever
the Discover at Miles card they automatically match the miles
you earn at the end of your first year, so

(01:36:45):
thirty five thousand become seventy. Go to Discover dot com
slash Travel Discover Match for new card members only in
LA It's The Herd. Be sure to catch live editions
of The Herd weekdays and noon Easter nine am Pacific
on Fox Sports Radio FS one and the iHeart Radio app.
TJ and I just having great conversations. So I TJ

(01:37:07):
as a coach, and you were always a thinker as
a player and thinking about the player's health and well being.
And you were just telling me during the break, Cincinnati
Bengal training camp with Marvin Lewis was a rough, brutal okay.
And then did you have a camp with Pete Carroll? Yes,
not as rough. It wasn't as bad. No, okay. How
about Raider Camp? No, I didn't. That was a lockout. Oh,

(01:37:30):
so that you didn't work out. By the way, it
is a different world we live. And there's no two
days at the college level anymore. When you look at
you know, there's a lot of pushback. I'm hearing this
from coaches now. College coaches are like, guys don't want
to play bowl games. We can't hit anymore. As a
former player, how much did hard practices during camp or

(01:37:53):
week translate to better Sundays? It doesn't really. You just
need to be in shape and understand the offense and
or the defense period. Me. I used to tell Marvin Lewis,
is we used to get it. Why why do you
guys go double days in camp? I used to ask Marvin,
because by the third day, you get out the bed
you cannot walk and you're like, how am I gonna run?
I can barely walk? And he says, well, we need

(01:38:15):
to build tough guys. I said, Marvin, let me just
explain this to you. If a guy's a punk going
into training camp, he's gonna be a punk coming out
of camp. He's figured out the way to get through
it for twenty some years. He's figured out a way
to get by and skate by these twenty whatever days
we're doing in camp is not gonna make him a
tough guy. He's gonna figure out how to skate by
like he's done his whole life. Training camp is not

(01:38:38):
gonna make you tough. No, that's good. That's good. You
are kind of what you are. By the time you
get to the NFL, you're pretty much what you are,
and you'll faking injury, you'll act like you're hurt, but
you're gonna get through camp if you're that good of
a guy. And if you're tough coming into camp, you're
gonna be tough coming out. And we would always have
these type of discussions. The guys that I play with

(01:38:58):
are watching this. They know you'd have them with Marvin. Oh,
I would have one Marvin And all the time guys
were scared to talk to Marvin. You and Carson Palmer weren't. No.
I mean I probably talked too much. That was my problem.
But I would be the voice for the locker room.
Guys would complain about stuff. I'd go take it to
Marvin because they would be afraid to and I wasn't.
And some of it was warranted, in others it wasn't,

(01:39:21):
but I would still go take it to them. I
love that. It's why you're a good talker. That's why
you're good on the show. Try to be Yeah, that's good,
why you're a good parent. So I said, I'm always concerned,
and this is almost a dad conversation. I said earlier today.
One of the reasons young child actors in Hollywood often
have horrible adult lives because they skip steps. Go play

(01:39:43):
with your kids, go play with your brother, go play
in the pool, go play in the lake. But in Hollywood,
nine years old, you're on a movie set, and it's like,
that's not healthy. I don't like where NBA guys go
one year at college and now you're in private jets.
You can't even go to the bar in the hotel.
You're skipping steps. Freddie Kitchens, My concern is he skips steps.

(01:40:03):
We look at Sean mcvaan, go oh, he came out
of nowhere. Sean McVay was a position coach, a coordinator
for three years, then a head coach. Freddie Kitchens has
never been a coordinator. Would you be concerned you go
from a position coach mostly for eleven years in Arizona,
the Browns hire you as a running back coach, and
then nine months later you're the head coach of a young,

(01:40:25):
highly dramatic team. Would that concern you? It would concern me.
But when you look at it, when they fired Hugh,
he was the de fact offensive coordinator and charged offense.
He did very well. They did well on offense. The
only thing that is going to worry me is if
they don't play well early on. You're best players and

(01:40:45):
they're pretty much all on offense, it's going to be
a problem. You have to every coach and every team.
They script plays and you're gonna go over its Saturday night.
So the first five to seven plays you'll know exactly
what they are. Hopefully you don't go three and out.
You know, the first third and short second and long
second and medium whatever it may be, as long as

