On today's episode, Jason talks with NFL Network Insider Tom Pelissero to get his thoughts and insight on the most significant selections of the draft. Pelissero breaks down how Shedeur Sanders slid to the 5th round and explains what caused teams to view him differently as the draft approached. Pelissero examines the full scope of the QB draft class and reports his findings on why the Saints targeted Tyler Shough. Pelissero gives a first look at the 2026 draft class. Plus, Jason reacts to the Warriors narrowly defeating the Rockets on Monday and explains why he is loving the aggressive play on the court.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
This is Straight Fire with Jason McIntyre.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
What is up, Drake Park Bam, It's me Jason McIntyre.
Straight Fire or Tuesday, April twenty ninth. What an awesome
night of basketball. Well we got one good game, right.
Obviously we will talk a little hoops here to start
the pod, but we have a great guest, Tom Pelasorrow
(00:30):
NFL Network. He was all over the Shador Sanders stuff
all weekend. Let's just say you're gonna be surprised by
some of his takes on the quarterbacks in this draft.
He caught me off guard with the Tyler Shook stuff.
I was mocking him. I feel bad for saying the
stuff you're about to hear on the New Orleans Saints.
Now backup or thirstring whatever you quarterback. I'm still a
little stunned by the Shadoor stuff. We'll see what happens
(00:52):
with Sehan Watson. A lot of momentum that he's just
gonna get cut out right and they're gonna take the
cap hit and this will be like a gap year,
if you will, for the Browns where they test drive
all these quarterbacks and then probably back into arch Banning
in what would be a pretty glorious tank job. Anyways,
before we get the tom quickly, let me talk about
Golden State Warriors war oh nine, Rockets won oh six
(01:15):
in what I thought was a pretty phenomenal game. It's
interesting the West has had three really good series and
then that Okay, see Memphis trash right, Lakers Wolves is
coin flip on three of the games basically now two
of the games, Warriors Rockets coin flip on at least
two of the four games, and Nuggets Clippers literally has
been three coin flips, like one possession games with ten
(01:38):
seconds left, you know, wild stuff. So I don't want
to go too overboard on my NBA physicality stuff. If
you were listening to The Herd Monday, Colhurt and I
in a rare moment of back and forth like kind
of disagreeing pretty vehemently. He loves this new NBA physicality. Okay, yes,
I like watching some of the physicality obviously, some where
(02:01):
guys are getting each other's faces. Yeah, I like that.
I don't like forty eight hours grabbing, tugging, pushing, pulling, fighting, tripping.
I just don't like that. It's not visually appealing when
it's like, you know, we cait We me and my
brother we like to think we invented this game in
our basement growing up. We had like, you know, like
one of those nineteen eighties basements where we had like
(02:22):
wood paneling and stuff because they knew the parents, My
parents knew that we would be putting holes in the
wall if they got drywall. So we got like this
wood paneling cheap material, and we put up one of
those nerf hoops, and then we had a nerf hoop
on like the other end of the room, and it
was basically like full court body check basketball. That's what
we called it. Like anything goes. It was basically football
(02:43):
with a basket. We played with a nerf ball and
it was just so fun. Just body check basketball. That's
what it looks like the NBA is devolving into. So
you had Draymond Green versus Tarry Easan, Draymond just losing
his mind. You had Draymond Green for stilln Brooks. But
Brooks did a stupid thing at Curry. But Curry did
ignite it by saying, that's two fouls on you, So
(03:04):
they don't like it, and then Jimmy Butler's talking to
Dylan Brooks. It looked like he was basically saying you
better stfu or I'm gonna whoop your ass like Butler's
saying it. And Dylan Brooks is like so surprised. He's
wide eyed and like laughing, but he's laughing it off
because he's like, oh damn. Within like minutes, Jimmy Butler
fowls Brooks pretty hard on a breakaway. I'm surprised it
wasn't an ejection. I mean, he clobbered Brooks and nobody's
(03:27):
gonna look out for Brooks because he's such a goon.
But like again, you got like three of these battles,
you have Draymond Green woofing the whole game. Eventually that's
gonna escalate and it's gonna get ugly, and the league,
I don't think they're gonna have a mallet at the palace.
But I'm just telling you some of these teams are angry.
The short Pistons are down three to one. They're pissed.
The Rockets are down three to one, they're pissed. The
(03:48):
Lakers are down three to one, they're pissed. All three
of those teams are getting roughed up. Well, actually, the
Pistons are doing more roughing and yes, uh Draymond Green
is leading the Warriors charge in roughing, but a couple
other things. Big reaction after the game last night. Oh,
I can't believe they benched Jalen Green. Guys, did you
watch the beginning of the game. Jalen Green was not
(04:09):
running offense. He was jacking terrible shots. I think he
got stripped twice in the first quarter. Like he was
not locked in. Come out in the third quarter. You know,
the bench come brings a max setd quarter. Come out
in the third quarter eighteen to one, Warriors run, like
Jalen Green got benched. He was not good last night.
I get it now. I know what you're saying. I mean, listen,
that's your best or second best player. Oh, shen Gun
(04:31):
had a great game, thirty one and ten. He did
miss the final shot. You know, I didn't love drawing
up a play to go with like one of the
best defensive players of the league, Seene in fifteen years.
I didn't love that. I would have put Green back in,
but nevertheless, so Sengun didn't make it, and then two
more free throws and they went by three. Fred van
(04:52):
Vliet hit eight threes, so you're not pulling him off
the court. Aman Thompson is just everywhere. Does everything love
him again. We'll get to Yani's trades eventually one day.
I don't know that i'd include on Men Thompson in
a trade for Giannis. I just think his upside is ridiculous. Uh.
And Giannis is, you know, turning thirty one soon and
then Dylan Brooks gooning it up. But like Steven Adams
(05:13):
was great off the bench plus sixteen. This is the
chess match stuff that I love. Okay, So Steven Adams,
they're going two bigs Adams and she goon inside and
the Warriors are struggling. Rockets are dominating, eating inside.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
They win the.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Interior points in the paint by like twenty five. They're
collecting all these boards. Adams has four blocks, they had
thirteen offensive rebounds.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
It was working.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
So what does Steve Kerr do? Hack a shack? He
starts hacking Steven Adams, and as soon as it happened,
the Rockets fearful pulled Adams. He only shot one of
two free throws. The Rockets did miss twelve free throws.
That was a killer. You can't miss twelve free throws.
Come on, sixty one percent, give me a break. So
they have to pull Adams because of Kerr's smart move
(05:59):
that will just foul him every time and put him
on the line. I thought that was a stroke of
genius by Steve Curst. So they pull Adams. The interior
advantage is gone. Jimmy Butler starts to take over Butler
at like fourteen in the fourth but really good game,
high level basketball game. Just Adam Silver tell the refs
to actually blow the whistle. All right, without further ado,
let's get to our guest, NFL Networks, Tom pilosorrow.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live. You know, Jason likes to think he knows
everything when it comes to sports.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
I know what sports fans want, but for.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Everything he doesn't. He knows a guy who does.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Let's just say I know a guy who knows the
guy who knows another guy.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
All right, let's welcome back to straight Fire NFL Insider,
NFL Network Star. He's been working his butt off for
like four or five months. Tom pelosorrow, Tom, How you doing,
Man doing fantastic?
Speaker 3 (07:02):
It was a great week in Green Bay, Jason. I
can't say enough about how the people there did putting
together at the draft. I'm always concerned with just like
the logistics of it and the you know, the smoothness
of the operation. The people there couldn't be nicer and
more informed. There were no getting lost in the labyrinth
of the of the draft footprint, so it was really impressive.
(07:22):
It was a good week. Could have been, you know,
could have dealt with all a little of that sideways
rain on Friday, but other than that it was pretty good.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
Sideways rain. Yeah, it seems it seemed like a fun time,
but I gotta be honest, your whole twenty twenty five
is basically what Senior Bowl combine traveling to pro days
getting ready for that. I mean, it's been Listen, we're
not here out here digging ditches. We're talking about football.
But it's been a bit of a bit of a
rough four or five months. Just tough, a lot of travel, I.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Would say, yeah, the travel part of it. Everybody's always
like after the Super Bowl, they're like, oh, man, aren't
you happy to be done? I'm like, actually, the next
three months from you know, there's only two weeks until
the combine, then a week after that is free agency,
then like two weeks after that's the owners meeting, and
then you're directly into the draft prep. I always it's
funny because like every year, over the course of time,
(08:09):
like all schedule things, right, it's like every dentist appointment,
doctor appointment, talking to my financial advisor, and then I'll
open up my Google calendar. After the draft, I'm like,
oh man, I got like seven meetings this week, so
I do nothing for nine months.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Now we're back, baby, Yeah, we're back. So let me
ask you. It's been a rough four months. You've been
on the road a lot traveling, and the biggest story
out of the draft, and I'm sure some people are
sick of it, but Shadoor Sanders and it did propel ratings,
TV ratings were massive for the draft. I just have
to ask, over the last four or five months, did
you see any of this coming? I mean fifth round, Tom, I.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Didn't see fifth round. I did see and tried to
frankly brace people for the fact that there was a
decent chance that Shador Sanders was not going to go
in the first round. You know, really, by the time
we got today, it was down to the Giants or
the Steelers. Those are the only two teams that really
could keep Shador in the first. When he slid out
(09:07):
of the first I thought he would go on day two.
I was surprised that he did not. I think it's
more so Jason you if you rewind and go back,
and this happens sometimes where there is a media narrative
that's created that maybe is not accurate relative to the
(09:27):
feeling within the league. And what I'm pointing to there is,
you know, there were certainly, you know, some of the
foremost draft experts, right mel Kiper is the godfather of this.
He's been doing it forever. He had Schador number one
all the way on his quarterback list. Our guy Bucky
Brooks had Chador number one, and those guys, you know,
they watch way more tape than I do. They're entitled
to their opinions every year. But I think that he
created this idea that this was a two horse race
(09:49):
with Shador, Sanders and cam Ward when really, even going
into the combine, when I talked with people, it was
cam Ward is clearly QB one. The real race is
going to be for QB two, And I think to
understand how that entire thing played out, you have to
go back even further. I had a conversation Friday night,
right after round three. It was like midnight. I get
a phone call from a GM who's thinking about taking
(10:10):
Shador on Saturday in rounds four through seven, And I
asked him just like what, like, how is this possible
though that he could a slid this far? And he
pointed all the way back to BLU was February or
March of twenty twenty four, so over a year before
the draft. When Dion Sanders goes on a podcast and
talks about, oh, you know, talking about Shador and Travis Hunter.
