Seahawks WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Plus the Biggest Trends We’ll See This NFL Season w/ Kevin Clark

Hey, Resilla listeners, you can find every episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Look, if you're a bigger guy like us, have you ever bought a shirt that technically fits, but it doesn't, like, actually fit? That's why this is my favorite brand of all f***ing time. One Bone. I'm in love with everything that I put on today. In fact, I would say I've never loved a brand more than One Bone. Trust me, you guys are going to romanticize getting dressed in the morning. That's what One Bone does. Go to OneBone.com and upgrade to a fit that is actually built for you. Use code BARSTOOL for 20% off to see the difference firsthand. After one wear, you'll understand why standard fits don't make the cut. The Rhymer Solo Show is presented by DraftKings. On today's show, from the Super Bowl champs, Seattle Seahawks, it's Jackson Smith and Jigba, led the league in receiving last year. We're going to talk about his career, his journey from Texas to overlooked as a recruit to Ohio State, and who's meaner, Witherspoon or Eamon Worry. And we've got Kevin Clark previewing the biggest storylines from the NFL this season. We'll do a little over-under on how many quarterbacks we think will be benched because of play and life advice. DraftKings Game Day is officially here. All day today, sports fans can score massive deals and exclusive offers during this one day only. It's happening right now, folks. Celebration of everything sports. And this game day is bigger than ever. The DraftKings Sports app is now live in all 50 states, from Texas to California, Florida, and everywhere in between. Fans across the country can get in on the excitement. One app, every sport, all 50 states. This game day is yours. DraftKings Game Day is live right now, kicking off a new season and a new era for sports fans everywhere. So get ready. Get in the game and make the most of game day. New DraftKings customers sign up today with code Ryan. Join the game day celebration. That's code Ryan, R-Y-E-N. In partnership with DraftKings, the crown is yours. DraftKings Predictions involves risk of loss. Availability varies. Predictions offer void in New York. Terms at DKNG.co slash audio. Nationwide based on sportsbook predictions and free-to-play sports contest availability. Varies by state. He's an all-pro. He's a leading receiver in the NFL last year. He's a Super Bowl champ. And he joins us from Seattle, a member of the Seahawks. It's Jackson Smith in Jigba. And he is here on behalf of Levy for the food and beverage hospitality partner of the Seahawks. And also, he has a huge announcement on Sunday. Some new products that they're doing up there at the home of the 12th man. So, it's good to see you. How are you? Yes, sir. Thanks for having me. So, did it feel like the NFC Championship game was your Super Bowl last year? Nothing's like the Super Bowl. But that NFC game was definitely close. We knew those guys. We knew those guys. We prepared for them. And for us to play them three times in a season, it was a. You could say two Super Bowls. How about that? We'll say they were both a Super Bowl. I get it. And I think you're being very respectful. You know, because you don't want to be respectful of the opponent and then all the pomp and circumstance that goes into a Super Bowl. But I just loved watching you play the Rams last year. Because the first game is weird and tight. I think the second game is the strangest game of the entire NFL season. So, I wonder, with you winning that game the second time around, if you won it in a way where it was a great. Way for you to not be overconfident against an opponent that you had beaten in having this rematch. Because, again, it was. It probably felt like they should have won that game that night. And then you walk away going, how the hell did Seattle do this? Yeah. And I've been on the other end of that many times. So, you know, I would say we deserved to win that game. And we earned the right to win that game. It was definitely a close one. And, like I said, they knew us. We knew them. And it's going to be a. Four-quarter battle, like, to the end. And, like, that's what we preach all season long. And I know the mindset of my guys in the locker room is, like, we're not going to stop until it's 0-0. And then we'll see, you know, what happens. So, you know, it was definitely a fun matchup last year. And, you know, it gets a little better this year. So, we're looking forward to it. End of the first half. They go up with the touchdown. And you have very little time to work with. And I think that's arguably, like, the most important drive, maybe, of the season, you know, considering everything that happened. You go up for a deep shot. How bad do you know that you're going to get hit by Curl? I do know he's there. And I know he's ready to clean. You know, he's ready to put me in the dirt. So, I did feel him, that awareness of him, you know, ready to clean my clock. So, I knew I had. I had to jump for the ball because if I would have ran through it, it probably would have been an even worse collision. So, really just jumping up and trying to protect myself at the same time and just, like, going and get the ball now, I thought was the best case scenario. So, luckily, that worked out. Is it because. I just was watching it, and you pop right. Is it all adrenaline? Like, does it hurt, but you don't even know that it hurts yet? Yeah, no, that didn't hurt. That didn't. I honestly didn't. I was really in a great position to take on the hit and to absorb the hit. Kind of like in a cradle position in the air. So, that was an easy one. Okay, fast forward a few plays later, the touchdown. I don't know. They lose you, and it's a great design, too, because you've got somebody in the flat to take the underneath man. You have, I think, a tight end running through the middle that brings the other safety over. And if you're not lined up in the backfield, I don't know that you're able to just kind of run through the coverage there. They lose you there because I think of where you're aligned as opposed to if you were in the slot or kind of like assigned to somebody. 1000%. A great play call, great play design. And if you see me, I'm kind of like. I kind of hide behind the offensive tackle, and then she's running a post right at the corner, and I'm just praying he grabs him. So, I kind of go in line, and Cooper Cupp's also running out. So, I kind of like hide between those guys, and then once they make their move, I was able to just make my move as well. So, just happened to play out real well. I mean, with the respects of Cooper Cupp and Shahid, I mean, they opened the play up. Yeah, what did Shahid do for your offense this year? I didn't realize this. I'll share it with you. I don't know if you knew this, but like of a certain number of receptions that you have, so basically the high-volume guys, the guys that really play, he has the lowest drop rate going back to 23 now. Like, he doesn't drop the football. 1000%. I mean, his consistency, and of course his speed and his vertical threat is something the defense has to take account for. And even his third down play, you know, was great for us. And he's just somebody you have to account for because he will burn you. And I think his route running is very under. It's not underappreciated because he runs great, clean routes. And like you said, he has reliable hands. So, I'm excited for him. I'm excited for what he's going to do year two. He's really going to take the next step. And our receiving core, you know, we don't get talked about a lot, but, you know, we're here to take the title for sure. Yeah, I think a lot of times like the go-route guys, we just assume they're not quick. They're not good slot guys. They're not like short route burst guys. And then even times, sometimes I think because they're like, oh, it's just a track guy. How good are his hands? And your front office is incredible, you know? So, you rarely, rarely make mistakes. You go back to high school. I was looking at the stats. They're insane. Just a million touchdowns. You're in Texas. How'd you end up at Ohio State? Honestly, the lack of recruiting from the Texas schools. You know, I would say, I wouldn't say all Texas schools, but the majority of the ones, you know, I wanted to go to. Where did you want to go? Well, growing up, growing up as a baby, I was an A&M fan. And then I went, and then in middle school, high school, I went to Texas OU. You know, the Con Bowl, each and every year, my dad would take me. So, I was kind of like, I'll definitely, I don't know which side I'm going to play on, but I'm definitely going to play in this game. And then Ohio State comes in and swoops me up, you know, before they can, I guess, get their hands on me. And that was, that's history. First of all, I love that you're sitting there with your dad, because I know your dad used to work you guys out like crazy. And then he basically, from the interview that I saw, he was like, then they were good. So, I was like, oh, this isn't just a, a bonding session, but you were going to the Cotton Bowl as what? A junior high, high school kid watching the game, thinking I'm going to play in this game one day. 1,000%. Yeah. It was something, you know, me and my dad did, and it was fun. Look forward to it every single year. Was able to, to talk to OU a little bit, you know, Texas a little bit, but it wasn't like, we want you to come here, like commit today. So, but yeah, But yeah, I definitely have my mind made up on those two. And then out of nowhere, Brian Hartline comes, Mark Mantoni and Coach Day come, and they're like, you know, we want you here. Like, you need to be here. And then after that, I was just like, turn my back on them, and we're going to Ohio. So they came in late then? Is it fair to say Texas came in late and it was way too late? They came in way too late. I don't know what they do to the receivers up there in Columbus, so maybe you can give us some more insight. But that program is on an absolute heater. Of putting not just, you know, crazy college stats, but just NFL talent. What stood out to you the most about your development there to turn you into the receiver you are today? Man, got to give credit to Coach McMarati, our head strength coach there. I mean, a legend. A legend, been doing it for years and years. Came in, you know, with Urban Meyer from Florida. So I would say, you know, the toughness. And the things he had us do, definitely built. And I think the recruiting aspect of it all, honestly, you know, I love to compete. And they want competitors in that receiver room, like, to be the best. And we had about six guys who were wanting to be the best, you know, at all times. So for me to compete against that and understand and to be in that room with those guys just elevated my game to a whole other level. And for me, that's why I went there, to develop with those guys. I knew being around great players was going to make me great. So that was my mindset. And yeah, now we're here. You have the incredible sophomore year, and then you're limited only three games your junior year. I mean, I can't help but think, like, you don't want to be that guy and another dude in the locker room looking at his draft projection. But did that get to you at any point where you're starting to go like, man, if I were coming off my junior year with those numbers, like, this would be a wrap, and now I got to worry about this a little bit? What was that like? Oh, man, it was, at the time, it was hectic. It was stressful at the time. Yeah, it was very disappointing, you know, not being able to play my last year of college. And at that time, you know, just the decision for me, I thought, was best to just go ahead and get it done. You know, just go ahead and. You know, get to the league and develop. And, you know, we're here. I'm here to be great. And you have to dominate at the highest level. So looking back, you know, sometimes I question, like, should I have just thought about staying? But there was no. At the time, it was like, I'm gone. Like, I didn't even think about staying at that point in time, and we were out. Yeah, I don't. Look, I don't blame you. You're dealing with something. I mean, I guess the good part for you in the pre-draft is it wasn't some ACL. It wasn't like an Achilles. It was this lingering hamstring thing. Yeah. But you know how the football world works. Like, did you feel like people were holding that against you, you know, trying to. Because I swear, if you had come out after your sophomore year, if you've been allowed to come out, I think you're a top-ten pick. I mean, you absolutely lit it up. And you're like, dude, is he better