Patriots Catch-22 6/18: Way Too Early Roster Projections and Minicamp Leftovers

Watch as Evan and Alex discuss which players stood out during last week's minicamp and offer some way too early roster projections.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is the Patriots Catch twenty two podcasts with Evan
Lazar and Alex Barth.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Blazarre and Lazarre. Hello, everybody nailed it Joined as always,
buy our bar gap gafit match.

Speaker 1 (00:16):
Here is Evan Lazar and Alex bar I.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Really want to drink the kool Aid with this team
right now because I am excited. I have the glass
of kool Aid is on the table right like I
poured it. It's on the table, it's right there. I'm
like about to pick it up and drink it. What's
your favorite kool Aid? Do you have a favorite one?

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (00:34):
Man, I just the lemonade?

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Yeah, say lemonade? Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
I haven't had kool Aid and long? But does that
used to be a summer staple. Maybe I'll bring that
back to this.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
You're gonna bring kool Aid back.

Speaker 4 (00:46):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
You know how much sugar's in there.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
There's a lot of sugar and kool Aid. Hello, everybody,
It's Evan Lazar Alex Barth. Patriots Catch twenty two, really
big off season Catch twenty two. We're in the in
the doul drums right word right, everybody gets on me
about my words doldrums of the off season right now,
So we're gonna talk Patriots football though, or we still

(01:09):
got plenty to talk about. We're gonna do a little
roster projection talk and we'll take your calls and we'll
take your emails. But before we get rolling here on
all of that, I wasn't one hundred percent sure that
you were gonna have time, Alex for this podcast anymore,
because you have expanded your podcast repertoire and now you
are just on seventeen different podcasts, So you are going

(01:33):
to make time for Catch twenty two. All right, there,
there's gonna still be a podcast here.

Speaker 1 (01:37):
Yes, I am your referring to. David Andrews is coming
over doing some stuff with Sports Up. We're super excited.
He's going to be on Azolak and Bertrand during football
season once a week, I believe is the plan. And
then me and him are going to do something that
kind of ties into that, and exactly what that is
we're still kind of figuring out. But there will be
sort of something with me and David Andrews. So update

(01:59):
your Alex Podcast co host power rankings.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
I'm still number one. I'm number one.

Speaker 1 (02:04):
What the people decide, David Andrews.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
Is number two because he's a super Bowl champion, so
obviously he's ahead of everybody else, but I'm still number one.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
I'll let the people decide.

Speaker 2 (02:13):
Well. I would also just say about all of this
that and I love David Andrews, but as soon as
players retire, they immediately come to the dark side. They
immediately come to the media, and now all of a sudden,
everybody wants to be in the media. During their careers,
David was great, not all of them. David Andrews was fantastic.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
I think there's a guy probably sitting in an office
over that way that didn't do that.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
Maybe, but there's there's all I'm saying is is that
there's a lot of guys that are, you know, not
David Andrews. Andrews was great, but there are a lot
of guys that weren't great with the media, and then
all of a sudden they retire and now they're in
the media because guess what, it's fun. It's a fun
way to make some money, no doubt about it. It's
not a real job, we know that. But I'm glad

(02:59):
that you're still gonna make time for this show. And
that's pretty cool with David Andrews. Your name was even
in the press release, Yes, along with David Andrews. You know,
Zoe and Beatle were in there. And he's gonna be
on that show.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
And that's the only reason I like specified it, Like
him being on Zola can Bertrain once a week and
he'll do some stuff on the pregame, Like that's the
cool part. Yeah, and then he's just doing something with me.
I don't know how they talked him into that, but
I don't even know that was going to be in
the press release.

Speaker 2 (03:24):
Well that's the other thing that I thought was funny
about this is that you knew but you didn't like
have like a conversation with David about this ahead of time. So, like,
how did they talk David Andrews into doing a podcast
with like you? And I would say the same thing
about me if it was me, Like.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
We've got good people over there, we got you got
good people. I got to brush up, but like I
lean on you for a lot of the offensive line stuff,
So I got to brush up on that you do
because I can't. I can't come into that.

Speaker 2 (03:50):
Well he can teach you.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
I'm not looking prepared. It's honestly, kind of what I'm
hoping it is is just picking his brain on what's
going on with the team, but kind of the football
stuff in general. I think what will be cool about
doing it this year is I think this year, you know,
and some of this goes back to last year, but
this year as much as any other, I think fans
are legitimately generally going to care about what's happening on

(04:12):
the offensive line. Yeah, fourth overall, pick on an offensive linement.
It was such a big issue last year. So getting
to talk to an offensive lineman every week about what's
going on with that, I think will be a really
cool opportunity.

Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, and it will be cool because he played in
this system under Josh McDaniels for years and years, so
he's gonna know all the calls, he's gonna know all
the schemes that they're running up front, he's gonna know
all the protection numbers and all that fancy stuff. So
that's really cool. But again, I'm just I'm really glad
that you're still gonna do this show. And how many
podcasts do you have now that are Patriot centric podcast It's.

Speaker 1 (04:45):
We're Patriots centric.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
We're going on double digits at this point. Yeah, yeah,
this is what.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
I thought four or five.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
No, it's more than that. It's more No, I think.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
It's about that. There might be a few more things
in the works too.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
So okay, wow, what a tease. Well, he's gonna leave
us behind, that's for sure, all right. Anyways, So what
we're gonna do from a serious standpoint on the show
today is we are going to do a fifty three
man roster projection. You published a fifty three man roster projection.
I kind of have a half baked one over here
in my notes. So we're going to talk about yours,

(05:21):
talk about where I would maybe differ from you, if
not the same. And then also we're going to do
that on the offense this week, and then we'll stretch
it out do the defense next week and special teams.
Don't forget about special teams next week. So let's get
into it. Let's start with the offense. Yeah, and you know,
there's a lot of burning questions that I have that

(05:41):
kind of our subcategories to the roster projection itself that
we can get into here at every.

Speaker 1 (05:47):
Position, like the depth chart.

Speaker 2 (05:49):
Yeah, so this is kind of like a roster projection
slash roster reset, which we've done in the past as well,
but we'll use the projection to kind of as a
springboard here for the rest of it, and just starting
at quarterback. I don't really feel that there's any doubt
in my mind right now that it's gonna be Drake

(06:09):
May and Josh Dobbs as the quarterbacks. We've talked about
this in the past though, about the emergency third quarterback
rule and is it worth carrying it or not carrying
a third quarterback, But right now I have May and
Dobbs because if Woolridge is going to make a push
to make the roster, then he's gonna have to really

(06:29):
make a push to make the roster. Yeah, and I
don't think we've seen enough to determine that. Or there's
always the possibility that they sign somebody at the end
of the summer that's a veteran that gets cut from
another team, and maybe they claim somebody on waivers for example,
or something like that.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
There's a two horse race for the MVP in the
UFL between a couple quarterbacks this year. Yeah, you remember
Jordan Toms.

Speaker 2 (06:50):
Yeah, I was gonna say what Florida State, right no Ole,
miss Ole, miss Why did I think Florida State?

Speaker 1 (06:59):
I don't know, Okay, but it was Jordan Tamud. You
don't remember Bryce Perkins. I think that all of them
wouldn't have been really on our draft radar a little bit.
I know the name, but neither neither one of those
guys are really McDaniel's fit, So I don't know that
it would be them. I just wanted to throw that
out there. But yeah, I just said the two. Look,
I believed they changed to the rule. It's so complicated

(07:19):
hard to find this. Yeah, so you can't name a
quarterback on your practice squad the emergency third quarterback, but
if you make him one of your two game day elevations,
then you can, I believe is how the rule is written. Now,
don't quote me on that. Yeah, they're gonna have three
quarterbacks in the building, right, you know, whether or not

(07:42):
that third is on the roster on the practice squad
is kind of what we're talking about here. It just
didn't seem in the spring. I don't think Ben Wilwrids
necessarily did anything that was wrong. He just really didn't
get a lot of reps. I mean, it was May
and between May and Dobbs, and May got the heavy
percentage between those two, but if you combine those two,
they probably got what ninety percent of the team reps.

(08:03):
Eighty ninety percent of the team reps. They didn't really
work role Ridge in a ton, So he to your point, like,
if he's gonna make a push with the fifty three
man roster, he simply needs more opportunities there, enough time
there to prove that. I think he can stick around
on the practice squad. I love watching the way we've
talked about this. I love watching the way he goes
about practice. I think he does a good job of

(08:24):
maximizing the reps that he getsh But just as it
stands right now, where they're at with other positions, it's
hard to justify keeping him on the fifty three when
you can get him to the practice squad. And you know,
let's say, you know, it's a seventeen game season, Drake's
gonna tweak something at some point. Okay, he's playing, but
we'd like a little more depth. Will you promote Woolridge
that week? I guess you get out right promote him.

(08:45):
You don't need to make him the emergency. So I
look that doesn't take a roster.

Speaker 2 (08:49):
That rule about elevating them the practice squad was vetoed
in the last go around of trying to pass that rule,
so they still need to be on the fifty.

Speaker 1 (08:57):
Thh so they can't be in elevation correct. So okay,
So maybe that it was a real proposal that had
some steam, So maybe that helps his case a little bit.
But again, it just you know, you make something work
that week where maybe you cut somebody and you sign
him and then you move them back. We've seen them
do that with guys. So yeah, as of right now

(09:17):
outside looking in, I'm not ruling out them him making
the team, just because I'm not ruling out them keeping
a third quarterback period because of that rule. They bring
in somebody else before during camp, then that becomes a competition.
I don't think it would definitively be him, but I
just have him at two right now.

Speaker 2 (09:33):
I just feel like this is no disrespect to Ben Woolridge,
but in order to carry three quarterbacks, it has to
be a pretty unique situation similar I guess really the
only situation I can come up with is last year
where you have the veteran bridge quarterback, the Josh Dobbs,
highly drafted rookie, late draft pick, rookie who has him

(09:53):
upside like Joe Milton.

Speaker 1 (09:55):
Joe Milton is also just a better just better for
Joe Milton. I don't know every team's third quarterback. I
feel comfortable in saying Joe Milton was the best third
quarterback in football last year.

Speaker 2 (10:04):
It's possible.

Speaker 1 (10:04):
It's hard to imagine he wasn't.

Speaker 2 (10:05):
Yeah, so that's a very unique set of circumstances where
you're in this quarterback transition and you have two young
qbs that you just drafted and you want to keep
both of them around. That scenario does not apply to
Ben Woolrich. So the only other way that I could
see this going that they carry three quarterbacks as of today,
as of June eighteenth, is if that quarterback is not

(10:29):
currently here, Like if that third quarterback is somebody that
they just happen to really like that hits waivers and
they claim that player on waivers or he goes unsigned
through waivers, and then you know, they sign him to
the roster after roster cutdowns. We'll see. But Woolridge, yeah,
he's gonna have to earn that spot. So right now,

(10:49):
we're both kind of in the same boat Drake May
and Josh Dobbs at quarterback. Running back is where I
feel like it gets really interesting in a couple of ways.
So Ramandra Stevenson and Travon Henderson are locks, They're both
going to be here. I believe Antonio Gibson's pretty close
to being in that category. Yeah, So I have those

(11:12):
three guys on as of right now. And it's similar
to what I was saying to Woolridge, But I think
he had a better spring than Woolridge did. Willane Larrison
started hot started, had a really good rookie Mini Camp
had a really good spring at the beginning in OTAs.
Didn't hear from him as much as the spring war on.
So similar to Chisholm, but I think maybe Chisholm's a

(11:32):
little bit ahead. Larison's going to have to show us
a little bit more, I believe to fully make this
team for me to feel really good about putting him
on the team. But that's question number one. Is it
three running backs? Is it four running backs? Is a
big question mark here as well. And then I also
think there's a secondary question of our Travon Henderson and

(11:53):
Antonio Gibson two redundant that you don't need to keep
bold but three or four running backs to start? Where
are you at there?

Speaker 1 (12:00):
So I'm at four. Look, I try to do this
as much as if they had to make a decision today. Yeah,
because I don't want to project. You know, camp who
knows this was one where I made a little bit
of a projection. I have four running backs. On to
your point about we need to see more from Larison,
we really didn't see a ton of special teams work
this spring, and I think that's probably where he's going

(12:23):
to create his roster spot. He can factor in as
a running back, and I think he'd play a little
bit of offense if he's on the team. But we've
thrown out the Rex Burkhead Brandon Bolden comparisons, right, And
that's the difference between him and Gibson. You asked about
Gibson and Henderson being redundant. Are Gibson and Larison redundant?
I think there's some redundancy there, but I just I
love Larison's makeup for a special teams role. Yeah, so

(12:44):
I think he gets it and they don't have a
ton of guys that projects like those core special teamers
at least, and we think are going to make the
roster right this ille Brendon schooler. But I think he
gives them a body on special teams. He can play
both the early down and passing down back roles, so
he gives you a lot of versatility at a position
where injuries generally pile up. And I know people have

(13:05):
cited Mike Rabel generally only keeps three running backs. Josh
McDaniels generally keeps four. So it'll be interesting to see.
Is that's something McDaniels goes to Rabel and was like,
to run my offense the way I want, I need
four guys. I know you want three, but I need four.
And maybe he says you take a guy from here,
you take a guy from there, whatever, But I mean,
that's just such a McDaniel's room. If you keep all four.
Stevenson's your early down guy, Henderson's you're passing down guy,

(13:28):
and then you have essentially two guys that can play
both spots in Gibson and Larison, with one of those
probably being more of a core special teamer. Were actually,
before I say this, I don't know that this was
ever the room was the room ever at one point
Bolden White, not Bolden or Bolden, but blunt White, Burkhead, Bolden.

Speaker 2 (13:50):
I believe it was Blunt White, Dion Lewis Bolden at
one point, maybe twenty thirteen through sixteen, Patriots like somewhere.

Speaker 1 (14:02):
Around there that works too.

Speaker 2 (14:03):
I don't know if if Burkehead was in that mix.
I just I feel like with my question, I guess
in terms of how many they'll keep, I currently feel
comfortable putting three guys on Stevens.

Speaker 1 (14:19):
In seventeen, sorry, in seventeen. Their Week one roster was
Gillis Lee, who was the power back, and he got hurt.

Speaker 2 (14:28):
He got a bunch of touchdowns there, Gillous.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
Lee, White, Burkehead, Bolden, and they had Dion Lewis. They
kept five running backs Week one twenty twenty seven.

Speaker 2 (14:36):
They kept a lot of running backs towards the end
of their.

Speaker 1 (14:39):
Final roster Head, Oh no, that's also five.

Speaker 2 (14:41):
It's they They had a lot of running backs towards
the end of the bill because of the Stephen Jackson year.
I don't think he ever wanted to go back down
that road. And if you remember the it was at
eighteen that quarter of Patterson had to play some running
back because then they ran out of running backs, so
he was very Bill was very wary of running out
of running.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
But all the more reason, I think Josh goes there
and says, like Stevenson struggled to stay healthy, Henderson struggled
to stay healthy at Ohio State. That was kind of
the one big knock on him was the durability. All
the more reason to keep four guys, Like, there's a
really strong case. I get Vrabel usually keeps three. You
can use that trend sort of, but also you've got
it he hit Derrick Henry. That sort of skews things.