(10:31):
If somebody takes me out't want to go to the
We're gon we're gonna pull an Eli right, We're just
not gonna go and we're going to force the issue here.
And that's kind of how Schadeur went through the pre
draft process. It's a series of touch points right where
every team it's not just they've watched the game film,
but they've done background. Their area scouts have gone through
a year in advance and done homework on guys, they're
(10:54):
gathering all the background information. They're obviously dissecting the tape.
You go into the process and then from All Star
Game season to the Combine, to the Pro Days to
private visits and all that, you try to fill in
the gaps, right, You try to fill in the blanks.
Well with Shador, he didn't make it any easier to
fill in those gaps. He didn't go to the Senior Bowl.
He chose to go to the East West Shrine Bowl
(11:15):
because it was in Dallas.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
He displayed, hold on top, Tom, let me jump in.
So in the last like five years, can you think
of any quarterback in his position that also skipped the
Senior Bowl that was kind of relevant? Like I don't
remember it was Justin Herbert did he go to the
Senior Bowl?
Speaker 3 (11:30):
Or Justin Erber won the MVP of the Senior Bowl.
Baker Mayfield only showed up for a day, And that
was kind of the same thing which Baker Mayfield showed up.
He wasn't in the greatest mood. He was only there
for a day and then left, and there was he
thought he was like a buzz out Baker Mayfield at
that time as well. But for Shador. He goes to
the East West Shrine Bowl. As an MNFL memo saying,
if you go to these all star games, you have
to practice. He doesn't practice. He goes to the Combine,
(11:51):
and it's now well documented that some of his interviews
went really poorly. There are both the formal interviews and
the informal interactions that can occur there. You get to March,
the whole Big Twelve has their joint Prota in Dallas.
He doesn't do anything there. He shows up, but he
doesn't do anything. They have their showcase at Colorado. There
were I mean the Giants, for instance, put a ton
(12:12):
of homework into him. They were at every open practice,
they went to every game, they had him on a
private visit, they went to the showcase. I mean, they
did everything here, and they did a private workout like
a week before the draft, so they had as much
information as anyone and they decided to go with Jackson Dark.
And the issue then becomes like, we can debate the
talent between these guys, but what happens is for a
(12:33):
lot of teams philosophically, if you think a guy as
a starter, you take him in the first right, You
just you go and get him. It doesn't really matter
the value you take him in the first If you're
taking a backup, you're probably not doing that until day three.
And then for even some of those teams, they might
have had shador as the player evaluation, and he's the
name that's like sticking out, that's above all the other
remaining guys on the board. By not taking the opportunities
(12:56):
with all those touch points with some of these other
teams that may not have been the teams do or
wanted to go to, or the teams he thought would
be in play for him, it made it harder maybe
for some of those gms to take the leap, and
so in the end he ends up being the second
quarterback taken by a team that did have a lot
of time with him in the Browns. He goes on
the fifth and ends up, frankly, in maybe the best
(13:17):
situation if he wants to get on the field in
twenty twenty five. When you look at all this in
his totality, he ends up in a spot in Cleveland
where he's legitimately gonna have an opportunity to come in here.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
So you think, despite them having five quarterbacks on the roster,
we can make it for since Watson, you know, had
the Achilles and he's probably not gonna be ready. But
they traded I believe, a fifth for Picket, Flacco. We
know Stefanski loves there's a system, and they drafted Dylan
Gabriel ahead of Shador. So you think Shador still has
a shot to start any games next season.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Well, if you think of the names you just listed there, Jason,
I don't know that you sit there and go, boy,
really comfortable with that that'd being the guy. I mean,
you're right, they've got a you know, they have guaranteed money,
not a lot, but some invested in Flacco, Pickett, they
gave up a five, Like you mentioned, Dylan Gabriel, they
drafted in the third. Shador was obviously rated lower than
Dylan Gabriel on their board. But you know, why not
(14:13):
let's talk about Shador the player, because so much of
the focus has been on Shador, and you know, I
don't even think it was so much like the personality.
You know, he's not a nobody sits there and says
like he's a bad guy or he's a party guy.
He wants to be great, he wants to come in
he's all ball. He wants to be a really really
good football player. He's got accuracy, he's got toughness despite again,
(14:35):
all the different things, and he's not you know, his
his backstory is different than everybody else. Teammates really like him.
You know that. That's the thing that you heard out
of the school when when scouts went in there, which
is teammates seem to have his back. But it comes
down to he's not the biggest guy, he doesn't have
the biggest arm. He's not an elif elite athlete like
his dad. And he has this free wheeling play style
(14:56):
where he makes so much happen outside of structure and
it's not on top. And so the projection is a
player again, setting aside all the other stuff, the projection
as a player was is he going to be able
to adjust his game and play on time, play in rhythm.
I know there's been people have made comparisons to Drew Brees. Well,
Drew Brees was one of the best ever See it
and get the ball out of your hand with Shador.
(15:17):
He's very cool, calm and collected in the pocket. But
how many of his highlights are him backpedaling and exiting
the back of the pocket and extending it and then
he's throwing the ball up to Travis Hunter. It's gonna
be harder because he's not a Kyler Murray level athlete,
a Josh Allen level athlete to make those plays happen
in the NFL. And so that's part of the projection too.
And so let's see he goes in with Kevin Stefanski,
(15:40):
who is now you know, they're very much going to
run Kevin's offense, which is timing based. Let's see what
time of progress Shador can make. Dylan Gabriel is the
more natural fit in terms of his play style. But
Dylan Gabriel is like, you know, my size. He's got
a few extra pounds on him, but like he's five
foot ten and he's shown it that he can function
on that. But that's below the line for a lot
(16:02):
of people, especially because he's not a runner. He's not
a scrambler like Kyler Murray. He is going to play
in rhythm. He's like a mini Tua, is what Dylan
Gabriel is. So between him Joe Flacco, who's forty one,
I think didn't play great when he got his opportunity
last year. With the Colts, and then Kenny Pickett, who
is now on his third team and you know, quite
(16:23):
possibly if things don't go his way as fourth soon,
you know, you don't have a lot of certainty here.
So let's see. It'll be fascinating to see how Kevin
Stefanski divides the reps because you just don't have that
many to give four guys a ton of reps here.
But you know, I understand the philosophy too, especially it's
in an odd situation, like your philosophy is. Hey, once
you get past those first round guys, and there was
(16:44):
only one quarterback, cam Ord, who profiled as a surefire starter,
you're just kind of throwing darts anyway. These guys all
have some traits, but they've all got holes in them.
So bringing a couple, maybe neither one works out. But
if you hit on either one of these guys, Gabriel
or Shadur, you end up getting value in maybe that
extra first round pick you picked up in the Travis
Hunter trading and use on something else.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
So that's interesting because Gabriel went on day two. Is
there a you know, a theory out there that, hey, Stefanski,
he likes Gabriel the coach the front off it, they
like Gabriel, but it was the owner who meddled and said,
bring me the star, bring me Deonza. Do you buy
into that? Is that why maybe he took them in
(17:23):
the fifth round.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
My understanding is that was not a Jimmy Haslim pick.
That was a classic position where a team is they're
looking at the board and listen. It's not like when
you draft, you just go straight down the list, right.
Like there's times where whether it's a duplicate or hey,
you might have you know, if the Chiefs could have
had cam Ward is the number player one player on
their board, But even if they had the number one pick,
(17:44):
they're probably not taking cam Ward because they've got Patrick Mahomes.
So there are times where you see there's one name
that's the outlier and you're just like, god, if we've
got to I don't know exactly what their grade was.
It was obviously lower than the grade they had on
deal in Gabriel. But let's say you got a second
third round grade on or Sanders and you're sitting there
in the fifth you're like, why wouldn't we just go
get the guy? And that's that's my understanding on that one.
(18:06):
I think you were correct in terms of Dylan Gabriel
being the fit for Kevin Stefanski that has Kevin written
all over it. You know, he was a part of
the Minnesota team that had case Keenum running around and
making plays. You've seen other quarterbacks too of being a
prime example who are undersized but being able to play
in that rhythm passing type of an offense. And Dylan Gabriel,
(18:27):
you know, he really showed something too to coaches at
the Senior Bowl who were watching him on field level
and going this guy, I mean, I was there. This
guy is small like you see him. He's not. He's
kind of thickly built, especially through the lower body, but
he is. He is a short man.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Like Russell Wilson.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Maybe you could see I mean Russ, though Russ would
get outside the pocket and make more things happen. With
Dylan Gabriel, it's much more of a He's more like Tua,
where a lot of what he does is going to
be in the rhythm of the play. You know, Russ
was a run around and then throw the ball down field.
That was kind of his game. Dylan Gabriel has been
a highly productive I mean number are unbelievable. He started
(19:01):
more games, he threw more yards than anybody else. You know,
that's more of the play style with him. It's very
tu alike. He's even left handed, so that's probably a
better fit for what Stefanski wants to do. But again,
if you can get the buy in from Shador and
if he can show, you know, I don't think that
anybody out there, know what I've talked to is like, well,
shod door can't process. No, it's not that. It's just
(19:23):
he was good enough and had enough freedom and latitude
of Colorado that he could make those extended plays. In Cleveland,
you're getting chased by much bigger, much faster men in
the NFL. It's just gonna be harder for him to
play like that, you know, So let's see. You know,
Chador's got things he's got to clean up. He said
that himself the other day. You know, of all the
(19:45):
of all the quarterback competitions will have in training camp,
the best one is going to be in Cleveland. And again,
it'll be interesting to see how they're dividing the reps,
what order these guys even are going in through OTAs
and mini camp to kind of figure out, Okay, who's
getting a real shot at this job, and how are
they going about trying to make as much of an
apples to apples comparison as they can.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
Let me go to the Saints who took Tyler Shuck,
the kid from Louisville. That was a stunner. I'm a
were you surprised by that? And b like, there's no
way he's a better prospect than Schudor. I didn't see
anyone have that on their you know, big board or
what have you. That was a stunner to me.
Speaker 3 (20:37):
I was not shocked by it. In fact, I was
on a show that afternoon and they asked me, like,
what's the wildest rumor that you've heard? And I said, well,
I would say it's more than a rumor. But Tyler
the Queebi three may not be Shudor Sanders, it might
not be Jalen Miilroe who's still in the green room.