than the other guys? Like, this Ohio State room is ridiculous. And then, you know, you go 20th, and that, you know, to remind everybody, I know you remember, but it was the first. You were the first receiver taken, but that's so late in the first. And even at the time, it's like, oh, yeah, he was kind of nice two years ago. And I'm kind of like, man, he was. I couldn't unsee the sophomore season. Yeah. No, I was definitely sweating in the draft room, for sure. But yeah, that was going on. That was the thing that was talked about was me just kind of, you know. Me just not really being heard and. Right, right. That was it, right? You were hearing that. Yeah, definitely. And for those who know me, you know, they know, you know, what it was. And people who were a part of it understand what was going on at the time. And if I could play, which I wanted to very badly, help my team win a national championship, you know, I would have. You know, there's no doubt in the world that, you know, but, you know, the circumstances, the circumstances prevented me not to. And, you know, I just had to deal with that and to move on, honestly. And which was a big step in my life, you know, personally and obviously, you know, in the sports world. So, yeah, dealt with that. But definitely just made me a stronger individual, a stronger player and person, for sure. Every guy I've ever asked about the draft. Like, I assume there was another team that told you they were going to take you and then it doesn't happen. Was there any other place you're like, oh, I'll probably go there? No one told me they were going to like they're going to get me. I mean, I definitely had some some teams in mind going into that draft. I was like, I think Chicago might take me at 12. Maybe Houston takes me at 10. Maybe Green Bay takes me, but they don't take first round receivers like that. Maybe the Patriots at 15. And then it will. We were at 18 and I'm and I'm sweating. And then the Seattle had to pick and the rest is history. Yeah. And then four straight receivers went to. So, I mean, at least you had the bragging rights over the rest of the class there because then it was like, all right, we're taking these guys. I love Witherspoon and Eamon Worry. I loved him in college. I love that they're nasty, that they play mean and knowing how like the offense defense works out. Can they even do that to you when you come in in the same class with Spoon and then he's and then Eamon? Worry's after you like can they they can't really mess with you, though, can they? I mean, they can try, but like it's not like they've been there five years before you show up. Oh, yeah. No, I give it to them. You know, you know, you can't you can do all that to them. But, you know, when you see me as a different animal and just having those back and forth battles, I think it is very fun and sharpens both of our tools for sure. For sure. They've done it. They've done a good job on on getting these young guys in. Who's meaner between the two? Two of them. Who's meaner? Hmm. Gosh, those are two mean guys. Honestly, they're super cool. Like, it's crazy because they're the coolest guys, too. But when they get on the field, they're super mean. I think I'm going to have to give it to Spoon. You know, Nick had his rookie season, so I'm sure he'll get even more, you know, uglier, uglier in the years to come. But I think Spoon's been doing it for a while. So so he really so he really knows. And Spoon's loud, too. He knows how to get that that Florida out of him, you know, to get the defense. I mean, to get the opponent, you know, off track for sure. And when you're a little skinnier, too, and you're that tough. Oh, man. Those guys are even meaner. Like Nick's thicker. And, you know, he's exactly. Although I would give Nick probably another year because the South Carolina stuff that I watched, I was like, this is a bad dude. And that's what I love. I love about your defense so much. When you first come in, though, you know, with Lockett is there who I think had some really nice years for Seattle and Metcalf's a beast. I mean, it's like absolute. It's like twins with Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito with those two. And I think it's a credit to your skill that, you know, we know how the league is. They turn the page on guys, but they're like, all right, we're good. What did you take from two completely different style of receivers in your rookie year as far as influencing you and how you saw the game? Oh, man, I took a lot. You know, I'm always learning from my peers. And to have two guys like that, you know, it was, you know, I was living the dream in the receiving room, just picking up on information about the game and about how they see things. And two totally different perspectives, just and totally different players, you know. Right. So it was awesome to kind of see that between the two and kind of pick, you know, what I think, you know, I could put in my game here, what I can pick. And put in my game here, which is, you know, DK wants to run through people, which at times, you know, there's a time and place for it. Then Tyler Lockett, you know, he wants to get down and make sure everybody's safe on the play, which there is a great time for that. So just being able to to be with those guys and learn from them and put it into my game is something I feel like I'm really good at doing and understanding and visualizing. So. And off the field as well, you know, just two great guys, two great competitors. You know, I was definitely lucky to have them my first two years. I was watching your mic'd up game against Tampa. Yeah. And I, I know because you were mic'd up, like, like, I'm aware of how receivers, hey, you come off after a series, you're like, hey, I'm open. But you were very specific. And there was a certain thing I think 25 or 22 was doing to you. You were like, he's kind of like sitting inside of me. Like he's playing. He's giving me. He's giving me the right. Because he's kind of like sitting down inside and then you come back and you just go like, look, he's flat footed. If if he does that again, like I'm I'm changing the route on him. And like, here's the heads up. Does it take some success in the league? Does it take a little seasoning to feel that comfortable as opposed to the receiver that just kind of like, you know who I'm talking about? Not anyone specific, but the guy who comes back who's like, I'm open every single route. And you're like, you're not doing us any good, man. This is super annoying. That was very specific. And it was also accurate. And then, you know, you hit the big shot. You get the touchdown on the inside. cut and all that kind of stuff. That development of your game feeling comfortable like how how long does that take yeah and i think it's huge um i think it's huge to build that relationship um strategically honestly um just to come back to your offense and not come very like emotionally um but just coming back and understanding like having them understand and it takes time you know to build that relationship and to build that understanding like i kind of know what i'm talking about you know you don't want to come off and be like ah like arrogance i might say but i just want them to be able to trust me and trust you know what i'm looking at and what i see and i think that's just the best route to to to go because there's a million things going on you know with the coaching staffs and the quarterback so there's a million things going on and they don't want to hear or deal with all that so um but you know if i can give valuable insight you know on what i'm seeing and they trust that you know that that itself takes your game to a whole nother level i'm telling you i was very impressed because it was a specific thing you were sitting down and i've just seen so many mic'd ups where i'm like this isn't helping anybody like i used to always joke that you should have receivers play quarterback every now and then and drop back and then go like hey do you realize like you think you're open or whatever because it's just i get what happens like it sucks like sometimes your job sucks you're running you're blocking you don't get a target for an entire half and you can get really frustrated but you can also get so frustrated where it's like to the detriment of the team and if you're sam donald or the offensive line it's like oh great you know 81 was open again cool he's going to tell us all about it uh i was yeah i was like oh that's that's pretty cool how you'd set that up um i really do love this team i i love the mentality i love your head coach uh you know everybody talks about culture and all these different things but what feels very real to you about this group as you prepare to try to defend a super bowl championship which we know is really hard but it feels like your team and there's a team that has the personality certainly the roster but the personality to like accept this challenge what do you think it is about your group going into this year that maybe has kind of impressed you as you prep up for 26 i think i think it's just that just accepting the challenge and with accepting the challenge you got to understand the challenge which is like we're in a different space than we were last year like we we are the defending champions we did win that um we can put we can put that mentality to the side and and focus on what we need to focus on um which is week by week you know game by game and understanding that you know kind of the outside noise we don't want it to really dictate on how we think about ourselves view ourselves or go out there and play like we are who we are and we're going to do what we need to do and we're going to be who we are um this is a new team this is a new season and we understand that it's going to bring new challenges so um i feel around the building and definitely the players within the players that you know we're going to we accept this challenge and we're ready to you know move it forward like we say and and and attack it head on so on the way out here i know that you collaborated with levy to create a special rotational menu with each dish uh dish constructed using the jsn ingredients like ordering a blt so we've got the jerk salmon nachos we've got the breads and the jsn spreads and then uh the jicama jicama that's right steak noodles silent j uh what what went into this were you in the lab just cooking this up or were you just telling them like can you cook a little what's going on man uh levy uh reached out and i definitely wanted to collab with them i they've been doing a great job and making sure you know the 12s have enough energy you know because we have the best fans in the world and and sometimes they need their their bread and and spreads you know to to attack the fourth quarter you know what i'm saying so um just wanted to give that back to the 12s and making sure we're in tip-top shape to attack this season and i'm excited i've tasted all all the things on the jsn menu and won't steer you wrong it's it's the way to go well your name's all over it so obviously the standard is the standard so hey congrats on an awesome season and what's been just a kind of a rocket ship two years for your career wise it's been a lot of fun to watch so thanks for the time today thanks for having me appreciate it netflix is expanding its nfl coverage in 2026 from week one to the first ever thanksgiving eve matchup and two christmas day games and a playoff game in january week one of the upcoming nfl season will feature the league's first ever regular season game in australia on september 10th between divisional rivals the la rams and the san francisco 49ers that will air on netflix live from melbourne cricket ground thursday september 10th 8 35 p.m eastern 5 35 p.m pacific time i gotta talk about the rams i picked them to win the super bowl obviously they're the heavy favorites so it's not that exciting i'm not doing anything outside of the box but there's a couple different factors one is i couldn't help but feel like they were better than seattle last year all right and i know seattle won the whole thing um the rams could not get off the field in that fourth quarter of the nsc championship game they addressed that defensively this is kind of insane just to remind you of what they've done with this roster all right so they trade for miles garrett which means versus out okay but they already had byron young in who i love um kobe turner's the other defensive end across from this guy named aaron donald who's the right defensive end who's going to come back and even at 35 with two years off the worst version of him is still going to be nastier than probably 90 of the interior defensive linemen in the league that actually moves because puna ford's their d tackle that