(15:22):
Whereas Derrick Henry's a tank. They don't have Derrick Henry
on this roster. I like the running backs they have,
they don't have Derrick Henry. This group I think speaks
more towards keeping four guys.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
So the other question, which I think is definitely related
to the number of running backs that they're going to keep,
is Ramandre is very clearly his own thing. He has
his own skill set, early down, power back type of
skill set ideally, and you can see that. Then you
get into the Henderson, Larrison, Gibson category and there's a

(15:54):
lot of crossover there. And there's always two roles that
we talk about with the early down and the past
game back, but there's also that which we've talked about
in the past is kind of like that Burkhead thing
of the the sub package back, right or the the Yeah, really,
the sub package back is the best way to put
it where it's not solely just a passing game role,

(16:16):
but it's eleven personnel shotgun formation defenses in nickel or dime,
and you're not early down under center offense. It's not
your base offense. It's a sub package offense. And Mike
like wondering, like my question there is is there a
world where Traveon Henderson is just so darn good that

(16:37):
he's both that he is the sub package back and
he's the pass game back.

Speaker 1 (16:41):
I also saw them run a lot of Pony this spring, so.

Speaker 2 (16:44):
That cort but I when I look at Pony, like
Remondra and Henderson, they fit so well together, Like that's
part of the the appeal of drafting Henderson.

Speaker 1 (16:54):
Are there going to be times where they want Henderson
and Gibson or Henderson and Larson like we would see
go Pony with James White and Rex Burkhead. So I
have not in the day, right.

Speaker 2 (17:04):
And I'm sure they would. But then it stands the
question that comes up with that is, then is it
Gibson or Laris? Like do you need all three of
those guys? When all three of those guys are probably
gonna play very similar roles and like there's not gonna
be enough snaps to go around for all of them.

Speaker 1 (17:24):
I guess, do you need all three of those guys
in any given game? Probably not. Will you end up
needing those three guys over the course of the seventeen
game season, Yes, I think so. Like Land Larison might
make the team and be a healthy scratch some wings, right,
But I still think he's a guy that you keep
around because there are gonna be weeks that you do
you do need them.

Speaker 2 (17:42):
Okay, you're selling me. I don't want to move on
from Gibson. I don't either, And maybe this is just
a nerd in me, but a lot of the metrics
last year are really good for him, you know, yards
after contact, things like that he was a better running
back last year than Ramondre Stevenson.

Speaker 1 (17:57):
That they should have played him was, that's just a fact.

Speaker 2 (18:00):
One of their biggest He was a better more efficient,
more productive runner than Remondre was last year. And as
much as I'm excited about Trevon Henderson, We're all excited
about Trevion Henderson. You don't want to to say, you know,
use what they said last of this offseason, Li Wolf
said about Jalen Polk. You don't want a Jalen Polk
Travon Henderson where it's like all on Travon Henderson to

(18:22):
do it all in the backfield. I know I'll have Remandre,
but you know what I mean in terms of that
kind of role and those types of situations, because I
definitely think that there's a world where Traveon Henderson might
not have more touches than ramondre Stevenson by the end
of the season, but he might have more snaps than
vermondre Stevenson by the end of the season, and that

(18:43):
that could be a lot for a rookie out of
the gates. So I'm still hanging on to Gibson because
of that. So right now I'm at Remandre, Gibson, Henderson,
and I have Larison squarely on the bubble. Like I
think Larison's trending towards making the team, but I'm not
fully putting him.

Speaker 1 (19:00):
On the bubble. Don't get me wrong, but I have
him on all right.

Speaker 2 (19:03):
H Why let's let's skip over wide receiver because it's
it's such an interesting topics. We're going to come back
to it. I'm gonna go to tight ends in full
backs first, so I group them together because they practice,
they practice together. They're not A full back is not
a running back. He's with the tight ends usually, so
right now.

Speaker 1 (19:24):
Long snapper is not a tight end.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
Well, that's that's just Madden. That's just Madden, not anymore
that no real football team is offer the fixed it finally,
so Locks Hunter, Henry, and Austin Hooper are going to
be here. I feel pretty comfortable saying that the two
quick questions are do they carry a third tight end,

(19:47):
a true third tight end? And do they carry a
full back? I'm willing to bet that they're going to
carry a full back. Is it brock Lampy? I think
so too. I don't know for a fact that it's
gonna be brock Lampy. It could be somebody else. I
did look this up. Yakab Johnson's in Houston. He's on
the Texans roster, so probably not gonna be him. It

(20:09):
could be somebody else, but I believe that they're gonna
carry a full back right now. That fullback on this
team is Brock Lampy. So Brock Lampy is the third
guy that I have on But as of right now,
I do not have them carrying a true third tight end.
Jean Bell, Jack west Over, CJ. Dupre G, Scott Junior
are the candidates there. And the main reason why I

(20:30):
don't have them carrying a third tight end is because
I think this is what the practice squad is now
built for. I don't know. I think those guys, to
use a baseball term, those guys are four A players,
and so do you need to take up a roster
spot on a third tight end? Where if you get
into a game week and you're like, we're gonna be
twelve personnel heavy, Like the game plan is twelve personnel heavy,

(20:50):
and if knock on Wood, some Henry or Hooper goes down,
then we have to throw out the entire game plan
because we don't have a second tight end to put
on the field. So maybe this week we elevate jam Bell,
or this week we elevate CJ. Duprie. I just don't
know if those guys are gonna be sought after commodities
enough to have to keep them on the initial fifty

(21:12):
three man roster. So right now I have Henry Hooper
and Brock Lampy.

Speaker 1 (21:16):
Yeah, I'm I'm with you. I have the same thing.
I just think you can nobody emerged and look, maybe
somebody and CJ. Depriez kind of the guy you look
at here because he's a blocking tight end. And what
happens when the pads come on, Maybe somebody emerges and
has a strong enough summer that now you feel, okay,
we have to keep him on the roster. Right sure,
but for the time being, as it looks right now,
you can get I mean, I think of the four,

(21:38):
You're probably not gonna keep four tight ends on the
practice squad, but you could keep two even three of
these guys between Jaheen Bell G Scott, CJ. Deprie and
Jack west Over. Jack west Over got some decent run
this spring. Let's not write him out of this, and
then you just elevate guys as needed. Like that's such
a classic usage of that practice squad elevation and it's
what three per player. Right, So let's say you keep

(21:59):
three of them. Let's say you keep Bell to pre
in Westover. That's nine weeks. That's nine weeks or third
tight ends you have lined up, and we know how
this works out. Obviously you're not rooting for injury, but
eventually his spot's gonna open up, and when you need
to put a tight end on the roster, you'll put
a tight end on the roster. So for now, I
think they could take advantage of the practice squad elevation.

(22:19):
They only need to keep the two tight ends in
Lampy and they'll just elevate guys.

Speaker 2 (22:23):
So a couple of things I want to unpack here
Jeane Bell. I want to start with him. I've been
a little bit disappointed so far, and I know it's
maybe a little bit unfair to say disappointed because here's
a seventh round pick, and my expectations probably shouldn't have
been very high. But at the same time, I didn't
when they drafted him. I didn't feel like he was
a true seventh round pick. I felt like his talent

(22:44):
level was higher than that. A lot of projections had
him going like in the early to mid day three range,
and he fell to the seventh round because essentially because
he's a player without a position, Like he's kind of
this tweeter full back tight end type. It's a little
too tall, a little too big to be a full
beat but he's not a natural in line tight end either.
So he's kind of a man without a home right now,

(23:06):
or man without a position, and that hurt him in
the draft as well. And I just wonder, and maybe
it's not in this system. Maybe this is not the
right fit for him. Maybe he needs a John hu
Smith type that needs to be in a West Coast
offense with Kyle Shanahan or with Mike McDaniel who had
a great year with John hu Smith last year. But

(23:27):
there's got to be a way in theory that somebody
could tap into that. Jaheinm Bell athleticism, like, he's clearly
a great athlete, tested extremely well, a big, fast, strong guy. Like,
there's clearly a raw skill set there and a raw
talent there. But in my opinion, the way that you
have to go about untapping that is that it's very

(23:50):
he has to have a very scheme specific role. You know,
you're gonna have to find ways schematically to get him
the ball in pockets of space. Where he can use
his ball carrying skill, whether it's a screen, whether it's
you know, sliding him across the formation on a bootleg,
whether it's a crossing route, a seam route, just things
that are runways that create those foot races for him

(24:13):
all over the field. If you're asking him to just
like run routes and break down and catch the ball,
and he's gonna look clunky, and it's gonna look on
orthodox a lot like it did for Johnny Right in
this offense, It's just not gonna look right. So is
there a world that Jahean Bell works here? Like, what's
the path for Jaheim Bell to work here? Because I

(24:34):
still think it's ideally his role is pretty similar to
like how the forty nine ers use Kyle Uschek, Like
he's a traditional fullback some of the time, probably the
majority of the time, but in reality he's kind of
this Swiss army knife blocker who can block from multiple alignments,
catch the ball from multiple alignments, detached from the formation,

(24:55):
not a guy that's got his hand in the dirt
at the end of the line of scrimmage. So do
you do you see a path for Jama Bell here?

Speaker 1 (25:00):
There's a path I just didn't don't know. Okay, so
you keeping a true fullback in an H back because
like we've talked about this, I think he can do
some of that Kyle used check fullback stuff, but that's
not how Josh McDaniels has traditionally used the position. He's
used the position is who's meeting the linebacker in the
A gap? And that's something that you know, Bell's not
really a blocker in that way. He's not somebody who's

(25:21):
just gonna put his head down the way Lampy does
so and they they've struggled with scheme touch players as
a whole, like you said with John hu Smith. So
I mean you could keep both when you're having an
H back where you also have a traditional fullback. So
he's doing less. That's a pretty limited role. I don't
know if you're using a roster spot on that, but
that's what they would have to deem that one role,

(25:42):
and he probably played a ton of special teams. They'd
have to deem that role being worth a practice squad spot,
agree or a roster spot.

Speaker 2 (25:49):
If he can't play traditional full back. I think it's
a tough path for him, and I don't think that
he's really he's high cut, so he's not really built
to like sink and meet the guy in the hole,
and and.

Speaker 1 (25:59):
Like, really, what are you looking for more out of
that role? So that traditional fullback stuff, So you're gonna
keep the guy that's better than that in Lampy.

Speaker 2 (26:05):
So, like you said that, that brings us to Dupre
and Jack Westover, who Jack Westover got a lot of
run in the Spring. Yeah, I don't know how much
I'm going to look into that. It's a spring they
like Jack west Over. Austin Hooper wasn't really a full
go It didn't seem like for some of the Spring.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
Right, But somebody from that group before had to get
those and it was Jack Westover.

Speaker 2 (26:24):
So what do we make of that because he if
we're just taking that phase of value of what was
happening in front of us during the last couple of weeks,
Jack Westover was involved.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
Jack west Over right now might be the third tight
end and that can change. But that's what that told
me is he's the third And look, I think you
split that into well, Jahem Bell is not going to
do the stuff Austin Hooper did. He's more specialized and
even CJ. Dpreeze more of a blocker. He's not going
to do the stuff Austin Hooper did, So it breaks
down a little bit more. But if that's what they like,
what do they want? We kind of are assuming they

(26:54):
want a blocker for that third ten end and that
would make sense. What if they just want another body
who can do the stuff Hooper and Henry do as
you know insurance, Well, then it's between Jack west Over
and g Scott. Yeah, because that's those I mean. G
Scott was a four star receiver at Ohio State and
then move I think he was four star and then
moved to tight end. He's a true receiving tight end.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
Does Jack Westover give you any Jacob Hollister vibes? Maybe
that's just the lazy comparison a little bit, but that's
kind of how I see him. And like Jacob Hollister,
not that he's had this great career, but like the
times that he has been good, it's been stuff near
the line of scrimmage, and there's a pretty good athlete.
He can win those foot races to the to the

(27:36):
edges and things like that on you know, shallow crossers
and things and leaks into the flat and like all
that kind of stuff. That's that's sort of how I
see Jack west Over in terms of the skill set.

Speaker 1 (27:46):
He's carved out an eight year NFL career. There's a
spot for that guy in the league, and there are
some similarities there. It doesn't mean that he's great, but
there's a spot for that guy in the league.

Speaker 2 (27:56):
So CJ. Dupree, I'm still holding out hope that that's
one of my UDF guys, and I still have I
still have real estate on CG. Deprie Island.

Speaker 1 (28:05):
By the way, G Scott was the seventy seventieth ranked
player in the class at twenty twenty.

Speaker 2 (28:10):
Is that good?

Speaker 1 (28:11):
The top one hundred recruit good. He's the seventieth best
player in his high school class NATE nationally and he's
an there right, here's a wide receiver recruited Ohio State.
That's usually something pretty good.

Speaker 2 (28:24):
Yeah, all right, So maybe he's that.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
I'm just saying, I think everybody got excited about c J. Deprie,
and I am excited about it. Part of the reason
you get excited about c J.

Speaker 2 (28:34):
Dupris I got real estate on the island. I had
a big nice.

Speaker 1 (28:37):
And I'm not saying it's wrong to be excited about him.
But part of the reason I think from a Patriots
perspective you get excited about him is their tap two
tight ends aren't really blockers. He's a blocking tight end.
It makes a lot of sense. There's a clear path there.
The path or g Scott maybe isn't as clear. But
that's not to say like he's not a it's not
to say he's a scrub, like there is something there.

(28:59):
It's we are all assuming again the Patriots want to
blocking tight end in that role. So what I would
do personally, and I you know, there's logic for them
doing that. What if we're wrong in assuming that, What
if they want a third receiving tight end. If that's
what it is, then it's again it's westover g Scott
over Dupree. Because if you're looking for a guy that okay,
if Hunter Henry goes down or Austin Hooper goes down,

(29:22):
and we want a guy that we can put out
in the pattern, those are the guys who are gonna
give the role to Yeah, which is again I think
all the more reason that you're keeping as many of
those guys as you can on the practice squad to
have them ready at that situation occurs.

Speaker 2 (29:35):
So the last thing I want to back here at
this position before we move on the full back. I
we both feel like the fullbacks back and yeah, when
we saw it in the spring, there's a lot bit
happy about that. Yes, there's a lot of fullback stuff
going on in the spring, a lot of regular a
lot of base personnel going on with the full back.
Brock Lampy right now is the guy. And I've used

(29:56):
this analogy before, but it's like when you're on a
hockey team or a lacrosse team that has one goalie
and so you just automatically default know who the goalie is.
Right now, that's Brock Lampy at the full back position.
And the one thing that always excites me about the
full back and the usage of the full back. And
I should just say from a number standpoint, the last

(30:16):
two Josh McDaniels offense is for the full season. He
got fired mid season in Vegas. So twenty one and
twenty two with the Patriots and with the Raiders, both
offenses were top five in the league in twenty one.
Personnel usage, So two running backs or two backs in
the backfield one tight end, usually a running back in
a full back. So both times, by the way, Jakub

(30:39):
Johnson was the fullback right. So they have a type.
They've used it at one of the highest clips in
the league. We saw it in the spring. It would
be an upset at this point to say that there
would be no fullback in this offense moving forward. The
fullback has a lot of schematic advantages that I've asked
a lot of people about over the years, and the

(31:02):
biggest one from just a true x's and o's standpoint,
is that the full back can go both ways. Right,
like a tight end that's lined up on the line
of scrimmage, it's harder for that tight end to now,
let's say he's lined up on the right side of
the formation, it's hard to get him over to the
left side of the formation right. And so as a defense,

(31:23):
when you start to mirror what the offense is doing defensively,
like you're gonna be tilted mostly towards the strong side
of the formation where that extra tight end is. From
a front standpoint, so with the full back, there's an
unpredictable element because he's lined up. You know, if you're
power eye right he's lined up right in front of
the running back and they could go left or they

(31:46):
could go right just as easily. There's no tell there.
The other thing that I really like about the full
back that I'm glad that it's back. Well, I should
also say he's also just a freaking battering ram up
the middle of the field for the running back.