(01:41:07):
the players Odell Beckham, Jarvis, Landry and Joku to tight end,
as long as they see in those first however many plays,
I'm trying to get you the ball here. I'm trying
to get you the ball here. That should be okay
because they'll see the script and say, okay, he's trying
to get me the ball. But if it doesn't work
and they're not winning, it's gonna be a problem, and
it's gonna say what you just said, he skips steps,

(01:41:29):
he's end over his head. That's going to be the
narrative the players talk about that. I mean, have you
ever been on a team where players are privately talking
about doubt in the staff all the time. Because the
problem is there's a lot of players that really don't
know the game, but there's some that really understand football.
But the coaches think you don't know the game, and

(01:41:52):
so when you try to come at them what you
feel is best, they that's like an insult to them,
Like I know the like you put a lot of
time in coach, but I also know the game. They
look at you like you don't know the game like
I do. And yes, that's one percent. If a coach
doesn't know what he's doing, he will get talked about
a lot in the locker room. If I said, on average,

(01:42:13):
go to an NFL coaching staff sixteen coaches on average,
how many are great, how many are average? And how
many are over their head the great ones, I'd probably
say it's a couple on each coaching staff. Great coaches,
there's really good coaches average more than fifty percent, and
being over their head I would say probably thirty percent.

(01:42:34):
Dang yeah. And the coaches think about this. If you're
a head coach, a buddy has given you a job.
You have running back coach open. This guy's been a
quarterback coaches whole career. Oh, I have only spot. I
have opened as a running back position. So now he
goes and coaches running backs. He'll teach you football, but
what can he teach you about playing running back? He's

(01:42:55):
been a quarterback coaches entire career. And so that that's
where that's the divide. You have a coach as a
position coach that will teach you the game of football,
but he can't teach you your position and what to
do and what not to do because he's foreign. It's
foreign for him. He started, Other running back coaches do it,
but he's never had to do it. So Aaron Rodgers
Jeff Saturday came out a year ago, maybe it was

(01:43:16):
six months ago and said Aaron would roll his eyes
at Mike McCarthy's call. So twice in camp so far
with a new coach, Matt Lafleur, he sort of rolled
his eyes. He criticized publicly the audible system, and then
yesterday comes out of the day before in terms of
the joint practices and said they were kind of stupid
and they don't help. So twice now with his young coach,

(01:43:37):
he sort of publicly said kind of a kind of
the equivalent of an eye roll, like audible systems, joint practices,
and I say this to me, that's the gap with
him and Brady. Brady's been pissed for eighteen years. He's
been upset, he doesn't like his new contract. But Tom's
able to massage the message publicly, so it lands as

(01:44:00):
this is just you know, I'm just a guy. I'm
just another player. Aaron wants you to know I'm not
another guy. And I do think the gap between Brady
and Rogers there are some maturity and leadership advantages where
I think Tom understands my words resonate through the building.
Aaron doesn't give a rip how they resonate through the building.

(01:44:22):
Is that a fair criticism? If you look at how
they came into the league. Brady wasn't highly touted. Aaron
Rodgers thought he should have been the first pick. They
came into the league differently, and so Brady came in humble,
had to earn his way. Aaron Rodgers sat behind Brett
Farve a little better. He yes, he was, and when

(01:44:43):
he got that opportunity, he kind of I told you guys,
I should have been that guy. And so for me
when I when I look at this, it's it's it's
really odd that he would publicly say it. Whereas Brady
he might vent at home, but he's not gonna vent
publicly about these type of things. I'm just shocked that
he would actually publicly say these practices are stupid, it's

(01:45:04):
a waste of time. Like number one, you're a quarterback.
It has no effect on you're not getting hit. All
you're doing is throwing the ball for everybody. It's harder
for everybody else. The guys running down on special teams
sixty yards sprints, did they come to him say, man,
I'm really tired. This is really tough. And is he
talking for them or is he's just saying I think

(01:45:26):
this is stupid. Don't do it again. You don't know
when you made comments in your career, because you're an
outspoken player. You would go into Marvin Lewis's office, you
would talk with teammates. Did you ever make public comments
or were you aware? And you didn't live in the
big social media era? But what were you willing to
go public? It just depends on what it was. But