moves fisk to backup now um and then at corner they didn't like what they had there jaylen watson comes over to kansas city and then they trade for trent mcduffie who's even better than he is um obviously with a new contract and that was part of the exit in kansas city the entire time so that's two new corners cam curl who plays more snaps than like anybody at safety and then they trade for a new contract and that was part of the exit in kansas city the entire time so that's two new corners cam curl who plays more snaps than like anybody at safety uh on top of what they have on offense which is a steady hand somebody you trust in stafford you you trust that mcveigh is going to whatever their challenges are whether it's offensive line injuries whether it's a receiver missing um they drafted another tight end in the second round to go with the third the three guys they have from last year parkinson hickby and ferguson they're they're going to adjust i would say week to week offensively probably as well as any staff i would say staff with quarterback combo that would be your favorite sure you could throw shanahan in the mix there because of what he's done offensively over the years but if you're looking at active quarterback with a coaching staff and an offensive philosophy of like what do we need to do to adjust throughout the entire season as every team battles injuries they're the best bet in the sport so it's not just a rosters thing it's also that the team that they had that ridiculous loss to at seattle and then the playoff situation in that fourth quarter uh they've addressed it defensively like they are trying to do it they're trying to do it defensively and they're trying to do it defensively and they're trying to do whatever they can and you would think based on this personnel be able to get off the field if they are faced in that kind of scenario again in the nsc championship game or perhaps an earlier playoff game so it's not just stafford um it's it's not just puka nakua it's not just this offense it's not just an offensive line that yeah you could ding here a little bit although there's some upside i think on some of the preview stuff that you go through it's a loaded loaded team that should be motivated kind of like the spurs when they the miami heat in the nba finals ray allen hits the shot it felt like the spurs came back that next year so mad at the world that they were undeniable as they came back and won a championship so some parallels there watch week one of the nfl on netflix the los angeles rams versus the san francisco 49ers live only on netflix thursday september 10th at 8 35 p.m eastern 5 35 p.m pacific he's still too young to be called an old friend but kevin clark this is football podcast and espn 2 and part of the scott van pelt slate this fall good to see you man i'm i'm fired up uh we both have facial hair right now how are we feeling about that uh i don't think mine's going to be hanging around as long as yours you you look like an extra for magnum pi right now which is in which has been in for a while i mean i i saw stagecoach footage where i went okay this is i was at a rodeo in montana i'm like okay you know so i think you look great and i think you thank you how old are you uh 38 yeah so it actually makes sense you gotta do something i also look a little young on tv and i got i wanted to just throw a curveball in and now i kind of like it i think it's kind of it's at least through the football season i've committed to up through the football season have you got any ned flanders comps no uh not getting any no no i'm not doing does it come okay does it come off as flanders i never know not at all i wanted to make sure it wasn't happening yeah i know internet comments tend to tell you what's going on pretty quickly and i actually haven't gotten a ton of of negative feedback like there was uh when i first started doing stuff at the ringer my hair was always kind of wet and i was like oh my god i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna and combed and uh well every comment i got on the internet was about me being looking like the child of the president and so uh we had they bullied me out of a little older uh but They they I got bullied out of that particular hairstyle. So Internet comments are kind of a great corrector in this. And I actually have gotten pretty positive as far as this goes. I feel like you have a high approval rating of content people. I feel like yours is people. People don't give you as hard of a time, which just means the content is that good. I sent you a note last night going like, let's run through some storylines with the NFL. And you had mentioned an emphasis on running heavy packages. I started looking at some of the splits on the run past stuff. I think the numbers are kind of all over the place, depending on what kind of site that you're looking at here. But I mean, Saddle's a good example. Forty eight percent run on the run pass ratio. Number one in the NFL. Nineteen teams running at over 40 plus times on available plays here. And we know the commitment to just going heavier against lighter teams. So where are we in this run pass cycle? We're at the peak right now. You know, it's funny. The innovation. Cycle is so quick now. I was actually watching a thing this morning on the 85 bears. And there's a big sideline fight between Mike Ditka and Buddy Ryan because Marino was torching 85 bears. Ditka was like, hey, we might want to put out an extra cornerback. And Buddy Ryan was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You don't tell me what to do. And it was like it was some foreign thing. Obviously, nickel defense was a thing back then. But it wasn't like, hey, we should we should probably not let Dan Marino do this to us. The innovation cycle. Now, teams remake themselves like almost over a quarter of a season. And you saw this. So Puka Nakua gets injured last year. The Rams throw out three tight ends. And then you look at the draft and everybody is drafting these tight ends. And why? It's because there's not a lot of depth at linebacker around the league. Explosive plays are more important than they've ever been. And so you want to be able to pass out of those looks, but also have the power running game out of it. And I just think that there's right now. We're going to see. We're going to see. We're going to see. We're going to see a bunch of teams try as many big bodies as possible because just the way that the defense has gotten faster, more spread out. And again, the linebackers are not the you want to put linebackers on the get as many linebackers in the field as possible because not a lot of teams have three linebackers. And then and then you want to just get as many explosive plays as possible. So we saw the tight ends get overdrafted a couple of months ago. And we're going to see this all season. Now, having said that, as I said, the innovation cycle is so quick now that by the back half of the season, we're going to see this all season. It could literally swing back. And that's kind of what you're seeing now. And a lot of that's like the Internet, the way that the coaches are able to install, do things very quickly because you can just send these things to the iPads at home and all that stuff. But right now, I think it's September and October. You're going to see a lot of tight ends, a lot of a lot of the places. And you talk about the explosive running game, like the easiest thing to do if you're the Chiefs against two high looks for the past five years has been to run the ball. And they have not done it effectively. So go out and spend money on Kenneth Walker. You know, some of the some of the office coordinator hires we saw over the past couple of past year, at least, have been about the guys with the best run designs in football. So explosive runs are going to be a huge part of it. And that's that's what you want to see from these big bodies, too. So that's that's literally the defining trait of of this season is is the big bodies everywhere. Yeah, we haven't seen the investment on the running back position, though, which kind of speaks to like what you're talking about. I mean, here. And I keep talking about Ferguson for the Rams. He's third on the depth chart right now at tight end. And then they drafted another one out of Ohio State, like really high. So, yeah, the the amount of emphasis, not only on personnel, the irony of all this is that I don't know that we'll see that swing back to spending the money on the running backs, though. So it's it's a lot of things, right? So you spend the money on Kenneth Walker, but it's not anything like spending the money on a cornerback or spending the money even on a wide receiver, a premium tight end. But Andy Reid said at the end of last year, the team. Just weren't biting on play action. They just didn't care. They were like everyone. Caitlin Clark did the little wave of the whoever the woman was, the three point line like, eh, don't worry about that. She's not going to shoot her. If she does, who cares? My team's basically that's what Reid was saying. People were doing the running game like, eh, we don't need to bite on play action. Don't say somebody. Somebody figure it out. Somebody figure it out, you know, with the run game. And so I think that if I had to guess and guys have been paid as far as, you know, B. John Robinson, obviously a couple. Weeks ago, Jeremy, I love being a third overall pick and getting at the time the most guaranteed money in history for running back the Eagles rewarded Saquon Barkley after the Super Bowl season. But if I had to guess, I think teams see the running game still as a function of offensive line play and run designs and how many guys or how many times you run into a light box and all that stuff. And so it goes more into the. Running back is not about having. I know what you're saying. No, running back is not about having a great running back. And the one the one analogy I've used or so is if you ever heard the phrase don't drink to feel good, drink to feel better. You ever heard this face? No. OK, so essentially it's like a kind of an old dad, old granddad rule that like if you're feeling bad and you start drinking, you're not going to feel good. But if you feel good, you can't be like, hey, I'm going to I'm going to delete 15 beers. And at the end of it, I'm going to feel awesome. Right. That doesn't typically happen. But at the end of it, if you're. Feeling good, you're going to feel better if you have if you delete 15 beers. Right. Depending on your tolerance, knowledge, doctrine, responsibility. But I feel like. Yeah. Yeah. The running back position. I don't think you can run your way into being a good team. I don't. I don't think you can go from bad to good with a running game. I think you can go from good to great with a running game. I think you can go from average to good with a running game. But if you're a bad team, we saw this with the Raiders last year. We're probably going to see if Jeremiah Love is healthy. There's not a lot you can do with that. And I think that's the problem. The running back faces is that you can't be a pillow where it's like, all right, well, we're going to have this guy. And then in three years, he's going to be the cornerstone to our franchise. It's a hard position to do that. Okay. How does that relate to tempo? Because of defensive personnel disguises, pre-snap stuff. Yeah. And then maybe even under center. Because I want to share some Rams, specifically Stafford numbers with you, who's obviously a big fan of the show here. But there's more to it, though. We had a lot. But there's these Stafford numbers that I'm going to share with you at the end of this part of it, which I couldn't believe how surprising they were. So there's a little tease inside of the show. Yeah. So let's start with the tempo thing. So whenever I talk to OCs on my training camp tour a couple weeks ago, a lot of them were like, hey, we're going to apply pressure. We're going to be the aggressors. And what happened the last couple of years or so, so defense has got really good at disguising looks. Because the simplest way to read a defense, hey, is it one safety or two safetys? And then we go from there, right? That's high school. That's college. That's pros. In college and in pros the last couple of years, especially in the pros, they've gotten a little better at disguising those things and rolling at the last second. Hey, we're not actually in this. We're not. This safety is actually going to drop back. Or this safety is going to come close to the line at the last second. So what happened the last couple of years or so, it was the number of plays with one second left in the playcock exploded. Because there was this chess match of, oh, we're going to do. I'm going to