Speaker 1 (32:00):
This for mister Caveman football.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
That that helps having that Now you're geting that that light.
I think what did they describe James Devilon as like
a green light? Like, you know, follow the light, right,
follow James Devlin. That does make your job easier as
a running back.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
I just just so clear on where you stand because
you're usually well, you know, we need you know, it's
got to be more than just crash heads.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
Smash hair and a steal hair.

Speaker 1 (32:28):
All right, but this is what you're describing, and you
sound very excited about I am.

Speaker 2 (32:31):
Excited about it, Okay, I'm very because the real reason
why I'm excited about it, Alex, is because using the
full back to get those again I'll go baseball, to
get the singles to get on base is great, but
using the full back and play action for the home

(32:52):
runs is really what you're trying.

Speaker 1 (32:53):
To set fit in because the nerds hate singles.

Speaker 2 (32:55):
You're just trying you're you're really trying to set up
the big pass. That's really what you're trying.

Speaker 1 (33:00):
Well, and it makes it easier because if you have
the fullback on the field, the defense either has to
get bigger defensively it's gonna make it easier to pass
the football, or get smaller and then you just run it.
That's what the twenty eighteen Patriots did because they had
Tom Brady. And look, Patriots don't have Tom Brady now,
but like they put the fullback on the field, the
defense wasn't willing to go to a bigger package because

(33:21):
they didn't want Brady carving them up, so they just
ran it down everybody's throats for sixty minutes.

Speaker 2 (33:26):
So there's the advantage, like you just said, of matching
personnel base on base or nickel or dime on base,
and then you run the ball base on base, you
throw the ball. There's all sorts of really great advantages
for the offense of being in a base formation, being

(33:48):
in a run formation with base personnel, and then throwing
out of that base personnel. It's probably the best way
to throw the football if you can, if you have
the base personnel to do it at a high level,
it's it can be really prolific. Then the other thing
with the full back, just from a post nap perspective,
is that now you can mimic the run plays and

(34:08):
you can make all of it look the same. So
we just talked about how it's easier to run behind
the full back and you know, go right up the
middle of the gut of the defense with the full
back leading the way. Well, now you have the full
back go right up the gut of the middle of
the defense. But now it's play action, and so those
linebackers have no choice most of the time but to
react to that action, step up downhill into the line

(34:31):
of scrimmage, and that's when you get the crossers, the
seam routes, you know, gronk up the seam off the action.
The lead action is just like a classic vintage McDaniel's play.
So I'm a big full back guy. I think there's
a lot of schematic advantages to having the full back.
I'm glad that they're bringing the full back back their

(34:51):
short yardage offense too. There are power numbers or so
much better in the full back era than the non
full back era recently. Again, that's more to the first
point of do you just have that battering ram in
front of everybody? But short yardage, goal line power number
is much better. Throwing out a base personnel with the
full back in the backfield is can be really efficient offense.

(35:13):
So I'm all for the full back coming back, and
I think we're getting that. So that's tight end slash
full back. We're both at Henry Hooper brock Lampy for
the time being. Let's get to offensive line, which is
a beefy position. I almost want to break this up
into guards and interior guards, tackles, excuse me, and interior guys.

Speaker 1 (35:33):
There are that many guys. There's I have one guy
that we too. I guess that really crossed that.

Speaker 2 (35:38):
There's so many guys, that's my point in general. And JUI,
so I have let's see, I have ten.

Speaker 1 (35:45):
I was so tempted to keep ten. I up with nine.
But my fifty fourth or fifty fifth player is so
fifty fourth player at tackle? Yeah, two locks, will Campbell,
Morgan Moses. Obviously I do have Kitten Wallace on right now,
and I think that there's some flexibility there with him

(36:07):
being able to play some guard like we saw in
the spring too, so I think he's going to stick around.
As of right now, I have a Darian low On
the main reason why I have a Darian Lowe on
is I just don't until I see King Kate Walls,
you don't have a backup left tackle exactly.

Speaker 2 (36:23):
I don't like who's truly the backup left tackle out
of this group. And then I also have them holding
on to Marcus Brian as a developmental player. But you're
not putting.

Speaker 1 (36:30):
Marcus Bryant then keeping five tackles.

Speaker 2 (36:32):
Five tackles, okay, because I feel like Kitten Wallace is
more at this point like a flex or swing player
inside outside.

Speaker 1 (36:39):
Kten Wallas is right tackle. Combo card, I don't think
you're putting Kan Walls a left tackle less it's an emergency.

Speaker 2 (36:45):
Agreed, and I as.

Speaker 1 (36:46):
Marcus Bryant left tack before I put Kane Wallace there.

Speaker 2 (36:48):
I think I would probably too. And then Vaderian Lowe
I have there. I know he's a point of contention
with people after last year, but really, what's your left
tackle depth look like if he's not here?

Speaker 1 (37:04):
So I got a little creative with it. Okay, so
I have more Campbell Moses Wallace, yep. And so I
was between for my backup left tackle because I'm with,
you need somebody. I ended up cutting Marcus Bryant because
I went purely on versatility. I have Jack Connelly, and
the idea being if Will Campbell gets hurt in a game,
it might not be pretty, but Jack Connelly's played it.

(37:26):
He'll get you through the week. And then you're keeping
Marcus Brian on the practice squad and maybe Venderien Lowe
as well, and then the next week you add one
of those guys to the roster if Will Campbell's gonna
miss time.

Speaker 2 (37:36):
So that's not a good spot to be in. There's
a lot and I don't mean.

Speaker 1 (37:40):
It's not that different than your spot, no, No, I.

Speaker 2 (37:42):
Just mean in Jet like regardless.

Speaker 1 (37:44):
Of yeah, they don't ever real backup left tackle.

Speaker 5 (37:46):
Now.

Speaker 2 (37:48):
I think that you could probably say that about a
lot of teams. Yeah, there's a tackle. There's a depression
on tackles right now, and I think there's a lot
of teams that probably sit back and say, oh, our
depth at left tackle is not great. But he's the
fourth overall pick, so he this comes with the territory
of something of this territory of being the fourth overall pick.

(38:11):
When I did this exercise, it definitely put in perspective
how much is riding on Will Campbell. Yes, and it
doesn't even need to be that Will Campbell's a stud.
He has to be starting cal he needs to be
starting caliber, and he needs to make it the season
like he's gonna have to, like if they have a
major injury. Again, knock on Wood to Will Campbell. That's
one of those Janga pieces that I think, now you're back.

Speaker 1 (38:31):
Now you're back where you were last year, essentially because
they didn't really add a true backup left tackle. So
again I was between. The reason I didn't keep Low
is because whether it's Bryant or whether it's Conley, Marcus
Bryant can play both tackle spots. Jack Connelly can play
both tackle spots and both guard spots. Now can he
do it at an NFL level? This is what we're
gonna see this summer, And maybe Jack Connelly comes out

(38:53):
this summer and isn't good and all. Justin I'll put
Marcus Bryant, Irvener and Low back on the roster right,
but they were giving him a ton of opportunities to spring.
It felt like they're moving him around. It felt like
somebody they wanted to keep. And if he can play
on the left side again, it's not like you're going
into the season you can't make moves. You might end
up in a bad spot for a game, as they
did multiple times last year. Who was the guy they

(39:15):
got off the Rams practice squad who had like never
played tackle and he had to play tackle for half
a game because people got hurt, and then they cut him.
Oh do you know what I'm talking about?

Speaker 2 (39:24):
Then the name is right because.

Speaker 1 (39:26):
They ran through so many different players last year. But
the point being, like I think Jack Connelly could if
he's the player I think he is. I don't know
that I want him starting games for the Patriots at
left tackle, But if he has to get you through
the rest of a game after campbellill it gets hurt,
and then you bring low Er Bryant back from the

(39:47):
practice squad the next week, that's what you do.

Speaker 2 (39:49):
Okay, that's a fair enough reasoning, I just.

Speaker 1 (39:52):
And the same could be said for Marcus Bryant. Literally,
the tiebreaker for me was Marcus Bryant plays both tackles.
Connolly plays both tackles and both guards. And with the
guy that you're talking about, Zack Thomas instead of two. Yes,
I knew it was the name of another NFL players,
Zach Tom Zach Thomas.

Speaker 2 (40:08):
Yes, so I understand what you're talking about. I just again,
I look at Will Campbell rookie. I'm not saying that
Will Campbell's gonna get bench for Vaderian Lowe by any means.
There is there a chance of that Will Campbell gets
hurt though, as a rookie in his first NFL season
and doesn't go the full seventeen games. I think there

(40:30):
you have to count on that being a possibility. And
Vaderian Lowe right now is the only guy on the
team with that as any real starting experience at the position.
So Jack Colley's an interesting one. You know, maybe he
earns that kind of keep. So I interior offensive line
now on when who Bradbury Cole Strange? Right now? I

(40:52):
have Jared Wilson and City so on as well. So
I do not have Leyden Robinson on.

Speaker 1 (40:57):
I don't either. I have Connolly on when who so Strange,
brad Berry, Wilson, and then I had Ben Brown right
on the bubble.

Speaker 2 (41:03):
Yeah, so I have Laydon Robinson and Ben Brown is
right on the bubble as well. On when New Bradbury strange.
I feel pretty good that those three are going to
be here, and Wilson obviously as the rookie, uh you
know third Brown pick will be here as well. Really
it's just a matter of do you need to keep
a fifth guy in that.

Speaker 1 (41:20):
Mix again, like a guy like Connelly who can play
guard and tackle.

Speaker 2 (41:26):
That's why I thought, that's what I kept sitting so
for maybe a little bit.

Speaker 1 (41:30):
I don't think that city can play tackle.

Speaker 2 (41:31):
I don't think you left tackle. I think maybe right there.

Speaker 1 (41:34):
I mean when when it comes to Laane Robinson, like
because I've been asked why I wasn't talking about him
or he we didn't really see him in the spring,
and it didn't seem like he was hurt. He just
wasn't getting reps Tyrese Robinson got more reps than Laden
Robinson did.

Speaker 2 (41:45):
I don't know what's going on with Landon Robinson.

Speaker 1 (41:47):
Did you have west whitz on before he retired.

Speaker 2 (41:49):
Yes, so did I. I don't know what's going on
with Leydon Robinson It's one of the bigger under the
radar storylines that I would say I have about the
offensive line right now. It just doesn't seem like he's
in their plans.

Speaker 1 (42:05):
It doesn't.

Speaker 2 (42:06):
I don't know what it is. I don't know if
it's that he's not picking it up. I don't know
if when I say up it, I mean the scheme,
the offense, he's not picking it up. I don't know
what it is. I don't want to speculate. I have
no idea, but based off the spring, it was strange.
It was Schweitzer when he was still participating. It was

(42:26):
Tyrese Robinson, it was City, it was pretty much anybody.

Speaker 1 (42:30):
Everybody.

Speaker 2 (42:31):
Yeah, and that's telling. That's got to be telling.

Speaker 1 (42:34):
It definite, As somebody pointed out to me, just we'll
get Tide receivers in a second. I have as many
twenty twenty five udfas making the team as I do
twenty twenty four draft picks.

Speaker 2 (42:43):
That's fair. I mean, this is it's a new vision,
it's a new coaching staff, it's a new offense. You
have to think in terms of everybody on this team
is starting from square one with Mike Rable. You have
not done anything for Mike Rabel yet, So yeah, it
just doesn't. There's no sacred cows because of that. Besides,

(43:04):
you know, maybe like Drake May Christian Gonzales, but there's
really no sacred cows when it comes to these kinds
of guys. So the other thing that I find a
little bit interesting about this offensive line is just how
the weight is going to be distributed. I don't know,
I know that sounds like silly, but.

Speaker 1 (43:21):
They're gonna be bigger on the right side and the
left side. Yeah, and like very classic McDaniels though very
much so.

Speaker 2 (43:28):
Though it's gonna be very pronounced because you're gonna have.

Speaker 1 (43:32):
Not if they plug City in it left guard.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
Well, that's so that's sort of where I'm getting at,
because if I've wanted to be in there, if it's
Will Campbell, Cole Strange, Garrett Bradbury at center, I know
Garrett Bradbury is in the middle, I get it all right.
But if it's that's sort of your three on the
left side, when you're going that direction, that's that's pretty small.
It's pretty small. So then on the right side you

(43:56):
have the house set is Morgan Moses, and you have
the cinder block that is Mike Onwenu. You have like
eight hundred pounds of human being on the right side,
and then you have like these felt athletic offensive linemen
on the left side. It's not the worst thing in
the world in terms of flexibility, and I would agree

(44:16):
in the past they had Solder in Tuney and then
Mason and Cannon like it was similar to that they do.
It's more pronounced than that though, but it's similar. But
it is something that I think about because next to Campbell,
just to go back to the draft conversation a little bit,
the wingspan stuff. The big thing about the wingspan number

(44:37):
was it's it's his girth, right, It's like how wide
of a body he is and how much space that
he takes up. So if he's at left tackle Will Campbell,
which is going to be and then Cole Strange is
your left guard, You're just You're just narrow. You're just
you're just not taking up a whole lot of space
from a natural standpoint. So I've always thought that it

(45:00):
made a lot more sense to have a bigger guard
play next to Will Campbell. On top of that, he's
also playing next to Garrett Bradberry, who is also a
smaller guy. So it would help I think on both
sides of Campbell and brad Berry to have girthier, bigger
dudes next to him at left guard. Who is that
left guard? Is it City City so based on the

(45:22):
ross right now, or could it be my guy Jared Wilson.

Speaker 1 (45:26):
I still think that Jared Wilson's good enough to start
you playing at center, Okay, and then that solved some
of your problem with guard in terms of the size
because now your center's bigger, Your center's bigger. I still
think if Jared Wilson's good enough to start, you start
him at center, like you let him work at that position,
and then like Ben Brown's right on the bubble too.
I Ben Brown, So you know how I do like
my like last three on, last three off? Yes, so

(45:48):
I had two linemen that were my like next three
off and it was Marcus Bryant and Ben Brown.

Speaker 2 (45:54):
Yeah, so my bubble because.

Speaker 1 (45:56):
If you're gonna start Jared Wilson at left guard, like,
let's go down this road. If you're gonna start Jared
Wilson left guard, now you have to keep Ben Brown.

Speaker 2 (46:05):
As a backup center. Yeah, unless you kick Jared Wilson
into center.

Speaker 1 (46:08):
We know that that's not their philosophy though they want
one in, one out, or if it's Cold Strange Okay,
I didn't think of that year, but either one of those.
But we did col Strange get any center reps in
the spring that we saw not like very sparing, very sparingly, So.

Speaker 2 (46:23):
Most of it was in like positions.

Speaker 1 (46:24):
I think, well, if Jared Wilson is going to start
a left guard, now, maybe you don't need to keep
Jack Conley, Tyres Robinson, whoever that guy is, and that's
where that spot goes to Ben Brown.

