07-25-24 Ryan Michael with Broncos Country Tonight

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
That's the KWA Common Spirit Health hotlinethough, and bring on our favorite Ryan
Michael at the Ryan Michael on Twittercontributor and writer, an analyst at the
Pro Football Hall of Fame. Right, I gotta ask you, when does
Lucas Kroll get in? I'm notqualified to say, I'm not the gate
keeper. The fans want to know. Is he getting his own wing?

(00:24):
You know? At what point arethey just gonna build a whole new Hall
of Fame separate for him? Ikid, how you doing? Man?
We'll get right too. Of thesequarterbacks here, you know, the first
two days with no pads, andit really does look like Jared Stidham's gotta
lead on the other quarterbacks. Heshould by virtue of the fact that he's
been around these these players and beenin this offense for a year. But

(00:49):
with with Bo Nicks and Zach Wilsonsort of you know, getting their snaps,
getting their turn up at bat andand all of that, how long
does it take do you think forsomeone to emerge and take that role.
I think that as we get afew weeks of training camp underway, and
I'm in agreement with Nick, Idon't feel that training camp is truly training

(01:11):
camp until the pads are on,so I don't really read much into what's
happening right now. I'd give ita solid two to three weeks before we
have more of a clear indication asfar as who's going to be QB one
to open up the twenty twenty fourseasons, So before you join those.
Ben and I were having a conversation, and I really want to get your
take on this. Would you ratherbe a guy on a team that won

(01:34):
a championship but you really didn't contribute, or would you rather be a major
contributor on a team that did notwin a title. I think that's a
great question, and I think thatmost players would say that they would rather
be part of a championship winning team, even if they individually didn't contribute as

(01:55):
much, because football is the ultimateteam sport, and I think there's something
about the nature of team sports thatattracts players to American football specifically. So
given the fact that almost every footballplayer I've ever spoken to Nick has that
in common, I would say maybeit's not universal, but I'd be willing
to guess that at least nine outof every ten people would answer they'd rather

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have the Super Bowl. Yeah,I mean that's the way I'm at Nick
is. Nick's like I want tobe a contributor and I want to be
out there, and I'm like,man, you could carry me. I
could sleep on a waterbed while everybodyelse goes and wins the Super Bowl.
I'm showing that ring off. I'mjust it's just mean. I don't know,
it's about winning, It's about championships, I think. But you have

(02:38):
positive that using Super Bowl rings tomeasure greatness at the quarterback position might be
a faulty way to look at it. Yeah, I've never felt that Super
Bowl rings are a good measure ofindividual performance at any position, much less
the quarterback position. So you knowwhat I did then, was I put
together a chart where I compared everysingle Super Bowl winner since two thousand to

(03:02):
their first team All Pro selection atthe position. Counterpart, and what I
did to level the playing field wasI also incorporated postseason performance. So and
the Associated Press selects they're All Proteam, they're not factoring in the postseason.
Oftentimes those teams are announced before theend of the regular season, and

(03:23):
so by leveling the playing field toinclude postseason performance, I had a pretty
good idea as far as which groupwould play at a higher level, but
even I was surprised by the resultsand posted that chart on Twitter in the
twenty four season. Since two thousand, twenty one of the twenty four quarterbacks
that I charted ranked higher and adjustednet yards per attempt. And it's just

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stat that we often talk about hereon VCT, but twenty one of the
twenty four ranked higher and adjusted netyardsper attempt regular season and postseason combined as
first team All Pro selections. Therewere only two occasions were the Super Bowl
winner ranked higher than their first teamAll Pro counterpart, and well, Patrick
Mahomes was both in twenty twenty two, so you kind of set that on

(04:11):
the side as its own thing.But you had Drew Brees, who rand
number one and adjusting net yards perattempt in two thousand and nine he tought
Haydon Manning, who was the firstteam All Pro selection finished fifth, and
Patrick Mahomes in twenty nineteen actually alsoled the league and adjusted net yards per
attempt higher than Lamar Jackson, whoalso finished fit beyond that its first team
All Pro selections playing at a higherlevel and by a considerable margin so ron.