do this. Then you're going to do this. And the offense's reaction to that over the past offseason, basically, has been like, screw this. We're opting out of the chess match. And a lot of this stuff is like Indiana. If you saw it, they lined up really late because they didn't want to do the chess match with the headset stuff. They didn't line up until there was 15 seconds left in the playcock so that no one could get into the linebacker's ear and tell them what to do, right? And so I think we're going to see more of that at the pros. where you just line up and snap the ball. We're not going to go through this chess match. We're not going to go through identifying. Yeah, we'll do a little motion to find out where the cornerback wants to go, or we'll do a little motion to see if there's pressure. But we're just going to get up there and snap it. And, you know, Nate Tice talked about this a lot. He thinks that Kingsbury going to the Rams is partly to get more tempo there. They have had that, that those pages installed into the Rams playbook. I just think there's a lot there. And Sean Mannion, the Eagles OC, that's going to be a big point of emphasis. Just sit. Line up. Not a lot. The thing that the Rams, excuse me, the Eagles offensive line keeps talking about is like, there's less on the plate of the offensive linemen in this offense. It's just put your hand in the dirt and go forward. That's it. There's less chess match. And so I think offenses doing what they do and not worrying about what the disguise on the other side is going to be a huge part of that. Now, under center is a huge part of that. Jaden Daniels, the whole thing, Dan Quinn told me he said the whole thing is run action, play action. Jaden Daniels, you know, gets a little bit of time and then he builds his explosives. Explosives have become the most important thing. It's almost like the three point offense now, where if you look at the research, if you have an explosive play in a drive, you're going to score way more. It's like 25% than any other team. And because of the way the kickoff rules are now, really, if you get one first down, you're midfield. So if we get a 30 yard play, you're going to get points on the board. And so the whole, if you look at it like the, the, the, the, the, the difference between how many explosive plays you get versus how many you give up is literally the most predictive stat in football. And we're starting to see teams do that, where it's again, heavy personnel. We talked about it's the play action and then bang, we're going to have a 40 yard shot. That's, that's what most offenses are doing right now. Like I just, Ted Wynn had a great article about Leah Lembrank in the play callers. And he was saying the, one of the DCs was saying that Liam Cohen's best trade is he knows exactly when to time a shot place. and that kind of three-point offense type deal is becoming a huge part of it so so the entire the entire plane is built out of shot plays now because when i was looking at i look at it like intended air yards you know for qbs because i think that tells a real story it also tells a story on like either what your qb is limited to or the design of what your offense is and so stafford is clearly number one in intended air yards last year which speaks to those shots and it's funny though because you compare that with like his bad throw percentage and his on target percentage it's shockingly lower than you would think like on target he was 24th bad throws he's 28th that means like not good um and it's like wait a minute it was stafford would there really be 27 other quarterbacks in the league that ranked higher than him on on bad throw and i know like some of the stuff in the tracking or whatever but like that i think those match each other a little bit with some of those stats that are underwhelming for stafford but then also yeah realizing like hey we don't care the bigger picture is those intended air yards for what we want to do well that's what the tape guys talk about with caleb williams where his completion percentage i believe was league low for starters last year but again it's a three-point offense so it's going to be a little bit lower because you're trying to push the ball down the field and get explosive plays the bears had the most explosive plays in football last year that's not an accident would you take you almost have to get into effective field goal percentage right would you take less completions if i'm at the most explosive plays in the nfl every coach hopefully would take that if not then they need to look at football in a different way and so the bad throws there's just part of it i remember one year brady and mitch trubisky were the least had the most bad throws in football um that's just gonna happen sometimes by the way trubisky uh you know did not have the highs of tom brady so uh it's it's it's just a little bit of a different way of looking at it you know sean payton has always talked about explosives like interceptions not not you don't care it's not that you don't care about interceptions but interceptions can sometimes be the tax you pay for explosive plays and i've heard sean payton talk about that and so i think there's going to be a little more of context about what offenses are trying to do you know there's never been more touchdowns in the league than there are now um teams don't want to look at field goals uh as much as they have in the past this is a touchdown league and it's a shot play league and i think that there's going to be more margin for error when you're playing in the league than you're playing in the league when you're playing in the when you're ben johnson and you're saying hey i want caleb williams to just connect on four of these shot plays per game and then we we score 28 points a game then it is hey i want him to be 65 completion percentage i mean there were so many times i actually heard a bunch of the tape guys talking this this preseason about like you know in the nfl now especially in preseason if you want to scheme up a 9 for 10 stat line you can it's really easy you just have a bunch of bootlegs to hit the tight end you're good but that's not what that what the league is becoming and i think that's that's the most interesting thing is how we even view the completion percentage stats all that stuff going forward i need to apologize to philadelphia and eagles fans when we did our kind of contenders thing with nate tice i had it written down and i just missed it i just i mean it's a shocking omission but maybe a little freudian in that it feels like philadelphia is completely overlooked and i'd offer up and i'm guilty of it too because it just feels so stupid to be wondering like if hertz is an issue when they have this resume but then you watch and you're like look there's some stuff here that's clearly an issue and maybe aj brown even though i don't love the execution of his issues with it like maybe he had some points here and now we kind of understand it it's the go balls it's those deep shots so that's kind of like what you're talking about there a little bit like if there was one thing that you loved in philadelphia is that you had two receivers in the air and you had two receivers in the air and you had two receivers in the air and you had two receivers in the air and you had two receivers in the air and outside they're just going to win all of those balls and so maybe it covers up from some of the deficiencies in hertz games overall but you know from a personnel standpoint it's it feels like the hertz thing is dragging down the perception of the eagles to depths that are just absurd so i've become a bit of a hertz defender over the past couple weeks and i you know i keep joking about it riscilla but like if this entire operation were in glendale arizona we would just be like oh they're a machine they're going to win the game they're going to win the game they're We'll see him in January. See you guys. We would never check in on them. We would certainly never have weekly debates. So part of it is the market. The Hertz thing is so funny to me. I mean, he's still one of the most gifted down ball throwers in football. He's, to me, the only guy who gets punished narrative wise for having help because we always say, oh, wow, Josh Allen gets TJ Moore. Hell yeah. Like we do. Oh, when is Mahomes going to get the wide receiver? And we go, oh, wow. Whoa. Mahomes has Hertz has help. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. No, no, no, no. No, we can't have help. He has to do this all by himself or else he doesn't get any credit. So but my argument for the Eagles is, first of all, I don't think the different talent difference between the Eagles and the Rams is all that significant. I think that if the Eagles had acquired all these guys over the past few years and it wasn't through the draft and all that stuff, they obviously don't have a Miles Garrett. But I think that the the way that they draft and develop is a little bit boring. So we don't talk about them as much. But when I was going and let's leave the Rams out of this first. Second, but when I was going to some of these camps, one of the things I like to do is ask people. They're like, hey, we know that the quarterback, especially on a contender, is usually the best player who's the second best player on this team. And a lot of these contenders were solo. It's kind of bleak who the second best player on the team is, or it was or, you know, there's a huge drop off after three or whatever. The Eagles have a bunch of guys, a bunch of guys who would be the third or second best player on legitimate contenders. In this league, and we know they are like, I just had Kyle Long on my show. He said, Land Johnson, still the best offensive lineman in football, Jordan, my lot is in that conversation, Saquon Barclays in that conversation, you know, Jalen Carter, Zach Bohn, Queen, John Mitchell, Quinn, yeah, Quinn, yeah, Mitchell, like, these are just like, elite and Jonathan Bernard, who is going to be healthy at some point, these are blue chip guys, and they're everywhere on that two deep. And because Jalen hurts because we think. I don't think the barrier for entry is having an elite quarterback, by the way, Sam Darvish won the Super Bowl. Because of that, we discount the Eagles every chance we get. And I don't know if that's a we just assume we underrate Nick Sirianni or whatever. But I've become a little loopy with the Eagles disrespect and then the Seahawks disrespect Seahawks disrespect is that the Monday after the game in February, we just started talking about 31 other teams miss moved on and I don't remember, probably since that Peyton Broncos, or the or the Giants after 2011. I don't remember a Super Bowl team where we did that. And so I am leaning towards the Rams being the NFC champion. But I don't think that this is this is not, you know, Miami in the ACC. This is not like the talent difference is so significant that it's that we can just call it I mean, we the stat yesterday, that came out Ben Fox from from Yahoo had this that the 20 biggest Super Bowl favorites in the modern era over 20. In in 2020. And in winning the Super Bowl, and some of those didn't even get close. And so a lot of them made the playoffs couple and made the Super Bowl. But there, you know, football is it can be a very, very weird sport. And there are no foregone conclusions and certainly not this one. On the help thing with Hertz, I kind of understand the overall premise, but I think specific to Philadelphia, like during this run, they're like, okay, offensive line is insane. And when Kelsey was there, it's two Hall of Famers with lane and you know, I don't know what's gonna happen with the left tackle. We're gonna have some work to do. We bring in AJ Brown, we spent another first on Devante, we have an incredible defense because they're just good at this stuff. And then it's like, oh, now we're also going to add Saquon Barkley. I mean, that's, that's an absurd amount of help. And I think also plays into the point of like, you're going look at how many players we can name that would be the second or third best player and some of these other contending teams. The weird thing about this team is because I'm with you, like every week when I watch him, or you're doing whatever your preview work on this stuff, you're like, look at all of this talent. And if you look at the PFF grades, you go, okay. Yeah. Okay. O line. What's who's the only O line you would take over Philadelphia is probably Denver right now on paper. Cause all five guys are back. Maybe somebody would pick Philadelphia, but I think the lane injury stuff probably plays in at least for 26. What do you think? Okay. I don't know if you're shaking your head. It's no, no, no. It's the Broncos. It's a hundred percent. The Broncos. I just saw, I was actually doing some work this morning on deep ball works. So we're doing the shop play discussion. The Broncos have by far, by far when Bo Nix throws it deep, he has by far the least pressure rate in football. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That is close. Like that is a huge competitive advantage. Okay, cool. We're both on the same page. Yeah. Defensive line. Um, Philly's done a really good job on the edges of, of kind of making it work. But the interior part of this, like, if you look at that PFF grade, I think the D line is fourth. Yeah. Uh, there's the Rams and everybody else right now, but you know, there's, there's conversations to be had. It's like, there's no doubt that Philadelphia and this personnel group. But I think last year, when you look at some of this stuff, like the pass block run block, run block rates are average, um, the pass rush run stop rates are average. This is a high profile roster that at least for 25, there's just the stats do not back up the, the resumes of these guys. I'm not to say that like, oh, they're all collectively done, but 25 was a very weird year. Um, based on some of the success failure rate stuff for a group that we all love. Yeah. So to your point, Saquon got hit behind the line way more than you had. Yeah. And, and that was real. What I'd say about the Eagles were solo is they very rarely make the same mistake twice. that there was an unsettled offensive line and then they go out and they get it's i you know lane johnson this is his last ride they probably had some idea of that i doubt how he was finding that out uh at the moment that he said it at a press conference a couple weeks ago but then they go out and they draft markel bell a huge guy out of miami i think he's like 6 9 3 40 or something like that he's the biggest lineman in the draft um they go out and they get him um i think that there's going to be a little more health than there was last year across the offensive line so i'm always going to bet on talent and i'd also say like with with the rams miles garrett hasn't really practiced the last couple weeks you know there are questions aaron donald hasn't played in two years and so there are still questions about that and you know i i uh there's whenever you have a bunch of guys on your second contract whenever they're your best players and that's true that's mostly true of the rams and mostly true of the eagles you're always going to run the risk of of a cluster of injuries and like even with the niners i don't believe the substation thing i believe there's just a bunch of guys in the second and third contract and third contract which is typically old by nfl standards even though there have been some young guys who've been who've been hurt in san francisco um and so i think they're gonna they're gonna even out with with the health and then i think that some of the moves they made have been have been really really good i think hopefully mckay lemon is healthy i mean when i was there a couple weeks ago and i was watching the practice for solo you just see these things where you're like why why wasn't there motion in the eagles offense last couple years like that seems like a really easy thing to help jalen hurts just like move one guy over from the right side to the left side to just give a little clearer picture and i think that's what it's just going to be a little bit more simple and and i i trust sean manny to do this and i trust jalen hurts to execute it i don't think that the practice interception thing and the priest's interception thing training camp interception thing whatever is the most overblown thing on the planet and i think that it's just a guy learning his his uh we've seen it with a lot of elite quarterbacks when they're trying to learn the limits of the new offense i think i think he's going to be good do you think he's going to be good do you think he's going to be good do you think he's going to be good raising canes is sponsoring pga raising canes is sponsoring pga raising canes is sponsoring pga tour pro golfer sam burns lsu alum tour pro golfer sam burns lsu alum tour pro golfer sam burns lsu alum louisiana native and a good friend of louisiana native and a good friend of louisiana native and a good friend of raising canes owner and founder 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sauce i canes chicken fingers and cane sauce i canes chicken fingers and cane sauce i can imagine the kids had a harder time can imagine the kids had a harder time can imagine the kids had a harder time letting go of the chicken fingers than letting go of the chicken fingers than letting go of the chicken fingers than they did they did they did let's say a seven iron um that's just let's say a seven iron um that's just let's say a seven iron um that's just how good it goes down how good it goes down how good it goes down we all know that we all know how much i we all know that we all know how much i we all know that we all know how much i love it can't wait for an ad to come out love it can't wait for an ad to come out love it can't wait for an ad to come out in scouting out your tailgate for all in scouting out your tailgate for all in scouting out your tailgate for all the necessary requirements because canes the necessary requirements because canes the necessary requirements because canes has you covered has you covered has you covered raising kane's chicken fingers one love raising kane's chicken fingers one love Aaron Donald, looking at it again the other night, eight, not Pro Bowls, All-Pro. All-Pro. Okay, All-Pro. I think the only time he didn't make it was like the second to last year. So he makes All-Pro in his final season. And so you're right, he hasn't played in two. He's going to come back at 35. I know we all love Chris Long. There is a reverence, not just in his talent, but the nastiness of Aaron Donald, of like in an alley type of thing against bigger people and all that kind of stuff. The fact that he has that mentality and they'll probably manage him a little bit more, I expect it to be nasty. So like, I don't, maybe it doesn't have to be peak beating triple teams for 70, 80 snaps, but with this rotation of talent that they have, if he's managed, I just, I expect really impressive games from Aaron Donald, even at 35 with two years off. You know, Andrew Wilworth said something to me a couple of years ago, I think it was during his last season, that stuck with me about Donald, which is he's truly, and everybody says they do this, but these guys are in the facility. They know they don't. Aaron Donald, Wilworth said, is the only person he's ever seen who acted like he was an undrafted free agent every day of his life, where he was out there doing way more work. And I had had a GM tell me this one time, and I thought this was probably the most interesting scouting nugget I've ever heard, which is that pit coaches used to tell, which is that pit coaches used to tell, to tell the visiting scouts or GMs or whomever, they used to say, you got to get here early just to watch Aaron Donald warm up. Because it's not unlike anything you've ever seen. You don't want to see him, first of all, and this happened in the NFL too, he's such a game wrecker that they had to remove him from practice because he was so, you know, especially Jeff Fisher's talked about this, they had to remove him from practice. He couldn't even see him in all his glory in the practice because they needed to do another game. They needed to install, you know, play action schemes that he would blow up. But if you saw him warm up, you'd understand why he was so great. That's why scouts used to go look at that. And so if you're hearing all of these stories, I mean, from the defensive tackle standpoint, it sounds like freaking Michael Jordan stories, right? It sounds like they totally psycho about being the best you can be. So if anybody is going to come back and be good, I mean, obviously Jordan didn't have that great of a comeback, but if anybody can do it and be 80% of himself, and by the way, he's going to be managed. Second comeback is pretty good. Oh yeah. But then the Wizards come back. Third comeback. So the second comeback was good. Okay. So we're on the second comeback. So we're good. That's because he was running the team and he's like, who better to sign? But there'll be a third come. There'll be a third comeback when he's the GM of the, of the Panthers in a couple of years. Yeah, there you go. It won't be Dan. You should do that on TV in a pre-show meeting. Next, get up pre-show meeting and be like, what if Donald retires? And then at 41, he comes back and he's like, he's GM of the Panthers. Then he plays. Does that settle the Jordan LeBron debate? All right. So if anybody can come back, 80% of Aaron Donald is like the best defensive tackle in most franchises history. And so the front seven is still going to have a lot of talent. Braden Fisk is good. Kobe Turner is good. Puna Ford is good. Byron Young is good. Byron is nasty, dude. Yeah. And so even if he just plays 60% of his snaps and the one thing, about it, and this is something that Fisher has talked about, Aaron Donald, and we always talk about this with quarterbacks, but Aaron Donald knows when winning time is as a pass rusher. And a lot of that means setting up a move all game just to use the opposite in the fourth quarter, two minutes to go and bring down the quarterback and win the Super Bowl, right? And so it's going to be, even if you save him and only give him a part-time role and then turn him loose in the two minutes, two-minute drill, like that, that is as effective a weapon as you can possibly have in the modern game. So I'm pro-adding the best, one of the best defensive linemen in history on August 31st. Yeah, I love it. Two years off. You know, the real question would be, how many years could you take off of your Aaron Donald and still be good? So I asked Kyle Long this yesterday, who's the oldest guy that could come back and still play a role? Deshawn Love? Deshawn Love. Yeah. A lot of tread on those tires. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good one. I said Kurt Warner. I'm not laughing because I think it's ridiculous. You know, it might work. Yeah. He had one. If he had to. One intriguing name he had was Mike Allstott. Could Mike Allstott play a role in 2026? I feel like when you take that many hits, like even Mike Allstott would be like, the first time I ran into a 320-pound D-tackle at this age with this many years off, it would be like, hey, this sucks. There's just something that happens when you get older. Like when you get punched or whatever. There's just. There's an age north of that age where you go, eh, I'm not. I'm not into this. Even if you're a psychopath, you know, and Mike Allstott would be, but I think he'd probably go. I mean, the Kurt Warner thing is probably ridiculous too, by the way. So. I do love this exercise though. What a great. You should do a whole. So I asked. I asked Swagoo about this a couple years ago and he said. It's a good July pod. He said DeMarcus Ware could come in and get you a sack right now. He looks good enough. He does. But that also drives me crazy too. Like when somebody looks good and they're older, they're like, oh, he can get you a couple snaps right now. And you're like, he's 68. He has a tan. Like. Well, unfortunately, this whole thing stems from. I saw Jason Taylor on the sideline of the Miami game last year and I was like, Jason Taylor could go in right now and wreck this game. And it was because he looks great. That's it. It's just because he's gonna. Look, Red Sox fans know this. I've already done this rant. I'm talking about. It's been 40 fucking years since Fred Lynn played and they show him like in game and he just looks good. He's aged really well and it's just. Hey, Freddy can get you. He can get you a couple ABs right now. And every single Red Sox. It's. This happened every year since I was a little kid where whenever they show his face, the announcer by law has to say he thinks Fred Lynn can play today because he's not overweight and gross and he's got a nice olive tone going on. All right. I have some questions for you. That's the opposite. We could do the opposite. All can't get me a bucket team of just guys who just look awful and would just be the worst possible. There are. Look. There are some NBA point guards. Where you go. What the hell. What? So you really hated working out. You hated practice. You hated all this stuff. All right. Questions for you. the intended air yards thing i love it it's clear so last year stafford 5 358 intended air yards aaron rogers just under 3 000 only one less game the rogers film feels a bit like uh hey they gave me a uniform and a helmet and i play quarterback but