Speaker 2 (46:36):
It's just something to think about. They're not very big
on that left side, and they're not gonna they're not
gonna be big at center. If it's Garrett Bradbury either,
who I I know that we're all excited about Jared Wilson,
and there is a world where Jared Wilson just gets healthy,
gets on the field, is participating. It comes out of
a Gang Busters and wins the job away from Bradbury.
But Bradberry's experience, his steadiness, I just feel like there's

(46:57):
a really good chance that Bradbury is the starting center.
So the last one the definitely the one that gets
the most headlines and the most attention is of course
wide receiver. So there's one guy in here that I
was A million guys that I have that are interesting.
But yeah, in terms of the locks, give us the
total number that you have seven same So in terms

(47:19):
of the locks, and I want to say this, we're
gonna do defense next week, so I won't give out
any names. But I did this strictly one time through
just gut reaction, on off, on off, and I got
exactly fifty three players the first time.

Speaker 1 (47:36):
That's that's impressive to me.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
That tells you just where this roster is, not necessarily
in a bad way, but just kind of in a
bad way. Like there just isn't a whole lot of
guys that I felt guilty being like.

Speaker 1 (47:50):
No, I think Larson is the only guy you've said
so far is on the bubble.

Speaker 2 (47:53):
Yeah, so at wide receiver. Yeah, there's so many, there's
like a million questions. Yeah, Stefan Diggs is going to
be on the New England Patriots. Is he going to
start the year on pup or is he going to
start the year on the active ross one?

Speaker 1 (48:09):
Just based off how he look the spring, I have
him on the active roster.

Speaker 2 (48:11):
I do as well, but there's that storyline that's going
to be something to monitor the entire training camp. Stefon
Diggs is going to be here, though, so let's just
earmark him for some sort of spot in this organization.
Tomrio Douglas, I think is fine. Yeah, I think a
good spring, good mini camp especially. I don't think to
Mario Douglas is going anywhere, and of course Kyle Williams

(48:34):
is not going anywhere either as a third round pick.
The one guy that I want to say is a
lock who I'm I'm not one hundred percent Shore because
I hear it from other people in our brother in
the beat is Matt Collins. Like I just I think
Matt Collins is a lock personally because I feel like
they have a vision of on and off the field,
how Matt Collins is going to fit into their culture,

(48:55):
and I they want to change the culture of the team,
but they specifically have to know that room was a
mess last year and they had to specifically attack the
culture of the wide receiver room as well. Yeah, so
even if Matt Collins isn't as individually talented as a
Jayvon Baker or as you know, Jalen Polk or even

(49:16):
as a as a Kendrick Bourne or someone like that.
He has a role, like he has a purpose on
this team. I just don't think that they're gonna shake
from because I think the culture stuff is too important.

Speaker 1 (49:26):
To this and the special team stuff too. No, I'm
with you, he's the well with him too, because he
didn't participate in the spring. He did less than Diggs.
So if we're talking about it and it's different injuries,
so I know this isn't like apples to apples, But
if we're talking about Digs maybe being on PUP week one,
what is that like? I was tempted to put Mac
Collins on PUP. I kept him. I gave him a
Week one spot because I don't know it hasn't been

(49:49):
reported that he could miss the start of the season.
I feel like we would have heard something like that
by now. So I have him and Digs on the
week one roster ready to go.

Speaker 2 (49:57):
And I'm also not ruling out or just discarding the
fact that he had a really good year with Josh
McDaniels in Vegas not too long ago.

Speaker 1 (50:05):
I did have one guy starting the year on I R.
But we can get to that.

Speaker 2 (50:07):
Stefon Diggs, Yeah, mccollins, Tamario Douglas, Kyle Williams. Yeah, these
last three spots, you could you could talk me into
keeping only two of these guys. You could talk me
into all three of them. Kendrick Bourne, yep. I have
Kendrick Bourne on now.

Speaker 1 (50:24):
Yeap.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
The main reason I have him on now is because
of that twenty twenty one season with Josh McDaniels.

Speaker 1 (50:30):
So it's that, and he was very involved in the spring.
He was very involved. It looks like McDaniel still wants
to work with him. He did not. We saw some
wide receivers who will get to who their usage looked
more on the bubble. Kendrick Bourne's usage, now this is
without Diggs and without mccollins, so it does come with
an asterisk. But dig Bourne's usage was not that of

(50:53):
a player that's on the bubble.

Speaker 2 (50:54):
I agree, And he's a pure Z, which is what
Stefon Diggs I think will ideally play in this offense
long term play little X and but as a pure
as I guess. My point is is that if Diggs
isn't one hundred percent healthy, sure. Kendrick Bourne is a
quote unquote NFL player at that spot, so that allows him.

Speaker 1 (51:13):
He's a pretty he's a pretty good backup if he's
your backup.

Speaker 2 (51:16):
Right Like, I don't think that's the Mario Douglas. It
could be Kyle Williams.

Speaker 1 (51:20):
In theory, I think that will Kyle Williams play the X.

Speaker 2 (51:22):
So do I which worries me a little bit. And
it's certainly not Matt Collins. MC collis a big slot
or X receiver, so that's that's not him. I have
Kayshawn Bouody on I do too. Rapport with May is
important here. Ability to play on the outside is important here. Yep,
we saw it all spring long. It's just there's really
unless it's Digs and Diggs is the full time X,

(51:43):
which is definitely possible. There just isn't really a like
we saw it so much in the spring and last
season of just that's who's on the outside is Kaysehan Boody.
He has a clear rapport with Drake May. I think
that's important. He's one of those guys from last year
that did have some productive moments with Drake May quarterback,
and then you have to have an outside X. You

(52:03):
have to have somebody that can play that role, and
Kaisehon Boody can do it. So I have Kaishan Bouody on,
and then I do have ft Chisholm on as of
right now, yep. Same just McDaniel's binkie like it just
it just feels like that is just too it's too perfect,
Like unless he completely falls off a cliff in the
training camp when the pads come on and we don't

(52:24):
even see him for like the last three weeks of camp.
Maybe that's that happens to him. But as of right now,
the skill set is just too much of a fit
for me to write it off. So Stefan Diggs, Matt
Collins to Mario Douglas, Kyle Williams, Kender Born, Kishan Boodyftn
Chisholm feels one heavy. I would definitely be on the
lookout for a born or a booty trade. I think

(52:46):
that that's possible to kind of get this number down
to six. We didn't say Jalen. I don't get on.

Speaker 1 (52:51):
So I don't think any of those seven guys are
getting cut. If you tell me one of them is
getting traded, sure, I could see that I don't think
any of those seven are getting cut. H You mentioned Jalen.

Speaker 2 (52:59):
Pole, then didn't say either one of those guys.

Speaker 1 (53:02):
You just said that, we didn't say them. So I
Jalen Polk opening on ir me too. He's coming back
from that shoulder injury. They now have this new thing
where you can place the player on IR ahead. You
don't have to keep them on the fifty three ahead
of roster cuts, designated him return. You get two such players.
Now we'll see maybe injuries Mountain camp, but he's working
his way back from his shoulder injury. And then you
kind of see they're not going to carry seven wide

(53:23):
receivers for eighteen weeks. But because there's so much uncertainty,
it gives you a chance to let things play out
and then you see as the season goes on, who
the odd man odd man out are and it putting
Polk on ir kind of extends the opportunity to do
that hundred percent.

Speaker 2 (53:38):
It extends the window of essentially you're kicking the decision
down the road of potentially having to move on from
a second round pick early on his rookie contract. You're
kicking the decision down the road. You have that ability
to that flexibility now that he's still here, if somebody
gets hurt, if a roster spot opens up. He's healthy,

(53:59):
he's looking good in practice, like all those things are
starting to line up for him. You activate him, you
put him on the team, and you see what happens.
It just makes him more digestible for the whole room
to just kind of hold your water a little bit
on Jalen Polk right and not have him on the roster.
Javon Baker is the other one. It's a tough world
right now for jayvon Biker.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
He didn't get a ton of reps in the spring
that you want if you're a player competing for ross
or spot. We know he struggled with the offense last year.
This is more complex. I like, maybe they keep him
on the practice squad, but I just I don't see
the spot for him on this team.

Speaker 2 (54:37):
Neither do I. Neither do I And I like the talent.
I love the pick. I thought it was the right
pick at the time to just bet on the upside
and bet on the talent. It just hasn't worked so far,
at least it hasn't stuck. But just summarize, so this
is our room right now. I think we're both in
the same boat. Stefan Diggs, Matt Collins to Mario Douglas,

(54:57):
Kyle Williams, Kendrick Bourne, Kishan Boudi Eft and Chisholm yep,
one of those guys getting traded. That's my prediction. Probably
it's it's too many. You can't carry seven receivers.

Speaker 1 (55:08):
He gets hurt like you never know.

Speaker 2 (55:10):
So that's your roster projection right now. For the offense,
we were pretty pretty close. Yeah, I think you had Conley.
I had so I believe it was.

Speaker 1 (55:20):
Oh no, I it's so too or there was one
one of those I did running back. You kept three. No,
I'm two players ahead of you because I kept laris
and and Conley. Yes, oh, you kept Venerian Low So
I'm one player ahead of you going to the defense.

Speaker 2 (55:34):
But all right, pretty close, pretty close. You're usually better
at this than me. All on that. I'm not very
you know, roster projection wise. I I feel like I
get I get too attached to my the guys that
I like, I us not and that is it. I'd
rather be right right like I'm not thinking enough. I
don't think enough about what they're gonna do I think
about I like this guy the most, so I would

(55:56):
keep this guy on the team. And it's not, as
everybody knows, I am not the one making the decisions
of who's staying on the team.

Speaker 1 (56:02):
And it's why when we run a team, you'll be
the coach. I'll be the GM.

Speaker 2 (56:05):
All right. So we're going to open it up now
to your calls and emails. We have a lot of
emails coming in a couple. Congratulations for you, by the way,
for your David Andrews podcast.

Speaker 1 (56:15):
I mean congrats to him for starting, like you know,
this next phase. I don't know, what a suck up. No,
I'm serious, Like people were congratulating. Yes, I appreciate it,
but it's also like, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (56:26):
It's cool. You're in a press release. That's cool. All right,
there we go, But before we get into all your
lovely calls and emails. I was wearing mine yesterday, so
I'm not gonna wear it two days in a row.
But Brunton sent us some great stuff in a great
quarter zimp that I am definitely going to wear. Like
sometimes I'm a little picky with my clothes. I wear

(56:46):
the same vineyard vines Polo all summer long, just different colors.

Speaker 1 (56:51):
And whales to hype up another clothing company during the adage.
By the way, I didn't real good job.

Speaker 2 (57:00):
Well, the point of me bringing it up was that
I really liked the clothes that Brunt send me. So
based right here in New England, bront Work, where it
makes you work, makes work boots in apparel that are
built for the job site. Their gear is comfortable, durable,
and named after the real workers and the trades that
help design it. You can even try Brunt on the
job and if it doesn't blow you away, they let
you send it back. Save ten dollars on your first

(57:22):
order at brontworkwear dot com, forward slash pats or with
coupon code PATS. I did that last week too with
the other furniture company. I remember that and not the
furniture company. Attention team. The fourth of July is around
the corner and you can stock up on everything you
need to host a winning weekend to get together at
Bob's Discount Furniture. Bob's Discount Furniture, the furniture store of

(57:45):
the New England Patriots, joined Bob's for four for the
fourth celebration that's a mouthful and shop must haves for
every room like featured pack sectionals perfect for hosting party,
ready dining sets and consumer reports recommended Mattress is at
unbelievable values. Do the fireworks so stopping and get a
holiday weekend ready at Bob's's com Furniture the Afridial Furniture

(58:08):
Store of the New England Patriots. When they update the reads,
I really should read them ahead of time.

Speaker 1 (58:12):
You should lawless execution glowing the salespeople under the bus.

Speaker 2 (58:15):
I should read them ahead of time because I'm much
better at reading it when I've read it ahead of time.
When I don't read it ahead of times.

Speaker 1 (58:22):
What you usually want to usually want to read it
ahead of time. Any copy you're gonna read on the air,
usually try to read ahead of time. Honestly, man, those
segues are awesome, great segues.

Speaker 2 (58:30):
Thank you, thank you. This Alex is being nice to me.
This Alex is not being nice to me about my segues.
I'm just I'm just having radio that I was giving
praise to another uh, another closed company, another company. I
was saying that I'm very picked the front work where

(58:50):
that's what.

Speaker 1 (58:50):
I could have said that part. If you had said
that part, it would have been a great read. You
just went a little too far with it. I went
a little little too comfortable with it.

Speaker 2 (58:59):
You're right, You're right. Okay, I'll work on that for
next time. Shall we take these phone calls? All right?
Nate is in Connecticut. What's up, Nate?

Speaker 6 (59:07):
Than guys? Can you guys hear me?

Speaker 2 (59:08):
Well, yeah, we got you.

Speaker 6 (59:11):
Okay.

Speaker 7 (59:11):
I know I called in yesterday and my phone quality
welcome the best, so I'm hoping it's better today.

Speaker 1 (59:16):
Sounds good.

Speaker 7 (59:17):
But anyways, my question for you guys is have we
heard any update on Terrell Williams. I know he has
had contact with the team, but he hasn't been in
the facilities in person. Any more update on that. And
my second question for you guys is what would you
consider a successful season?

Speaker 6 (59:35):
Is it?

Speaker 7 (59:35):
Ten wins? Eight wins? Seven wins are just a winning record?

Speaker 2 (59:39):
Thank you, guys, thanks for the call, Nate, much better
phone today. Yesterday was not Nate's best phone performance. Today
was much better. Terrell Williams Mike Rabel seemed cautiously optimistic.
I guess I would say at the end of Mini
caampt Terrell Williams will be here soon and we'll be
ready to coach for training camp. But it's something that

(01:00:00):
just in terms of attendance. Unfortunately, given the heal the
situation that it's a health situation, he is now on
the list of attendance, so we have to check on
July twenty third of whether or not he is here.
But I would say cautiously optimistic that he will be
out there based off of what Rabel said.

Speaker 1 (01:00:18):
Yeah, we haven't heard. That was the last update we've gotten.

Speaker 2 (01:00:21):
So yeah, in terms of our expectations for the season,
that's one that I've struggled with a little bit because
I want to I said at the beginning of the
last show, I want to be all in on this team.
I think they have a lot, a lot more talent.
I think they have significantly better coaching, and I'm optimistic,
but what they have in front of them, I'm just

(01:00:42):
gonna have to see some of it to believe some
of it. In terms of predicting them to be in
playoff contention or double digit wins, I'm probably right now
at like an eight and nine season.

Speaker 1 (01:00:52):
So for me, it's just I don't know that I
can give you a number. I think it's more and
I've laid out in the past, Evan my life timeline
for a rebuild and a rookie quarterback contract be in
the mix for playoff spot. Week eighteen should matter if
they ultimately don't get in, but they're playing meaningful football
in Week eighteen, and like there's other things within this.

(01:01:14):
Obviously you want to see Drake may take a step forward,
things like that. But I think all things considered, if
Week eighteen is a meaningful game for them and not
in the way it was last year, like a real
playoff implication meaningful game for them, I would say they
had a That's the baseline for me, Like, okay, I
think they had the kind of season they needed to have,
and then next year the expectation would be not only

(01:01:36):
that they make the playoffs that they are, you know,
Week eighteen is at least relevant for the division that
they're competing for, the division down to the end.

Speaker 2 (01:01:44):
So let me ask you this. Then, Yeah, you said
week eighteen not in the way of last year.

Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
Right, that was kind of just tongue in cheap, I know, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:01:53):
Two Week eighteen was technically they were a lot in
Week eighteen it is a game in Buffalo. It was
the Naheim Heines two touchdown return game.

Speaker 1 (01:02:06):
Does the game after uh Hamlin, right, Yeah, yeah, I.

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
Think I think it might have been the first home
game after that for the Bills. Technically speaking, I believe
if they had won that game in twenty twenty two,
they were gonna go to.

Speaker 1 (01:02:21):
The b help. I think they needed help. They'd to
win in something else that to happen.

Speaker 2 (01:02:25):
But is that Is that meaningful enough if it's something
like that, because that team, to me, was already on
the downward and you could tell that they were going
in the wrong direction. So a lot of it is
what it looks like.

Speaker 1 (01:02:39):
So kind of I guess that's a fair question. Look,
they started six and four and then went five and
two down the stretch, and so this was two and five. Yeah,
So this is something i'd go to with that, the
operational stuff, like, I just want to see signs that
they've taken progress going back to the end of Bill.
They've not been good in November in December now, So look,

(01:03:03):
if it's something like that, here here's where again, it's like,
so I can't it's tough to give a straight answer,
and I know this is classic me. But like, did
they go six and four and then two and five
and they're, you know, attempting to back in with the win.
What if they start two and five and then go
six and four and maybe they lose the last week
and that's why they don't get in, but they won
six of their last ten games.

Speaker 2 (01:03:24):
That to me would be okay, it's different, right, Like
that's what I'm saying, And we'd all depends how say,
because that Week eighteen game could be meaningful, like it
wasn't twenty twenty two, but it wasn't really like you
knew that team was not very good.

Speaker 1 (01:03:38):
You could feel they also okay. But here's here's the thing.
If they hadn't overachieved in twenty one, if they had
won four games in twenty one and then had that season,
we would look at that a lot differently. It's because
they regressed. I find it really hard to believe that
this team is going to show regression. And if they do,
they're not flirting with the playoff spot. We'll know by Halloween,
yea that they're not in the playoffs. So like, yeah,

(01:04:02):
it's a fair point. So I'll tell you these two things.
Be in the mix or playoff spot in week eighteen,
and be better at the end of the season than
they are at the beginning of it. I like, if
they do those two things and Drake may show some
sign of progression within the team showing progression, it's a
successful season.

Speaker 5 (01:04:18):
To me.

Speaker 2 (01:04:19):
We are and we got an email about this. We
are in the minority in a lot of ways with
our feelings on the team. Like there's some people that
think that were too low on the team.

Speaker 1 (01:04:31):
I had them at ten wins on the schedule release day,
but that well, I said they should win ten games.
It doesn't mean they will. I said they should win ten.

Speaker 2 (01:04:38):
But you're that whole take that I agree with about
what would deem a successful season To a lot of people,
that would not be a successful season. We're talking about.
I think, well, eight nine wins and yeah it's pointing upwards,
but there's still not a playoff team, and that a
lot of people would be disappointed with that. I think

(01:04:58):
that's great growth. I think that's over at least double,
if not over double, the wins that they had last year.
It's arrow by the way.

Speaker 1 (01:05:08):
Nine wins might get you in the playoffs in this
AFC the conference sucks.

Speaker 2 (01:05:13):
It's good at the top, it sucks in the middle sucks.

Speaker 1 (01:05:16):
And they don't. They'll like what three good teams at
the top? Yeah, I guess they played the Bills twice,
so that doesn't help them.

Speaker 2 (01:05:22):
But oh the Bills are a good team though relative to.

Speaker 1 (01:05:27):
The conference where it stands right now. Yeah, they're a
little better in the Cleveland Browns.

Speaker 2 (01:05:30):
All right, let's take Patty in aguon. What's up? Patty?

Speaker 5 (01:05:35):
What's up?

Speaker 8 (01:05:35):
Guys. I'll go over a few things. First thing, getting
into the wins. I'd be happy with anything over seven
to wins, seven wins or more, just as long as
they don't start out seven and zero and end up
the season seven and ten. I just want to see growth,
and especially growth from Drake May. Like I said on
a previous show, I don't think he's I don't think
this is good is going to be his breakout year.

(01:05:57):
But I do think he's going to improve, and as
long as they steadily improved, I'll be happy with that.
My second thing I want to get into I know
it's way too early, but I'm giving you my Super
Bowl picks this year. I'm picking the Ravens to go
up against the Rams and I am taken in an
all time classic your guy he's my guy too for

(01:06:18):
a little bit too, but lamar super Bowl MVP. And
the last thing I want to cover is I know
there's only one Saturday training camp that's open to the public,
and I'm looking to attendant. And if it's possible, I
know you guys are going to be busy watching this,
watching the practices, and you're gonna have to do your
writing and probably get on video afterwards. But if I

(01:06:41):
do end up going, I would like to say pop
in and just say what's up to you guys, if
that's possible. If not, no big deal, you know.

Speaker 2 (01:06:48):
But absolutely is it possible. So what my recommendation. I
maybe I shouldn't tell everybody the secret of how to
crash the media attempt, but.

Speaker 1 (01:06:57):
Yeah I wouldn't, so I simply would.

Speaker 2 (01:07:00):
My recommendation would be, uh, if you're going to do that,
I would say before practice is probably the move. I
think after practice we we do get pretty busy, but
before practice we could definitely say quick hello for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:07:12):
Yeah, if you come over by the media time there,
that's usually yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:07:15):
I'm gonna keep I'm gonna keep that call in like
the week before to remind us Yeah, absolutely, pass.

Speaker 8 (01:07:21):
Well, I promise do you know what will guys? I
call it it almost every week.

Speaker 5 (01:07:24):
It's been.

Speaker 8 (01:07:24):
It's been a little bit crazy. That's why I've been
calling it in a couple of weeks. But uh, you know,
working family life gets you after a certain point. As Evan,
you're you know you're gonna soon find out alex stays
single as long as you can.

Speaker 1 (01:07:39):
But that's all tell him that next week, speaking of
that super Bowl projection, we do have a little NFL
breaking news, very bold and this kind of goes this
kind of goes to my point about the AFC kind
of sucking and the haves and the have nots. Jay
R Alexander has signed with the Baltimore Ravens.

Speaker 2 (01:08:01):
Patty got some reinforcements for you.

Speaker 1 (01:08:03):
How about that? That's a good move for I. Lamar
is gonna get his and you know I was not
a Lamar guy at the beginning. My hot take was
that Lamar Jackson and Josh Allen were very similar players
that did kind of in terms of their ability. That
take bode well, not the way I meant it to,
but it boded well.

Speaker 2 (01:08:21):
You were saying that because you thought they were bad.

Speaker 1 (01:08:23):
I thought yes.

Speaker 2 (01:08:23):
And now they both have m vps.

Speaker 1 (01:08:25):
Well one has two real MVPs and one has a
fraudulent MVP that should have been the other's third. But
I digress.

Speaker 2 (01:08:32):
The Ravens always has to be a backhanding car.

Speaker 1 (01:08:34):
Are the Ravens? That's not remotely a compliment. It was
a fraud MVP. Man, Lamar Jackson's going to be a Marino.
He's just going to be a career Dan Marino. Are
the Ravens the best team in the AFC?

Speaker 2 (01:08:46):
They should be?

Speaker 1 (01:08:47):
Yeah, I mean they might have been before they signed
to Youer Alexander. I'm not like. I don't think I'm
being a prisoner of the moment here. But that's a
great addition for them.

Speaker 2 (01:08:54):
Lamar I Lamar and Josh Allen. I've loved both of them,
love watching both of them. I would say Lamar is
probably my favorite quarterback in the NFL currently that isn't
playing for the Patriots. That that would be where I'm
at with Lamar. I just pulled up his playoff box
scores and look box scorse gotting stinks. I hate I

(01:09:14):
of all people should not be doing this, but to
pick the Ravens to win the Super Bowl, he's gonna
have to play better than he thought.

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
So I always thought a lot of that was just
because he runs so much. He was hurt at the
end of the year and he wasn't himself. But they
added Derrick Henry last year and that should have made
a difference. Yeah, was he better in the playoff game
last year? I don't remember he was better.

Speaker 2 (01:09:37):
He was bad, and then he turned it on and
got them back in the game. He threw a really
bad pick against Buffalo with just a bad pick. He
also fumbled against Buffalo as well, so he had two
turnovers against the Bills. I think they were both in
the first half if I remember correctly. And then he
was literally a Mark Andrews drop two points right away
from having that game in overtime. So let's call for

(01:09:59):
what it is. In the second half of the game,
he put Baltimore on his back and got them back
in the game.

Speaker 1 (01:10:05):
Mahomes has just taken advantage of Allen and Jackson just
choking and puking all over themselves in every shot. And
in this kid Joe Burrow a load up again.

Speaker 2 (01:10:14):
Buffalo and Baltimore played in the divisional round, which that's
a heavyweight divisional round matchup. You know, they could have
had seating gone a different way, but he was just
from the box score, he was sixteen for twenty one
for one to seventy five and two touchdowns against Pittsburgh
in that win, he did rush for eighty one yard.

Speaker 1 (01:10:37):
Yeah, that Pittsburgh wind really felt like them being like,
we know we're the better team, but the Patriots played
these games. Let's get in, get out, don't get hurt,
No need to get flashy.

Speaker 2 (01:10:45):
One seventy five inc great, you know, eight point three
yards per tempt. So you know, it wasn't It was efficient,
but it wasn't. It wasn't a high volume game for Lamar.
And then in the Buffalo playoff game he was eighteen
for twenty five for two fifty four, two touchdowns, one pick.
He only ran it six times six for thirty nine yards,
and then he had the probable lost as well. So

(01:11:08):
I want Lamar to win to a super Bowl, maybe
more than any quarterback that's not named Drake May in
the NFL. I'd love to see it, but he's gonna
have to be a little bit better that and I
hate that, like I hate that narrative. I hate all
of that. But that's just the in his case, it's
probably an accurate conversation.

Speaker 1 (01:11:26):
I just it. It's it's wide opening again. I mean,
the Chiefs are the Chiefs. You can't rule them out,
but they've lost talent. The Ravens and Bills continue to
choke and puke all over themselves in big moments. The
Texans took a step back last year and we're CJ
strad at and he's now got this with's his shoulder
issue right, that's limited him throwing in camp. Who's next?

(01:11:47):
Is it the Steelers?

Speaker 6 (01:11:48):
No?

Speaker 1 (01:11:49):
Is it the Dolphins?

Speaker 6 (01:11:50):
No?

Speaker 1 (01:11:52):
I'm just looking at the second place team. Is that
the Chargers at the Broncos. I don't think so. The
Chargers on paper should be, but they won't.

Speaker 2 (01:11:58):
So the other question that I and we're kind of
talked about the Sun Pew and Patty kind of jogged
my brain about it.

Speaker 1 (01:12:03):
I don't even think there's a take there beyond just
like it's not a good but with.

Speaker 2 (01:12:08):
Drake May and our expectations for Drake May, just talking
about his entire career now, Yes, as a whole you can't. Obviously,
you can't use Brady like Brady as being the bar
is a bar that will never be reached again. It's
it's unfair to everybody. We're taken. We have to have
a different bar for what is deemed a good career,

(01:12:31):
What is deemed that he's you know, he passes because
I think there's a lot of still and I understand it.
You know, won one game last year. There's still there's
a lot of people out there that still aren't ready
to anoint him like the franchise quarterback, you know, the guy. Yeah,
but what is what's our bar for him being the guy?
Because for other teams that don't have a Tom Brady

(01:12:53):
in their history, the bar for being the guy is
very different than what we know it is around here.
So you ring up the Chargers, Justin Herbert is the guy.
There's no doubt that Justin Herbert's a great talent and
a great quarterback.

Speaker 1 (01:13:06):
You know, not seeing those like Burner Twitter accounts saying
like per sources that definitely don't exist. There's gonna be
like a Alex Smith Patrick Mahomes thing with Justin Herbert
and Trey Lance. No, if anybody's gonna do that. It
is hard.

Speaker 2 (01:13:20):
So Justin Herbert is the undisputed quote unquote guy in LA.
He has not won a playoff game yet. He's owing
to in the playoffs and what I want to say,
two playoff appearances in five years, he's owing to in
two playoff games. He's never won a playoff game. Do

(01:13:42):
any of us sit here in question whether or not
Justin Herbert's great? No, but that's if that's the bar,
he's not really passing it, right. I'll give you another
one that I kind of thought of in the Drake
mayprism just because of the raw talent, Like Trevor Lawrence
is another one to me, tons of raw talent, tons
of ability, but has either not sniffed the playoffs or

(01:14:06):
had really hasn't had much success in the playoffs. I
think you had that one playoff win that was over Herbert, right,
the big comeback, that was a couple of years ago.
So I guess the point that I'm trying to make
with Drake May is like Justin Herbert Trevor Lawrence are
the guy undisputed. You had to pay those guys and

(01:14:30):
in like two or three years from now, if Drake
May's career trajectory follows a similar trajectory as those players.
He's gonna be a sixty million dollar year quarterback, yep.
And I don't think you can second guess that, like
you have to give him that contract, right, like yes.
So that's the world we live in now with these quarterbacks,

(01:14:50):
where that bar of like it's really it's black or white.
It's either yes you are or no you're not, and
there's no in between. There's no more like middling quarterback contract.
It sort of came back a little bit like this
Sam Darnold deal in Seattle's like kind of intriguing for that,
but for the most part, you're talking about you're either

(01:15:11):
playing this guy fifty million plus or you're not paying
him and you're back in the carousel. And I just
wonder where the Patriots will fall with Drake May if
it's similar to some of these other guys, If we're
being realistic about where they're going, and he's not going
all of a sudden turned into like Mahomes or Jalen Hurts,

(01:15:31):
who's in the super Bowl every other year, You're gonna
have a very expensive quarterback that I think a lot
of people, especially people on like your station will be
like it isn't worth it.

Speaker 1 (01:15:40):
You just hope that they can put the ross around him.

Speaker 2 (01:15:44):
It's just an interesting conversation because our brains are obviously
we had Brady. Brady also was very team friendly with
the contracts that he took. The way the quarterback market
is going. Now, do you think that Trevor Lawrence should
be making fifty million a year?

Speaker 1 (01:16:02):
You know, my view on these contracts, it's it's all
kind of fugazi, it really is. Because when's the last
time Evan, a player at any position, but especially quarterback,
got a contract and people were like, yeah, you know,
he's a good player, but they're probably playing paying him
a little too much money. When's the last time that
happened in the NFL? I know, it just happened with

(01:16:24):
the Red Sox.

Speaker 2 (01:16:25):
Unfortunately, some people might think that that's the case with
these guys though, like is Trevor is Trevor Lawrence worth?

Speaker 1 (01:16:30):
But when you look at the alternative, like he's a
good quarterback.

Speaker 2 (01:16:34):
Yeah, right? And Kyler Murray the other one, Okay, but
like quarterback.

Speaker 1 (01:16:39):
Two or three years after signing the nobody's saying Kyler
Murray's overpaid and the cardinal should have signed him. Nobody's
saying that, And that's coming for me, who's not a
big Kyler Murray guy like Mahomes. When the Mahomes contract
came out, it was, oh my god, this is gonna
change sports. This is generational, this is legendary. What is
two years later and he's the Is he even a

(01:17:01):
top ten.

