Answering 5 Big Questions for the 2026 NFL Season With Tom Pelissero!

welcome to the ringer nfl show i'm your host shiel kapadia we've got our newest colleague tom pelissero with us today with me and billy gill we kind of zoomed out and we looked at some big picture questions in the 2026 nfl season we wanted to pick tom's brain find out where he's at with some of these questions what he knows what intel he has the conversation went in a number of different directions it was a lot of fun all right let's take a break we'll come back with tom and billy this episode of the ringer nfl show is presented by orgain orgain creatine helps improve muscle size strength and power when combined with a regular exercise and weight training routine plus it's certified with informed choice which means it's tested for prohibited substances in sports upgrade your performance with orgain creatine available at amazon costco walmart and these statements have not been evaluated by the food and drug administration this product is not intended to diagnose treat cure or prevent 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pelissero joins me and billy gill tom well great to have you here my friend let's do this thing fellas i've been waiting i've been watching you in the background while i've been on the stationary bike for weeks checking in seeing how the show goes i'm just i'm excited to be here with you billy you were a little nervous when tom said he's you know consumed the show before how are you doing today i'm somewhat concerned that he's consumed it i'm hoping that tom jumped around i wasn't off i wasn't on the show much in the off season so hopefully he didn't catch many of my episodes if any oh well because here's the thing this is you know kind of aligning with the start of a new school year as well we all have children going to school so like this is almost like we're meeting a new teacher of sorts you know what i mean she also like this is a chance for first impressions but if tom's been doing his homework and he's familiar with us then it may not be the best opportunity to have you know a new first impression here gotcha you're worried he's talked to last year's teachers and like they put certain kids in a certain class well okay well listen i think it's gonna be okay i think we're gonna have a lot of fun we got big picture topics here because we thought you know what it's our first time potting together we don't need to get caught up in the training camp minutiae let's let's find out what tom thinks about some of the big questions in the 2026 season so that's what we're gonna do today and i want to start out with this one tom let's start with you which quarterback will we look at differently after the 2026 season and the genesis of this question i'm just going through all the quarterbacks and i'm that guy's got a lot on the line it feels like that guy's got a lot on the line i could have gotten to probably half the quarterbacks in the nfl and so i'm wondering what you think maybe looking into your crystal ball a little bit end of the 2026 season we're saying no we're talking about this guy differently than we did in mid-august it's very easy to immediately point to the second year quarterback the guy's going to make the proverbial year two job that's just kind of a a natural progression especially because we now live in an age where highly drafted quarterbacks have a head coach that gets fired after year one if not during uh year one and kind of reboot i want to swing the other direction though because one of the themes of the 2026 season in my mind is the number of established quarterbacks veteran guys who have been to pro bowls might have won mvps might have won super bowl mvps and they're going to be asked to do things a lot differently this season than they've ever done in their careers you start with jalen hertz who has been in under a but kind of a similar type of threat in terms of the offensive approach now sean manion comes in as a first-time offensive coordinator trained under uh kevin o'connell and sean mcveigh he was with matt lafleur you know what that offense is going to look like it's going to be precision and timing based that hasn't really been jalen hertz game jaden daniels is going to go from the cliff kingsbury air raid derivative offense to now running something with david blau that we don't necessarily entirely know uh exactly what it's going to look like lamar jackson might be the most glaring example of this where i was out at the joint practice yesterday the ravens against the vikings and you can see like they're trying to get the ball out faster you know they want it to be connecting his eyes to his feet and you're going from one to two to three coach up the receivers get to your landmarks have the ball come out on time we all know lamar could do the crazy off schedule stuff but we haven't seen him play in that precision type of an offense justin herbert also going into a certain style of offense now with mike mcdaniel coming in another guy out of the kyle shanahan um tree you know kind of what that offense is going to be stylized as and then kyler murray going to minnesota now he had drew petzing in arizona the past couple of years i'm certainly there's elements but he's being coached differently another guy i got a chance to look at yesterday so of that list you're talking about five like really like if you're talking about the 10 most known quarterbacks let's say 10 best but 10 of like the highest profile guys half of the 10 most known quarterbacks that are going to be doing stuff that's really really different this season i i think that the one to watch in my mind is lamar and and we all know you know what lamar can do and the special plays he can make last season he was he was banged up he just never really seemed like himself didn't seem like he was you know really able to cut it loose for a good chunk of the season and the ravens results um you know played into that it's part of the reason john harbaugh is no longer there part of the reason that declan doyle is the same age as lamar is going to be calling the shots now on offense with jesse minter as the head coach this is you know potentially year two or lamar depending if anything can get done before the season the ravens have been trying on a contract for a couple of years next year could be the year for lamar to be the first 70 million dollar a year quarterback on a traditional type of an extension if he plays the way he can and i do think it's going to be a growth process through the year um to me that's one of the biggest storylines in the nfl billy where are you with lamar jackson because it's just like you look at the pro football reference page and we've watched him and there's been exciting moments and there's been mvps and so i feel like most people are lamar jackson fans and defenders but then there's always going to be the faction of well you know wake me up when he gets to the super bowl all right ravens won 12 games again who cares they don't do it in the playoffs and i don't think that's entirely his fault we've all watched say flowers and mark andrews and there's been other factors at play in those playoff games but like is lamar jackson interesting to you going into the season are you like i kind of have some lamar fatigue you know bring me some of these new guys where are you i mean i don't have lamar fatigue i like him i mean i think he does a good job i think if you look back he probably should have won a third mvp the year that he finished second place but you know he's not a guy that i'm coming into the season thinking i'm going to look at differently as you asked before shield i don't know if you did you do any of these shield for yourself or you're just wondering me and tom what we were thinking on this i did i i have one that i'll name here uh in a minute but yeah go ahead i did three so i don't know how you want to handle this situation i can give you all three some of them are a little more for on the field reasons some for off the field reasons the first one that i'm thinking that i may look at a little bit differently after this season drake may now you're probably thinking drake may wow he finished second mvp votes last year he had a great season but are we in store for the rare junior slump tom i don't know what you're hearing down there when you're at these camps and you're talking to all these people but last year he had the first and the second easiest schedule right he kind of got fat off of weak teams 12-1 against teams that missed the playoffs two and two against teams that made play the playoffs in terms of the strength of schedule or the opponent's win rate 4-10 win percentage it's the worst win rate of any team the last 25 years and here's another thing when you start looking a little bit deeper you start reading the book seeing what was going on there exactly you start finding out he was struggling against cover six and it's something that was discovered late in the season so teams started adapting to that situation so when you kind of start looking into things when he was man-to-man coverage number seven in epa number four in success rate number one in yards for temp versus zone non-cover six number one in epa number three in success rate number one in yards for temp against cover six number 31 33 32 all right sorry tom billy i think he's trying to show off he wants you to know he wants you to know he's done his homework that he knows the difference in different coverages i mean i don't i don't know what do you think i've never heard mentioned cover six. Nine games against playoff teams. plus the Lions and the Chiefs that missed the playoffs. I mean, what are we doing here? Drake May, is he going to figure out this cover six or not, Tom? What are they telling you? I did not have a cover six reference in the first five minutes of my first episode of this show. I was not, I wasn't prepared for it. Listen, there's going to be some things that look different about that New England offense in general. I would say this, you know, Drake May was beat up at the tail end of the season. How much did that affect him in the Super Bowl? You know, with rushers in his face that entire game, I don't know how many quarterbacks, healthy or not, would have functioned at a really high level. Certainly, you know, they benefited from being one of the worst teams the year before and having the schedule that they did. But Drake May still played big in big spots. And when we were assessing Drake May, he's still ahead of the curve. That was the guy in that draft class that people thought had the ceiling. But everybody said, like, it's going to take him a while. He's the guy you don't want