It's Tyler Shuck. Because I knew that the Saints were
really high on Shuck, and they were not the only
(20:59):
team I had heard. The Rams were really high on
Shuck too, and maybe even somebody would try to trade
up and take Shuck at the top of the second round.
So the difference with Tyler Shuck and when I talk about,
you know, the touch points right that are in the
pre draft process, and as much as Shador probably missed
opportunities to take advantage of those, Tyler Shuck crushed the
pre draft process. Which it's easy to see why. The
(21:21):
guy's almost twenty six years old. He was in college
for seven years. He was in a bunch of different offenses,
played for a bunch of different coaches, and so when
he's going in and they're testing him on the board,
there's recall with everything. It's like, oh, I ran that
concept in twenty twenty one in Texas deck that reminds
me of twenty eighteen at Oregon when I'm backing up
Justin Herbert and so he's a he's a tall. He's
six foot four, he's not you know, he's two hundred
(21:43):
plus pounds. He doesn't look like the biggest guy, but
tall enough with enough arm. His run a pro style
offense they gave him, Jeff Brown, give him a lot
of responsibility at the line of scrimmage in that offense
at Louisville, and he finally stayed healthy. The guy had
never played. This is one of the wildest stats in
this draft. The first six years of Tyler Shuck's college career,
he never played more than seven games in any of
(22:05):
those seasons. He was perpetually. He was a backup for
two years. He had the COVID season in Oregon where
he did leave lead them to a conference title. He
had three years of Texas Tech, got hurt in all
of them, then goes to Louisville and you know, puts
it together and has a pretty good season. Now, there's
also coaches who will say when they see this on tape,
and I thought to several has said this, there's a
(22:26):
little bit of flints with him. You worry is he
shined away from contact? Is he trying not to get
hit because he has been hurt so much? That's the
number one drawback with Tyler Shuck. But you know, he's
your classic efficient, smart guy who knows a lot about offense,
and you could he's arguably the guy who's the most
ready to step in and play right now. And depending
what happens with Derek Carr in New Orleans, you could
(22:48):
end up having a Tyler Shuck competition with Spencer Rattler
in New Orleans. And I wouldn't put it against Tyler
Shucks to be the twenty twenty five Week one starter
for the Saints.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
So maybe they're that Jorg dude. They're doing that to
get Arch Manning with the number one pick. Bring a
full circle with the Manning family, right because I listen,
I know you're saying nice things, Tom, this, this dude's
not a starting NFL quarterback. I mean he was. He
was in college for seven years and it was only
a starter for like one full season. He just kept
bouncing around because he wasn't good enough. I don't mean
(23:18):
to be a hater. I'm sure you know his agent
and stuff, but you watch the tape on.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
It, he's not me and the agent. The Satan stuck
him from the top of the second.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I can't believe it's off the board. Okay, So was
that the worst quarterback pick in the draft?
Speaker 3 (23:30):
Be honest, No, I don't think it was the worst
quarterback pick. I mean the way that I kept explaining this,
and again this goes back to like I don't like
to crush you know, yeah, I know, well it's a
media or anything else. But like there was just this
misconception that it was, well, it's cam Ward versus Shador
and then it's everybody else, Like it was pretty a
parent through the process, right, wrong or indifferent? Okay, Jason,
I don't watch a Licko tape. I don't watch these guys.
(23:53):
I may have seen him on TV. Like, I don't
go through and like evaluate and take notes. I just
call people, yeah, because I know that ultimately I don't
know what I'm looking at. I just asked people within
the league, people who are in the quarterback market, people
who are not. I try to get a blunt assessment
and talk to people just like lay it on me.
Not the press conference version, not that everybody's great version.
(24:13):
Like give me the actual good and bad. And what
became a parent was it was cam Ward was the
consensus number one on just about everybody's board. If you
went to you know, there were a few people who
had Chador's number two. There were a lot of people
had Jackson Dart as number two. There was real competition.
It was stacked differently on everyone's board. From Jackson Dart,
(24:35):
Shador Sanders, Jalen Milroe, and Tyler Shuck. Those were the
next four. There were different orders for different people, which
makes sense because think about it, you could not find
more different quarterbacks than those guys. Jalen Milroe is a
hillacious runner with a massive arm who's just not accurate
right now. Tyler Shuck is a pure at this point
pocket passer. He's a decent athlete, but he doesn't want
(24:57):
to get out and run. They didn't use him that
way last year. Who's been in a pro style offense,
you know where his floores might be the highest, but
the celia might be the lowest. You got Shador, who's
had all the hype on him and again very accurate,
very tough, but has to play probably a different play
style in the NFL. And then you got Jackson Dart, who's,
you know, just kind of a bigger, more physical athlete.
(25:19):
You know what I was told when I asked about
the Jackson Dart over Shador Sanders for the Giants, because
they were going through that all the way through. If
you went back a year ago and told the Giants,
you're sitting there in the first round and you can
take one of these guys, I would think they probably
would have said Shador Sanders. But what it came down
to what Jackson Dart was. He's bigger, he's got more
(25:40):
athletic ability. Probably played against tougher competition too in the SEC.
But you think about Brian Dable where he's had success.
It was in Buffalo with Josh Allen, it was the
first year in New York with Daniel Jones. These are
like big physical athletes. You can do RPO, you can
do read options. You're not gonna do that with Shador Sanders.
They felt like Jackson had more layers to his game,
(26:02):
and so for it to go the way that it did,
which was Dart being the second, Shuck being the third.
I can't remember if Milroe or Gabriel was fourth. They
were both late third round, but the fact that it
was that order. The only surprise to me was Dylan
Gabriel jumping up above and then Shador going completely out
of day two. Everything else and you can go back.
I mean, I did the whole quarterback story and ranked
(26:24):
all these guys. It's like the ten guys I said
would get drafted. They all got drafted. There was a
little bit of variance in the rounds, but I really
didn't find it that surprising. And again, I think that
the way that we talk about things at times, it
just miscasts it. And you know the fact that there
was like this seeming debate in the media of is
(26:45):
Chador the number one quarterback in this class? All I
would tell you is if you went through and I did,
I talked to dozens of people, not maybe not all
thirty two teams, but easily over twenty teams. I did
not find a single person who had Shador Sanders as
the number one quarterback in the straf And it was
hard even to find an unqualified positive opinion of Shador
(27:06):
Sanders because some people really liked the player, but they
just had reservations about the culture Shaka coming in. What's
it going to be like walking into a locker room
where for the first time and really his entire life,
his dad is not the coach, the accountability structure is
going to be different. Or they were fine with the
person and they enjoyed their interactions, but they're like, the
player just isn't that great. It's not say Shad or
(27:27):
can't be a starter in the NFL. I would just
tell you the only guy the consensus across the league
that projected as a surefire starter was the guy who
went number one, and after that it was, for lack
of a better term, chuck a dart and figure out
which one's going to go next.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
The only counter would be that I think you would
even agree with this that the NFL has struggled badly,
very badly in identifying quarterbacks and what works and what
doesn't in the NFL over the last I don't know
fifteen years when like Mitch Trubisky goes what third overall
and Mahomes falls.
Speaker 3 (28:00):
And he was the sense to quarterback in that draft
as the wild thing in seventeen, he was the consentsus.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Yeah, there's just so many crazy I mean, Josh Rosen
taking like twenty spots. I had a Lamar Jackson Russell
Willith said round.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
That's a great example. Right, So let's go back to
the twenty eighteen draft, because I think this is a
really important point too that doesn't get talked about enough.
It's not just the evaluation. It's easy to say, well,
the scouts don't know what they're doing and they miss
all the time. But think about the environmental factors of
that twenty eighteen draft, which nobody thought, by the way,
was a good quarterback draft. Four of the five guys
(28:32):
I believe that were in that draft went to the
Pro Bowl last year. But think about the routes they
had to take. Baker Mayfield goes number one. That was
a surprise at that time that the Browns were that
high on him. He was below the line from a
hype perspective. There are all these questions about what kind
of guys he is? He gonna be a pain in
the end of Donald right stuff? What's that?
Speaker 2 (28:51):
It was supposed to be? Donald right?
Speaker 3 (28:53):
Donald was That was the one I had won in
my in my breaking.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Because thrilled the Jets. He lit fell to my Jets
because then the second pick was Saquon and I was like, yeah,
it's a victory. But anyways, continue.
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Right, and there were you know, John Dorsey was the
GM in Cleveland, and he just he bought into it.
He'd been around Farv in Green Bay and kind of
that edge and that toughness. He felt like there was
some of that with Baker. But Baker gets run out
of Cleveland, gets replaced by Deshaun Watson, then goes to Carolina.
It doesn't work out there, It's traded to the Rams,
has that wild game where he three days later he
(29:25):
starts and plays great. Goes to Tampa on a one year,
five million dollar deal. Now he is, if not a
top ten quarterback, Baker Mayfield is certainly a top twenty
quarterback in the NFL, solid starter on a team that
keeps going to the playoffs. Number three pick is Sam Darnold.
Same thing, wrong environment with the Jets. It's a disaster.
You are well versed in how that one went, Jason.
(29:46):
He ends up going to Carolina, into San Francisco, and
then finally the right place, right time in Minnesota. Jji McCarthy,
there's this meniscus in camp. I'm of the mine based
on everything I know that Donald was probably gonna be
the starter out of the gate last year anyway, but
also he didn't have the pressure of the first round
pick breathing down his neck, and he played great until
the last game of the regular season and then the
(30:07):
playoff game as well. But he revived his career. Josh
Rosen never had a chance. He's in Arizona and I'm
not saying Josh Rosen would have been better than these guys,
but he's in Arizona and by like the third game
of the season, they've decided these coaches suck, were firing everybody,
and the season is a mess. He gets traded the
following April to Miami, ends up in another bad situation
(30:28):
like it was. It was a wreck. Josh Allen turns
into the MVP. I believe he went eight in that draft,
just the second of Josh Rosen, but he was the
guy everyone's going fifty seven percent completion percentage on me.
This guy stinks again, But they ran the right offense
for him, allowed him to use his athletic ability while
they worked on the accuracy. And then thirty two is
(30:48):
Lamar Jackson, who there was real debate that year and
people requesting, hey, can he work out at wide receiver
or running?