Speaker 2 (01:17:02):
Highest paid He signed a Brady contract if we're being honest,
like he signed him.

Speaker 1 (01:17:06):
No, he was one of the highest page.

Speaker 2 (01:17:08):
Yeah, but it was it was always below the number
that if you projected it out of way, the market
was going.

Speaker 1 (01:17:14):
Lamar Jackson wins back to back MVPs, gets that big contract,
Oh my god, is he really worth that much money? Now,
Dak Prescott's making more than him. Look, it's not my money,
so I get it. But also, like all of these contracts,
the way the cap goes up, with the TV deals
and all that, none of them really end up being
the albatross we all think they're gonna be in the moment. Now,

(01:17:36):
Sometimes you have to renegotiate it and players get upset,
and that's part of it. But again, the alternative is
not having the player. So if the players good, usually
it ends up being a good contract. I don't remember
the last time the NFL a good players signed a
bad contract. There are players we thought we were gonna
be good, that we thought were gonna be good that
weren't in the contract becomes bad, but that's because the
player isn't performing. With how flexible the NFL salary cap is,

(01:17:59):
both in terms of how can maneuver it and how
much changes year to year, it's really really hard in
this league, specifically to have a good player on a
bad contract, especially at that position, when you consider the alternative.

Speaker 2 (01:18:11):
I just keep looking at all these quarterback contracts and look,
we're only in year two of Drake may where a
couple of years away from this being not a problem.

Speaker 1 (01:18:19):
But how many are truly bad? How many do you
look at and look, you could look at the Daniel
Jones contract and say that was a bad contract, he
was a bad quarterback. How many do you truly look
at and say, he is a good quarterback, but they
would have been better off not paying him. Is there
any of those contracts that you can confidently say that
about Rock Party? But is brock Purty good quarterback's fine?

(01:18:44):
Is brock Purty a starting caliber quarterback. Yeah, okay. So
there's one example, and that's your boy, Kyle Shanahan. So
your guy, your genius, signed the worst quarterback contract in
the league. Well, there's a reason I'm saying loudly to
make surebody hears this. Your football genius signed the worst
contract in the league. Is that what you're telling me.

Speaker 2 (01:19:02):
I don't know if it's the worst contract in the league.

Speaker 1 (01:19:04):
Well, it's the one bad quarterback contract according to you,
and that's the most important position. This is my point. Like,
and I will leave room in this. I will leave
room in this for injuries, like I if a guy
gets hurt a lot, that's another conversation. But again, to
find a good quarterback that's on a bad contract and

(01:19:25):
not well, I think he sucks and they should have
sign him. So then you think he's a bad quarterback.
A quarterback that you think is good that is on
a bad contract, it's hard to find that.

Speaker 2 (01:19:33):
It is hard to find. I'll pull it up and
we'll take the next call and maybe we can figure
it out. All right, Jeff is in LA. What's up? Jeff?

Speaker 6 (01:19:42):
Hey, Ivan, Alex, thanks for tating to call. Two questions
I had for you. With the reported hirings of the
expansion of the team's analytics department, what are some tangible
benefits or benefits that you expect to see in the
next few years to bring the team more online with
other franchises. And secondly, in an effort to help injury
situations due to an expanded schedule and like the lack

(01:20:03):
of player development that we see across the league, was
wondering what you thought about this rule change suggestion. All
fifty three players on the active roster on game day
are active, but to create parody, the amount of elevation
from the practice squad each week correspond to the number
of players who are ruled out due to injury. Thanks
for great content, guys, and thanks very much for partic Nicole.

Speaker 2 (01:20:24):
Thanks Jeff. That's an interesting proposal, because the reason why
they have the way it is with the forty six
or forty seven guys and then the inactives is so
that you don't have to have an injured player active,
right Like, if the guy's injured, you can just put
him on an active So he's saying that would then
free up an elevation from the practice squad, so that.

Speaker 1 (01:20:44):
Yeah, but you're gonna have a lot of teams getting
weird with injuries on a week to week basis. I
just think making all fifty three active makes sense. Yeah,
Like you could just leave it at that and then
you still have the two practice squad elevations, right, So
I get the issue that in the past, before all
this practice squad menuitia came into play, was that then
you could, in theory, have a team that has like
fifty one healthy players going up against a team that

(01:21:06):
has fifty three healthy players. Right, So now when you
with the inactives, you in theory will get everybody down
to the same number of healthy players. I think between
fifty five players it should be close enough.

Speaker 2 (01:21:17):
Yeah, I agree with that. Now to the first question.
It's a really good question about the analytics department, A
classic catch twenty two question, because I know, uh, I
don't know how exactly you feel about them expanding their
analytics department. So just on the on the surface, like
I you know, first and foremost, you know, where do
you stand on this? Because you know I love it,
So where do you stand on it?

Speaker 1 (01:21:37):
I look, analytics is this wide umbrella, right, And I
think you often assume that I hate all of it.

Speaker 2 (01:21:44):
And that's because you only talk about the one thing
when it's like a.

Speaker 1 (01:21:48):
Really tangible numbers. I am okay with the tangible numbers,
and that can mean multiple things. That can mean statistics,
but also like when it comes to player evaluation, player
tracking data, miles per hour, that sort of thing. Right,
I'm in on that, and they haven't used a ton
of that, and I'm all for using more of that.

(01:22:08):
That I'm good with when it comes to like injuries
and that kind of thing, I'm good with. What I
don't want is well, the expected EPA DVOA on this
play tells us we should make this decision. So turn
off your brain and make the decision, because the spreadsheet
says So that's what I don't want. And based on
what Rabel said last week about analytics, he doesn't want
it either. I think, I you know, do I love

(01:22:32):
that they're going more to the maths side, know, because
that's just how I feel about sports. Do I think
Rabel is going to keep it where it belongs and
not allow it to spill into areas that it doesn't.

Speaker 2 (01:22:43):
Yes. He basically said that you want the football jock
to bury the nerd in the locker every once in
a while when he needs to be to.

Speaker 1 (01:22:51):
Make sure everybody knows their place. That's what you want,
and he said. Rabel's asked, are.

Speaker 2 (01:22:55):
You're the ghost behind your computer and let the football guys?

Speaker 1 (01:22:58):
Rabels asked, are the analytics guy is going to be
in your ear when it comes to making you know,
should we go for this on fourth down? And Rabel said, no,
that'll be me in stretch talking about the analytics and
make sure he said that, you know, we'll talk to
those guys during the week and we'll see what they have,
but it's gonna be him in stretch making a football
decision in that moment. The analytics might help inform it,
but they are not going to make the decision.

Speaker 2 (01:23:18):
Fine, So we talk about this all the time on
and off the air, and we talk about it a
lot with the Celtics too, because in the Red Sox,
but Celtics really.

Speaker 1 (01:23:27):
The Red Sox are on a whole other level with
us as we're learning.

Speaker 2 (01:23:31):
But I I know how to put words in your mouth,
but I my general feel on your take on this
is that you don't want them impacting play style like
you don't like the Celtics Your issue with them is
that the nerds say to shoot three, so they shoot
a bunch of three.

Speaker 1 (01:23:46):
I don't want it being the lead driver of dictating
play style and get in game decision making. If you
want to use it as a guide and have it
be one of multiple things you're looking at to inform you, fine,
it should not be the be all, end all.

Speaker 2 (01:24:00):
You don't want the Patriots head coach and this is
different but similar. You don't want the Patriots head coach
at the owners Meeting saying the most important stat is
past EPA right, which is what Ben Johnson said in
the Owners Meeting.

Speaker 1 (01:24:14):
The most important status points. So however you get them,
I don't care if it looks pretty or not. And
however you keep them off the board, I don't care
if it looks pretty or not.

Speaker 2 (01:24:22):
So I'm not I'm not too concerned about the Patriots
using for lack of using like public data that like
EPA or no love Aaron Schatz mean it DVA. Yeah,
I'm not worried about them using those metrics because the

(01:24:42):
people that they've hired in the way that I think
they're heading is that they want to create their own metrics.
They want it, So it's not necessarily going to be EPA,
d VA or whatever. But I think the main thing
that they're trying to do, and this is just a hunch,
is side information just a hunch. The main thing that
most teams try to do now is they use this

(01:25:05):
in personnel to place value on players, not necessarily to say, oh,
when we're in this first you know formation, with this
personnel grouping, you know, twelve personnel against base defense, we're
averaging you know, our EPA is plus two point five
per play, So we should try to do that more, right, Like,
I don't think that that's where football in general is headed.

Speaker 1 (01:25:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:25:28):
I think where they are headed though, is free agency.
How do we and the Patriot like Bill did this?

Speaker 1 (01:25:35):
So this isn't new So okay, so you're walking a
fine line here because what we just went through with
the Red Sox is the grandiose version of each player
is worth an exact dollar amount. We're going to measure
that dollar amount against the contract. And this goes back
to what we were talking about with the quarterbacks. I
don't want to go too far in the baseball discussion,

(01:25:57):
but like, if our metric tells us that this is
a two hundred and ninety eight million dollar player, and
we would have to pay him three hundred million. We
do not want that player, and that, to me is
a dangerous road to go down, because you do have
to overpay elite players at times, whether the math tells
you to or not. That's how you get good players

(01:26:17):
in the building. I'm not saying the Patriots are going
to do that. I think Rabel's smart enough not to.
But what you're describing is what has become super charged
and run a muck through baseball.

Speaker 2 (01:26:27):
Sure, So I think there's a big element of that
in terms of player evaluation. So I whether that's value,
whether that's player tracking, whether that's you know, any sort
of advanced scouting, type of stuffy and analytical scouting. Like,
there's the personnel side of this, I think is going
to be a main driver of what they're going to

(01:26:50):
be doing.

Speaker 5 (01:26:50):
I like it.

Speaker 1 (01:26:51):
For player this is going to I'm probably splitting heres here,
hairs here. If they're a user for a player of
value evaluation, fine, for player valuation, now, I think you're
going down a slopery slope.

Speaker 2 (01:27:02):
Okay, So I think that there's going to do a
lot of that with personnel. Now, I do think that
there is a lot of data, and this data usually
they they have a present to packet to a coach,
the head coach and the coaching staff every week of
analytical data about the opponent, scouting the opponent, and for

(01:27:24):
all thirty two. It's up to the coaching staff how
much you look at it and how much you done
what tendencies?

Speaker 1 (01:27:30):
So like that's not even doing that for years.

Speaker 2 (01:27:33):
Sure, but I think this is yes, but more modernized, right,
so we're not necessarily just talking about splitting grouping. How
often are they an eleven or twelve?

Speaker 1 (01:27:42):
And you can get is expected with tendencies.

Speaker 2 (01:27:45):
I don't think it's about expected. Uh No, I would say,
you know, there's things like heat maps are becoming popular.
Where does the quarterback funnel?

Speaker 1 (01:27:56):
The floor? That's tangible, date, that's tangible.

Speaker 2 (01:27:58):
That's fine, right, So like this, yeah, to inbreakers in
the middle of the field, and this is you could
watch the film and come to that conclusion, but you
could also see it in like the hot spots on
a heat map.

Speaker 1 (01:28:10):
Well, so I would hope they do both because there's
things that the heat map is not going to show
you that the film is going to show you, right,
how is he it does when he you know, moves
in the pocket, where's his arm slot? When he throws
to certain places? What routes? You know, you catch a
ball in between the hashes four yards down field from
the line of scrimmage, there's what four or five different

(01:28:33):
routes that could get you to that spot, and he
might throw those different routes differently depending on the coverage.
So it's your point, like how much how little? I
don't think Rabel's gonna look at that packet as a bible.
Might use it, but I don't think he's gonna look
at it as the be all end all, which is fine,
Like it's a tool, it just shouldn't be the tool.

Speaker 2 (01:28:50):
Okay, So let me ask you how you feel about this.

Speaker 3 (01:28:54):
What if.

Speaker 2 (01:28:56):
There is a cornerback, Yeah, and the data is able
to extrapulate how that cornerback fares on every route when
he's targeted, go route, post crosser, corner, drag, incut, yeah,
all of it. And the data is just like heavily

(01:29:16):
telling you that this cornerback is burnt toast when you
throw a go ball over his head.

Speaker 1 (01:29:24):
So, I you know, how's that there's still more information there.
How who's tracking that? How's it being tracked? Is he
toast because they're shading safety help and maybe you know
they have a good safety and okay, well he's getting burnt,
but if they're gonna put the safety back, we don't
want to worry about it.

Speaker 3 (01:29:42):
Or is it?

Speaker 1 (01:29:42):
Because is it? Is the data skewed because in this
one game he was struggling this one receiver or this
type of receiver that maybe we don't have, Like again, okay,
you show me that I'm not gonna use so here,
I guess here's where I'm at. So if I were
the coach and I were showing that right, the right
answer is not Okay, let's throw a million go balls
at this guy. It's get me the cutups of all

(01:30:04):
the go balls. Let's see why this is happening. And
do we have the assets on our roster to be
able to take advantage of this? Yes or no? Because
if you have it, I think that's exactly okay. But
I think there are some people and maybe they're not
really the coaches, but I think there's some people who
look at it, analytics who look at that and don't

(01:30:25):
go to that second step and say this guy sucks
against the go ball bombs away and that's not the
process and that never will be the process, and map
can never fill in that grind, that that that groundwork
in the middle.

Speaker 2 (01:30:40):
That to me is analytics at its best, is exactly
how you just.

Speaker 1 (01:30:44):
Do you think everybody uses it at its best? No,
the answer is no, and that's my problem.

Speaker 2 (01:30:49):
No, but I would say football is still holding out
the best in football?

Speaker 1 (01:30:54):
Do you think everybody uses it at the best for football?
And by the way, I against major everything that Vrabel
said last week, I was actually relatively encouraged by when
he was talking about analytics, which was we're gonna basically
summed up it. I don't you know, maybe I'm misinterpreting,
but my interpretation was we wanted to have more of
it as a tool. But at the end of the day,
it's me and Stretch and we're making football decisions good

(01:31:17):
in terms of like going for it and right, yeah,
and I will. I think you can extrapolate that too.
I remember that thing a couple of years ago, where
like the Browns was, it was the coach before Stefanski,
like the the game plan had to be turned in
every Friday, so the analytics department could approve it.

Speaker 2 (01:31:34):
Do you remember that sounds like a Browns thing like
that is wrong? Now, I think what what dared?

Speaker 1 (01:31:39):
But I don't think the Patriots would ever do that.

Speaker 2 (01:31:41):
I think what you're hoping for in a dream world
is that the analytics department find some anomalies within the
data of this team's bad at defending this. They run
a lot of that, you know, that kind of stuff,
and then the coaches then take that and say and
put content behind it, like is this real? To your

(01:32:03):
point about Goballs, is that corner. We're four weeks into
the season and he's bad against Goballs, but he faced
Jamar Chase aj Brown Tyreek kill, right, So then we're
throwing that out that's not real.

Speaker 1 (01:32:13):
That's I just think there's some analytics people. I don't
know that these are the people working for the team,
but just the people in the football community that you
talk to that get really upset when their information is
not used and they don't like the context being added
because they think it's devaluing the value of analytics.

Speaker 2 (01:32:28):
So I don't think that you're you should be too
worried about the game to game stuff. If you're gonna
be worried for you. I'm not worried about any of it,
but if you're gonna be worried, it's the personnel side
of it.