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With that being said, when dideveryone start measuring the success of a
quarterback based on the number of winsas far as Super Bowl wins or appearances?
And the reason I asked that becauseDan Fouls in the Hall of Fame,
Dan Marino in a Hall of Fame. Neither one of those guys have
super Bowls, very difficult to getinto the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

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Of that Super Bowl raining had Warren, Ya title, France, Argent and
also part of that Elague group.But as far as when the criteria shifted
to place a greater emphasis on rings, if you go all the way back
to the nineteen forties, the premierquarterback rivalry was between Hall of famers Sammy
Baugh and Said Luckman, who werealso personal friends. Said Luckman was the

(05:18):
greater champion, four time champion,even beat Sammy Baugh in Washington seventy three
to zero in a nineteen forty NFLchampionship. Law only had two rings.
But nobody made the argument. WhenI say nobody, I'm being a bit
hyperbolic. Generally speaking, it wasan understood consensus that Sammy Ball was the

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greatest quarterback of all time, despitehaving half championships you fast forward to the
nineteen sixties, you had John Unitisand Bart Starr. Bart Star was a
five time champion. Uniteds was athree time champion, but a super Bowl
win in nineteen seventy was more similarto Peyton Manning super Bowl win in twenty
fifteen, so he had three ringstotal, truly on two. But very

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few people would make the argument thatbart Star was better than John Uniteds.
He carried that goat title. Itwasn't really until the nineteen eighties when the
debate came down to Dan Marino andJoe Montana. In the reality of Joe
having four rings to Marino's zero,and with one of those four rings being
the reality that he outplayed Marino ina super Bowl. That changed the discussion

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and the super Bowl itself was evolvinginto more of a spectacle. In the
nineties, most people would probably pickBrett Farves, Steve Young, or John
Elway before Troy Aman who won threeand the debate again Manning and Brady brought
rings that into the conversation. Iwould say before Brady won his fourth maybe
three quarters of people would have pickedManning over Brady, but Brady had the
longevity and went on to win sevenrings. So we're really looking at a

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trend that started in the nineteen eightiesand began to solidify itself in the latter
half of Tom Brady's career. Whenwe look at the data, we can
see that that Drew Brees won aSuper Bowl while he led the NFL and
adjusted that yards poor attempt. Isthat an indicator that that could perhaps be
one of the greatest quarterback seasons ofall time where the quarterback did carry a

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team to a Super Bowl. Absolutely, and especially when you consider the reality
that the Saints finished twentieth in theNFL I believe in points for games surrendered
on defense, it's one of thelowest ranked scoring defenses in the history of
the NFL to win a Super Bowl, and not only that New Orleans cruise
to the number one seed in theNFC. So when you look at Drew's

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postseason run, knocking off Kurt Warner, outperforming Brett fav in the NFC Championship
Game, and then outperforming the quarterbackwho's in my opinion, the on field
performance go Paid Manning. Drew Breesoutperformed Paid Manning in the Super Bowl.
So it's one of the greatest runsof all time from Week one to the
moment he hoisted the Lombardi Trophy.For sure. When we talk about quarterbacks,

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we talk about their level to commandthe offense and then their level of
leadership. As we were talking aboutthe whole conversation about winning a title and
not really contributing, someone on thetext line brought up the fact that Peyton
Manning did not Oh he was pulledacross the finish line and Super Bowl fifty.
Are there, in your opinion,other elements that quarterbacks can provide to

(08:18):
their team when their skills, likePeyton in that particular situation, start to
diminish. Absolutely, And I've oftenreferred to Manning's twenty sixteen season this game
the greatest add season of all time. He actually finished dead last and adjusted
nit yards per time the monkst quarterbackswho threw three hundred or more passes.

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So I can't exercise this enough.He won the Super Bowl finishing dead last
in one of the most efficient efficiencymetrics that we have. And you compare
that to two thousand and three,two thousand and four, two thousand and
five, twenty twelve, and twentythirteen, twenty thirteen, eighty second if
you include Nick Foles, who attendingfewer passes, but he led the league

(09:01):
in adjusted NT yards per attempt morethan anybody to ever play in the game,
and in those seasons never won achampionships. So I think that that
paradox is a testament to help aditionusing super Bowl rings to evaluate performance at
the quarterback position. Really is isthat the worst all time quarterback season to

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get a Super Bowl? Because it'sgot to be thinking. We're talking about
the successes, but you know,you think about maybe Brad Johnson with the
Tampay Buccaneers. You think about FredDilfer with the Baltimore Ravens. Grossman,
I don't think he won one,but he was they got there. I'm
trying to think what the worst seasonby a quarterback would be to to get
to a super Bowl, to getto a super Bowl, And I want

(09:45):
to answer your question first, towin a super Bowl statistically adjusted for era,
Yes, the answer is yes.There is a caveat that. Manning
didn't play a complete season, sohis overall efficiency levels were dragged down to
significantly do the reality he was playinginjured, especially on November fifteenth of twenty
two thousand to fifteen, when heplayed Kansas City broke the all time passing

(10:07):
record. He finished that game witha zero point zero passer rating. So
the bad games in twenty fifteen draggeddown his numbers considerably on the flip side
of the coin. And I'm notsaying this to say he had a good
year, but he did average morepassing yards per game on the road than
TODM Brady did that year, andBrady played at an MVP level. He
also led the league in fourth quartercomebacks if you include the postseason, and