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Yeah, but Napoleon right, it.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
Was a real that was a real bait within the league,
and so you think about that. But like Lamar went
into a spot in Baltimore where they had a clear vision,
we are going to do the things he does best
while he improves as a passer, and as soon as
he graduated out of being a run first type of quarterback,
and he's still an unbelievable runner. Once he became more accurate,
(31:18):
they made an offensive coordinator change. They ran run an offense.
Now that's a little more advanced. Same thing with Josh Allen.
Once he got better as a passer, they ran their offense.
You had vision in those spots. Baker bounced around, Darnold
bounced around. Rosen's completely out of the league. The quarterbacks
that are going to succeed, it's not just the ones that. Oh,
that was the right evaluation. It was what are we
going to do with him here? How are we going
(31:40):
to win with this guy? And you know, we'll see
how how Tennessee uses cam Ward. I mean the comps
to you here on cam Ward, it's Mahomes, it's Caleb Williams.
It's a guy who just can change ourm angles and
run around and make plays. I heard somebody who compare
him to Ben Roethlisberger, which I thought was really interesting
because there's times you see cam Wore getting hit in
(32:01):
the pocket and just like shedding people and extending plays
that way. He's not a scrambler. He's a guy who
moves to throw. But listen, if you know, they get
itchy and Tennessee and you know, God forbid they fire everybody, Like,
you know, what could that do to cam Ward? I
think everything's circumstantial. Everything's about what environment of these guys
in and that's where you know, that'll be the telltale
(32:23):
sign on this quarterback class, which outside of cam Ward,
the NFL issued a verdict that shouldn't really surprise anybody,
which was this is a one quarterback draft and after that,
we're just trying to trying to get lucky.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
It's interesting, you I totally forgot that. Uh it was
Dorsey who picked Baker Mayfield. What's his name, Dorsey, John Dorsey,
Don Dorsey. It's interesting, so I looked it up. It
looks like Dorsey has not worked really since he was
a consultant somewhere.
Speaker 3 (32:52):
He's with the Lions. He is, he is in the
front office. You can still find him wearing that same
gray sweatter.
Speaker 2 (32:56):
Oh a senior personnel executive. Oh okay, there it is.
Speaker 3 (32:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
So here's the interesting thing. And again this is kind
of off the beaten path, but Dorsey actually was the
GM when they drafted Patrick Mahomes and then he was
cut loose, like a few months later before Mahomes even
played a game. Oh man, I totally forgot you. I
believe yes, June Wow, good memory. So wait, so he
doesn't get a lot of credit for Mahomes. That usually
(33:21):
goes to Brett Veach and some others. Huh.
Speaker 3 (33:23):
Well, Andy Reid has said that that Brett Veach was
the one that was pushing Patrick Mahomes. I knew, you know,
I had Deshaun I remember catching flat because I had
Mahomes ahead of de Shawn Watson in the rankings that year.
And what I was saying was listen, like, Mahomes really
impressed people. Everyone's like, oh, you've running the It's this
guy who's running the air raid. He just you know,
he's he's just a thrower. He's not a passer, which,
(33:46):
you know, the amazing thing about Patrick Mahomes. If not
for you know, Patrick Mahomes walked so cam Ward could run.
If not for Patrick Mahomes, none of these guys who
play who have these unorthodox throwing styles and are you know,
throwing the ball across their body and side arm and
all that that wasn't considered like a positive trait. Now
it's taught every quarterbacks coach teaches guys to make these
(34:09):
you know, off platform throws as they call them, and
change their arm angles and things. And you see every
year Caleb Williams same thing. They train that in now
because Patrick Mahomes is the modern quarterback. But when he
was taken by the Chiefs, it did surprise some people,
Like I remember specifically I had the order of the
quarterbacks right that year, but that was not the consensus opinion.
(34:30):
It was Deshaun Watson was the winner at Clemson. He
was giving me the next one off the board. But
Mahomes where he impressed people was he went in and
when they put him on the board and stuff. Again,
because he's an air raid quarterback, everyone's assuming he doesn't
know football. He was amazing in those meetings. There were
a bunch of teams that were hoping Patrick Mahomes was
going to slip to them in that draft. In the end,
(34:50):
the Chiefs went and got him and the rest is history.
That's still being written here because Mahomes is still only
like thirty and will probably win five more Super Bowls.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
Before way, not five war maybe one more. I think
the Chiefs certains of trouble this year, but I'm sure
you would agree, So hey, I'll wrap up with this.
Speaker 3 (35:04):
They have shown a remarkable ability to reinvent themselves. I mean,
everybody thought when they traded Tyreek Hill, like what are
they doing? And they took the draft capital and the
cap resources, rebuilt the defense, rebuilt the offensive line. Now
they're kind of in another another phase of that. As
long as Mahomes is playing. This is like a Tom
Brady level run in my mind where it's like, okay,
(35:25):
just pencil them in the AFC Championship game. Oh see,
if they can win two more.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
I'll go Buffalo in the Super Bowl this year out
of the AFC. One last thing. It's way too early
for this, but Fox Sports asked me to do a
twenty twenty six NFL mock draft. I just need your
insight because you're obviously way on top of this. So
like every single year, we say, oh, next year's quarterback,
that's the one, it's going to be loaded. So I
went back and looked Tom. I'm sure you remember this.
(35:53):
A year ago, everybody was saying Quinn Yours is probably
gonna go top ten, Carson Beck Georgia probably gonna go
toup to it. And then as the season progresses, we
start to weed guys out, but it seems like arch
Manning people just cannot because he's Manning. You got, everybody's
putting him in. Hey, that's the guy next year. And
I know you haven't done the work, and I'm sure
(36:14):
people aren't talking to you about arch Manning yet. But
a year out they're talking. Are they talking about Art?
Speaker 3 (36:21):
Yeah, without a doubt. I mean people make just kind
of glancing comments. You know, they're not deeping the evaluation.
There's not that much to evaluate. I mean the guy
he has then played a whole lot there. I mean,
think about this. If arch Manning is the presumptive number
one pick or whatever projected number one pick for certain
people in the twenty twenty sixth draft, he essentially sat
(36:42):
for two years behind a guy who just was a
seventh rounder in Quinn Yours, which tells you something about
how much Steve Sarkisian had faith in Queen Yours. His
slide was the one. If we weren't talking about Shad
or Sanders, we would have been talking about why in
the world is Quinn Yours going in the seventh round?
You know, the drawbacks on him. Was just not the
biggest guy, not the biggest arm. He's been hurt every
(37:03):
year going back to high school. But there's no argument
the guy has won. He went to the college Football
Playoff twice. Yeah, he was eleven and one on the road.
Him and Joe Burrow are the only ones who beat
Saban over the last decade of Saban at Alabama. I mean,
I don't know what more you can ask of Quinn yours.
I thought he would go third, fourth, maybe fifth round,
because he's at minimum this guy can come in and
(37:24):
be your backup for the next ten years. He goes
in the seventh to Miami. I mean, he may well
beat out Zach Wilson. We'll see all that competition.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
May of course he's gonna be wouldn't be.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
S Drives at all if we see him backing up
to it. But you go back to Arch, I would say, like,
and this is one of the things too, the coach
has noticed when they dug into the Texas tape, was
like when you saw, like if you're watching one of
the Texas receivers, for instance, and all of a sudden,
the ball was like, man, that ball just jumped off
his hand. Oh that was Arch. That was Arch in
place of yours, Like you could tell a difference when
(37:55):
Arch was in the game. He's obviously got the athletic ability.
He's he's a better runner already than anybody in his family,
at least the at least Eli so much. I mean
he's he can move out there, you know. Drew Aller
from Penn State's another one. If he had come out,
he quite possibly could have been QB two in this draft.
He decided to go back, So that's one that we're
(38:16):
going to be watching. If Carson back, if he hadn't,
what do you do he tore his ucl right, I
mean it was a significant injury that he had. Yeah,
season ends up transferring. We'll see, be right. I mean,
the quarterback position is the hardest one.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
And there's so let me give you a name, a
name you didn't mention him so obviously Nico who's at
UCLA from Tennessee. He's gonna have a lot of questions
about the departure. But do you know the name Leonoris Sellers?
I do though of that name, Yes, South Carolina. I
will have him like top six in my mock. I'm
sure people.
Speaker 3 (38:48):
If I'm not mistaken. Leonora's Sellers is trained by the
same coach who trained cam Ward and Shoudor Sanders, and
so I had him on a show recently and he
brought that up, and this is one of the next guys.
This Leonoras Sellers like he's gonna be the next one
who can do it. And so he's definitely on the
radar as well. But I mean, you said it like
you look a year out and it's so hard to
(39:12):
project these things. This is looked at as a better
quarterback class than twenty six than the one that we
just had in twenty five. But you know, the cautionary
tale would be it's not just the you know, the
the Quinn Eewers or you know, to go way back,
Brian Bram, who's the guy I've brought up for some
of the comparisons to Shoe or Sanders, who it's like
next Sally I could be the number one pick and
then he slides and then he's out of the league
(39:34):
in a few years. But cam Ward was projected as
like a fourth, fifth, sixth round pick. He declared for
the draft, went back because everyone told him, you're not
going till day three. Joe Burrow was projected as like
a fourth fifth round pick going into his senior year,
his last year at LSU, and then all of a sudden,
he has one of the greatest seasons in college football history.
(39:56):
You know, the one year producer for so long, that's
what scouts always referred to it as. It's he always
made people nervous because it's like, Okay, what was going
on that he didn't look like that? And then how
did he make this leap? In other words, was that
the real guy? And he just kind of caught fire?
But now it's like, with the way that the players
move around, sometimes it's a matter of just getting with
(40:16):
the right coach in the right program. And god knows,
these guys are playing at three different schools, Like you're
moving around enough that you're probably playing for a bunch
of different coaches. The guy who ends up being the
number one picker, the number one quarterback in this draft
may well be somebody we're not even thinking about. But
will arch Manning enter this coming season as the presumptive
(40:37):
number one pick? I think it's fair to say, And
again this is not from a scouting perspective, because NFL
teams haven't fully dug into this, but I would say
he will enter this season with as much, if not
more hype than any player who has not previously been
a starter that we've ever seen. I can't think of
anybody else with that maybe Jimmy Kloss, who entered with
(41:01):
that much that much hype, and hopefully it'll work out
better for Arts that did for Jimmy. Wow.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
All right, Tom Pellas are great stuff NFL Network. Listen, man,
you're a fountain of information. Love it and congrats. Now
get some rest, man, he's up. Summer's here for you.