(01:45:47):
for the most part, I was a little politically correct
at times, but I always spoke my mind. But I
would say it in the locker room. I would say
it to the coaches and that's not a good thing
to do. And I tell guys this all the time.
Shut your mouth play football if you want to play
a long time. Once you get the year ten eleven, twelve,

(01:46:08):
shut up because as soon as they think you're declining,
you're getting out of here. And that's what's gonna happen
to Aaron Rodgers as soon as he declines, we ain't
got time for you. Yeah, listen, it's it's I always
heard a rumor of years ago that player representatives Kevin
MOI was a player representative, that that was a dangerous
position to take. I was one for seven years. You

(01:46:29):
shit in the room with owners and they're like, yeah,
just going to the combine. You have meetings. I was.
You were a player up for seven years, seven years
I had I was on a committee with Roger Goodelle
when obvious we were Cincinnati. We kind of started all
the trouble making back then and how to navigate through that.
And did you ever feel a little resentment from coaches

(01:46:52):
or the microscope was on you a little? Looking back
on it, maybe at the time, no, I thought I
was being helpful. But you know, now that you think
about things that have transpired, you say wow, because you
are I am outspoken, and you you want to look
out for the players, but at you sometimes it's okay
to just shut the mouth. And I didn't do that.

(01:47:13):
You know. It's it's funny even when players talk politics.
Malcolm Jenkins for the Eagles talk politics, but I never
felt he was divisive. Malcolm's like, listen, we gotta make
changes in our community. I would love to work with
our owners. Like I thought, Malcolm Jenkins was very mature.
He's like, listen, there's some political things I feel strongly about.
Let's work together. And the Eagles complied. The Eagles were like,

(01:47:34):
this is the way to do it. I thought there
were other players and I don't need even need to
mention them that went politics, and it was almost a shot.
It was. It was so the bottom line, even when
you talk politics or you talk policy, like you, there's
a way to massage the message because in the end,
NFL players are mostly outside of star quarterbacks. Man, there's

(01:47:54):
a lot of replaceable. The college football's given you two
hundred guys, three hundred guys a year. You want to
everybody's replaceable. Coaches are human and so they get attached
to players. Why do you see when coaches leave a team,
they bring players that they've coached before because they're familiar
with them. You're familiar with them, and so you want

(01:48:15):
to be able to get along with every Malcolm Jenkins,
you gotta galvanize the locker room. You got you gotta
get along with the defense. You gotta get along with
the offense. But you gotta get along with the black guys,
which will come natural. But you gotta get along with
the white guys too, because you have different interests and
people don't think about that. Like we've been a locker room.
We play all hip hop music. Oh there's sometimes. Now

(01:48:36):
we're gonna play country music. Now we're gonna play a
little Leonard Skinner. And so you have to be able
long to get along. You gotta go out with them,
hang out with their families, go out to dinner. And
people don't realize in locker rooms guys aren't doing that.
The black guys and the white guys. They all don't
go out to eat together. And so the guys that
can relate to both those are the guys that lead
the team, and those are the guys that people go to.

(01:48:57):
I always thought one of Brady's Brady talks about in
the last five or six years, in the offseason, he'll
get up on music and tack because he knows he's
got twenty two year olds heading into the locker room
and he's forty two years old. Brett Farve once joked
about it. He's like, I don't have a lot of
common with these new guys. It's a real thing. It's tough.
They'll they'll bring you in on what's going on. That's

(01:49:18):
just what it is, man, And that's why sports is
the football is the best sports you can play because
there's so many different guys, come from so many different backgrounds,
and you have to coexist. It's great. What was the
best single locker room you ever had? Wow? Probably when
I it's not a probably the Ravens was the best
locker room that I had been in. Wow. Yeah, Now
you weren't there very long. I was just there a year.