to play out of the gate. He's the guy who's going to take time. He went to the Super Bowl in year two. You know, from year one, where everything was a complete disaster, I still think the arrow's pointing up on Drake May. I mean, you bring up many, many valid stats there, Billy, and certainly the numbers don't lie. But I would also say, like, take the context into account here. You know, what he was working with, obviously, you know, in the playoffs for Will Campbell's not healthy either. The time that he missed last season, Drake had to continue to function. The receivers are going to be a little bit different this year because they're going to be a little bit different. They're going to be a little bit different this year. They're not just bringing in, you know, A.J. Brown as, like, a one-for-one Stephon Diggs swap. Like, Diggs played half the snaps, and over half the snaps he did play were in the slot. A.J. Brown's going to play outside. So you've got, like, a one-on-one mismatched weapon. When you do get those man-covered situations, he's going to go out there. Yeah, he can go be big in the slot if you want him to and just go win, you know, with his physicality. But you add him to the room, you add Romeo Dobbs to the room, obviously Diggs is no longer there. I think that this may be set up for Josh McDaniels to deploy a little bit more versatility, where maybe last year, based on what they were working with personnel-wise and the way that they seem to be trying to manage things with Diggs, maybe they got a little bit more freedom here to open things up a little bit as Drake May continues that progression. It was kind of incredible how good Diggs was given the amount of snaps he played. I mean, he put up big numbers, was very efficient. But, you know, their wide receivers are definitely better. The O-line questions, I still wonder how much better are they going to be on the offensive line. You mentioned Will Campbell. Was it just injury? Was it, you know, his play maybe not as good as some people expected? They signed Elijah Vera-Tucker. He's had injury issues in the past. They're moving the kid from guard to center. So I want to see what that offensive line looks like because they have a very high ceiling. If the offensive line is, like, average this year, then Drake May has a chance to put up the same kinds of numbers. All right, Bill, you ask me who my guy is. Yeah, who's your guy? And I'm not just kissing up to Tom's audience because Tom's bringing us a Minneapolis audience, you know, his home state there. I actually think. I think we're going to talk about Kyler Murray differently in January than we do now. And I have not historically been the biggest Kyler Murray guy. I wasn't like, oh, he's underrated. People don't understand. I never got caught up when he had. He would always have, like, a great six to eight weeks and everyone's like, Kyler Murray, MVP watch. And I'm like, let's just wait till the end of the season and see what this looks like. But I'm looking at the situation in Minnesota and I just feel like we have to be realistic about the bar he needs to clear. Like, he kind of just needs to give them competent quarterback play with that wide receiver core, with two good offensive tackles, with a good offensive coach, with what I think is going to be a good defense. And I think at the end of the season, we're going to say, you know what? There's this big group of quarterbacks in the NFL, this middle tier, that it kind of depends what situation they're in, whether we consider them really good or average or kind of bad. But I think it's like a small sort of range that we're going to see with Kyler Murray. I don't think he's going to be an MVP. I don't think we're going to say he's like a top five, but I also think there's a good chance he's going to be like one of the 15 or 16 best quarterbacks in the NFL, Tom. And I think that could be enough for the Vikings to certainly get into the playoffs. What are the vibes, the feelings in Minnesota right now with Kyler Murray? Well, they moved to Kyler Murray and made it clear that he was the starter pretty early in camp. They could have played it out through the preseason. They didn't think that that was the best thing for him. They want to maximize his reps with the first team and go out there. They did split it 50-50 through the whole spring. I know that. I know that everybody out there thinks this is a fake competition, but they did split the reps between Kyler and J.J. McCarthy. What I think Kyler Murray unlocks, besides just being, if he's healthy, which that's job one for Kyler. He has had injuries in recent years, obviously going back to the significant one that cost him essentially almost an entire season. Then last year with the ankle or the foot, whatever it was, that never really healed and not being able to make it back. He's got to stay on the field first and foremost. Would you put Kyler, who whatever tiny tick of elusiveness maybe you lose when you're getting a little bit later in your career, this will be year eight, I believe, for him. He still is so difficult to defend in space. How are you going to spy the quarterback and double Justin Jefferson on every snap? It forces the defense to account for something that, you know, the same vision existed with J.J. too, because he can use his legs, but Kyler's a rare, rare runner. How are you going to defend that if Kyler's able to find that balance? I don't see this. It's being a Kyler Murray throws the ball 40 times in a game type of an offense. I think that if they're doing that, the Vikings are probably playing losing football. This is very much going to be using the diversity in the run game, forcing people to account for the quarterback run, and then trying to get themselves into favorable matches where they can take advantage of, you know, what might be the best three deep wide receiver room in the entire league with Jefferson, Jordan Addison, and Juwan Jennings, which is a lot of J's now that I say it out loud if you're trying to keep that straight at home. Their run game is going to be a lot better. The game's been overhauled, too. One thing they haven't talked about enough with the Vikings is they've completely changed the way that they're going to run the football. They brought in Frank Smith, who was the Dolphins' offensive coordinator. They brought in Keith Carter to be the offensive line coach. It'll be much more of the outside zone-oriented stuff. And then with Kyler, of course, we all know, you know, shotgun, pistol, he can pull it, he can run zone read. I just think it's going to be really interesting to watch what's a really talented Vikings offense that last year, because how things went, a quarterback was having to win games where Max Brody was the quarterback. Rosemary's out there throwing for 52 yards. Yeah, nine and eight with the quarterbacks they played last year. So I'm like, all right, they can win 10 games and earn a wildcard spot. So we'll see. Billy, before we move on to the next question, the Kyler Murray video game jokes, should we retire them? Like when you see those now, are you like, all right, you know, enough? Or do you think they still have a little shelf life here? I feel like we can move past the Kyler Murray jokes at this point with the video games, right? So that's our official stance on this pod, I think. Tom, you good with that? I think at this point, we haven't had a Kyler video game story since the contract. I mean, I said it on Bill's podcast the other day. Kyler holds the NFL record, as far as I'm aware, for most millions of dollars paid to a quarterback that the team hates. And he got it. And he collected almost every dollar of that contract, including the, what are they, 37 million, I think, this year while he plays for the minimum in Minnesota. And then by the way, becomes, if he plays the way that you're thinking, Sheil, will become the number one free agent next March. He's got a no-tag clause on a one-year minimum deal. He's a free agent. Baker is potentially a free agent, though hypothetically he could end up getting tagged. It's a really interesting quarterback landscape as we look out the 2027 before we even get to the college class that's potentially encountered. Oh, I didn't realize he had a no-tag clause because when you said that, I'm like, if Kevin O'Connell has a veteran quarterback play well this year, he will make sure that that person is not allowed to leave Minneapolis, but it could potentially be a little bit out of his control, right? If Kyler Murray can just test the market, if he has a good season, the Vikings don't have that card that so many teams have that, hey, you can't, you know, we have the leverage here because we can tag you. That's interesting. This is the story of the Vikings is that they have been the place going all the way back to, you know, the Randall Cunninghams of the world that you come in and you have this lightning in a bottle thing. And then all of a sudden you're gone. Like it never was there before, you know, Favre came in, same way, Case Keenum at his run in 2017, obviously Sam Darnold a couple of years ago. I mean, Kyler would love to follow the Sam Darnold path and, you know, new leadership, of course, in Minnesota now, Nolan Teasley's in there as the GM. I would certainly think, and dollars are another thing, but I would certainly think if he plays the way you're thinking, the Vikings would be doing everything they can, probably not during the season. I would think it'll be a post-season evaluation, but everything they can to get something done before he hits the free agent market next March. All right, there you go. Let's start to the five big questions. Let's take a break. We'll come back. We'll get to some more big questions coming up in the 2026 season. The Ringer NFL show is brought to you by FanDuel. Before the football season begins, every team is undefeated. Every fan believes this could be the year, the year their team wins the division, makes the playoffs, lifts the trophy. And with FanDuel, you can bet on any of it. From who will win it all and division winners to season win totals and playoff futures, FanDuel has all the ways to bet on the season before it even begins. Get your football futures bets in today on FanDuel. Visit FanDuel.com slash Ringer NFL to get started. 21 plus select states or 18 plus DC or Wyoming. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut. All right, we are back here on the Ringer NFL show. Billy, what do you think? Are we getting to no time here? You got any questions? We'll be right back. before we get to the next football-related topic. I personally was very impressed by those stats, your knowledge of different coverages, cover six. Yeah, well, you didn't reference anything. Well, I didn't even get to ask you about Justin Herbert. Can I ask you just a quick follow-up? A 1B for last question? Yeah. Is there any chance, Tom, you're hearing around there, that Deshaun Watson might be looked at differently after this season? I mean, certainly it's possible. You know, we'll see how Shadur does in his preseason start coming up. It seems like the arrows are pointing toward Deshaun. Listen, if Deshaun Watson plays well, all right, and I get all the reasons to think that he won't. He's played 19 games in the past five seasons combined. He hasn't played since he tore his Achilles twice in a calendar year. And he's got to go into every single building, including his own building, where people don't like him or he's hearing it from the crowd. And that's part of what they wanted him to experience, getting that first preseason start. So, let's say he plays pretty well, all right? I'm not talking MVP. I'm talking like borderline top 10 quarterback. You know, at the time that the Browns traded for him, they thought he was a top five quarterback. But let's say he's borderline top 10, okay? He has a good, solid year. I have no idea what the market is going to be because of all the things surrounding Deshaun Watson. I think it's really hard for the Browns to extend him. I think it's hard for any other team to bring him in on more than a one-year deal. But we also know there's not 32 starting quarterbacks walking the face, the earth, and if he plays well enough, we're going to be talking about who's in the mix for Deshaun Watson, which is something that I think there have been many, many times over the past five years that we didn't think we'd actually be uttering that phrase. It's the Jets. It's going to be the Jets, isn't it? Oh, my gosh. I think we might get to the Jets here. Jets are on the relatively expansive list of teams who, if I were sitting here right now, projecting who's going to be starting at quarterback in 2027, I would say probably not a guy on the current roster. Yeah. Watch football on Saturdays, Jets fans, and there's a few other teams we can say that about. My favorite Browns stat, Billy, is that the two worst quarterback seasons of the last two years by EPA per pass play, Deshaun Watson in 2024 and Shador Sanders in 2025. So that would be a big leap that Watson would have to make if he's even going to approach average quarterback play. Now, you said you wanted to ask about Justin Herbert, and then you asked about Deshaun Watson. Did I hear that incorrectly? No, I mean, Watson was one that I was thinking. Herbert, you know, is one that I was wondering if we're ever going to kind of know, because the thing that I'm wondering about, because you mentioned Herbert earlier in your quarterbacks that maybe we'll look at him differently, is now he's a man in love. Now he's a man that's engaged. We saw the pictures of him, of him sitting on the field with his fiance, Madison Beer. Part of an ad campaign, apparently. One of those guerrilla advertising marketing campaigns. Wait, is that true? I hope it's true. Yeah, I think so. Because otherwise, it was a strange, strange scene there. Yeah, it was a little bit odd, but now, like, you know, is love an off-the-field issue we need to be worried about? Because, like, we kind of saw Travis last year had to step back, but he was also planning his wedding. So, like, should we not want these guys to be falling in love? Tom, I don't know about you. I feel like my year's post-marriage. I couldn't tell if that was a rhetorical question or not. Go ahead, chill. Yeah, this is, I think, you know, let me make sure I get the dates right here. I married 2011. I thought I was doing good work in 2012. You know, my first opportunity to write about. Football, full-time, tough season with Andy Reid. But I thought I did a good job. Tom, what about you? Post-marriage, I feel like it adds a little something to the workflow. There's a cliff. You hit a cliff at a certain point. You're like, the first two years is good, and then it's like, oh, now I'm putting on some pounds, and then right downhill, and you're doing a pod with me. My wife would probably say that my attention to work has remained high throughout 12 years of marriage. Let's put it that way. 14 years is crap. Oh, no. Well, you proved I was right. You said, Tom, there's no editing on this podcast, by the way, I don't know. It's 14. I don't know why I had 2014 in my head. 14 plus 12 equals 26. Yeah, that's the year we're in. You're lucky I didn't know where I am right now. I've done that exact same thing on a podcast before, and I've lived to tell about it. So don't worry. You're in good company here. All right, my next question. Are the Chiefs going to be back to being the Chiefs? Because I was just going through the whole, and I'm like, I don't hear a lot of people talking about the Chiefs. I don't hear a lot of buzz about the Chiefs. Typically, I would think people would be like, don't sleep on the Chiefs. This team's getting back to the Super Bowl yet. It doesn't feel like a lot of people are making that prediction. Where are you with the state of the Kansas City Chiefs and the possibility that they're back atop the AFC this year? I'm sure Billy's got all sorts of numbers on how Mahomes is against cover nine and things like that. I will stick with the strictly, I wouldn't say emotional argument, but the anecdotal argument that Patrick Mahomes is, is one of, if not the greatest player I've ever seen in my lifetime. And what he did from the moment that he stepped into the lineup and became the Chiefs starting quarterback is unprecedented because it was not just that they were winning. Tom Brady won early in his career, but it was, they were winning because of Patrick Mahomes. He was the centerpiece. He was the best player in football, and he did it really, really quickly. I still, it feels unreal. It feels like it didn't actually happen that the Chiefs went six and 11 last year. Like, that to me is such an anomaly. There were different things happening. They were still in the playoff chase until Mahomes tears his knee and Gardner Minshew comes over, takes over and what, throws an interception on like the first play and that ended their chances there. But it just felt like last year was, every single week was an uphill battle. And while I understand, all right, Travis Kelsey's getting older. Chris Jones is getting older. There's all kinds of changes. I mean, they basically overhauled the entire secondary and let some pretty good players go. Traded one way in Trent McDuffie. Lost Brian Cook to Cincinnati. Lost Jalen Watson to the Rams. They've got a lot of moving parts. They're counting on young guys like Mansour Delane to step in right away. And receiver remains in a position group where if you look at the depth chart, it's a lot of the same guys. A lot of the same guys. You keep going, hey, is this the Xavier Worthy breakout? Hey, is this your Rishi Rice stays healthy and is on the field? The only reason that I have just from a strict objective perspective to say this is that I don't see Patrick Mahomes being a guy who's going to miss the playoffs two years in a row. I don't see Patrick Mahomes allowing the Chiefs to have a hiccup. Even setting aside like, all right, if this is the final tour for Travis Kelsey and what that means to him and how that can drive himself to be a better version. The past two seasons, the only time we really saw Travis Kelsey look like Travis Kelsey was the playoff run two years ago where all of a sudden he came out and like single-handedly took over a playoff game. Other than that, he's still a really good player. He's still a top, what, 10 tight end in the NFL, but he's not a good player. He's not a good player. He's not the number one guy. He's not quite Hall of Fame, you know, tight end Travis Kelsey. I do think he can get closer to that. I do think that you can extract something at the end of your career. But more than anything, I just foresee Patrick Mahomes along with Andy Reid, the return of Eric Biennemi, which people felt like they lost a little bit of that personality because Andy's not really the enforcer on the coaching staff. EB being back is significant. Again, like, I look at all the same stuff you do. You know, are they really going to give the ball to Kenneth Walker III? It's Andy Reid He doesn't want to run the ball. He wants to throw it every single snap. It just feels like that has to be the anomaly. They got to get past the Broncos, which are a really, really talented roster. Obviously, you got to get past the Chargers. That's in their own division. But I'd really be, not much shocks me, but I would be very surprised if the Chiefs are not right back in the playoffs and we're talking about, can they, can they pull it off again? Billy, you agree? You fade in the Chiefs. You back in on the Chiefs. The AFC West, I've changed my mind on who's going to win the AFC West. I've been in the AFC West about 17 times just in like the last three days. Well, where are you at now? You know, I saw that Chargers injury with Biotish, the center going down. I'm like, should I just bet? I think at this very moment, I might be leaning Denver just being like, they have the most talented roster, but I'm with Tom. I have the Chiefs as a playoff team. I think the Chiefs are still like fourth in odds to win the AFC this year. They're up there. The Ravens, Bills, and Patriots. And I think it's because of what Tom's saying. It's kind of like, well, they're the Chiefs. You know what I mean? Like they can't have another down year like they had. And you pointed out Eric Biannimi. Like, I wonder how much that's actually going to give them because there was a time you guys know where it was kind of like back and forth. Is he the one that really should get the credit? Is Andy Reid that gets the credit for this offense? And then he left and kind of just bounced around from stop to stop. I'm like, oh, okay, I guess this was really more of an Andy Reid situation than it was Eric Biannimi. But it's a familiar face that comes back here. He gets to work with Patrick Holmes. I mean, could this be Xavier Worthy's year that he has the breakout? Did you see what happened this year, guys? We have now an annual tradition because it happened for the second time. So I don't think you can have an annual tradition until something happens for the second time. Do you know what happened today at Chiefs camp? I missed this. Tom, did you get this? It's a big story. Everyone's talking about it. What do you got? Xavier Worthy for the second year in a row ended camp by giving away his PlayStation 5 to a kid and he signed it. So, I mean, if