i'm kind of like there's guys that it feels like they're hacking the game a little bit because there's just stuff that they don't want to do that they know is going to be worse but it limits your offense on top of everything else i'm wondering if we could have kind of a a second to last ted williams season aaron rogers 25 and then ted williams last season and i know you remember this but just remind everybody because we should do yearly if not monthly ted williams reminders uh his 40 year old season he hit 254 with 10 home runs he was so pissed about it he'd finished top four and mvp for nine seasons so then he comes back has an incredible season at 41 years old great batting average again and again somebody who missed five seasons military service misses 24 25 and 26 year old season if you just gave him an average of 37 home runs in the five seasons that he missed with korea as well at one point considered maybe the best fighter pilot bone fisherman and hitter three things you're the best in the world at tough to pull off he'd be north of 700 home runs is there any chance that aaron rogers has kind of a limitation 25 into a reminder of how talented he is in 26 type of end to his career does that with ted williams the end of his career does the phrase god's god's not answered letters resonate with you at all do you know what that is yes yeah the john updike essay it's really good if you if you haven't read the john updike essay on ted williams last game at fenway park i i encourage you we didn't prayer at my home we had to read that uh all right so aaron rogers 316 29 home runs 41 years old not gonna happen um so aaron rogers average intended area yards according to pro football reference was six last year and i know i've done some research on this earlier in the offseason believe he had the quickest time to throw since next gen stats started tracking which i believe was 2018 he was getting rid of the ball he can't move anymore and i think that the value the fact that he can be you know average nfl quarterback because he knows where the ball can go is actually impressive but what he used to be able to do was buy three or four seconds when he needed to let that vision and that arm and all that stuff come together for an incredible explosive like we talked about but right now all he's doing is getting rid of the ball very quickly knowing where to go with the ball and that's serviceable i don't see much of a ceiling uh high ceiling on that and you know it's funny mcbarnwell pointed this out but they got michael pitman michael pitman was the best short yardage receiver in football last year like he's not he's not going to change if anything he's going to lean into this right and a lot of steelers fans get really mad at me and say no no you don't understand he didn't have any weapons and arthur smith was calling the plays i promise you if arthur smith could have taken shots down the field he would have with aaron rogers i promise you aaron arthur smith did not say to aaron rogers you have to have the quickest release and lowest average uh depth of target and in and on record i promise that three yards shorter per pass in the air than drake may three we'll talk about uh three point offense three yards shorter per pass in the air than jaylen hurts who had nine which is tied with matthew stafford and so uh i don't i don't see much going on in pittsburgh now they can win a bunch of games because they've got a nasty front and um they've got some talent there but mike tomlin is a much better coach mike mccarthy uh aaron rogers is not getting any better uh he can still be serviceable but uh i'm not seeing a throwback i'm not seeing a ted williams season i just want to talk about ted williams i think the tape on rogers last year is bad and i don't know why that would be better all right good answer edwin pope from the miami herald used to go uh fishing with ted williams and he used to tell stories about fishing with ted williams in the dolphins press box when i was there and it was the coolest thing ever and i wish you were there can you can we get him can we get a contact for him he he both have passed away both ted williams and edwin pope he was one of those guys who went to like the first 55 super bowls though hell of a life helmet sticker fredman pope yeah absolutely this is an adnan verg level of shout outs to other people but they're all good so that's the difference so keep them coming um if you can have any quarterback that's on an nfl roster right now for the next five years oh boy five years um it's not stafford because he's old uh it's right now right this instant it would be josh allen is drake may considered drake may was not on my short list but he's on the the list to be on the short list i still am not giving up on my homes i think we'll look back and say no i i love my homes i'm just saying right this instant coming off an ac i just i want to i want to sure but you get five years this isn't just i know i know 2031 those running quarterbacks i know you know this i can send you some numbers okay in three years who will you rather have cam ward or jackson dart cam ward that's not i shouldn't ask you any cam yeah that was you might as well get me talking about edwin pope again should i ask you do you think your kid's cuter than ben peltz um go ahead oh he did what do you think he was great he had an awesome time an awesome time a lot of good kids shout out to the red sox department that does the kids because he had an awesome time and he's a he's all ball family friendly uh fenway definitely uh do you think we'll ever come to a consensus on dac prescott he has to win a super bowl for him to get the recognition that he deserves that's the tax you pay i saw did you see there was a is troy achman overrated debate like last week in 2026 got somebody's phone again so so that just tax your pay it drives me crazy it's like when somebody brings up that larry bird actually wasn't that good of a shooter because they like look at three point stuff and you go hey like you can't do this to troy achman yeah we can't do it and and so it's it's deeply unfair to him uh we talked about explosives i think that they were second and third second or third in the nfl on explosives last year george pickens cd lamb the line will be good enough it's about the defense and he's going to get judged off of the defense which is i think it'll be better quinn williams last year and maybe the last couple years most pressures after double teams in the entire nfl i think rashaun gary is at least a professional body in that spot uh caleb downs is an eraser i think i love that term professional i just i don't know how to i don't know how to how else to put it like i don't think he's that good but he's not he's not an nfl flunky right get you some snaps yeah rashaun gary's the oldest will you drop a he'll get you some snaps about somebody you're just not interested sort of man on tv just you get a month yeah i could do that i'm on first date tomorrow i'll do it i'll do it i'll do it for you um uh caleb downs can be an eraser instantly uh at every level of the defense so i'm willing to buy that can be 14th best in the nfl and then that gets you that gets you 12 or 13 wins and in the mix with the eagles i'm coming around on this i really am because there's some really good win rate stuff from this group that was the worst defense in the nfl you're like you know if you can just kind of put this whole thing together and you're like and there is some personnel like this is not a roster that's devoid of talent obviously even on the defensive side okay we brought up the caleb stuff on the big shot because like the stafford on target bad throw stuff this is where the caleb thing scares me because i think again my caleb thing's pretty simple i think he does the hard things better than most people already do and it's about doing the easier things better so like he's passing the tougher tests and maybe getting some c's on the ones you're like what the hell's wrong with you this thing was a layup we're doing spelling it's 10 words come on um but out of 33 quarterbacks like he's 32nd on our target throws he's 31st bad throw percentage you know he's behind chador and a couple of these even uh which does not qualify so that's out of 33 that qualify then you can expand it out and see everybody that threw a pass here for this kind of stuff um do you think we saw enough last year where we don't worry about this because if it were okay yeah so just give us your answer all right so here are the most just total volume bad throws in football caleb williams number one stafford second caleb williams number one stafford second caleb williams number one stafford second cam ward number three bow necks for jared goff five patch mahomes six so it's a mixed bag as far as whether or not that's we think that's sticky or not or a sign of anything obviously you don't want bad throws um but that you know goff and mahomes they'll get you they'll get you some buckets they'll get you some snaps and uh and and they had some bad throws last year stafford as well obviously um my my bigger my bigger concern is the leap has to be so significant for them to take the step that people or at least bears fans think they can take they don't have a pass rush and the thing that worried me was they didn't really address it in the off season and they asked ben johnson where the password is going to come from he said well we're going to coach better i don't believe that pass rush is a coach better position i think you either have dudes or you don't and so my concern is you know drew dalman retires uh although kyle long said that that's not that big a deal because bradbury gary bradbury is good um and we'll see what happens offensive line. But I think that the way to take the next step is for Caleb to have a massive leap. And I don't want to put that kind of pressure on him because he had an awesome leap last year and two huge leaps in a row is pretty rare. And so I still think he can be a star quarterback. I still think he can be a star quarterback in Ben Johnson's offense. I just don't think that the Bears are NFC contenders because of what's around him. All right, I'm going to give you this number. Oh, you know what? I have one other little quick exercise. Fill in the blank. This quarterback is good and I don't want to talk about it anymore. Who's that guy for you? Wow. Aside from Jalen Hurts. That sounds like it's Jalen Hurts. That can be your answer. Baker Mayfield. I think that the Bucs are going to be really good this year. And I think because. I think that there's an. Oh, and Jared Goff, too. And they have the same story. Which is if an NFL team gives up on you or the NFL. If the NFL deems you unworthy even for a minute, your narrative permanently changes. And when I was in Detroit, I had one of the guys on the line said to me, if you Chad Powers Jared Goff and put a mustache on him like you and me and just said his name was Steve Simmons, he would. Dalton Kincaid. Dalton Kincaid. If his name was weirdly Dalton Kincaid, he would be. It's like a guy from Landman. They were in the writers room being like, let's call this mine and Dave. Like he's 14. Throw a Texas Tech hat on him. Let's go. Get out there, mine and Dave. If Jared Goff were just a new guy, he would be considered an MVP candidate because McVay gives up on him. That becomes part of his narrative. Baker, same thing. Because he was playing defensive end for the Panthers a couple of years ago in practice. That becomes part of the narrative. I feel like Tampa's messing it up on the Baker thing. Like, hey, okay, you want to get cute with it? Like there's some quarterbacks I'm like, I actually respect the cuteness on this one. And with Baker, it's just, what's your other option? Like, what do you think you're also going to do? Okay, he's not perfect. Yeah, we can dig into some of this stuff and not necessarily love it. But like you always pointed this out, especially with the cap increase every single year. Like when you sit and dance around of like taking your time, just pay that we don't want to do this tax now. Because it's so much worse when you wait around on it without another in-house alternative. Well, that's also why the Cowboys don't maximize their rosters. They wait on all their extensions. They wait all the time. And the price never, ever goes down. The Eagles are able to get out of their mistakes very quickly if they make them, including Carson Wentz, because they sign guys as soon as they show any talent. They've been doing that since Andy Reid and Joe Banner 30 years ago were in there. And Jeffrey Lurie kind of learning how to go about things. He said, okay, well, if it gets, if everything gets more expensive, the cost of a superstar NFL player has never gone