Speaker 3 (41:17):
We still got the Insiders five nights a week, every
week night, SENBM Eastern Time only on NFL Network.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
All right, buddy, take it easy,
This is Straight Fire with Jason McIntyre.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
What is up, Drake Park Bam, It's me Jason McIntyre.
Straight Fire or Tuesday, April twenty ninth. What an awesome
night of basketball. Well we got one good game, right.
Obviously we will talk a little hoops here to start
the pod, but we have a great guest, Tom Pelasorrow
(00:30):
NFL Network. He was all over the Shador Sanders stuff
all weekend. Let's just say you're gonna be surprised by
some of his takes on the quarterbacks in this draft.
He caught me off guard with the Tyler Shook stuff.
I was mocking him. I feel bad for saying the
stuff you're about to hear on the New Orleans Saints.
Now backup or thirstring whatever you quarterback. I'm still a
little stunned by the Shadoor stuff. We'll see what happens
(00:52):
with Sehan Watson. A lot of momentum that he's just
gonna get cut out right and they're gonna take the
cap hit and this will be like a gap year,
if you will, for the Browns where they test drive
all these quarterbacks and then probably back into arch Banning
in what would be a pretty glorious tank job. Anyways,
before we get the tom quickly, let me talk about
Golden State Warriors war oh nine, Rockets won oh six
(01:15):
in what I thought was a pretty phenomenal game. It's
interesting the West has had three really good series and
then that Okay, see Memphis trash right, Lakers Wolves is
coin flip on three of the games basically now two
of the games, Warriors Rockets coin flip on at least
two of the four games, and Nuggets Clippers literally has
been three coin flips, like one possession games with ten
(01:38):
seconds left, you know, wild stuff. So I don't want
to go too overboard on my NBA physicality stuff. If
you were listening to The Herd Monday, Colhurt and I
in a rare moment of back and forth like kind
of disagreeing pretty vehemently. He loves this new NBA physicality. Okay, yes,
I like watching some of the physicality obviously, some where
(02:01):
guys are getting each other's faces. Yeah, I like that.
I don't like forty eight hours grabbing, tugging, pushing, pulling, fighting, tripping.
I just don't like that. It's not visually appealing when
it's like, you know, we cait We me and my
brother we like to think we invented this game in
our basement growing up. We had like, you know, like
one of those nineteen eighties basements where we had like
(02:22):
wood paneling and stuff because they knew the parents, My
parents knew that we would be putting holes in the
wall if they got drywall. So we got like this
wood paneling cheap material, and we put up one of
those nerf hoops, and then we had a nerf hoop
on like the other end of the room, and it
was basically like full court body check basketball. That's what
we called it. Like anything goes. It was basically football
(02:43):
with a basket. We played with a nerf ball and
it was just so fun. Just body check basketball. That's
what it looks like the NBA is devolving into. So
you had Draymond Green versus Tarry Easan, Draymond just losing
his mind. You had Draymond Green for stilln Brooks. But
Brooks did a stupid thing at Curry. But Curry did
ignite it by saying, that's two fouls on you, So
(03:04):
they don't like it, and then Jimmy Butler's talking to
Dylan Brooks. It looked like he was basically saying you
better stfu or I'm gonna whoop your ass like Butler's
saying it. And Dylan Brooks is like so surprised. He's
wide eyed and like laughing, but he's laughing it off
because he's like, oh damn. Within like minutes, Jimmy Butler
fowls Brooks pretty hard on a breakaway. I'm surprised it
wasn't an ejection. I mean, he clobbered Brooks and nobody's
(03:27):
gonna look out for Brooks because he's such a goon.
But like again, you got like three of these battles,
you have Draymond Green woofing the whole game. Eventually that's
gonna escalate and it's gonna get ugly, and the league,
I don't think they're gonna have a mallet at the palace.
But I'm just telling you some of these teams are angry.
The short Pistons are down three to one. They're pissed.
The Rockets are down three to one, they're pissed. The
(03:48):
Lakers are down three to one, they're pissed. All three
of those teams are getting roughed up. Well, actually, the
Pistons are doing more roughing and yes, uh Draymond Green
is leading the Warriors charge in roughing, but a couple
other things. Big reaction after the game last night. Oh,
I can't believe they benched Jalen Green. Guys, did you
watch the beginning of the game. Jalen Green was not
(04:09):
running offense. He was jacking terrible shots. I think he
got stripped twice in the first quarter. Like he was
not locked in. Come out in the third quarter. You know,
the bench come brings a max setd quarter. Come out
in the third quarter eighteen to one, Warriors run, like
Jalen Green got benched. He was not good last night.
I get it now. I know what you're saying. I mean, listen,
that's your best or second best player. Oh, shen Gun
(04:31):
had a great game, thirty one and ten. He did
miss the final shot. You know, I didn't love drawing
up a play to go with like one of the
best defensive players of the league, Seene in fifteen years.
I didn't love that. I would have put Green back in,
but nevertheless, so Sengun didn't make it, and then two
more free throws and they went by three. Fred van
(04:52):
Vliet hit eight threes, so you're not pulling him off
the court. Aman Thompson is just everywhere. Does everything love
him again. We'll get to Yani's trades eventually one day.
I don't know that i'd include on Men Thompson in
a trade for Giannis. I just think his upside is ridiculous. Uh.
And Giannis is, you know, turning thirty one soon and
then Dylan Brooks gooning it up. But like Steven Adams
(05:13):
was great off the bench plus sixteen. This is the
chess match stuff that I love. Okay, So Steven Adams,
they're going two bigs Adams and she goon inside and
the Warriors are struggling. Rockets are dominating, eating inside.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
They win the.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Interior points in the paint by like twenty five. They're
collecting all these boards. Adams has four blocks, they had
thirteen offensive rebounds.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
It was working.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
So what does Steve Kerr do? Hack a shack? He
starts hacking Steven Adams, and as soon as it happened,
the Rockets fearful pulled Adams. He only shot one of
two free throws. The Rockets did miss twelve free throws.
That was a killer. You can't miss twelve free throws.
Come on, sixty one percent, give me a break. So
they have to pull Adams because of Kerr's smart move
(05:59):
that will just foul him every time and put him
on the line. I thought that was a stroke of
genius by Steve Curst. So they pull Adams. The interior
advantage is gone. Jimmy Butler starts to take over Butler
at like fourteen in the fourth but really good game,
high level basketball game. Just Adam Silver tell the refs
to actually blow the whistle. All right, without further ado,
let's get to our guest, NFL Networks, Tom pilosorrow.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app. Search FSR to
listen live. You know, Jason likes to think he knows
everything when it comes to sports.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
I know what sports fans want, but for.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Everything he doesn't. He knows a guy who does.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Let's just say I know a guy who knows the
guy who knows another guy.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
All right, let's welcome back to straight Fire NFL Insider,
NFL Network Star. He's been working his butt off for
like four or five months. Tom pelosorrow, Tom, How you doing,
Man doing fantastic?
Speaker 3 (07:02):
It was a great week in Green Bay, Jason. I
can't say enough about how the people there did putting
together at the draft. I'm always concerned with just like
the logistics of it and the you know, the smoothness
of the operation. The people there couldn't be nicer and
more informed. There were no getting lost in the labyrinth
of the of the draft footprint, so it was really impressive.
(07:22):
It was a good week. Could have been, you know,
could have dealt with all a little of that sideways
rain on Friday, but other than that it was pretty good.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
Sideways rain. Yeah, it seems it seemed like a fun time,
but I gotta be honest, your whole twenty twenty five
is basically what Senior Bowl combine traveling to pro days
getting ready for that. I mean, it's been Listen, we're
not here out here digging ditches. We're talking about football.
But it's been a bit of a bit of a
rough four or five months. Just tough, a lot of travel, I.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Would say, yeah, the travel part of it. Everybody's always
like after the Super Bowl, they're like, oh, man, aren't
you happy to be done? I'm like, actually, the next
three months from you know, there's only two weeks until
the combine, then a week after that is free agency,
then like two weeks after that's the owners meeting, and
then you're directly into the draft prep. I always it's
funny because like every year, over the course of time,
(08:09):
like all schedule things, right, it's like every dentist appointment,
doctor appointment, talking to my financial advisor, and then I'll
open up my Google calendar. After the draft, I'm like,
oh man, I got like seven meetings this week, so
I do nothing for nine months.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Now we're back, baby, Yeah, we're back. So let me
ask you. It's been a rough four months. You've been
on the road a lot traveling, and the biggest story
out of the draft, and I'm sure some people are
sick of it, but Shadoor Sanders and it did propel ratings,
TV ratings were massive for the draft. I just have
to ask, over the last four or five months, did
you see any of this coming? I mean fifth round, Tom, I.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Didn't see fifth round. I did see and tried to
frankly brace people for the fact that there was a
decent chance that Shador Sanders was not going to go
in the first round. You know, really, by the time
we got today, it was down to the Giants or
the Steelers. Those are the only two teams that really
could keep Shador in the first. When he slid out
(09:07):
of the first I thought he would go on day two.
I was surprised that he did not. I think it's
more so Jason you if you rewind and go back,
and this happens sometimes where there is a media narrative
that's created that maybe is not accurate relative to the
(09:27):
feeling within the league. And what I'm pointing to there is,
you know, there were certainly, you know, some of the
foremost draft experts, right mel Kiper is the godfather of this.
He's been doing it forever. He had Schador number one
all the way on his quarterback list. Our guy Bucky
Brooks had Chador number one, and those guys, you know,
they watch way more tape than I do. They're entitled
to their opinions every year. But I think that he
created this idea that this was a two horse race
(09:49):
with Shador, Sanders and cam Ward when really, even going
into the combine, when I talked with people, it was
cam Ward is clearly QB one. The real race is
going to be for QB two, And I think to
understand how that entire thing played out, you have to
go back even further. I had a conversation Friday night,
right after round three. It was like midnight. I get
a phone call from a GM who's thinking about taking
(10:10):
Shador on Saturday in rounds four through seven, And I
asked him just like what, like, how is this possible
though that he could a slid this far? And he
pointed all the way back to BLU was February or
March of twenty twenty four, so over a year before
the draft. When Dion Sanders goes on a podcast and
talks about, oh, you know, talking about Shador and Travis Hunter.
(10:31):
If somebody takes me out't want to go to the
We're gon we're gonna pull an Eli right, We're just
not gonna go and we're going to force the issue here.