you're, if you're going out there, you're giving away PlayStation 5 at Christmas. Why do you hate the kids, Billy? Why are you against giving out nice things to children? No, I'm saying this is a good thing. Giving the kids the thing is good juju that's going to propel them. It's going to take them to the playoffs. And here's another thing that's kind of like an underrated thing, right? But I think might work in their favor. There is this kind of question like, are they done? But it's very different than, oh, they're going to be the best team in the AFC. It's going to, they're going to steamroll everyone. Like, the pressure's off of them, I think, because there isn't this expectation that they're going to win the AFC, that they're going to be even the two seed probably, right? They may not even win their division. So I think that that Who's the favorite in the conference, Billy, right now? Because you just mentioned, even with, all right, the win odds are what? The Bills, the Ravens, the Patriots, and the Chiefs, and the AFC? Yeah. Count the teams that didn't make the playoffs last year. The Chiefs didn't make it. The Ravens didn't make it. The Patriots were the surprise team that made a run, and Buffalo lost on a weird play in Denver. In other words, even some of the teams we're talking about being at the top, as much as everybody talks about the AFC is just so good and it's so difficult, and a lot of that's driven by the quarterbacks, it's like a lot of the teams that we think of as the ones that are tough every year, they weren't last year. They weren't very good, and that's, I think, part of the fun going into this season. You know, the Chiefs aren't playing on Christmas for, like, the first time ever, right? Like, there's kind of a little bit of a recalibration here, you know, which makes me think that this is going to be really interesting to see how it plays out. One thing that would be helpful, Travis Kelsey not running into Xavier Worthy on, like, the fourth play of the game in the opener, like, last year. Do you remember that? Yeah. The whole game plan was built. Just around Xavier Worthy in that game. He gets knocked out in the first series. That game goes to crap. It was like the omen of the entire season. Nobody could stay healthy. Nobody could stay on the field. Everything that could go wrong went wrong. I'm taking a guess that the law of averages is going to even that thing out. How close are you to getting invited to that wedding, do you think, Tom? I think if I had really tried. How do you know he wasn't invited, Billy? Listen, I was not. My kids were cast a hundred times. Yeah. I would say this. Based on, and this is not a shot at anyone, I would just say based on some of the people I saw that were at the wedding and their ostensible lack of connection to anyone involved, if I really, really wanted to go, I bet I could have found a ticket. Really? I bet if I pushed all the right buttons, I somehow could have gotten there. It didn't really cross my mind to attempt to do that. Took a vacation with my wife instead. Sent the kids to Banff. That was plenty good for me. Where did you guys go? Went to Banff. Banff. In Canada. Banff? This is beautiful. You're ready to go to Canada? That shows up on my Instagram every day. Me too. It actually looks amazing. I never thought about going there until this summer. Banff will be there forever. It's all over my Instagram, Tom. Give it two thumbs up. Madison Square Garden with 22,000 of your friends, your acquaintances, strangers, closest friends. Finger foods. And not even allowed to put anything on Instagram except for a photo of you in your hotel room because it's all secret. Or you go to Banff. One of the most beautiful places in the world and just see the water that's completely crystal blue behind you. I enjoyed it. It was a fun trip. It does look beautiful, Billy. Now, don't upset it. We want to, you know, increase that Canadian audience, Billy. I saw your reaction when he said that, and I'm going to take offense on his behalf. Okay. Well, I mean, it could have been like Bali or something. Like if it's like I'm way out of the way, but like you can hop on a plane to Banff at any point in time. I don't need to leave North America in July. It's crazy. Who's the next wedding? I guess now it's Herbert, right? So do you now like start kind of like getting a little bit closer to Herbert and say like, hey, you know, just ask me questions. Well, if you guys start like guilting me and if they also get married in an arena, I will just, just for the humor value, I will try to get a ticket. But no, I don't think, I like Justin. I ended up in his ad for a certain television brand several years ago and I still have a big screen TV to prove it because they took a clip of me. Yeah. Okay. Well, I didn't know if we have a sponsor. I'm new here. Shoot. Oh, come on. I ended up in the ad. And so we talked about it. I was, I was very grateful, even though it was completely incidental. It was me talking on TV about Justin Herbert and not having won a playoff game yet. And they stuck that in the ad and it was him sitting on the couch watching me say it. Wait, hold on a second. So did you, are you one of the people that ended up with like one of those 95 inch TVs that takes up a wall? That's correct. You have one of those? It's pretty loud. It might be 85. It's a, it's a big TV. Oh, sorry. Yeah. All because. Yeah. Incidentally ended up in an ad. That's huge. And I love those guys, man. They're wonderful to work with. So do you like, how big is the room this is in? I would think that, does it give you headaches? Is it like your wife hate this thing? No, we put a gigantic, ridiculous sofa out there and it all kind of like, it fits, you know? Yeah. Ratio. It's all about the ratio. All right, here we go. Which team is going to get the first year bump from its head coach? This seems to happen every single year that you, this is what I do. My exercise in the preseason, I'm like, all right, let me look at all the first year coaches, which one of these guys is going to make a big impact. That team's going to make a leap. We have a lot of these coaches this year. We got Joe Brady with the bills. We got Mike LaFleur with the Cardinals, Jesse Minter with the Ravens, Clint Kubiak with the Raiders, Jeff Halfley with Billy's Dolphins, John Harbaugh with the Giants, Mike McCarthy with the Steelers, Robert Sala Titans, Kevin Stefanski Falcons, Todd Munkin Browns. Unbelievable. New head coaches all over the place, Tom. Which one? Should their fan base be like, oh yeah, baby, we're getting the bump from what we saw last year because we hired the right guy. Listen, this one, I thought it was a pretty strong group of head coaches that got jobs, both the veteran guys, as well as the young guys. I think that, you know, everyone certainly has a chance to be successful, but for me, it's not about, all right, yeah, we all have the expectations, right? Of like Jesse Minter and Joe Brady, like really talented teams with stud MVP quarterbacks. Like, can they? Can they get them over the top? And they'll get all the credit for that, even though these are, again, really talented teams and really good quarterbacks. To me, it's more about who is going to take the awful team and actually just make them better. That, to me, is the bump. Like, I think Jeff Halfley's got a chance to be really, really good. I think the Dolphins are going to be hard-pressed to be good until 2028, just because of how they're building this. They want to do it the right way, draft and develop. A little bit of the same thing with Michael Flewer. I think it's going to take time. The guy I look at. Because he's the antithesis of everything that they were doing a year ago. The antithesis, frankly, of like what has been the persona of the franchise, which now fits together with some other people coming in like that. I think it's Clint Kubiak. One of the most soft-spoken guys in the NFL. He's really bright. Of course, Gary's son. Gary was also, you know, kind of a flatline personality. Didn't say a whole lot. Won a Super Bowl, you know, as the head coach of the Broncos. Clint has that saying. He comes from the same offensive system. He has that expertise. And he's got a guy in Kirk Cousins that knows how to run the offense. They spent a ton. If they do improve, it will all be Clint. I mean, they spent a ton on defense. I mean, Max Crosby gets traded for a few days to the Ravens. He comes back, and they've spent like $300 million on defense. And he's like, hey, this is pretty good now. Like, they put a bunch of money where they needed to. So, a lot of questions are like the wide receiver position. But think of how bad the Raiders were last year. Like, after. I was at the Week 1 game. One game, Raiders-Patriots in Foxborough. The Raiders won. I will still say, weirdest game of the entire NFL season was the Raiders beating the Patriots. Patriots lose that game and ruin the first game of the Mike Frabel era. And then after that, they were like virtually unstoppable. And the Raiders were the worst team in the NFL. But, like, Chip Kelly couldn't call a play correctly. You know, like, they had no idea what they were doing. Pete Carroll, he's a great guy. And he's well-established. He's a Super Bowl winner. But he's like, he was doing something he'd never done before, which is firing coaches in the season, just trying to figure it out. But Clint is going to come in and calm things down. Rob Leonard, the defensive coordinator, is close with Max. He's going to help calm things down on that side, even though Patrick Graham, who was there, is a really, really good coach. Andrew Giannouko coming in as the O.C. They got a bunch of guys who, like, have the demeanor for this. They are more talented. They got a quarterback who knows what he's doing until Fernando's ready, which I really do believe they're going to take their time before they put him on the field. The Raiders won, what, three or four games last year. I can't remember because they stole one at the end. Almost screwed them out of the number one pick. But they were the worst team in the NFL. I wouldn't be surprised if they scrape and claw and they get the six or seven wins. To me, that's a bump. It's as much about what happened last year as about this year. But I do think Clint coming in immediately, they're going to have a plan offensively. They're going to have a different dynamic just around the entire building. I think that based on all the changes, all the appeal for the Raiders, that's a good thing. Yeah, three and 14 last year. You're right. The bar is relatively low. We're not talking about them making the playoffs. We're talking about establishing some level