down, ever in the history of the world. And the idea that, oh, we're going to sign, like you see this now with like, Stroud and Bryce Young, where they're like, oh, we'll sign him to a team-friendly deal. Point to me what, where the team-friendly quarterback deal was in the NFL. Just point to me one. Yeah, Sam Donald, after you've been blown out like a million times. So I'm not saying you're wrong, but there's a very clear like path that you have to go through that sucks for you to be the bargain quarterback. It's not after the first deal. Right. And once you reestablish yourself, you're not taking the discount. You're simply not taking the discount. And so I would pay guys as soon as, as I possibly could. I mean, one of the, listen, the bills give Josh Allen an extension every 30 minutes and they should be doing that. You know, like they gave him one a couple of years ago where I was like, why'd they do this? They just wanted to, you know, a little tip of the cap to Josh Allen for being the most important guy in the entire region. And so that, that's, that's what I would do if I had a quarterback. Now, Josh Allen's a lot better than Baker Mayfield, but you can win a Superbowl with Baker Mayfield. And that's the thing with golf, with Mayfield, there's this constant, oh, he's not this, he's not that. Well, you can win a Superbowl with them. And with the Bucks, the way that they're building that defense, the way they're going to be healthier, you know, they had so many problems just stopping the run last year, stopping explosive plays, just tackling just very simple stuff. They were throwing resources and stopping the run. They couldn't do it. I think that's easily fixable, especially with a coach like Todd Bull. So the Bucks have the capability to make the NFC championship game this year. And I don't know why you look at this in the paper and be like, eh, I don't know about the quarterback. Like I'd much rather a Baker Mayfield. They're not, they're not going to be good enough to draft at the very top of the draft next year. So if you're saying we're going to let Baker walk and we're going to draft, you know, Dante Moore 15th, or we're going to draft Darian Mensah 18, whatever. I'd rather a Baker Mayfield. I'm with you. I was going through the contract stuff with that a little bit. And then, you know, Baker also has the rep, which is sometimes deserved of like, oh, is he all pissed off about something again? And then I went through it because it was like sort of a break for me from some of the headlining stuff. And I went back to it. I went back and read it. I was like, he has every right to be pissed off on this one. I actually think it's a mistake. Okay. Speaking of quarterbacks, as we finish up here, I'm going to give you this number eight and a half. How many quarterbacks are benched because of play? How many starters week one will be benched over eight and a half? Okay. Do you want to go through it? Because I wrote, I wrote down all the potential options. I do. So I've actually thought about this as far as like, as far as, who I always say this, like who's a bad month away from their career being over. Like I always ask that question. And so I think that this is kind of the cousin of that. So let's, let's go through it a little bit. Let's do, let's do. So start with the jets. Yeah. The jets certainly have the capability for that. So I'm going to, I made the most important point is the Kate Klubnick is the number two guy. And they're going to want to see him at some point. So I'm going to go. Yes. You're one. Do you think you're going over? Under eight and a half before we do the exercise? I bet I go over. Okay. Miami. With Malik in there. No, no gamesmanship. Yeah. By the jets. Yeah. Getting ready for that week seven matchup. Yeah. Kyle McCord stuck it to Miami a couple of years ago in Syracuse. Not, not a good afternoon. Although Syracuse is an entire institution appears to be failing. So, you know, won the war on that one. Don't know if you followed that one, but I don't even care what you're talking about right now. Okay. That's fine. The, the, there was this big story. The story about Syracuse is like failing financially or something. So big East, big East, tough for the big East. Anyway, no, Malik will, it's going to keep his job the entire, entire season. Okay. So that's a no there. Deshaun Watson, Cleveland. Yes. That's, that's the easiest. Yes. Ever. Although I think they could, I think they're going to start four different quarterbacks this year. I agree with that. I think all four guys will get a start this year. I know. I think she ends up starting the most games. I think Dylan with the back thing right now, but that meant that he could get back. I'm sure. You think a little roster management. Okay. They call it the Foxborough flu when like Belichick will put Jeff Demps on a season ending. I are as a red shirt. All right. Jeff Demps could go in college. My gosh. All right. That was sorry. I'm taking too long on this. Jeff Demps is one of my favorite. I mean, obviously nobody's the guys from West Virginia, but all right. Rogers. I love that Mason Rudolph's back in Pittsburgh seven seasons. Now after his rookie year, he's only started 11 games. This is reaching Chase Daniels. Territory of like people must just love Mason Rudolph. Mm-hmm. Bench for play. No would be my guess. I don't know. I mean, it's possible week 16 or week 17 and say, hey, let's see what let's see what we have with the young guys. I think they're going to be decent enough. And then Mike McCarthy is going to feel weird way about writing Rogers out off into the sunset. So now I'm a little worried that our Netflix UK division may be blurring out your hands during the segment. Oh, yeah. I didn't think about that. Okay. All right. Tennessee. No, not going to happen. They're going to, they have to let him play the entire season, see what they have. But I also, I knew you were going to say, there's somebody said to me the other day, Oh, Robert Salas said that, you know, I, I, this kid's not going to fail. He's taking a job on it. Well, if he fails, your job's gone. So you might as well be as strong as possible. So I'm, I'm good with that. Mitch is also the backup there. All right. Uh, the Colts little Daniel Jones correction, perhaps Riley Leonard. I, I don't, and Anthony, it's also still on the roster. Well, he's third on the depth chart. I think they know what they have now. Uh, um, no, that's a no. Okay. Vegas is a yes. Yes. 100%. 100%. And it should be like in September. Yeah. Cause I was watching something the other day. It was like, Oh, Kirk and the whole offensive staff. Like this is where he's always been. It's best. It was like, yeah, before he was hurt. So maybe further away from the injury, he's a little healthier and everything. There's just no way Mendoza is not starting at some point. What about Jackson dart with the giants? Don't think there's a, you think there's a, maybe like, Hey, why don't you calm down a little bit? Yeah. There could be like a, I he's better that it would, it would have to be, he's really not protecting himself. And that's what I mean. Yeah. Why don't you sit from the bench and Washington? You can't go outside today. Yeah. That would be the only pathway, but I, I think it happens. Cause it happens. Yeah. I think there's, well, here's the thing. He's probably going, if he tries to play like he did last year, he's going to get hurt. James is going to start anyway, but that's not what we're talking about here. But I, I don't think it's crazy to go. Can we do a mental reset? Just hang out with a hat for a week or two. Okay. So you're a four. Go ahead. Kyler, Minnesota. I think it's possible that he's not old Kyler. My concern is that, his backups are Carson once who's awful and who gets you some snaps but he's awful and then jj mccarthy jj mccarthy who's not playable so i'm gonna say you have him down as not playable like are you hearing jj mccarthy well he's only started 10 games they spend the pimp on him like i would not mind if things the defense is so good we expect the defense to be competitive every single week there's a lot of personnel again like a lot of these teams but you know kyler's going to get hurt uh i would imagine because he just he his tendency for injuries on plays where you go how did he just get hurt well he's hurt i unless you you would know way more than i would is there a hey this guy cannot play stamp on jj or is they is there a let's give this guy like another look in a non-pressure situation middle of the season to just make sure we know we screwed this up or they already i i think everybody's moved on i really do i think the issue was he just couldn't hit the layups last year at all and then uh i don't think he handled the competition that well i i no i i don't i don't think we're gonna see him unless something really bad happens all right that's fine i i'm writing carolina down here only because you know if i wrote down what's that it's a possibility because i like bryce coming out we knew there were going to be major challenges they make the playoffs last year i actually think he was at best average and i'm probably being nice last season but then it gets kind of packaged as this whole thing like turning a corner i don't think any corner has been turned whatsoever there but it's also kenny pickett so and then haynes king baby haynes king who i do i love his competitiveness but he's speaking to jackson dart like if he tries to play like he did in college he's gonna be sent packing uh at least jackson's thick haynes king is the man um he's the man but yeah i know it's probably a no it's probably probably a no the only thing i think of is this big contract year and if it's really trending down and they make the decision that we're not gonna we're not gonna resign this guy and they're at least in the hunt i i could see maybe pick it for a game but but i'm gonna say no atlanta's a yes no matter what who the hell who the hell is they like yes the answer is yes without it without a doubt it's a horrible situation and and there's an element jack strand jack's guy jack strand steven reese's guy um tape guys love jack strand there's an element with the falcons i'm surprised that falcons fans get so mad at me when i talk bad about them and i think they're i think matt ryan and kevin stefanski are too smart to know what's like about them and i think they're gonna lose a bunch of games i don't think they're gonna be mad at that get a little reset going tyler shuck new orleans dude they love him down there like the saints fans love him what about rat spencer rattler what about the rattler lurking i think tyler shuck's better than spencer rattler i'm gonna go no it's a no cardinals all right so this is the last team i have down on this potential list here so it looks like you're gonna go under i'm gonna go under way under brissette's probably just better than like that's how he's going to be introduced 10 years after he retires like he's going to meet somebody at some dinner some function and be like you know you're a little bit better than you get credit for but with carson beck there even if he's third on the depth chart and they're probably not going to be good they're going to play back they're going to play back i also think that beck and that's jumping bin shoe by the way you know the thing with beck last year and certainly we saw it in the last 52 seconds of national championship game is the the deep ball really flattened out with him and i went to i went to that game obviously and i was actually right in front of that interception and i was also with the louisville game where he threw a bunch of interceptions and 15 yards and in he was 18 yards out the ball would just die on i mean just die and go into a defensive back's hands we saw that over and over and over again over the course of the season we saw it the last possible second with 51 seconds left national championship game and what i saw and he knows where to go with the ball he's tough guys like him in the locker room um i think that people thought that like twitter doesn't like him which is probably a good thing that's usually a good sign um but i think that when i saw the arm strength he showed the first game of the preseason i was like oh this can work because my concern was he couldn't throw those shot plays if he's fully healthy two years removed from surgery then it can work and i'm not saying he's he's going to be a top five quarterback ever what i am saying is he can be a serviceable nfl starter kind of a long time and once that is established they're they're going to get jacoby out of the way he's guaranteed 15 million this year and they can at least have some hope going into into next year if they don't want to go quarterback next year so you we have you