(01:49:39):
It was the Baltimore Ravens. It was family, a great
place to play. Why just from top to bottom from
Ozzie Bashotti like he's the owner and he acted like
he was just a regular dude. It was unreal the
way like if you Baltimore was the place to be. Well.
I've always when we say balt More, John and I

(01:50:00):
have talked about this. When you say bald I always
think Baltimore Ravens, well run. I don't even care what
their record is. I always think of thee Yeah, I
always think of the Ravens as a well run organization.
I've had multiple guys on that team have become broadcasters,
have become coaches. It just feels rock solid. But I've
never was in a bad locker room either. Right, Cincinnati,

(01:50:22):
you know we had problems, but our locker room everybody
was tight. Um, you just had some crazy people. Yeah,
we just had a couple of crazy people. Other teams
have crazy people. They just kind of keep it under wraps.
The guys are out exactly. DJ. Good to see Anyboddy,
Thank you. Veteran newsman John Goulay. No, no, this is
the herd Line news Colin. The Eagles haven't decided if

(01:50:45):
Carson Wentz is going to play in their preseason opener tonight,
but Wentz doesn't actually seem to care. In fact, why
don't you take a listen to Carson on how much
work he feels he needs in preseason games. I think
I mentioned it last time. My pre seasons have looked
fastly different every year, So I don't know if I
really have a formula for it. You know, I think

(01:51:05):
a little bit is helpful, but it's it's definitely never needed.
So again, I'll trust coach to make those decisions. So
remember the first season he barely played because he remember
he was third string kind of, and then he was
hurt one year, And I don't I think it's pretty
clear Carson is not concerned about getting reps in in
preseason games. I know you are not a fan of

(01:51:28):
having four preseason games. I would have, I've said it before,
I'd have I would quadruple the number of joint practices.
I'd have one preseason game. Aaron Rods is not gonna
like that. I know that means every other year you'd
get a home game as an NFL owner, maybe two,
so every owner gets one home game in one road game.

(01:51:49):
And I don't buy this argument that you need four
preseason games to to to figure out your roster. First
of all, your roster is thirty players, smaller than a
college roster. You have double to triple to practice time,
film time, and yet college can start Day one Auburn
Oregon meet No Priese Auburn Oregon, huge game for both organizations.

(01:52:11):
Both team play Week one with a third the practice
time with younger players. So I think it's a bunch
of huey well. And also in college you can withstand
like you can have an injury, but you might have
a really good player that's just really young at that position.
If Carson Went gets hurt, like they don't have Nick
Foles anymore, the season's over, right, why would you risk
playing him to get reps? He's been the only thing

(01:52:33):
about the NFL. I love the NFL. This is my
big knock on the NFL. This is its whole. It's
it's the optics are bad, the football's bad bad. It
feels to me the NFL allows it because they want
to go to an eighteen game schedule and they kind
of want it to be bad. Yeah, because eighteen and
two sounds a lot better than sixteen and four. So
twenty two NFL teams will play in Week one of

(01:52:55):
the preseason tonight. However, one team might be a little
more intriguing than the others. Kyler Murray and the Cardinals
play the Charters tonight on NFL Network, so it's actually
everyone will be able to see it, so we get
our first glimpse of Kyler and Cliff Kingsbury together. I'm
sure they're not going to put the whole playbook on display.
I'm sure they also don't want to get Kyler hurt.

(01:53:15):
But this is one of the rare preseason games where
I really kind of want to see it. Oh yeah,
because I want to see at least a little glimpse
of what it what it will look like. I mean,
what do you think we're going to see out of
him tonight? This is the only team. Honestly, if there
were three teams I want to watch in the preseason,
Arizona's number one. I would kind of like to see

(01:53:37):
Baker and ob J and Cleveland for a couple of snaps,
And I'd like to see Lavan Bell for a couple
of snaps in New York. But after that the other
twenty nine most of the time, it's just well, it's
just rookie quarterbacks, right, I just want to see the
guys that I'm interested to see Haskins with the Redskins.
Nothing else about the Redskins, but just him. Yeah. But
I don't know how much ob J and Baker are

(01:53:58):
gonna play, but Kyler at because it's not just him,
it's this whole Like are they going to run some
kind of crazy college offense that is gonna work? Gonna
not work? Very little I want to see in the preseason.
I'm like fans, my fingers are crossed, nobody gets hurt.
I mean that's literally what I am reduced to as
an NFL fan in the preseason, praying great players and

(01:54:18):
quarterbacks don't get hurt. And finally, Sam Darnold taking shots
at Tom Brady. Clearly Darnald asked to be a part
of a birthday video for Tom Brady where players could
give him a little message. Drew Brees did it, to
Shaun Watson did it, many other players did it. Sam