of competence that you're heading in the right direction. See Mendoza at some point. Billy, are you buying the. Tom, is it? Let me ask Tom real quick here. The intel there, is this like a Tom Brady edict that this is what you need to do with first-year quarterbacks? And that I don't care what it looks like with Kirk Cousins. We need Mendoza to wait and wait and wait before playing him because this seems to be all the messaging. And coming out of Vegas, we don't care what you all think. We don't care what other teams have done in the past with these rookie quarterbacks. This guy is not going to play until, like you said, 10, 11, 12, 13 weeks into the season. It's not a Tom Brady edict. It's what Clint believes in. And he really wants to take this thing slow. I mean, he just won a Super Bowl in Seattle with a guy in Sam Darnold who maybe if he had a little bit of time to wait and he didn't go out there week one, like through a pick six, and then they won like 52 to 10 over the Lions. But after that, it was rough for Sam. Darnold with the Jets, like maybe with a little bit more time, he wouldn't have been the guy that everybody made fun of for seeing ghosts for the first five years of his career and bounced around. They want to get this right. And also remember this. Fernando's coming from a completely different system. I mean, it was shotgun, you know, zone read type stuff. He's throwing, you know, off the play fake to wide open windows. Now it's under center. Turn your back to the line of scrimmage on play action. All those fundamentals of that offense. And so it's going to take some time. I mean, what better? and player to watch than Kirk Cousins. Like, Kirk Cousins could step in right now and coach that scheme he knows it inside and out so you're going to be able to play now if they start out one and six you know what the pressure is going to be and you know what the conversation like basically what's the point of playing kirk cousins but kirk's going in there to win and i think that he'll at least have the opportunity to be a whole lot more competitive especially if they can get ashton gentry and the run game going um which should be you know part of the specialty for clint all right billy tom's got clint kubiak who who are you thinking is giving their team a first year bump before we change i just want to i want to advise you we need to be very careful around these parts with fernando mendoza because we found ourselves on the wrong side of fernando mendoza's fans and family earlier this year where a clip went out that she was on and something critical was said about something critical was said about fernando and his dad commented on it that we were clowns so you need to be very careful with fernando mendoza because these clips get around here so just tell you what i'm worried about if i'm being honest here i feel like you know tom has all these sources and he's talking to coaches and gms and players and i'm very worried that like on his first assignment for netflix someone's gonna come up to him and be and be like those clowns that you have that podcast with you know it's almost like he's not gonna do anything wrong it's like we're in high school we're like smoking pot in the bathroom and he's just trying to use the urinal but he's still getting the other teachers coming by and saying you three principal's office now i do feel like we have to be a little concerned about this billy because we're in high school we're in high school because we don't want our new colleague here to get in a in a bad situation on our behalf and i'm mostly talking about you but i'm trying to be a team player yeah it is something that did cross my mind and i have thought you know maybe i should behave slightly better just because you know tom's not just starting here at a new school but he's also starting at a new school at netflix and he's going to go out there and you know the worst case scenario is we say something where you know week one someone pulls him aside and say hey i was you know listening to bring our nfl show and here's the here's kind of like the double-edged sword with me and my career and my standing in this you know industry is that clip might go out no one knows who i am they're not going to remember it so it will be attributed to you for your shield probably so the consequences will be yours more than likely so i need to be on my best behavior i think on this front i agree with that and i can confirm that tom probably has the most to lose on it so that's you know we're just trying to look out for we're just if you say something stupid enough that i feel like i need to respond i will simply jump in and respond immediately so far okay i think you're on the right side of it so far wait you're gonna throw us out of the bus tom you're not gonna yeah 100 i'm saying i'll call y'all right here no mid podcast come on man that's good podcasting you gotta be able to yell at each other that's good i feel like now's the time you know let loose a little how many suits do you have tom right like actually in the rotation probably like 15 suits five sport coats somewhere in there really 15 wait there's some out of the rotation you still have well i'm saying like some suits you like more than others or they're newer and so you wear those a little bit more you know i mean i think it was deon sanders used to say you can only wear a suit once every five years now my suits are slightly less flashy than his but there is something to that if you wear something memorable you gotta gotta put it to the back of the closet the straight navy you can wear that every day outside of the uh like the professional obligations do you have many like suit needed events that you go to like what's your what's your suit usage rate at the moment oh no so i have way too many suits i think that that's uh that's fair uh you know maybe maybe netflix adds 15 more games next year otherwise yeah otherwise i'll be on the once every five years plan i like here's what here's what i'm thinking billy if this goes well this episode maybe future episodes maybe tom invites you over to his house because you're interested in the tv you're interested in the closet i do feel like at some point he might get a little annoyed with all these questions and just be like just come over look at what you want but don't mess anything up so let's work towards that now it's also possible shield that he says hey guys step your game up like this is a suit show now you know what i mean and then you need to go into the 15 suit game yeah i'm glad you didn't name a store there i thought you were going to give another billy i'm giving my head coach here okay because i know tom was saying all right it's the big turnaround team and that's true that's what you do want to look at this felt like the hardest question shield that you had by the way see i looked at it and i i think jesse minter there's a chance that in baltimore i know they're already a good team i know they got a good quarterback i know they got a good quarterback i know they're a good organization but that situation screamed to me like fresh new voice could really help here you know sometimes when a coach is there for that long it's just like all right you didn't do anything wrong it's just like we need a new voice here you hear great things about jesse minter i know he can coach a very good defense and i think there's a chance that the ravens are positioned to get over the hub now the bar for them is very different than clint kubiak like they've kind of got to get to the super bowl for us to be saying man jesse minter crushed it this year and i think that's a good thing i think that's a good thing i think that's a good thing and this actually did make a big difference but billy he's my pick uh jesse minter for the coach who's going to give his team a big first year bump i want to say joe brady just because no one has like we talked about it because like there's no one on there that i see that's going to take their team worse to first right like i don't think any of us think that any of the new coaches are and then the other coaches took over teams that were either playoff teams or like right there on the cusp of being playoff teams so i feel like if joe gets them to the super bowl that is while it's only winning one more game than they've been able to win so far that probably is the biggest bump right and he will now have a lot of leeway where if he loses in the first round or he loses in the afc championship game or whatever it's kind of like status quo but it feels like the bills are knocking on the door and i don't necessarily think that it was a coaching issue but when you get to that same place so many times and you just can't get over that hump you make changes so they made a change in head coach and if this is a year they finally break through i feel like he'll get more credit than he necessarily deserves just because he gets them there there is something to be said for change for the sake of change in other words when you consistently come up short and terry pagula kind of alluded to this in firing sean mcdermott who you know mcdermott had guided the turnaround in buffalo i mean they hadn't won a playoff game or been to the playoffs like 18 years and he comes in they get there right out of the gate they kind of ate a bunch of cap stuff but then for 2019 on they're one of the best teams in the nfl they're there every time but he said you know he saw josh allen crying in his locker and it was like it just it was happening again with baltimore it was just the fading down the stretch and it was the losing the games late i mean it was the same stuff over and over um to me like that that's it as much as anything you know if you're the ravens and you're showing up every single year and you feel like you keep having these situations where you're up late in the game and you blow it like that becomes ingrained you know the chargers had that for a long time and they're still not quite over the hump of that too you know just like the constant collapses like that's that's a challenge teams have to deal with and so mentor brady it may not be that they're better coaches or they did a better job it might just be the change is good for everybody change right place right time because yeah i mean those have been you know if you look at the hit the last 25 years it is very rare for teams to have the stretches that the bills and ravens have had here and they've had the stretches that they've had here and they've had the stretches that they've had here over the last whatever five six seven years and not even get to a super bowl so it might just be all right little change a little different voice get them over the hump