Speaker 1 (01:32:40):
So I'm worried and I'm encouraged. Like the player tracking
stuff great, Like I wouldn't hate if they did more
that don't go as far as the rams and like
not bother to interview the players because I think the
person matters to and what happens between them some draft
matters rorbly, So I mean it's gonna catch up to
them eventually.

Speaker 3 (01:32:56):
You got it.

Speaker 1 (01:32:56):
Well, But they meet with the players later, right or
do they just not do meeting at all?

Speaker 2 (01:33:00):
They don't do meetings.

Speaker 1 (01:33:01):
See, that's going to catch up eventually. They've gotten lucky,
that's going to catch up to them. They do homework, like,
don't get they know all about the player? Yeah, I
think you got to sit down a room with somebody
to get to know him.

Speaker 2 (01:33:11):
That don't mean they know like I mean like if
they was a major off the field, right, they're talking.

Speaker 1 (01:33:15):
To coaches and things like that. But also just I
think that will catch up to them eventually. I think
it's an anomaly that that hasn't burned them yet. But
like the player tracking stuff, fine again, evaluation, sure, valuation
is where you lose me.

Speaker 2 (01:33:30):
I think that it's really important for this team. I'm not.
I'm not really. I don't think it's really important from
a game plan perspective, like an in season perspective. Let
the football coaches be football coaches. Like they can see
that the guy's bat at the goball because they're watching
the all twenty two. They don't need they don't need
a nerd to tell I.

Speaker 1 (01:33:49):
Don't want this to replace what was it? Orlando pace?
Like they figured out this was an old bill thing
that like when he was in a two point stance,
it was a pass, and he's in a three point stance,
it was a run like ninety nine percent of the time, right, Like,
definitely watching the tape, figure that out. When this wide
receiver's left foot first, he's running this route. When he's
right for first, he's running that route.

Speaker 2 (01:34:07):
You can find all that out. Like, I have full
faith in this coach.

Speaker 1 (01:34:10):
He's that. I don't consider analytics at all. No, that's
just grinding tape. That's coaching.

Speaker 2 (01:34:14):
I have full faith in this coaching staff to go
game plan, you know an opponent, like, I'm not worried
about using Matt there the personnel side of things to
me that they've been pretty behind the times with two things.
One the in game player tracking data, you know, the
chip in the pads, Like I didn't like a couple

(01:34:37):
of years ago when I heard I'm not gonna name names,
when I heard certain people in the front office talking
about putting stock in the forty yard dash, I just
don't love it. I get that it's uniform. I get
that it's been around forever. I get that everybody has
to run the same forty so in here you're stacking
likes with likes. But football is played with pads on.

(01:34:58):
It's played between the lines. It's not a track meet.

Speaker 1 (01:35:01):
You can and you can use both just because like
you can still use the forty and the player tracking.
I think there's room for both. I don't think it
has to be one of the other.

Speaker 2 (01:35:10):
So I like that the track and data is coming
more towards the modern side of the way of doing things.
The other thing that I really like about it is
the predictive stuff that they have in terms of injuries.

Speaker 1 (01:35:24):
I think can be really so the injury stuff's fascinating
and that goes way over my head the.

Speaker 2 (01:35:28):
Sports science, if you will.

Speaker 1 (01:35:29):
So that's like actual medicine, that is somewhere where math belongs.
I have no problem.

Speaker 2 (01:35:34):
Very cool, very good. I think you can tell a
lot about you know, is this player's ne gonna last?
Is something?

Speaker 3 (01:35:42):
You know?

Speaker 2 (01:35:42):
Is there some wear and tear on his shoulder as
a quarterback? Like anything?

Speaker 5 (01:35:46):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:35:46):
And I think that's all important. So I think that
that can help. And you know, you always bring up
the Browns on the other side of the spectrum of
a team that's used a lot of math that hasn't
worked out. I always use the Eagles because they just
won the Super Bowl. The Lions are also at the
forefront of this Baltimore Buffalo. A lot of really good teams,
a lot of really bad teams are probably have big aa.

Speaker 1 (01:36:08):
Thing with this. And we this comes up a lot,
and we talk about the Celtics. Yes, did Joe Mizzoula's
style like last year in the win title? Did that style?
Did that philosophy work because the math was so good
that it was just unstoppable? Or did it work because
he had a super team and no matter how they played,
they were probably gonna win, right Like the same with
the Eagles, or the Eagles great because their math was

(01:36:31):
crunched so tightly and the numbers were so perfect. Or
did the Eagles win because they had an absolute nightmare
of refront seven a dominant offensive line?

Speaker 2 (01:36:39):
Right?

Speaker 1 (01:36:40):
But how did moxcelln skill players?

Speaker 2 (01:36:42):
My rebuttal to that, though, is I'm more interested in
the personnel side and how did the Eagles build that monster?
They built it through Howie Roseman and having a great
front office and great general managing. So it's like a
chicken or the egg thing, right, Like, the first thing
that had to happen was they had to acquire the
players that were to make the super team that they.

Speaker 1 (01:37:04):
Have player evaluation, fine, that's all.

Speaker 2 (01:37:08):
That's where when it bleeds into the game because their
analytics department saw like an inefficiency in the Kansas City
offense or defense that they won the Super Bowl because
of that. I'm saying that Howie Roseman's probably the best
drafter in the NFL going right now, He's on an
absolute heater, and I think a lot of the reason
why he's uh so hot right now is because he's

(01:37:30):
using all the information.

Speaker 1 (01:37:31):
But there's there's more to it, But again it's not
to be all end all because again, if just using
all the data was how you built a good team,
the Browns use all the data, what's the difference between
the Browns and the Eagles.

Speaker 2 (01:37:42):
It's a good question. I maybe the Eagles just use
it better.

Speaker 1 (01:37:45):
Well. I think there's probably just some inherent football IQ
that comes with that.

Speaker 2 (01:37:49):
Yeah, I would agree with that, and I think with
you know, the thing with Howie that I think separates
him too from a lot of other people is, you know,
he the way that they value you picks is maybe
a little bit differently.

Speaker 1 (01:38:01):
And that's something else is the math just telling them
to draft from the SEC because I could have told
you that with that an equation.

Speaker 2 (01:38:07):
No, you know, how do they get Kunon Mitchell kind
of get you know.

Speaker 1 (01:38:12):
Queen Mitchell was a consensus first round pick.

Speaker 2 (01:38:14):
Yeah, but like Quinnon, Mitchell's went to Toledo, Like, that's
not SEC.

Speaker 1 (01:38:18):
He's a consensus first round pick though, yeah he's not.
They found some diamonds in the rough. He's not exactly
diamond in the rough.

Speaker 2 (01:38:24):
I'm not saying he's a dim in the rough. I'm
just saying they have hit fairways for like five six
years now at the top of the draft, you cannot
say the same thing about this organization.

Speaker 1 (01:38:36):
So no, But again to go back to the Browns,
like they're both using the data.

Speaker 2 (01:38:39):
So I don't think I'm not trying to excuse you know,
the Paldi to Pedesta's the world and all that. I'm
sure that they could. You know, there's other issues with
the Browns, but sometimes with with at least with the
team like Cleveland. Like my two cents on it is
that maybe there's some medaling going on from other influences,
Like are the people that are hired to draft football

(01:39:02):
players actually given the freedom to just go ahead and
draft the football players in Cleveland?

Speaker 1 (01:39:07):
Who's meddling? Is it the owner medal or the math
people meddling?

Speaker 2 (01:39:11):
Maybe I don't know. Their GM is a math guy,
so Andrew Berry is grew up in the math.

Speaker 1 (01:39:18):
We're just gonna keep going in circles on this.

Speaker 2 (01:39:20):
I I like to have these conversations, not to argue
with you, but yeah, b I also like to have
these conversations because every time we talk about analytics and football,
the fourth down decision making stuff, that term.

Speaker 1 (01:39:35):
Has become way too much of an term. It encompasses
too much now, right.

Speaker 2 (01:39:38):
So I want to bring about out these other avenues
of what the department does on an NFL team, because
that is such a small, small sliver of what their
role is in an NFL organization.

Speaker 1 (01:39:51):
It's not, but it's not because those decisions are so impactful,
like how many hours they spend on it over the
course of a year. The size of the pie might
be small, the impact it ultimately has on the football team,
the slice of the pie is much larger. So I
don't think you can say that that's a small role.
It might not be what they spend most of their
time on, but it makes a very significant impact, and

(01:40:12):
that itself might be part of the problem for some teams.

Speaker 2 (01:40:14):
I don't think every team follows it, so I think
some teams are influenced by it.

Speaker 1 (01:40:18):
For the teams that use it, it's a it's a
big part of it, I think. I think it doesn't
sound like the Patriots an't going to are gonna use
it a ton which good.

Speaker 2 (01:40:25):
I think they'll be. I think they'll it'll inform them.
I don't think that they think it.

Speaker 1 (01:40:28):
Will be one item on the list of things that
informs them, and I don't think it will be any
greater than any other item, which is ultimately all At
this point, I think as much as I can ask,
as Felger says. Felger says all the time about analytics.
We've lost the war. The anti analytics people have lost
the war. But it doesn't mean that we should stop fighting.

Speaker 2 (01:40:45):
Let's get back to the phones. Kaylee is in Boston.
What's up, Kaylee?

Speaker 3 (01:40:50):
Hi, guys, long time, first time. I have a couple
of quick questions. First, I was wondering how has Jared
Wilson looked during the off season? How do you see
it playing out with him for subscribery? And then I
actually have just a quick question about the David Andrews podcast. Alex,
you came in really hot today. Is everything okay between
you guys?

Speaker 1 (01:41:09):
Between who.

Speaker 3 (01:41:12):
The two of you?

Speaker 1 (01:41:12):
Alex and oh oh yeah, Evan, Yeah, No, I'm fine.

Speaker 2 (01:41:16):
Oh always always. That's like some like you know, brotherly yeah,
brotherly teasing all the time.

Speaker 1 (01:41:22):
Because what's gonna happen is because we do this every week,
like we talk about this has been a thing for
most of the off season. We spend the first ten
minutes and this was more related. But like we did
the Celtics a couple of weeks ago, we did Madden
a couple weeks ago, Like we spend ten minutes off
the top of the show talking about something that's not
the show, and then there's a bunch of YouTube comments
blaming Evan for it. So when my counter to that

(01:41:43):
now has been and I like that we open the
show that way. But I get you guys don't. So
it's just kind of let's get through it and let's
get to what the people really want. It's more of that.
I'm just trying to save it and I just like
teasing Alex that's it, and I'm trying to save him
from himself.

Speaker 3 (01:41:57):
There you go, very good stuff, guys.

Speaker 2 (01:41:59):
Thank you, thanks for the call. Caley, appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (01:42:02):
Dot you mean, is everything okay between me and David Andrews?

Speaker 2 (01:42:04):
And like, I hope so I know he's already out.

Speaker 1 (01:42:07):
No, Like what did I say, somebody find a clip
someway I was thinking about the other day, Like, I
don't remember, that's not a guy you're critical of. I
remember saying something a couple of years ago. I think
this was on this show with you where we were
like breaking down a screenplay and the blocking was messed up,
and we were like, either David Andrews went the wrong
way or whoever the other player was went the wrong way.

(01:42:28):
And I think my take was literally, I'm just gonna
blindly sign with David Andrews. He seems like like if
he made the decision, he probably made the right decision.
I think the other player was like a rookie, like
late round draft pick or something. I'm like, we all
know who made the right decision.

Speaker 2 (01:42:40):
Well, I think that I succeeded. If Kayley thought that
we were actually feuding about this, then I succeeded in that.
Jared Wilson though we haven't seen much of Jared Wilson.
He's been I think Mike Reeves called an undisclosed injury,
so they're not even sourced disclosing the injury. So something
he is going through an injury, uh, you know, coming

(01:43:01):
back from an injury, I should say.

Speaker 7 (01:43:03):
So.

Speaker 2 (01:43:03):
He didn't get to see a ton of him in
the spring. He was working off to the side a lot.
They would like do team on one field and then
him and Anwenu and Viderien Lowe. A lot of the time.
It was sometimes Morgan Moses was there early on in
the in the spring.

Speaker 5 (01:43:17):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:43:17):
They were doing drills you know against air, like you know,
just pas sets and stuff like that. So hopefully we
see more of Jared Wilson moving forward, because I I
am not ready to call any competition on the interior,
like you know, left guard, even center, yeah, until I
see Jared Wilson in.

Speaker 1 (01:43:34):
Pat And Mike Gravell even said that, like he was
asked about the guard competition, He's like, yeah, we really
can't make any decisions till the pads come on. So
the only thing we learned, especially left guard, I think
center is more of a traditional competition, right, Yeah, it's
Garrett Bradburrig's Jared Wilson. Who's better? The only thing I
came away from the spring thinking about left guard it's
wide open. Yeah, you could list five actually wrote this

(01:43:57):
this morning on ninety eight five sports dot Com. I
don't remember how many a head on there, but you
can list like six guys that realistically could be the
weak ones starting left card, someone more realistic than others.
But I mean, if we want to run through it
real quick, right, you can make a case for Cole Strange,
make case for City.

Speaker 2 (01:44:11):
So I think Cole Strange has the inside track, but.

Speaker 1 (01:44:14):
Like I'm lightly putting that in pencil.

Speaker 2 (01:44:17):
We're we're just out of the thing.

Speaker 1 (01:44:19):
But right now, if I had to bet on the
week one starting left card, it would be Cold Strange.
But I'm not like, I don't feel great about it.
But you can make an argument for Strange for so
those are probably the two big ones.

Speaker 2 (01:44:32):
Yeah, right.

Speaker 1 (01:44:33):
You can make an argument for Kaden Wallace, Yeah, can
make an argument for Laden Robinson. You can make an
argument for Tyree Robinson. You can make an argument for
Jared Wilson, you can make an argument for Jack Conley.
That's seven players. You couldn't made an argument for West
Whites before he retired.

Speaker 2 (01:44:47):
I really feel like it's Cole Strange, yeah, Cayden Wallace,
Jared Wilson in terms of not City, so no, not
yet should be City. So just in terms of what
I feel like is going to happen now based of
what we've seen, right, Cold.

Speaker 1 (01:45:04):
Stranger of the field, Cold Strange. Oh, I'm taking the
field just on the number.

Speaker 2 (01:45:08):
Well yeah, I mean he could get hurt, so I
guess they're it's not even getting hurt.

Speaker 1 (01:45:12):
Like I think the percentage Cole straight If I like
percentage wise, right, who do I think is most likely
start a left card? Cold Strange would have the highest percentage,
but that percentage is maybe like twenty twenty five. Yeah,
so I'm taking the field.

Speaker 2 (01:45:24):
All right. Let's get to Alex in Atlanta. What's up, Alex?
Alex you there. I can't have three Alexes on the
show today if but call us back and we'll get
you on the air for still on Alex, Let's get
to some of these emails. So we haven't got to
the EMAILSCA. We've had a lot of calls today. I
appreciate that a June eighteenth show just bringing in the calls.

(01:45:45):
I really appreciate that.

Speaker 1 (01:45:46):
I feel like June eighteenth used to always be my
last day of school, Like this date is just burned
into my brain. Is like every time I see June eighteenth,
like I just have a Pavlovian instinct to be like,
oh nice, June eighteenth. And I think it's because it
was always the last day of school.

Speaker 2 (01:45:58):
See. I'm that way with June seventeenth because of the Celtics.
Two championships won on June seventeen.