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it's two touchdown no interception performance inthe clutch in the twenty fifteen AFC Championship
game allowed our defense to do whatthey did best that year, and they
teed off on Brady for the restof the game. So if you're looking
at an overall statistical finish, yes, twenty fifteen Manning is the worst amongst
Super Bowl champions, but you haveto take into consideration the reality he didn't

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play a four year Well, there'sa lot of young quarterbacks that will be
understanding this year and for a lotof these teams will be the starter.
Now, wins in law losses issaid to be the greatest measure of how
that player is developing. Well,you know, there's a lot of things
that kind of go into it.Is there another statistics that fans should pay

(11:11):
attention to where they're watching these youngguys actually developed in front of their eyes.
That may not be just wins andlosses. Sure, there are plenty
of advanced metrics that are are farbetter than wins and losses. Adjusted EPA
per play is a fantastic one.Adjust the ntyards per attempt as a fantastic
one. You could look at DVOA, total TVR, a number of measures.

(11:33):
Because if you're looking just at winsand losses, then Mark Sanchez would
be one of the greatest young quarterbacksthey ever played the game. And now
we know the reality that the twothousand and nine and twenty ten Jets were
some of the best defensive squads ofthat generation. So I look more towards
those advanced metrics that I cited beforeyou're looking at wins and losses because its

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history has proven a well rounded teamcan carry quarterbacks who are even playing at
a below average level to wins thatPatrick Mahomes is actually a great example of
that, even including his impressive postseasonrun last year, he finished thirteenth and
adjusted net yards per attempt. Heplayed with a defense that finished second in
the NFL in points surrendered, andduring the Super Bowl run, I don't

(12:18):
remember the exact number because I don'thave it in front of me, but
the Chiefs needed to score the sameamount of points per game to win that
championship. Hear their playoff run asthe New York Jets did during the tocality
of the twenty twenty three season.So if you have a well ended team,
especially a dominant defense, which I'msure Nick you can appreciate, a
quarterback of almost any caliber can winmore games than they lose. All off

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the script here, but I gotto thinking about something the other day.
What is the data say about quarterbacksthat have had a low late career,
whether that be due to injury alot Eric Rodgers trying to come back this
year, whether that be to youknow, transitioning to a new team and
a new coach and now working outRussell Wilson with Nate Hackett. What does
it say about Super Bowl winners thathaving the opportunity to bounce back and maybe

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win again, it's incredibly difficult.So Kyton Manning and Tom Brady would obviously
be the exceptions. Tom played atan elite level in twenty twenty when the
Buccaneers won, ironically played an evenhigher level the following year when they ended
up losing the Stafford and the RamsManning, as we discussed, he had
his twenty fifteen run, but hehad arguably the greatest season in the history

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of Pro football in twenty thirteen inhelping the Broncos at least get to the
Super Bowl. It's incredibly rare,and it's even rarer for a quarterback to
be the driving force behind that teamthat's winning or even getting through a championship
late in their careers. When welook at the quarterback position, obviously the
Broncos, I guess I have athree horse race, but there's only one

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guy who everyone is hoping actually getsto the finish line and be the starter
for the Denver Broncos. Both knicks. You've watched him at Oregon. Is
there something that jumps out to youthat gives you the indicators that you know
what. I don't know exactly whatthe first couple of games are going to
be like, but I can say, what's your confidence that this kid is

(14:15):
going to have a great career becauseof what you've seen. Is there one
thing or a couple of things.Yeah, there are a couple of things,
and there's certainly no sure vets Nake. I had Bonnick's number two on
my board under CABLEB. Williams,I would say information processing and pass accuracy
are his two greatest strengths. Andthey're not classy strengths. If you look

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at the way, say Drew Breesplayed the quarterback position during the final years
of his career, it wasn't nearlyas exciting from a highlight play standpoint as
what we've seen from the Homes orLamar Jackson or Trevor Warrence or Josh Allen,
but it was remarkably efficient. Soif you're winning games and you're executing
the offense death by a thousand paypercut that up. I don't care how

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you get it done. I carethat you score points. So when I
see a quarterback, who's two greateststrengths or even three if you want to,
for football IQ into that because they'reall interconnected. Football IQ, information
processing and pass accuracy. Those arethree of the most important core ingredients for
success over the long term. They'renot necessarily traits that I expect to flash

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early in year one or even inyear one altogether. It's something that's going
to take time, especially learning acomplicated system like the one that Sean runs
here at Denver. Well, Ryan, we appreciate it as always at the
Ryan michael on Twitter and look forwardto you getting us that information on when
we can expect the Lucas Croll induction. All right, I'll get the work
on it. Absolutely. Take care, Ryan Michael. Let the Ryan michael on