i think that that certainly is a big storyline this year can one of those two teams finally get over the hump and get to the super bowl billy you have something else before i get to the next question here who do you guys think is the most right place right time coach ever that wasn't necessarily the reason but gets like the glory for it is it maybe barry switzer i mean switzer's that's probably the best example of it but that's you know yeah you step in for a team that literally had just won two super bowls i mean bruce arians i was thinking him where all of a sudden now he was there with genus it wasn't year one if we're talking year one winners like that's a difference that's kind of different category i mean gary kubiak to go back to that you know we've been a great coach in houston he would have been there a lot longer but he had health issues and then denver needed to make a change that's where he played backup quarterback he decided to do it what a super bowl with the greatest defense of all time and what was left of peyton manning um i i certainly think that's another another good example if i wanted you know my audience for the ringers philly special to be very upset with me billy i might throw nick sirianni's name in there but i am not going to do that i'm going to take a break and we're going to come back with the next two questions this episode is brought to you by orgain go harder and push farther with it helps improve muscle size strength and power when combined with a regular exercise and weight training routine orgain creatine is certified with informed choice which means it's tested for prohibited substances in sports upgrade your performance with orgain creatine available at amazon costco walmart and whole foods these statements have not been evaluated by the food and drug administration this product is not intended to diagnose treat cure or prevent any disease hey it's ryan reynolds here for mint mobile now i was looking for fun ways to tell you that mint's offer of unlimited premium wireless for 15 a month is back so i thought it would be fun if we made 15 bills but it turns out that's very illegal uh so there goes my big idea for the commercial give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch upfront payment of 45 for three months 90 for six months or 180 for 12 month plan required 15 per month equivalent taxes and fees extra initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy see terms all right we're back on the ringer nfl show all right more questions here uh tom here's what we got is this rams thing actually going to work out i mean there's really a this might this is just feels like the biggest story in the nfl the off season they had are we going to look back and go that went extremely well they're in the super bowl or do you have maybe more concerns uh than the average listener out there the wild thing is i mean the rams are the same division as the defending super bowl champs and if you look at you know odds or you just you turn on the you know tv watch whatever like all you hear about is the rams you don't hear about the seahawks obviously the rams you know they've kind of done this since they went to la they are always interesting whether it is shedding veterans and going super young or it is doing what they've done multiple times now cyclically which is going out and trading for people and just loading up and going for it all right now you know they're perfect hollywood team they're a team that you can't look away no matter what they're doing you can't look away no matter what they're doing you can't look away no matter what they're doing at any given time having said that i mean listen anytime you're relying on some older players that it creates some questions i mean matthew stafford is one of the toughest guys in the nfl he's played through a ton but if something happens to matthew stafford are you going to winning the super bowl with stetson bennett or ty simpson can you even get through six games eight games four games with those guys and stay on track um you know miles garrett is still in his prime but i would say he's if you had to say he's past the maximum he's still in his prime but i would say midway point of his prime if aaron donald comes back this entire idea that he's going to be the same aaron donald is in my in my opinion and based on what i know far fetched he may be really good in spurts but he's not a full-time player and then things like you know puka who spent a stint in rehab in this offseason what does davante adams have left at this stage in his career and in an offseason where uh the rams at one point told him we might trade you because we're trying to get aj brown i mean these are you know how does it happen in the secondary you acquire the two chiefs corners it's not like the chiefs had the greatest defense in the world you trade for trent mcduffie with a first round pick and sign jillian watson all of which is to say the rams have a chance to be really really good and we know that that sean mcveigh is one of the best minds in the nfl um you know chris shula did a great job overall last year with that defense as well and they got a weird game in week one i'll be there i'll be on the sides in melbourne australia for netflix it's 49ers rams it's a division game played a day and many time zones away it's friday morning uh australia time it'll be thursday night football here imagine if the rams lose that game to a 49ers team that their only storyline has been hey they got guys beat up again is at the substation like has anyone talked about the 49ers outside of that and outside of guys getting hurt the rams lose that game we're gonna have 10 days to sit here and pick apart all the reasons that the rams aren't gonna do it they're gonna be there at the end i feel confident saying matthew stafford god forbid misses a huge chunk of the season like they'll be in the playoff mix but they still got to get past the team in their own division that when it came down to it last year found a way to in very weird fashion get a huge win that kind of turned seattle season yeah it feels like the seahawks probably love this you know you're coming off a super bowl win and the other team in your division is getting the headlines this this is perfect in terms of all right it's pretty easy to motivate my team uh this way billy i think it's gonna work for the rams i would love to see that i would love to see that i would love to see that i would love to see for content's sake i've really been trying to zag and be like all of you are hyping up the rams and now this thing's gonna not work out and this thing's not gonna work out just the infrastructure of mcveigh and stafford now if the quarterback goes down obviously it's not gonna work we can say that about any team in the nfl but when i'm just doing preseason projections i have one team that i think is going to have a top five offense and a top five defense and that's the los angeles frames it doesn't mean it's definitely going to work out it's football it's the nfl random things happen but the coach and the quarterback in addition to all the other things we're adding around them i i'm with tom i just i don't see a scenario where the floor is so low we're like they're not in the playoffs this year barring again some crazy injury thing i mean i'm siding with tom here where you're making great points they have all of the reasons for this to work and the stars if they align would be great and this should be the best team but like last year we thought that they were the best team and the stars didn't align and this year as you're saying they're older like if stafford goes down if puka kind of how you alluded to not even goes down with an injury just does something dumb because this seems to be something unfortunately that puka has been doing a lot lately to varying degrees whether it's you know the situation where he bits someone allegedly or the situation where he's doing things on live stream it seems like he just has gotten somewhat caught up in the fame there and is inclined to not make the best decisions and it hasn't cost him yet but hopefully he can you know when football season starts again kind of get his head on straight and not run into that but that's always a possibility and then even if you know that's not the case even everyone does stay healthy they still have to go through the seahawks they still what are the eagles gonna look like are the bears gonna you know play them tough again this year the lion's gonna bounce back we talked about it last week the cowboys dac said that they're gonna be the gaudy which is the greatest offense there is so are they gonna have to run through there like yeah there's a lot of teams out there in the nfc they're gonna have to go through yeah no there are reasons tom laid out good reasons second hardest schedule in the nfl when you look at super bowl odds bad special teams i think the o-line talent and depth is a concern puka is a huge concern i mean he might be the best wide receiver in the nfl if he's getting suspended or if he's just he needs to have like a tracker of like how many days without your name in a headline and he should just be trying to build that baby up maybe he can get some incentives some bonus tied to it because it just feels like he can't go more than two weeks without a lot of us reading another story about puka nakua honestly for him selfishly and this is very irresponsible he should have a countdown clock to days until guaranteed money like how about just get a big contract and get your guaranteed money like stay on your best behavior until send your best behavior always right but also why are you gonna do it like on rookie deals before you've even made money like you're gonna blow this for yourself is that a tricky situation tom that puka nakua contract situation given the you know all this stuff that's happened uh off the field and then the fact that plays he just looks like an unstoppable force in some ways what played out this offseason simplifies things relative to if the rams had known the various issues that puka was dealing with and he didn't leave the team and he didn't go into rehab the fact that it's all out there it eliminates the questions of like why aren't they signing them is it the thing he did on that live stream is it you know any number of other things the legal battles this is kind of like i think everybody understands right now i think everybody understands right now that puka nakua this is always gonna be a tricky deal to do because unlike jackson smith and jay bay he wasn't a first round pick which means there is no fifth year option which means this is the last year of his contract you're looking