(01:54:38):
Darnold said no, wouldn't wish Tom Brady a happy birthday.
He explained, quote, I'm going to get every competitive edge
I can because he's going to do the same. He's
the ultimate competitor. He's exactly where I want to be
when i'm his age to chase that I can't be
giving him anything, giving him apparently a birthday wish. I

(01:54:59):
love this, Sam Darnold. I think this is shots fired
by your boy at your other boy. I love Darnald,
this kid, I feel like he might have overthought the situation.
I think this is how grown ups act. I don't
wish my competitor's happy birthday. You think I'm gonna wish
all my competitor's happy birthday. I'm not. I don't want
him to have physical or mental harm, but I we

(01:55:22):
are competing every day, John, I mean against every show.
We're just competing it. So you've no other show, no
other host of any other show has ever gotten a
happy birthday text. Gottlie called me and told me it
was his birthday and I wouldn't recognize it. I like competition.
Veteran newsman, John, Well, that's the news, you know, it's

(01:55:46):
one of my favorite segments. Tomorrow's Headlines Today with Jason
McIntyre right around the corner on a Thursday. What a
show today, It's the Herd. Be sure to catch live
editions of the week dayson noon Easter nine Empacific. By
the way, you know that Seinfeld does that comedians and
cars doing coffee. He's finally got my favorite guy. Who's

(01:56:09):
that Martin Short? That's your favorite community? Oh God, nobody
makes me laugh harder on talk show appearances than Martin Short. Wow.
I think he's He was great on Carson, he's great
on Letterman, He's great on Bill Maher. Martin Short is
one of the funniest people on the planet. Wow. So

(01:56:30):
finally Seinfeld got him on Comedian Cars doing coffee. It's on.
Is it incredible? I don't know. They just showed a clipps.
He's already. He's just brilliant. When I think funniest comedians
on the planet, Martin Short probably doesn't crack the time.
That's because you're like nineteen years old. Yeah, Martin Short
was a big deal in the eighties, right, Martin Short
still unbelievable. His last couple of weeks on Letterman were

(01:56:50):
the funniest he ever been. Wow, he's a great learn
something new of Martin Short's a great American storyteller. He's
a great communicator. He's any any of that. Okay, Eddie Murphy,
that's who I'm excited about coming back on Netflix. You
heard about that, right what you're out on Eddie Murphy? Dude,
talk about the eighties? Oh my gosh. Yeah, we found

(01:57:12):
the one guy who does not like Eddie. I mean,
go watch Raw right now. It is incredible. You will
be laughing for an hour straight. Eddie Murphy. Raw. All right,
we do a segment called Tomorrow's Headlines Today. Jason McIntyre
started in the newspaper business, then bailed on it about
forty minutes in and he created a site and made
a bunch of money. So you predict, as a newspaper guy,
what the headline will be tomorrow? So tomorrow's headlines today?

(01:57:36):
What will we see from Lavian Bell after taking a
year off jets playing a night right? Are you excited?
You gotta watch that? I believe the headline will be
saved by LaBelle obviously talking about eighties? How about the
early nineties? Saved by the Bell. Awesome show. I've seen
every episode multiple times, but people keep talking about Sam
Darnold in the level he's gonna rise to his second year,

(01:57:59):
and Quinn and William you know we've talked about right
at camp. Levion Bell is the guy to watch because
if you look at Adam Gaze's history when he was
in Chicago, what did he do? He got the ball
to Matt Forte out of the backfield, catching passes, running
the football over a thousand yards nine tds. What happened
with Kenyan Drake last year in Miami? Awesome dual threat.

(01:58:20):
Now you're going to Levion Bell Collin who is arguably
the best complete running back in the NFL. I mean
no disrespect to Ezekiel Elliott. I think Bell is going
to be a monster. People in New York are excited
for sae Quon Barkley. I think, you know, if you
do fantasy football, Levion Bell is going to be a
basis year. They also brought in Jamison Crowder, always hurt,
who's actually was the second best slot receiver on the market,

(01:58:43):
who has had a great camp soul. Listen, Yeah, you've
been light on the hot takes today. This is not
that incendiary, But the New York Jets have the best
skill position players in the AFC East. Okay, we know
the Dolphins don't have anybody, the Buffalo Bills, and the
Patriots lost Gronk, So it's basically Sony Michelle and Julian
Edelman versus you know, Levy on Bell and the Jets guys.
You even like Chris Herndon, the Jets tight end suspended