And that's kind of how Schadeur went through the pre
draft process. It's a series of touch points right where
every team it's not just they've watched the game film,
but they've done background. Their area scouts have gone through
a year in advance and done homework on guys, they're
(10:54):
gathering all the background information. They're obviously dissecting the tape.
You go into the process and then from All Star
Game season to the Combine, to the Pro Days to
private visits and all that, you try to fill in
the gaps, right, You try to fill in the blanks.
Well with Shador, he didn't make it any easier to
fill in those gaps. He didn't go to the Senior Bowl.
He chose to go to the East West Shrine Bowl
(11:15):
because it was in Dallas.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
He displayed, hold on top, Tom, let me jump in.
So in the last like five years, can you think
of any quarterback in his position that also skipped the
Senior Bowl that was kind of relevant? Like I don't
remember it was Justin Herbert did he go to the
Senior Bowl?
Speaker 3 (11:30):
Or Justin Erber won the MVP of the Senior Bowl.
Baker Mayfield only showed up for a day, And that
was kind of the same thing which Baker Mayfield showed up.
He wasn't in the greatest mood. He was only there
for a day and then left, and there was he
thought he was like a buzz out Baker Mayfield at
that time as well. But for Shador. He goes to
the East West Shrine Bowl. As an MNFL memo saying,
if you go to these all star games, you have
to practice. He doesn't practice. He goes to the Combine,
(11:51):
and it's now well documented that some of his interviews
went really poorly. There are both the formal interviews and
the informal interactions that can occur there. You get to March,
the whole Big Twelve has their joint Prota in Dallas.
He doesn't do anything there. He shows up, but he
doesn't do anything. They have their showcase at Colorado. There
were I mean the Giants, for instance, put a ton
(12:12):
of homework into him. They were at every open practice,
they went to every game, they had him on a
private visit, they went to the showcase. I mean, they
did everything here, and they did a private workout like
a week before the draft, so they had as much
information as anyone and they decided to go with Jackson Dark.
And the issue then becomes like, we can debate the
talent between these guys, but what happens is for a
(12:33):
lot of teams philosophically, if you think a guy as
a starter, you take him in the first right, You
just you go and get him. It doesn't really matter
the value you take him in the first If you're
taking a backup, you're probably not doing that until day three.
And then for even some of those teams, they might
have had shador as the player evaluation, and he's the
name that's like sticking out, that's above all the other
remaining guys on the board. By not taking the opportunities
(12:56):
with all those touch points with some of these other
teams that may not have been the teams do or
wanted to go to, or the teams he thought would
be in play for him, it made it harder maybe
for some of those gms to take the leap, and
so in the end he ends up being the second
quarterback taken by a team that did have a lot
of time with him in the Browns. He goes on
the fifth and ends up, frankly, in maybe the best
(13:17):
situation if he wants to get on the field in
twenty twenty five. When you look at all this in
his totality, he ends up in a spot in Cleveland
where he's legitimately gonna have an opportunity to come in here.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
So you think, despite them having five quarterbacks on the roster,
we can make it for since Watson, you know, had
the Achilles and he's probably not gonna be ready. But
they traded I believe, a fifth for Picket, Flacco. We
know Stefanski loves there's a system, and they drafted Dylan
Gabriel ahead of Shador. So you think Shador still has
a shot to start any games next season.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Well, if you think of the names you just listed there, Jason,
I don't know that you sit there and go, boy,
really comfortable with that that'd being the guy. I mean,
you're right, they've got a you know, they have guaranteed money,
not a lot, but some invested in Flacco, Pickett, they
gave up a five, Like you mentioned, Dylan Gabriel, they
drafted in the third. Shador was obviously rated lower than
Dylan Gabriel on their board. But you know, why not
(14:13):
let's talk about Shador the player, because so much of
the focus has been on Shador, and you know, I
don't even think it was so much like the personality.
You know, he's not a nobody sits there and says
like he's a bad guy or he's a party guy.
He wants to be great, he wants to come in
he's all ball. He wants to be a really really
good football player. He's got accuracy, he's got toughness despite again,
(14:35):
all the different things, and he's not you know, his
his backstory is different than everybody else. Teammates really like him.
You know that. That's the thing that you heard out
of the school when when scouts went in there, which
is teammates seem to have his back. But it comes
down to he's not the biggest guy, he doesn't have
the biggest arm. He's not an elif elite athlete like
his dad. And he has this free wheeling play style
(14:56):
where he makes so much happen outside of structure and
it's not on top. And so the projection is a
player again, setting aside all the other stuff, the projection
as a player was is he going to be able
to adjust his game and play on time, play in rhythm.
I know there's been people have made comparisons to Drew Brees. Well,
Drew Brees was one of the best ever See it
and get the ball out of your hand with Shador.
(15:17):
He's very cool, calm and collected in the pocket. But
how many of his highlights are him backpedaling and exiting
the back of the pocket and extending it and then
he's throwing the ball up to Travis Hunter. It's gonna
be harder because he's not a Kyler Murray level athlete,
a Josh Allen level athlete to make those plays happen
in the NFL. And so that's part of the projection too.
And so let's see he goes in with Kevin Stefanski,
(15:40):
who is now you know, they're very much going to
run Kevin's offense, which is timing based. Let's see what
time of progress Shador can make. Dylan Gabriel is the
more natural fit in terms of his play style. But
Dylan Gabriel is like, you know, my size. He's got
a few extra pounds on him, but like he's five
foot ten and he's shown it that he can function
on that. But that's below the line for a lot
(16:02):
of people, especially because he's not a runner. He's not
a scrambler like Kyler Murray. He is going to play
in rhythm. He's like a mini Tua, is what Dylan
Gabriel is. So between him Joe Flacco, who's forty one,
I think didn't play great when he got his opportunity
last year. With the Colts, and then Kenny Pickett, who
is now on his third team and you know, quite
(16:23):
possibly if things don't go his way as fourth soon,
you know, you don't have a lot of certainty here.
So let's see. It'll be fascinating to see how Kevin
Stefanski divides the reps because you just don't have that
many to give four guys a ton of reps here.
But you know, I understand the philosophy too, especially it's
in an odd situation, like your philosophy is. Hey, once
you get past those first round guys, and there was
(16:44):
only one quarterback, cam Ord, who profiled as a surefire starter,
you're just kind of throwing darts anyway. These guys all
have some traits, but they've all got holes in them.
So bringing a couple, maybe neither one works out. But
if you hit on either one of these guys, Gabriel
or Shadur, you end up getting value in maybe that
extra first round pick you picked up in the Travis
Hunter trading and use on something else.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
So that's interesting because Gabriel went on day two. Is
there a you know, a theory out there that, hey, Stefanski,
he likes Gabriel the coach the front off it, they
like Gabriel, but it was the owner who meddled and said,
bring me the star, bring me Deonza. Do you buy
into that? Is that why maybe he took them in
(17:23):
the fifth round.
Speaker 3 (17:24):
My understanding is that was not a Jimmy Haslim pick.
That was a classic position where a team is they're
looking at the board and listen. It's not like when
you draft, you just go straight down the list, right.
Like there's times where whether it's a duplicate or hey,
you might have you know, if the Chiefs could have
had cam Ward is the number player one player on
their board, But even if they had the number one pick,
(17:44):
they're probably not taking cam Ward because they've got Patrick Mahomes.
So there are times where you see there's one name
that's the outlier and you're just like, god, if we've
got to I don't know exactly what their grade was.
It was obviously lower than the grade they had on
deal in Gabriel. But let's say you got a second
third round grade on or Sanders and you're sitting there
in the fifth you're like, why wouldn't we just go
get the guy? And that's that's my understanding on that one.
(18:06):
I think you were correct in terms of Dylan Gabriel
being the fit for Kevin Stefanski that has Kevin written
all over it. You know, he was a part of
the Minnesota team that had case Keenum running around and
making plays. You've seen other quarterbacks too of being a
prime example who are undersized but being able to play
in that rhythm passing type of an offense. And Dylan Gabriel,
(18:27):
you know, he really showed something too to coaches at
the Senior Bowl who were watching him on field level
and going this guy, I mean, I was there. This
guy is small like you see him. He's not. He's
kind of thickly built, especially through the lower body, but
he is. He is a short man.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Like Russell Wilson.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Maybe you could see I mean Russ, though Russ would
get outside the pocket and make more things happen. With
Dylan Gabriel, it's much more of a He's more like Tua,
where a lot of what he does is going to
be in the rhythm of the play. You know, Russ
was a run around and then throw the ball down field.
That was kind of his game. Dylan Gabriel has been
a highly productive I mean number are unbelievable. He started
(19:01):
more games, he threw more yards than anybody else. You know,
that's more of the play style with him. It's very
tu alike. He's even left handed, so that's probably a
better fit for what Stefanski wants to do. But again,
if you can get the buy in from Shador and
if he can show, you know, I don't think that
anybody out there, know what I've talked to is like, well,
shod door can't process. No, it's not that. It's just
(19:23):
he was good enough and had enough freedom and latitude
of Colorado that he could make those extended plays. In Cleveland,
you're getting chased by much bigger, much faster men in
the NFL. It's just gonna be harder for him to
play like that, you know, So let's see. You know,
Chador's got things he's got to clean up. He said
that himself the other day. You know, of all the
(19:45):
of all the quarterback competitions will have in training camp,
the best one is going to be in Cleveland. And again,
it'll be interesting to see how they're dividing the reps,
what order these guys even are going in through OTAs
and mini camp to kind of figure out, Okay, who's
getting a real shot at this job, and how are
they going about trying to make as much of an
apples to apples comparison as they can.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
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Speaker 2 (20:18):
Let me go to the Saints who took Tyler Shuck,
the kid from Louisville. That was a stunner. I'm a
were you surprised by that? And b like, there's no
way he's a better prospect than Schudor. I didn't see
anyone have that on their you know, big board or
what have you. That was a stunner to me.
Speaker 3 (20:37):
I was not shocked by it. In fact, I was
on a show that afternoon and they asked me, like,
what's the wildest rumor that you've heard? And I said, well,
I would say it's more than a rumor. But Tyler
the Queebi three may not be Shudor Sanders, it might
not be Jalen Miilroe who's still in the green room.
It's Tyler Shuck. Because I knew that the Saints were
really high on Shuck, and they were not the only
(20:59):
team I had heard. The Rams were really high on
Shuck too, and maybe even somebody would try to trade
up and take Shuck at the top of the second round.