at tagging him if you don't get a deal done um it makes sense for everybody to gather the information for the rams just to see how this thing goes and then it's going to be a high stakes negotiation um after the season you know could they pay him tomorrow could they pay him mid-season i suppose but i would think you want to see how this entire thing out and then all right the rams have never been scared to sign their players they've never been afraid to pay top dollar and at that point then all right if you can't get a deal done do you tag him and trade him somebody is going to take a shot on the talent um yes it absolutely complicates matters but the fact that everybody kind of has an idea even if they don't know specifics of why there's no contract talks right now i think actually makes it easier because sean mcveigh's not up there every day being asked questions about like you know is puka holding in is he holding out is he what's going on with the contract you kind of eliminate that part of it and everybody can focus on what matters which is going out there and trying to win games yeah potentially huge story going into next offseason depending on how uh this season goes but on field i mean he has a strong case to be the highest paid wide receiver in the nfl but it's not that simple if it were that simple he would have already probably gotten that deal all right last question here as we wrap up which coach is underprivileged the most pressure and this is where tom is the minnesota nice thing is that if you find that to be true and accurate or do minnesotans get uh annoyed when people are always referring to that uh i think that it's true to a certain level but it leads to a lot of passive aggression i would say like yes you can smile to someone's face and say something that that person's gonna walk away going with was that like a dick are they mad at me but they were smiling that's what minnesotans are most known known for they won't just insult you your face they'll just talk behind your back oh that's not nice billy this feels a little bit like the kapadia family you know keep stuff bottled inside keep your emotions inside and then maybe like once a year just to have a you know family blow up people are crying and yeah but for the most part you know everyone's smiling and nice to each other what's happening i'm sorry am i giving to let's get back to football all right which coach is under the most pressure here was that all a kevin o'connell set up no i don't think kevin o'connell is under a great deal of pressure i think everyone's realistic about the quarterback situation and the reality that benny all this plays out they may not have the guy on the roster like i would break it down in different ways like we already covered all the first year coaches jesse mentor joe brady to an extent mike mccarthy like they all have all varying degrees of pressure because of who they're following because the success those teams have had because of what's still out there for them like i'd set those aside in a separate category uh mike vrabel is in a category of his own it was just a couple of years ago and he was in a category of his own and he was in a category of his own in the super bowl lots happened since uh he has his own level of pressure just because you're going to have the scrutiny that's going to take place if the Patriots don't perform. We all can look at it and have all the stats and say they're playing a harder schedule. That's why the team's stumbling. Mike Tomlin himself said it on the NBC broadcast the other day, which is like if all of a sudden they're not playing well, that noise is going to get loud. That's its own issue, and the same thing with the guys who didn't make the playoffs last year. We all know, and the coaches know themselves. If you're Zach Taylor, if you're Shane Steichen, if you're Dan Quinn, any coach who misses the playoffs two years in a row and it's not your first two years, you know, you're probably your back's up against the wall, depending exactly how things play out. But I'm going to go to one, a guy who has made the playoffs multiple times, has previously been to a Super Bowl, and has not so far delivered what the franchise envisioned. It's Jim Harbaugh. Everyone talks about Justin Herbert, and certainly there's pressure on him, and he has been on a playoff game, and we talk about all the other things going on with him and his fiancée and these things. He's a really good player who's played through a lot. He's super tough. You think back to the injuries that he's played through. He's gutted it out through a lot. But Jim Harbaugh is the guy who came in, came back to the league coming off a national championship game at Michigan. He came in as the guy who, in his first two years with the 49ers, went to the NFC Championship game and the Super Bowl, and then went back to the NFC Championship game again in year three. But for all the other things going on, he could have been the 49ers coach for as long as he wanted to. He chose to go back to Michigan. There were a lot of other dynamics there we don't need to get into, but when you pay a guy as much as the Chargers are paying Jim Harbaugh, and you have the quarterback in Justin Herbert, and you have what I think is objectively a talented roster, you're doing that for one thing, which is like, we're competing right now. We're going to the Super Bowl in the near term. They've made the playoffs twice, but they haven't won a playoff game. Since Jim Harbaugh came to LA. I'm not suggesting that Jim Harbaugh gets fired if they don't win a playoff game again this year. But if you go three years without Jim Harbaugh winning a playoff game, if you're Chargers ownership, and you're the fan base, you have to start going, wait, isn't this almost Brandon Staley's resume? Haven't we lived this exact same thing for decades here? And this was the guy, this was the coup. This was in a year, and really a decade, where everybody in LA, everyone thinking LA football thinks about the people who you're their tenant at SoFi, which is the Rams. This year, everyone's talking about the Rams. Who's talking about the Chargers? If it's not Justin Herbert getting his hair combed on the field after practice. No one's talking about the Chargers. That wasn't what it was supposed to be. This was supposed to be the story with Jim Harbaugh. He lost his defensive coordinator after last season. He now wiped out his offensive staff. Now brings in Mike McDaniel. Those two guys, I'd love to be a fly on the wall, seeing those two communicate in the meeting rooms on a daily basis. It's just, there's so much into it. What bullets do you have to fire when you're a head coach? It's firing your coordinators, changing things out, right? They just change both their coordinators, one by choice, one not. A lot of this, you start to look at this and go, this is on Jim Harbaugh. He's got to take a step forward. We know that Jim can coach. We know he's had success everywhere he's been, from San Diego to Stanford to the 49ers to Michigan. If it's the third straight year and they don't advance in the playoffs, if they're not in the Super Bowl mix, then there's a conversation to be had about how long do they go on like this, and is this going to be the group and the coach that gets them where they ultimately want to go? If I heard that and I were Jim Harbaugh's defense attorney, agent, family member, or whatever, I would say, Tom, give me a break here. They've won 11 games in back-to-back seasons. They didn't have either of their offensive tackles last season, and they still won 11 games. At some point, does Justin Herbert have to be accountable for playing the worst game of his career in a playoff game? I look at the talent on the roster, and I don't look at that and go, they're underachieving. I look at that and go, that's probably kind of where they should be given the talent. I would defend Jim Harbaugh in that respect. Wasn't Jim Harbaugh also partly hired because he's a quarterback guy? You think about it, whether it was J.J. McCarthy or it was Colin Kaepernick or it was Andrew Luck. He's been a guy, even if he's not the one necessarily calling every player being the central figure, you hire him in part because it's like, this is the combination. These are the guys who are going to work together. We know because Jim Harbaugh keeps telling us how much he loves Justin Herbert. I'm not trying to take shots at Jim Harbaugh. I'm just saying, you're there for a specific reason, which is to go and do the one thing you hadn't done. You went to college and you got your championship there. Jim Harbaugh himself is there to win the Super Bowl. If you asked him, I'm sure he'd have a very colorful way of saying it, but like, he'd agree. He's not there to go one and done in the playoffs two years in a row. Definitely not three. And so, there is a pressure level, especially because look around the rest of that division, and you've got Sean Payton and Bo Nix in the Broncos. You've got still Andy Reid and Patrick Mahomes that you're contending with. And now, maybe, if Fernando Mendoza lives up to being the number one pick, you've got him and Cliff to deal with for years to come here. That's a treacherous type of division where, right now, you're going into the season thinking, we should have a shot. We should have a shot every year to win it, and there's still trying to get there. What do you think, Billy? More pressure? He hates Jim Harbaugh. You hate Jim Harbaugh. I like Jim! What's going on? I like Jim! Billy, you can't. He's, you see, that stuff you can't do, Billy. He's got to interview. I like Jim. The bar is high. Would you have said Sean McDermott had pressure on him last year? Would you have said, you know, that John Harbaugh had pressure on him last year? Sean McDermott, yes. Just because it felt like he was out of people to fire, and they just weren't getting over the hump. But Jim's only been there, like, three years. And now we're getting into, like, territory where, is Justin Herbert going to be a coach killer? You know? Because they brought in Staley, and he was, like, the boy genius at the time. Like, when does some of the blame, we know he has the talent, but when does this blame shift to him slightly there? Because he also has won no playoffs game preceding Jim Harbaugh's arrival. Right, right. I mean, Brandon Staley's a classy guy. I doubt that he's sitting in New Orleans on his off days, like watching Chargers tape and enjoying their playoff losses. But on some level, the team keeps bumping their heads in the same way. Kind of reflects better on the Brandon Staley era, especially because he came in there and changed a lot of things that they were doing