(01:59:06):
for four games. But the Jets skill position players are
the best in the AFC East. Okay, Tomorrow's headlines today,
how will we offense to look under Freddie Kitchens and
Baker Mayfield. Well, we're contractually obligated to talk Baker Mayfield
every time I'm on this show. Because of what happened
that one time. And I believe the headline will be
kitchens new shotgun offense as you see Baker Mayfield shotgunning

(01:59:30):
a beer here. Yes, yes, yet I know you'd like that. No, no,
lukewarm on that headline. Here's the funny thing about Freddie Kitchens.
Do you know what he was doing this time last year?
One year ago? He was a running backs coach at
the Cleveland Brown yea, he was a running backs coach.
Now he is the leader of a team that has
major expectations and they've got major personalities in that clubhouse.

(01:59:51):
I just you know, Freddie Kitchens loves to go deep
and they that's why they got Odell Beckham and Baker
Mayfield through the most percentage of deep pass is in
the league last year. People don't realize he likes to
throw deep. M Odell Beckham, is he going to be healthy?
Colin sixteen of thirty two games the last two years?
He's gonna missed sixteen to thirty two. The only part

(02:00:11):
of Cleveland's roster I don't like. I think their offensive
line is an injury away at the interior spots of
being a complete mess because they're not good at tackles
and I and I rely on scouts for this. It's
the hole in the team. So the question becomes, if
there was an injury up front, Baker's not gonna have

(02:00:32):
the time. No, So I think the Browns are gonna
win a bunch of games. I'm not doubting that. I
think they'll be a little rocky in the first six
weeks because their schedule and they're new and it's new
coach in the new system and new players. But I
do think the offensive line that is the cross your
fingers unit with Cleveland, can't have an injury. You are
on record picking the Titans in Week one against the injury.
I can't believe you like the Titans a lot. Colin

(02:00:54):
will eventually get to them. Tomorrow's headlines today, how will
the Raiders do in their last season in Oakland. Yeah,
I'm not bullish on the Oakland Raiders. They got like
twenty two new players and free agency, their schedules, Bruler,
all the world, come on this, it's here's the headline
for the Oakland Raiders. The Jokeland Raiders. I don't know

(02:01:14):
if you watched any of Hard Knocks. Yeah, John Gruden
is not very likable. I mean he's living off basically
one super Bowl win with Tony Dungee's guys. Uh did
you see what he did after that? In Tampa? Nothing?
And John Gruden Last year, Derek Carr had his worst
year as a professional since his rookie year. Gruden's supposed

(02:01:35):
to be this quarterback whisper. I don't like anything about
Oakland and um I called him jokelin because as you
saw the Antonio Brown stuff, it's a mass. Listen, Colin.
You know, there's a cryotherapy place where we live in
Manhattan Beach. I go there. I was going to have
them post the picture, but they were like, we can't
do shirtless McIntyre on here. I was like whatever, But
in cryotherapy they have you put on socks and crocs.

(02:01:57):
You can't go in there with nothing on your feet.
Like how dim is Antonio Brown to just walk in
there with nothing on his feet? Yeah? No, when you
go to these what are you doing cryotherapy places? They
I mean it's it's pretty restrictive. Some guys have them
at their homes, but I wouldn't play. I mean, this
is an embarrassment. Antonio Brown may not be ready for
Week one and now you're relying on Josh Jacob's, the

(02:02:20):
rookie running back who I like out of Alabama. There's
nothing to like about this Raiders offensive line. It's going
to be ugly for Oakland. Tomorrow's headlines today, What does
the new contract mean for Tom Brady? You know, we
saved the best for last because you love Tom Brady,
and I think the headline will be escape goat. Everybody's

(02:02:42):
bashing the Brady contract. I do believe, and this is
not anything crazy. I think Tom Brady's set to retire
after this year, and he gets it. If you look
at last year, they completely reinvented themselves. Colin's running football
are much more of a power team the last sixty well,
I mean, this is the greatness of Bill bell A check.
He has completely reinvented the Patriots over two decades. Initially