So the difference with Tyler Shuck and when I talk about,
you know, the touch points right that are in the
pre draft process, and as much as Shador probably missed
opportunities to take advantage of those, Tyler Shuck crushed the
pre draft process. Which it's easy to see why. The
(21:21):
guy's almost twenty six years old. He was in college
for seven years. He was in a bunch of different offenses,
played for a bunch of different coaches, and so when
he's going in and they're testing him on the board,
there's recall with everything. It's like, oh, I ran that
concept in twenty twenty one in Texas deck that reminds
me of twenty eighteen at Oregon when I'm backing up
Justin Herbert and so he's a he's a tall. He's
six foot four, he's not you know, he's two hundred
(21:43):
plus pounds. He doesn't look like the biggest guy, but
tall enough with enough arm. His run a pro style
offense they gave him, Jeff Brown, give him a lot
of responsibility at the line of scrimmage in that offense
at Louisville, and he finally stayed healthy. The guy had
never played. This is one of the wildest stats in
this draft. The first six years of Tyler Shuck's college career,
he never played more than seven games in any of
(22:05):
those seasons. He was perpetually. He was a backup for
two years. He had the COVID season in Oregon where
he did leave lead them to a conference title. He
had three years of Texas Tech, got hurt in all
of them, then goes to Louisville and you know, puts
it together and has a pretty good season. Now, there's
also coaches who will say when they see this on tape,
and I thought to several has said this, there's a
(22:26):
little bit of flints with him. You worry is he
shined away from contact? Is he trying not to get
hit because he has been hurt so much? That's the
number one drawback with Tyler Shuck. But you know, he's
your classic efficient, smart guy who knows a lot about offense,
and you could he's arguably the guy who's the most
ready to step in and play right now. And depending
what happens with Derek Carr in New Orleans, you could
(22:48):
end up having a Tyler Shuck competition with Spencer Rattler
in New Orleans. And I wouldn't put it against Tyler
Shucks to be the twenty twenty five Week one starter
for the Saints.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
So maybe they're that Jorg dude. They're doing that to
get Arch Manning with the number one pick. Bring a
full circle with the Manning family, right because I listen,
I know you're saying nice things, Tom, this, this dude's
not a starting NFL quarterback. I mean he was. He
was in college for seven years and it was only
a starter for like one full season. He just kept
bouncing around because he wasn't good enough. I don't mean
(23:18):
to be a hater. I'm sure you know his agent
and stuff, but you watch the tape on.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
It, he's not me and the agent. The Satan stuck
him from the top of the second.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I can't believe it's off the board. Okay, So was
that the worst quarterback pick in the draft?
Speaker 3 (23:30):
Be honest, No, I don't think it was the worst
quarterback pick. I mean the way that I kept explaining this,
and again this goes back to like I don't like
to crush you know, yeah, I know, well it's a
media or anything else. But like there was just this
misconception that it was, well, it's cam Ward versus Shador
and then it's everybody else, Like it was pretty a
parent through the process, right, wrong or indifferent? Okay, Jason,
I don't watch a Licko tape. I don't watch these guys.
(23:53):
I may have seen him on TV. Like, I don't
go through and like evaluate and take notes. I just
call people, yeah, because I know that ultimately I don't
know what I'm looking at. I just asked people within
the league, people who are in the quarterback market, people
who are not. I try to get a blunt assessment
and talk to people just like lay it on me.
Not the press conference version, not that everybody's great version.
(24:13):
Like give me the actual good and bad. And what
became a parent was it was cam Ward was the
consensus number one on just about everybody's board. If you
went to you know, there were a few people who
had Chador's number two. There were a lot of people
had Jackson Dart as number two. There was real competition.
It was stacked differently on everyone's board. From Jackson Dart,
(24:35):
Shador Sanders, Jalen Milroe, and Tyler Shuck. Those were the
next four. There were different orders for different people, which
makes sense because think about it, you could not find
more different quarterbacks than those guys. Jalen Milroe is a
hillacious runner with a massive arm who's just not accurate
right now. Tyler Shuck is a pure at this point
pocket passer. He's a decent athlete, but he doesn't want
(24:57):
to get out and run. They didn't use him that
way last year. Who's been in a pro style offense,
you know where his floores might be the highest, but
the celia might be the lowest. You got Shador, who's
had all the hype on him and again very accurate,
very tough, but has to play probably a different play
style in the NFL. And then you got Jackson Dart, who's,
you know, just kind of a bigger, more physical athlete.
(25:19):
You know what I was told when I asked about
the Jackson Dart over Shador Sanders for the Giants, because
they were going through that all the way through. If
you went back a year ago and told the Giants,
you're sitting there in the first round and you can
take one of these guys, I would think they probably
would have said Shador Sanders. But what it came down
to what Jackson Dart was. He's bigger, he's got more
(25:40):
athletic ability. Probably played against tougher competition too in the SEC.
But you think about Brian Dable where he's had success.
It was in Buffalo with Josh Allen, it was the
first year in New York with Daniel Jones. These are
like big physical athletes. You can do RPO, you can
do read options. You're not gonna do that with Shador Sanders.
They felt like Jackson had more layers to his game,
(26:02):
and so for it to go the way that it did,
which was Dart being the second, Shuck being the third.
I can't remember if Milroe or Gabriel was fourth. They
were both late third round, but the fact that it
was that order. The only surprise to me was Dylan
Gabriel jumping up above and then Shador going completely out
of day two. Everything else and you can go back.
I mean, I did the whole quarterback story and ranked
(26:24):
all these guys. It's like the ten guys I said
would get drafted. They all got drafted. There was a
little bit of variance in the rounds, but I really
didn't find it that surprising. And again, I think that
the way that we talk about things at times, it
just miscasts it. And you know the fact that there
was like this seeming debate in the media of is
(26:45):
Chador the number one quarterback in this class? All I
would tell you is if you went through and I did,
I talked to dozens of people, not maybe not all
thirty two teams, but easily over twenty teams. I did
not find a single person who had Shador Sanders as
the number one quarterback in the straf And it was
hard even to find an unqualified positive opinion of Shador
(27:06):
Sanders because some people really liked the player, but they
just had reservations about the culture Shaka coming in. What's
it going to be like walking into a locker room
where for the first time and really his entire life,
his dad is not the coach, the accountability structure is
going to be different. Or they were fine with the
person and they enjoyed their interactions, but they're like, the
player just isn't that great. It's not say Shad or
(27:27):
can't be a starter in the NFL. I would just
tell you the only guy the consensus across the league
that projected as a surefire starter was the guy who
went number one, and after that it was, for lack
of a better term, chuck a dart and figure out
which one's going to go next.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
The only counter would be that I think you would
even agree with this that the NFL has struggled badly,
very badly in identifying quarterbacks and what works and what
doesn't in the NFL over the last I don't know
fifteen years when like Mitch Trubisky goes what third overall
and Mahomes falls.
Speaker 3 (28:00):
And he was the sense to quarterback in that draft
as the wild thing in seventeen, he was the consentsus.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Yeah, there's just so many crazy I mean, Josh Rosen
taking like twenty spots. I had a Lamar Jackson Russell
Willith said round.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
That's a great example. Right, So let's go back to
the twenty eighteen draft, because I think this is a
really important point too that doesn't get talked about enough.
It's not just the evaluation. It's easy to say, well,
the scouts don't know what they're doing and they miss
all the time. But think about the environmental factors of
that twenty eighteen draft, which nobody thought, by the way,
was a good quarterback draft. Four of the five guys
(28:32):
I believe that were in that draft went to the
Pro Bowl last year. But think about the routes they
had to take. Baker Mayfield goes number one. That was
a surprise at that time that the Browns were that
high on him. He was below the line from a
hype perspective. There are all these questions about what kind
of guys he is? He gonna be a pain in
the end of Donald right stuff? What's that?
Speaker 2 (28:51):
It was supposed to be? Donald right?
Speaker 3 (28:53):
Donald was That was the one I had won in
my in my breaking.
Speaker 2 (28:56):
Because thrilled the Jets. He lit fell to my Jets
because then the second pick was Saquon and I was like, yeah,
it's a victory. But anyways, continue.
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Right, and there were you know, John Dorsey was the
GM in Cleveland, and he just he bought into it.
He'd been around Farv in Green Bay and kind of
that edge and that toughness. He felt like there was
some of that with Baker. But Baker gets run out
of Cleveland, gets replaced by Deshaun Watson, then goes to Carolina.
It doesn't work out there, It's traded to the Rams,
has that wild game where he three days later he
(29:25):
starts and plays great. Goes to Tampa on a one year,
five million dollar deal. Now he is, if not a
top ten quarterback, Baker Mayfield is certainly a top twenty
quarterback in the NFL, solid starter on a team that
keeps going to the playoffs. Number three pick is Sam Darnold.
Same thing, wrong environment with the Jets. It's a disaster.
You are well versed in how that one went, Jason.
(29:46):
He ends up going to Carolina, into San Francisco, and
then finally the right place, right time in Minnesota. Jji McCarthy,
there's this meniscus in camp. I'm of the mine based
on everything I know that Donald was probably gonna be
the starter out of the gate last year anyway, but
also he didn't have the pressure of the first round
pick breathing down his neck, and he played great until
the last game of the regular season and then the
(30:07):
playoff game as well. But he revived his career. Josh
Rosen never had a chance. He's in Arizona and I'm
not saying Josh Rosen would have been better than these guys,
but he's in Arizona and by like the third game
of the season, they've decided these coaches suck, were firing everybody,
and the season is a mess. He gets traded the
following April to Miami, ends up in another bad situation
(30:28):
like it was. It was a wreck. Josh Allen turns
into the MVP. I believe he went eight in that draft,
just the second of Josh Rosen, but he was the
guy everyone's going fifty seven percent completion percentage on me.
This guy stinks again, But they ran the right offense
for him, allowed him to use his athletic ability while
they worked on the accuracy. And then thirty two is
(30:48):
Lamar Jackson, who there was real debate that year and
people requesting, hey, can he work out at wide receiver
or running?
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Yeah, but Napoleon right, it.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
Was a real that was a real bait within the league,
and so you think about that. But like Lamar went
into a spot in Baltimore where they had a clear vision,
we are going to do the things he does best
while he improves as a passer, and as soon as
he graduated out of being a run first type of quarterback,
and he's still an unbelievable runner. Once he became more accurate,
(31:18):
they made an offensive coordinator change. They ran run an offense.