Speaker 1 (01:46:03):
Yeah, but one of tho.

Speaker 2 (01:46:04):
Ways only a year ago, so that can't be that
trained yet. But June seventeenth, it's a Celtics day and
it's six one seven. I always just say it is
six one seven day. I always associate you in eighteenth
with the last day of school. Now, what doesn't get
talked about that with that, with it being the Celtics day.
They also lost game seven of the twenty ten five
three on six seventeen, so that one, for young Evan

(01:46:26):
was probably one of the worst sports losses of my lifetime.

Speaker 1 (01:46:30):
And I think was the I don't think the Bruins
won on six seventeen, but was the Bruins parade on
six seventeen?

Speaker 2 (01:46:36):
Might have been? Might have been? All right, here's a
question from josh was the eighteenth Oh there you go.
Here's a question from Joshua, which I think is a
catch twenty two kind of question. He remembered. He asked,
how much do the Patriots you how much will the
Patriots use no huddle this year? And he thinks that
it would be a good fit with Drake may So.

(01:46:57):
I think the interesting thing about them potentially use a
lot of no huddle is the return of what has
notoriously been called the NASCAR package, which is the one
word association package that they have so that they can
run a no huddle and they can simply yell, you know,
Michael Jordan, and then everybody knows what the play is.

(01:47:17):
Josh McDaniel's also very that haas right, yes, yes, I'm
giving away the playbook now. Josh McDaniel's very notorious for
naming plays after NBA stars Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, like
those types of guys. And so the the reason why

(01:47:38):
I bring that up is that that's forty chess. So
if you really think they'll have a temple, they'll have
a no huddle. Every team has to have one, right
because if you get into a two minute situation where
you have to be no huddle, you have to be
no huddle. You don't have a choice but to truly
run it as like a core of your offense, like
not in like a situation type of thing. I think

(01:48:01):
you need to have like a PhD level grasp of
the offense as a whole. And I'm not sure if
they'll be there yet at the beginning of the season.
I don't know if this is the year for that
I guess is what I'm getting at. If this whole
entire setup is the same in twenty twenty six as
it is in twenty twenty five, it's McDaniels, it's for able.
It's may like maybe then you could do like what
they used to do, you know, twenty ten Patriots, twenty

(01:48:24):
eleven Patriots, when Josh McDaniels met with Chip Kelly and
like really installed some tempo into the offense. But for now,
I think that that's more there's one minute left, no timeouts,
tie game, we got a no huddle, right, It's not
necessarily something that you're just doing in the middle of
the flow of the game, if that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (01:48:42):
Yeah, McDaniel's also kind of been all over the place
with that, Like they'll be random stretches where he's super
in no huddle, and then they really won't use it
for a while, and then they'll go back to it.
So I don't know what to expect on that one.
Like that could go anyway, but like you said, I
think it's more likely, you know, if this all works
out and you're keeping a lot of the same players
together next year, than the likelihood goes up.

Speaker 2 (01:49:01):
Sure, So this is another interesting question here from Dennis,
so I guess I mentioned this briefly or we mentioned
this briefly about the overlap between Josh mcdaniels's offense and
Brian dables offense. It's the same offense.

Speaker 1 (01:49:12):
I think Diggs mentioned that.

Speaker 2 (01:49:13):
Yep, Diggs played in Brian Dables offense of course in Buffalo,
And there's a lot of similarities. It's both Ernard Perkins
play verbiage and all that kind of stuff. So that
doesn't mean that they call the plays the same way
in terms of like the actual words that they use.
It's just it's run the same way in terms of
the the mainly I would say protections and cadence like

(01:49:36):
it's it's kind of just structured the same way, is
the best way I can put it. So there's a
lot of similarities. I would say. The main similarity though,
from what I understand at least about it, is the
protection calls. Like Brady said it was some let's go
or something like that, or he had an interview with
Josh Allen where he said that he could like recognize

(01:49:57):
Josh Allen's audibles and his protection calls because it's the
verbiage as what the Patriots use. So there's a lot
of overlap between those two systems, between McDaniels and Brian Dable.
So the question, I guess, uh, okay, I get it.
The question that Dennis then asks on top of that
is who would you rather have running this offense, Josh

(01:50:19):
McDaniels or Brian Dabele.

Speaker 1 (01:50:22):
McDaniels, it's just the originator, right, you're you're you're going
right to this, and I really like Brian Daball, but
I'll go with Josh McDaniels. He just has more experience.

Speaker 2 (01:50:32):
So I would say I would have a lot of
faith in Dable, but developing me, you obviously developed Josh Allen,
so that would be a nice symmetry there.

Speaker 1 (01:50:41):
But I mean the development I thought about that, but
also the development windows only so long. Yeah, and ideally
you're building that long term partnership, and you know, once
they get going, once you get through that development phase,
I think you're gonna get more out of Josh.

Speaker 2 (01:50:54):
Fair enough, All right, let's get back to the phones
because Alex is back. What's up, Alex? A Hey, how's
it going?

Speaker 4 (01:51:03):
Man? I have a quick question for you guys, because
I know y'all was talking about the Jack Jahye Bill.

Speaker 6 (01:51:09):
Do you ever think like Josh mcdames would like bring.

Speaker 4 (01:51:12):
Them, like have them like playing like a little bit
of h back like you played in high school and college.

Speaker 1 (01:51:21):
Yeah he could. Yeah, it's just so you're gonna have
an h back and a true fullback. That's a lot
of roster spots to dedicate to that position.

Speaker 4 (01:51:30):
And the second question I got for you guys, did
y'all see that Madden got a new gadget player on there? Yes,
and you could kind of like put Deebo Samuels and
all that type stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:51:40):
I'm sure I did.

Speaker 1 (01:51:42):
Yes, I watched that trailer last night. I don't know
why they dropped bus.

Speaker 2 (01:51:46):
So you also showed me that the new snow thing
is like you're in.

Speaker 1 (01:51:50):
Like snow Thing school. And ironically to the whole conversation
we just spent twenty minutes on, like did the whole
One of the big things they did this year is
like Madden's much more data driven in terms of like
the coach AI, the quarterback AI. The different coaches are
going to make decisions based on what their real world's
counterparts would do, based on data they've collected over the
last ten years.

Speaker 2 (01:52:10):
You should hate that.

Speaker 1 (01:52:11):
That's no, because that's a video game, that's program that's
absolutely what come.

Speaker 2 (01:52:15):
Yeah, but that's like I can't say, that's not take
that's like computer nerds stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:52:22):
Right, but it's not actual football to video. I cannot
wait to take advantage of the accurate Kyle Shanahan ai
late in the game.

Speaker 2 (01:52:28):
Wow, so you're saying that he's gonna throw a wide
open pass and Jimmy Garoppolo is gonna overthrow.

Speaker 1 (01:52:34):
He's gonna have his bad quarterback throwing up fourteen with
four minutes ago.

Speaker 2 (01:52:38):
Yes, to walk off the super Bowl, but even sloth
and he could run it off.

Speaker 1 (01:52:43):
But no, I think that they it's kind of cool
seeing this, Like obviously kids still play Madden, but there's
also a generation, our generation that's grown up on it.
And I learned a lot about the game from playing Madden.
I think you said you learned you learned about the game.
A lot of people have said they learned out the
game for playing Madden and when we were ten years
old and the game was a lot more basic, like

(01:53:04):
that made sense. But the game has kind of grown,
I think with that fan base, and they've made I
don't think it'll be impossible to play if you don't
understand football this year, and I don't think you need
to be like Bill Belichick to play it. But they
have kind of made it beneficial to especially the last
few years when they hit their lull, you could very

(01:53:24):
much game the game and the football element of it
wasn't relevant. You knew, Okay, this play just works, and
I'm just gonna run this over and over, or the
player ratings don't matter. If the guy's fast, he'll be good,
he get be a sixty overall doesn't matter. Right, it
seems I will see if they executed it. But from
reading it from what it seems like they really put
work in this year where you are benefited by knowing

(01:53:46):
how football works.

Speaker 2 (01:53:48):
Right, maybe what? Maybe? Maybe?

Speaker 1 (01:53:50):
Well, so I'll give you an example. So they put
in something. I forget what the mechanic was called, but
it was something like route guessing or something where if
you are playing defense right and your opponent keeps burning
you with the same player the same route over and over,
you can route guess and there's like a soft guess
and a hard guess. So the soft guess is just
shading and there's not that much of a penalty and

(01:54:11):
there's not that much of a reward. You can hard
guess the route and basically, if you guess the route correctly,
you automatically take it away, regardless of what your defensive
call is. But that also comes with a significant penalty
because if you get it wrong, and I'm oversimplifying here,
if you gets it wrong, you guys gonna get totally
burn and be wide open. So you need to know
a couple of things. You one need to know the
name of the route, because in the menu you have

(01:54:32):
to pick the route that you're trying to take away.
You also kind of have to know you have to
recognize that it's that same route that's continually beating you.
And then on offense, you have to be able to
know if he's gonna route guess you. There's actually value
in the computer can do this too. There's value in
running setup plays. Right, I'm gonna run this comeback and
burn you with it five times, and if I catch

(01:54:55):
you route guessing it, well, now I'm gonna call the
go and I'm gonna cook you. So Cannick didn't necessarily
exist or didn't exist as formally as it does now,
which is I think is kind of cool.

Speaker 2 (01:55:06):
We'll see, We'll see this is too complicated to me,
Like I said this, What do you mean too compkind?
I said this to you last night. My ideal Madden
is like Matten O four, Madden O five, which one
was Mike Vick on the cover the best one?

Speaker 1 (01:55:20):
Well, like that's still existing.

Speaker 2 (01:55:22):
Give me the hit stick, give me, give me, like
just I just want to run around for like eight seconds.
I don't want to play actual you will still do that, true,
Like I just want to play a video game.

Speaker 1 (01:55:31):
I want to have to think they made it so
certain quarterbacks are if you want to do the run
around thing, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Kyler Murray are like
programmed to be better in those situations and like have
abilities in those situations that like I don't know Matthew no,
Matts Davis about exam, who's like a true pocket Kirk

(01:55:52):
Cousins right that Kirk Cousins can't do right. And it's
not just based on the ratings. There's like things programmed
into the game.

Speaker 2 (01:55:59):
But my my whole thing about Madden is when I
was actually playing Madden back in my day, when I
was actually playing Madden I ran like the same three
plays and they worked. It was like freaking remember the Titans, right,
I'm run the same three plays and then you know
we're just gonna keep giving it to him and like
no volcano will eventually work, right, So like that's how

(01:56:20):
I like, I don't want to I don't want to
do all this other stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:56:22):
Gets a little boring, gets a little repetitive. They made
it such less repetitive. It's the college game. You can
still do that because in college football, in real life
you can still do that.

Speaker 2 (01:56:30):
So I used to run, uh this one play and
with the Patriots, obviously Brady this was very probably Brady Gronk,
Shane Veren so like level page. Yeah, we were like
probably in college, late high school and uh, and Gronk
had the flag like, he had the corner route and
he was just so damn big that he could just
box out anybody on the corner route. And then Veren

(01:56:52):
had the flat like so he would and you what
you would do, like when you had zone, you could
just high low the defender out there, right, So you
can still do that with Gronk. But the problem was
the game got so far behind that the average tight
end just by being six six played like Gronk because
of the way the game is programmed.

Speaker 1 (01:57:12):
So now you can do that. You could do that
with the Patriots if they had Gronk. You couldn't do
that with the Patriots with the tight ends they had
after Gronk.

Speaker 2 (01:57:20):
So the other thing that I would do is that
if I could tell it was man to man, which
usually you could because it was a freaking video game,
you could tell like what the leverage of the defender was.
So if he was sitting outside, I would hot routed
to a seam so that he would bend it inside
their defender. But if it was the defender was like
the linebacker in the box or something, I'd still have

(01:57:40):
him run the corner and then he'd run away.

Speaker 1 (01:57:42):
So they still do that. It's the same player and
they still do that, but now you can bluff it, okay,
and you can bluff coverages like they put this in
last year, so you can run COVERAG two but come
out in a Cover three shell.

Speaker 3 (01:57:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:57:52):
I did hear about it, And that's actually really fun.
That's that's modern NFL.

Speaker 1 (01:57:56):
Can you can screw? And they added this year in
front of that, they took stunt out of the game
for like ten years. They finally put stunts back in
this year, and so when you call a defensive play,
it's no more. Remember it would just be like cover
two man and that would be the play. You now
call the front and you call the coverage. And they
put in all the Minnesota sim pressures and that stuff too.
They put in all these modern blitzes.

Speaker 2 (01:58:16):
All right, let's take this last call from one of
our regulars, Mark in Connecticut, and then we're going to
wrap this show up. What's up, Mark?

Speaker 7 (01:58:23):
Hey, guys, Love you guys.

Speaker 6 (01:58:25):
Hope to see you guys on training camp. Absolutely get
that rock in and rolling finally.

Speaker 5 (01:58:30):
Yeah, what I wanted to say is is this crazy
to think that our second round pick and fourth round
pick of last year may not even make the roster
of this coming year. I mean, that just baffles my
mind that we wasted a second and a fourth round
pick on these guys.

Speaker 8 (01:58:48):
So love you guys, hope.

Speaker 6 (01:58:49):
To talk to you doing again.

Speaker 2 (01:58:51):
Yeah, yeah, Mark, I hate to hit in the show
on that note, but yes, so I don't think I
think Jalen Polk will be here in some capacity, whether
it's you know, on a reserve LESPUPI R whatever the
case may be. I don't think they're going to totally
give up on Jalen Polk. But there's definitely a good
chance that both those guys are not like contributing, you know.
I think there's a really good chance of that.

Speaker 1 (01:59:11):
Yes, And I don't think this isn't the normal situation
if Drawd Mayo was still here. I don't think we
talk about Jalen pol potentially getting cut. This is in
this This kind of happens around the NFL when you
have new leadership. Players that and we talked about this
last year with Mayo coming from Bill like players that
might based on contract or draft status or whatever, players

(01:59:35):
that might have certain standing don't because everybody's kind of
viewed equally when new leadership comes in. So that it's
not that Jalen Polk was so bad that, oh my god,
the second round pick was terrible, So who's gonna get
cut after a year that's historic? Don'ting wrong, wasn't good,
But there is that extenuating circumstance of it's a this
isn't the coach that drafted him, And you're climbing up

(01:59:58):
a bigger hill when you're facing.

Speaker 2 (01:59:59):
That fair enough, all right. So that's the show for today.
We'll be back next week. We will be talking defense
on our fifty three man roster, projection and special teams,
and we'll be back on Wednesday at noon. I should
mention no PU tomorrow Juneteenth holiday company holiday, So Node
PU tomorrow. Make sure everybody knows that, because I do

(02:00:20):
think we said yesterday that we'll be that Thursday. We
won't be.

Speaker 1 (02:00:23):
Was that Alex I said that is Coorea?

Speaker 2 (02:00:26):
Yeah, No PU tomorrow, So PU will be back Tuesday.
We'll be back on Wednesday. We'll see you guys in
Thanks for listening.

Speaker 1 (02:00:31):
Bye, Hey, this is Deuce.

Speaker 9 (02:00:35):
Thanks for tuning into the show. If you really want
to help us, make sure you like us wherever you
get your podcasts, like Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Also make
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channel to see this show and everything else that we
do here at the Patriots.

Speaker 1 (02:00:47):
Thanks a lot,