and kind of set the table for where the Chargers now. I mean, they absolutely, like, why wouldn't you? We started this conversation by talking about, like, even the favorites in the AFC, two of them missed the playoffs last year. Like, why shouldn't the Chargers be in that mix? Yeah, they lost their center. They still got the tackles. Like, injuries happen around the league, and that's a huge, you know, sometimes undersold factor. Like, why shouldn't we be talking about the Chargers? The fact that we're not in year three with Jim Harbaugh, to me, that's the definition of pressure, which is, we should be in a certain place that we're not with a coach at a given time, even though it would be a stunning development if he wasn't still the Chargers coach going into 2027 and quite possibly beyond. Yeah, they got a lot right. I mean, you hire Mike McDaniel, everyone can agree that Mike McDaniel is a very good offensive coach. You've got the tackles. Like you said, you've got the quarterback. If it doesn't happen this year, yeah, somebody, you know, just in the court of public opinion, not that they're necessarily going to make wholesale changes, but we're going to be having these conversations. Could the GM have done a better job with the roster? Could Harbaugh have done a better job coaching? Does Herbert need to be held accountable? All those conversations are in play with the Chargers. You got a coach in mind for this one? Well, so I was going, I like the way Tom took this, because I was going to go with, like, the generic, okay, Aaron Glenn can be in trouble, Zach Taylor can be in trouble, but if I'm going to follow Tom's lead here, I'll ask you, Tom, I'll ask you, Shiel. Stan Campbell may be in trouble if they have another disappointing season, because he loses his two coordinators that got him right there to the brink of, you know, getting to the Super Bowl. He gets to the most successful season in the history of the team, and then he loses coordinators, and last year they fall off if there's another step backwards. So we use things getting a little hot for him. Well, first of all, I think the Lions are going to be very good. So I don't think that's going to be an issue. And I would think, no. It feels like Detroit still loves Dan Campbell. Their record is incredible since he got there. If you just look at Detroit Lions pro football reference page, like a stretch like this is highly unusual, certainly in our lifetimes, for the Detroit Lions. So I think. A new Lions, Shiel. There's a new standard here in Detroit now that they have to live up to, you know? They went 9-8 last year, and they make the playoffs, if not for the weird Christmas game in Minnesota where Taylor Decker gets sick the day of the game, and they have to play without their left tackle and change the whole game plan. And that was, by the way, Dan, he wouldn't say it publicly because he doesn't throw people under the bus like that, but at his core, he knows he made a mistake. I mean, he brought back John Morton to be the offensive coordinator. It didn't work out, and it was pretty apparent. Stylistic personality scheme, like not so much scheme because it's Dan's scheme. It just wasn't a fit. So now you bring in Drew Petzing, who was cast off from Arizona. They're continuing to develop with Kelvin Shepard on the defensive side. Kelvin, he's a really young guy, you know, former player, obviously. He's got a lot to learn, but Dan wants to go on that growth process with him. And he might have had a really young offensive coordinator too if Washington hadn't offered David Blau their coordinator job. So I don't think that there's pressure on Dan Campbell so much as you're right, Billy, like the standard has changed in Detroit. They expect to be there every year, but that's also a credit to Dan Campbell that they're in that place that they wrote it out if anybody is not going to you know for instance you know make a change after the season it's it's it's sheila ford hamp and and that ownership group i mean sheila to her credit she did one of the smartest things and it's a rare thing midway through dan's second season and they were like i think they were four and 21 over two years or something just abysmal and she came out and just said dan is our guy like we see it behind the scenes the winds are going to come but dan is our guy and from that moment forward all of a sudden that's when you saw the offense get going and that's when ben johnson became ben johnson um a lot of things changed you know injuries have been a huge part of it too well you know the taylor decker thing was you know the last straw but like there were so many injuries especially on their entire defense yeah the entire defense was it was totally decimated if they're able to be healthy and i'm certainly guessing that they're going to adjust some things in terms of how they're preparing these guys for the season um i i'm with you sheila i think the lines are going to be really good and no i don't think there's pressure on dan campbell any more than there is on any other coach who's really really good i could see him being on you know frankly like the mike tomlin or john harbaugh plan where you can have or sean payton in new orleans you can have one two three down years it's cyclical and this is not an ownership group that's going to move on from the people that they believe in i always think about if a coach did get fired with how quickly would they get hired and feels like dan campbell would probably be on the top of a lot of lists everyone wants to find their dan campbell what if you could actually just get dan campbell yeah maybe i don't think so i'm with you i don't think so but i took an easy one you know you guys are thinking outside the box credit to you but zach taylor who i actually you know i think he there's aspects to his job that are challenging there in cincinnati but to tom's point and i think zach taylor would probably uh say this if you injected him with some truth serum if you go four straight years with joe burrow as your starter and i know he's had injuries without making the playoffs i don't think he's going to be able to do that he's going to be able to do that there's obviously going to be a spotlight on that situation but you know i look at some stuff in cincinnati tom and i'm like if they had the resources or willing to be aggressive for a defensive coordinator like brian flores or vic fangio you know stuff that might be uh uh above zach taylor's head in terms of are we able to do this as an organization we're probably thinking about them differently going into this season so i think the bengals are going to be good this year i think he's going to be fine but i think obviously there's going to be some pressure there in cincinnati well they're doing unbengals things you know the bengals have always been like they get the reputation for not spending money and there's some things that are founded in terms of like you know the size of their scouting staff or you know some of the things that they don't have in the building the fact that their facility is one of the last ones it might even be the last one that's just a locker room in the bowels of the stadium you know with cement everywhere like all those things are real but like they have spent money you know they've done things like you know selling the rights to the the naming rights to the stadium um changing their contract structure when they need to to get certain deals done and then the sausage i mean they traded the number 10 pick to go and get a defensive tackle i mean that is not something you ever would have seen the the bengals do in the past you know much you know any trades they made like three trades in season over a 50 year span now they're trading the number one pick for dexter lawrence they invested in the defense these are all this is all new territory uh for the bengals and when you do that i think that it does show a level of not desperation but it does show a level of desperation and it does show an urgency and if that urgency falls short joe burrow said it um i think it was today or yesterday you know it feels like now or never in cincinnati and i don't think that means necessarily for joe burrow but it does mean for a guy who you know he's put his weight behind zach taylor they've been to a super bowl together to embrace the city and they're going for it here if they once again fall short whether that includes another joe burrow injury or not it will kind of feel like an inflection point uh for that organization um especially with zach you know later on uh in his contract at this point with an organization that typically has not fired people when they own money all right five big questions entering the 2026 season with tom pellicer billy how do you think we did is tom gonna be like i will never work with those two again do you think we're okay is he gonna get cornered the next time he's covering training camp or a game i mean is this one and done how are you feeling about the performance here i don't think we said anything today to get him in harm's way how big are you tom i don't know i have a hard time like seeing people like when i see him on tv how tall are you are you a big guy 5 10 legit okay so i mean you're in a position where there could be a menacing situation if we put you in a bad spot then right it could but i don't think like again i'm not it looks like he's in good shape i think you can hold his arm with you good shape ish uh no i listen i i have no problem throwing you guys under the bus so just okay there you go listen if somebody if somebody in the nfl is getting an hour plus into this podcast it doesn't like something that one of you guys said like i think that at that point they're invested in all of us enough to make this move things over yeah i was gonna say when you mentioned it earlier like i don't think your wife's gonna hear the part where we were bashing banff to be honest with you like that was deep enough in that i'm sure you were bashing that is a highly unpopular opinion by the way banff yeah it's fly into calgary short ride up bam looks great i love it there you go all right but if they did listen this much just tell them rate review and then here's you know billy's email uh you can do it you know you can you can tell him whatever you want he can take it he's a big boy all right that was a lot of fun thank you to tom palacero thank you to billy gill thanks to christopher sutton for producing stefano sanchez on video and additional production supervision by connor nevins and arjuna ramgopal i'm shilka pali we'll talk to you next time on the ringer nfl show 21 plus and present in select 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