Now that's a little more advanced. Same thing with Josh Allen.
Once he got better as a passer, they ran their offense.
You had vision in those spots. Baker bounced around, Darnold
bounced around. Rosen's completely out of the league. The quarterbacks
that are going to succeed, it's not just the ones that. Oh,
that was the right evaluation. It was what are we
going to do with him here? How are we going
(31:40):
to win with this guy? And you know, we'll see
how how Tennessee uses cam Ward. I mean the comps
to you here on cam Ward, it's Mahomes, it's Caleb Williams.
It's a guy who just can change ourm angles and
run around and make plays. I heard somebody who compare
him to Ben Roethlisberger, which I thought was really interesting
because there's times you see cam Wore getting hit in
(32:01):
the pocket and just like shedding people and extending plays
that way. He's not a scrambler. He's a guy who
moves to throw. But listen, if you know, they get
itchy and Tennessee and you know, God forbid they fire everybody, Like,
you know, what could that do to cam Ward? I
think everything's circumstantial. Everything's about what environment of these guys
in and that's where you know, that'll be the telltale
(32:23):
sign on this quarterback class, which outside of cam Ward,
the NFL issued a verdict that shouldn't really surprise anybody,
which was this is a one quarterback draft and after that,
we're just trying to trying to get lucky.
Speaker 2 (32:35):
It's interesting, you I totally forgot that. Uh it was
Dorsey who picked Baker Mayfield. What's his name, Dorsey, John Dorsey,
Don Dorsey. It's interesting, so I looked it up. It
looks like Dorsey has not worked really since he was
a consultant somewhere.
Speaker 3 (32:52):
He's with the Lions. He is, he is in the
front office. You can still find him wearing that same
gray sweatter.
Speaker 2 (32:56):
Oh a senior personnel executive. Oh okay, there it is.
Speaker 3 (32:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
So here's the interesting thing. And again this is kind
of off the beaten path, but Dorsey actually was the
GM when they drafted Patrick Mahomes and then he was
cut loose, like a few months later before Mahomes even
played a game. Oh man, I totally forgot you. I
believe yes, June Wow, good memory. So wait, so he
doesn't get a lot of credit for Mahomes. That usually
(33:21):
goes to Brett Veach and some others. Huh.
Speaker 3 (33:23):
Well, Andy Reid has said that that Brett Veach was
the one that was pushing Patrick Mahomes. I knew, you know,
I had Deshaun I remember catching flat because I had
Mahomes ahead of de Shawn Watson in the rankings that year.
And what I was saying was listen, like, Mahomes really
impressed people. Everyone's like, oh, you've running the It's this
guy who's running the air raid. He just you know,
he's he's just a thrower. He's not a passer, which,
(33:46):
you know, the amazing thing about Patrick Mahomes. If not
for you know, Patrick Mahomes walked so cam Ward could run.
If not for Patrick Mahomes, none of these guys who
play who have these unorthodox throwing styles and are you know,
throwing the ball across their body and side arm and
all that that wasn't considered like a positive trait. Now
it's taught every quarterbacks coach teaches guys to make these
(34:09):
you know, off platform throws as they call them, and
change their arm angles and things. And you see every
year Caleb Williams same thing. They train that in now
because Patrick Mahomes is the modern quarterback. But when he
was taken by the Chiefs, it did surprise some people,
Like I remember specifically I had the order of the
quarterbacks right that year, but that was not the consensus opinion.
(34:30):
It was Deshaun Watson was the winner at Clemson. He
was giving me the next one off the board. But
Mahomes where he impressed people was he went in and
when they put him on the board and stuff. Again,
because he's an air raid quarterback, everyone's assuming he doesn't
know football. He was amazing in those meetings. There were
a bunch of teams that were hoping Patrick Mahomes was
going to slip to them in that draft. In the end,
(34:50):
the Chiefs went and got him and the rest is history.
That's still being written here because Mahomes is still only
like thirty and will probably win five more Super Bowls.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
Before way, not five war maybe one more. I think
the Chiefs certains of trouble this year, but I'm sure
you would agree, So hey, I'll wrap up with this.
Speaker 3 (35:04):
They have shown a remarkable ability to reinvent themselves. I mean,
everybody thought when they traded Tyreek Hill, like what are
they doing? And they took the draft capital and the
cap resources, rebuilt the defense, rebuilt the offensive line. Now
they're kind of in another another phase of that. As
long as Mahomes is playing. This is like a Tom
Brady level run in my mind where it's like, okay,
(35:25):
just pencil them in the AFC Championship game. Oh see,
if they can win two more.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
I'll go Buffalo in the Super Bowl this year out
of the AFC. One last thing. It's way too early
for this, but Fox Sports asked me to do a
twenty twenty six NFL mock draft. I just need your
insight because you're obviously way on top of this. So
like every single year, we say, oh, next year's quarterback,
that's the one, it's going to be loaded. So I
went back and looked Tom. I'm sure you remember this.
(35:53):
A year ago, everybody was saying Quinn Yours is probably
gonna go top ten, Carson Beck Georgia probably gonna go
toup to it. And then as the season progresses, we
start to weed guys out, but it seems like arch
Manning people just cannot because he's Manning. You got, everybody's
putting him in. Hey, that's the guy next year. And
I know you haven't done the work, and I'm sure
(36:14):
people aren't talking to you about arch Manning yet. But
a year out they're talking. Are they talking about Art?
Speaker 3 (36:21):
Yeah, without a doubt. I mean people make just kind
of glancing comments. You know, they're not deeping the evaluation.
There's not that much to evaluate. I mean the guy
he has then played a whole lot there. I mean,
think about this. If arch Manning is the presumptive number
one pick or whatever projected number one pick for certain
people in the twenty twenty sixth draft, he essentially sat
(36:42):
for two years behind a guy who just was a
seventh rounder in Quinn Yours, which tells you something about
how much Steve Sarkisian had faith in Queen Yours. His
slide was the one. If we weren't talking about Shad
or Sanders, we would have been talking about why in
the world is Quinn Yours going in the seventh round?
You know, the drawbacks on him. Was just not the
biggest guy, not the biggest arm. He's been hurt every
(37:03):
year going back to high school. But there's no argument
the guy has won. He went to the college Football
Playoff twice. Yeah, he was eleven and one on the road.
Him and Joe Burrow are the only ones who beat
Saban over the last decade of Saban at Alabama. I mean,
I don't know what more you can ask of Quinn yours.
I thought he would go third, fourth, maybe fifth round,
because he's at minimum this guy can come in and
(37:24):
be your backup for the next ten years. He goes
in the seventh to Miami. I mean, he may well
beat out Zach Wilson. We'll see all that competition.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
May of course he's gonna be wouldn't be.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
S Drives at all if we see him backing up
to it. But you go back to Arch, I would say, like,
and this is one of the things too, the coach
has noticed when they dug into the Texas tape, was
like when you saw, like if you're watching one of
the Texas receivers, for instance, and all of a sudden,
the ball was like, man, that ball just jumped off
his hand. Oh that was Arch. That was Arch in
place of yours, Like you could tell a difference when
(37:55):
Arch was in the game. He's obviously got the athletic ability.
He's he's a better runner already than anybody in his family,
at least the at least Eli so much. I mean
he's he can move out there, you know. Drew Aller
from Penn State's another one. If he had come out,
he quite possibly could have been QB two in this draft.
He decided to go back, So that's one that we're
(38:16):
going to be watching. If Carson back, if he hadn't,
what do you do he tore his ucl right, I
mean it was a significant injury that he had. Yeah,
season ends up transferring. We'll see, be right. I mean,
the quarterback position is the hardest one.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
And there's so let me give you a name, a
name you didn't mention him so obviously Nico who's at
UCLA from Tennessee. He's gonna have a lot of questions
about the departure. But do you know the name Leonoris Sellers?
I do though of that name, Yes, South Carolina. I
will have him like top six in my mock. I'm
sure people.
Speaker 3 (38:48):
If I'm not mistaken. Leonora's Sellers is trained by the
same coach who trained cam Ward and Shoudor Sanders, and
so I had him on a show recently and he
brought that up, and this is one of the next guys.
This Leonoras Sellers like he's gonna be the next one
who can do it. And so he's definitely on the
radar as well. But I mean, you said it like
you look a year out and it's so hard to
(39:12):
project these things. This is looked at as a better
quarterback class than twenty six than the one that we
just had in twenty five. But you know, the cautionary
tale would be it's not just the you know, the
the Quinn Eewers or you know, to go way back,
Brian Bram, who's the guy I've brought up for some
of the comparisons to Shoe or Sanders, who it's like
next Sally I could be the number one pick and
then he slides and then he's out of the league
(39:34):
in a few years. But cam Ward was projected as
like a fourth, fifth, sixth round pick. He declared for
the draft, went back because everyone told him, you're not
going till day three. Joe Burrow was projected as like
a fourth fifth round pick going into his senior year,
his last year at LSU, and then all of a sudden,
he has one of the greatest seasons in college football history.
(39:56):
You know, the one year producer for so long, that's
what scouts always referred to it as. It's he always
made people nervous because it's like, Okay, what was going
on that he didn't look like that? And then how
did he make this leap? In other words, was that
the real guy? And he just kind of caught fire?
But now it's like, with the way that the players
move around, sometimes it's a matter of just getting with
(40:16):
the right coach in the right program. And god knows,
these guys are playing at three different schools, Like you're
moving around enough that you're probably playing for a bunch
of different coaches. The guy who ends up being the
number one picker, the number one quarterback in this draft
may well be somebody we're not even thinking about. But
will arch Manning enter this coming season as the presumptive
(40:37):
number one pick? I think it's fair to say, And
again this is not from a scouting perspective, because NFL
teams haven't fully dug into this, but I would say
he will enter this season with as much, if not
more hype than any player who has not previously been
a starter that we've ever seen. I can't think of
anybody else with that maybe Jimmy Kloss, who entered with
(41:01):
that much that much hype, and hopefully it'll work out
better for Arts that did for Jimmy. Wow.
Speaker 2 (41:07):
All right, Tom Pellas are great stuff NFL Network. Listen, man,
you're a fountain of information. Love it and congrats. Now
get some rest, man, he's up. Summer's here for you.
Speaker 3 (41:17):
We still got the Insiders five nights a week, every
week night, SENBM Eastern Time only on NFL Network.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
All right, buddy, take it easy,
Host
Jason McIntyre
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