(02:03:03):
they were defense and run. Then there was the Randy
Moss era, then there was the Gronk era, and now
it's back to ground and pound with Sony, Michelle and Brady.
As we've been over, he was not great in the playoffs,
by the way, it's not great in the Super Bowl.
I think the Saints are doing the same with Breeze exact.
Three of their four biggest cap hits are on the
old line Michael Thomas. They signed up, they had the

(02:03:26):
fewest attempts and Drew Breese in like eight years. So
and I think I think the Saints and the Patriots
are putting money into their offensive lines, realizing our quarterbacks
need more protection. By the way, the Patriots drafted receiver.
The Saints paid the receiver one hundred million dollars. So
I don't think I think it shows you the end

(02:03:47):
is near, but I don't think it shows you the
end is imminent in the near future. I think it's
I think it's I think Brady's got two more years,
and then I think he has what why two? I mean,
this is the first full year with out grounk and
they're already growing ground and pound. He's gonna be forty
three next August. No, isn't it amazing? And and if
I had a salary cap guru on my radio show,

(02:04:09):
and he talked about how the Breeze contract essentially sets
up for Drew Brees could retire if they win the
Super Bowl this year. Drew Brees could walk away, I think,
and the same could be said for Tom Brady. He
might just ride off into the sunset, like Peyton Manning,
like John Elway, you know two other top ten quarterbacks
all time. What does Brady have left to prove? Colin Well,
that's not how Alteimer's thing. What does Saban have left

(02:04:31):
to prove? I think all time aspirational people don't think
in terms of that. They just want to keep winning,
and they like the money. They like the challenge, they
like the competition, the money. He's easily he's taking less
money than the market says. I don't think. I don't
think that's how that's how rich people think. That's not
how all time greats Michael Jordan, Lebron James. I think
they just like competition, they like winning. Now, you always

(02:04:52):
get to do the headlines, but for the first and
probably last time ever, I am delivering a headline. So
oh boy, okay, okay, So I want to get back
to the Antonio Brown story. He messed up his foot
during cryotherapy. I've been told you do cryotherapy. I do, yes, Okay,
I do not do cryotherapy because I think it's a
little shaky. It's not shaky, it's great, it's not jumping

(02:05:14):
into a cold tub. If you've never done that, it's
to minus junior degrees. And I've seen a lot of
people have a messed up skin. So I don't believe
in it. You believe in it. So my headline today
is Cryoma River. There I am my head peeking out.
I'm telling you. I had my son take that photograph.
He came with it. So where did you do that at?

(02:05:34):
That's in Manhattan Beach. I got a cryotherapy spot and listen,
it's great at it. It's cheap, it's not expensive. You
go play tennis a lot, right, yeah? Yeah? Okay, so
you play a tough three set match, it's two hours.
What do you do to recover after the match? Vodka?
Club soda? Okay, that's one option. I will go cryotherapy
after and it kind of refreshes, recharges your body quicker

(02:05:55):
than just icing up. You're thirty years old. I'm not
as young as you think. And also, you know it's
good to keep your body, body and mind. Colin, you
can't just be reading all the time. You got to
do the body think. Do you think it works? Does
it hurt? No, it doesn't hurt. Come on, it's just cold.
You know two minutes in the chamber. Basically, Lebron's got
me that Lebron's got one at home. If Lebron does it,

(02:06:18):
is it? I mean, it's good enough for Lebron. Look
at that well, I mean I yeah, you know, John,
as John just said in my ear, you're volunteering for frostbite.
It's there's zero chance at frostbite, John, trust me. Look,
he's got the gloves on. You gotta wear gloves. Yeah,
an Antonio Brown's a bit of a dope. He doesn't
get it. You know, he didn't put anything on his feet. Yeah.
Jay Glazer, you know Jay Glazer does this stuff. I Glazer,

(02:06:41):
He's only five foot four. How can he lose him?
Stop it? They can raze the boy. Glazier's gonna come
after you take out a gun show. Yeah, Glazers big,
all right, Urban Meyer, Greg co Sell, Chris Sayins, t J. Hushman, Zada,
and Jason McIntire. Tomorrow's headlines Today, I'm off tomorrow. Speak
for yourself. I've got a labor intensive day off tomorrow

(02:07:03):
doing family stuff. Labor intensive. No cry oh one more
heard The Herd streams twenty four hours a day, seven
days a week. Within the iHeartRadio app, search Herd to
listen live or on demand whenever you like.

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