at six then yeah the number probably should have been seven and a half then if it were seven and a half attack eight and a half as after we just did the exercise it's just a hard how many guys were benched for play last year do we know a better host would have done that work i i assumed i'm gonna say over i'm just gonna say over because it's this league yeah i'll say there'll be guys that they get benched for play i mean like we're well you know i'm a i think malik will this is awesome i think he's a great throw of the football but i've never seen him with the dolphins so it's a lot of projection that goes on with that aaron rogers at his advanced age like there's just a lot of room for malik as much as any quarterback this year by the way i hope it works out i hope he gets i hope he has an nfl life a quarterback i do too i do too i and i think it's gonna be weird because there's no talent there but i think he can he can play for sure real quick super bowl pick to make it an official wg show yeah i'm gonna go and i hate this because i'm knocking saying it's it's a lot closer than you think uh but i'm gonna i'm gonna stick with the pick i've made since before the miles garrett trade which is rams over bangles cincinnati with all that new defensive personnel you're buying in al golden baby i'm gonna go rams denver chalk roster guy over here you're the man this is football kevin clark you'll see him with van pelt throughout the season you may see me with van pelt you also may not so here you go on that update thanks man love you buddy all right talk to you soon look we all know nfl sundays are sacred and so we found the perfect way to make sure we don't miss a single snap of nfl action we're fully dialed into nfl sunday ticket and youtube tv when you bundle nfl sunday ticket and youtube tv you get every game every sunday period the best part the multi-view feature lets you watch up to four games at once so you can track your fantasy matchups in real time watch your favorite players and keep tabs on everything across the league it's the ultimate setup for the nfl season plus new users can jump in now for eight payments of 30 per month go to youtube.com slash nfl st and get it done don't be the guy guessing what's happening in the other games be the guy in the living room who sees it all new users pay payments of 30 a month first charge of purchase availability varies with nfl sunday ticket for out-of-market games and youtube tv for local and national games youtube tv require terms and restrictions and embargoes apply device and content restrictions apply to multi-view commercial use excluded no refunds something big is coming on september 2nd draft kings game day arrives with massive deals exclusive deals and an all-day celebration built for sports fans the countdown has begun all roads lead to game day the draft 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Terms, DKNG.co slash predictions promo. Nationwide based on sportsbook predictions and free-to-play sports contest availability varies by state. You want details? Bye. I drive a Ferrari 355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you could possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid. So, now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Life Advice. LifeAdviceRR at gmail.com. Kyle and Steve with us today. Point of order on my end. I thought back. I watched the tape. Hired consultants. I want to apologize to Kyle. I feel like I was a little dismissive of Cosmic Bowling and finding lifelong friends. So, then I started researching Cosmic Bowling and I was like looking at stuff. I was even on Yelp, even though I didn't download it. But I'm like, damn, like Yelp just teases the shit out of you. And you're like. No, I don't want to do this right now. I just want to see some of the pictures. And it just speaks to Kyle that he could go to cosmic bowling meet a stranger saddle up maybe a couple sig breaks and that could be somebody in his crew for decades and i have um you know that's a thing that's a me problem that i wouldn't even allow myself i wouldn't open myself up to people said i can't open myself up to love i don't know that i could open myself up to like a long-term check-in what's the plan this friday guy after just one session of cosmic bowling so i don't like how i came off and i want to tell kyle i feel like i was dismissive and if i hurt your feelings i apologize my friend uh you did it and this is definitely a more do as i say not as i do situation i've never solo cosmic bold you know i just think that's a place that's where you could go people are loosened up or you know or our friend who wrote in more specifically is you know i've only been there with a crew but i could see you know a couple of modelos at the bar you know there's usually arcades like you don't have to jump right into bowling like do we want to reserve a lane you'd be like you want to go through those or do you want to go you know they got a mario kart joint over there what about a punch machine something easy so that was my point but you don't have to apologize as much as you are but it does it does feel good that you feel bad we have seen kyle rock a punch machine also that we got a text about this and an update on the pod you've really been thinking about this so i i damn shadow lanes in k-town that's my recommendation yeah there's a bunch of places out here great prices do it up yeah again i don't know that i'll go to any but maybe maybe i'll just put together a group hey do you like the cosmic bowl and who do you use at craigslist or is that for hand jobs sorry to the kids in the back seat all right um i'm gonna think about i'm gonna think about who's listening all right uh the two dates do i help her move guy has checked in remember he's 62 190 24 years old following up on the last email thanks for the advice great listen very helpful honestly especially the part about her dad being like this guy said no what what the f this guy sucks or whatever basically what ended up happening is i first kind of made some jokes about it didn't commit either way essentially kicked the can down the road but as it got closer to moving day i decided you know what i like this girl i want to see her and i want her to know that i'm willing to help out in these situations it's a nice thing to do she'll appreciate it so i'll tell her sure i'm available i'll help out problem was when i actually texted her it was after a late night out that's an awesome move like somebody you just are starting to talk to it's actually a late text where you're just excited in a way that doesn't make any sense other than the text is coming in like out of the clear blue yeah yeah 2 30 a.m it's like what and it's not like anything bad it's just clearly this person felt the need to reach out and honestly if the other person goes hey that's so funny haha great or if they're like why would you text me so late i think it's a pretty good like okay maybe this will work out and maybe this is a red flag that it won't work out so he says enthusiastically that he'll be able to help out the problem was when i actually texted her after late night out i sort of um way too enthusiastically all right we i think we already covered this committed ended up being unavailable which i felt bad about but it was monday and i physically could not make that work fortunately she understood appreciated the offer we're still hanging out despite my unavailability so that's good it was like seven car trips up and down manhattan so it wasn't the worst thing to offer and to also be unavailable that sounds like a full day she now floated the idea of me building her a dresser but i'm pretty sure that was more of a joke well i don't know have you expressed any desire to build one do you have any do you have a catalog we could look at hopefully to see the place what's that i was gonna say that's a way easier way of proving your prowess than doing seven car trips up and down manhattan if you just put together one ikea thing you know there might be you're gonna have to contain your rage on that page five when the shit doesn't make sense but you'll get through it and then it's like look how i'm a guy who can do stuff and i didn't have to drive up and down manhattan congestion prices or whatever uh it's just a way easier way to prove that yeah i went the other way where i thought he was going to have like a little woodworking shed but probably not manhattan so you're right kyle it was build the dresser it has to be that not what i was thinking of because i'm just thinking about like a later phase do i want a planer yeah no i wonder like i started pricing it out like what would you do would you be a table guy because stools just seem like oh you made some more fucking stuff and then you're like oh yeah i'm gonna do that and then you're making stools like not that many people need stools we got enough stools yeah what's that poplar my uh my stepdad has a uh adirondack chair operation going i think it was during covid wow he like he did like a bunch of adirondack chairs and some just like all-in-one picnic benches now we're sick the price of lumber went up but i'm he's kicking around with me he's like maybe i should get a sawmill and i'm just a hundred percent trying to contain my excitement like yeah i think that would just think about how many things you have to make before it pays for itself it's ten thousand dollars but i'm like i'm wearing him down i'm like dude i think you know you've been retired for a while i think this is a great think about the money you could make put a little like epoxy on it bring it to a farmer's market that thing will be gone i've thought about this a lot because it does seem like relaxing like cathartic to like hey just get just some woodworking you know your own base and stuff but the problem is like you watch like you know an instagram reel about it and it's like oh yeah this guy doesn't two seconds he's got all the tools you need all the tools and i don't have all the tools there's so many things you need to be to be able to do that right like i think i could follow instructions right you gave me instructions how to build a table i'd probably build you a table i don't have i just don't have the the technology to do that yet i'm buying all this stuff am i going home do you put a rent this stuff that's probably not worth it either so that's always been the hangout for me because it does kind of seem fun yeah i think it starts the hardest part too like you know i find a recipe online i'd be like that's great i don't have any of the stuff and it's like great this is an 85 chicken parm well not chicken parm i would have most of the stuff for that but like sometimes like something that you think is going to be awesome you're like holy shit i could have just ordered out this would have been a little cheaper but i guess the next time i'd never make this i'll have all that stuff yeah you hate that because you're like this is gonna go bad i'm not gonna use this again you didn't go you guys gonna grow up with a lathe no no no no no i mean my dad had a lot of things i told you his his truck got stolen and i was like wow that's like is that like 50 grand of worth of tools that are probably in there yes maybe i don't know um but but no not woodworking things but he had all the odds of that and stuff why is dad on zillow and danbury um all right so yeah i think a little aside there on woodworking i think buying the sawdust vacs would be you know the ducts and getting all that worked out the duct work that would be that'd be awesome but all right um hopefully you get to see the place find out it's an 11 floor walk up or 100 degrees or something like that just to feel a little better about it yeah so also she was not trying to find out how much money i had and if i would pay for movers that would be bizarre yeah that's why we read that email when it was like hey the one thing you weren't thinking about and it was like i don't think many people were thinking about that she knows what i do i'm in law school therefore do not have pay for movers or money right now some kind of a weird structure there i would also think a google search of a job salary would come before elaborate moving scheme if she was curious about my income so something else on the subject comes up that is of note i will follow up but for now appreciate the advice seems like i made the right call now by offering and was rewarded by being off the hook anyway though i didn't miss the chance to suss out if she owned anything weird like a zelda costume or suspiciously good like that weird might be i hope you check in depending on what you wear there yeah it might be awesome hey guys remember me so my kid is seven all right what else let's do um let's do one that sucks girlfriend of seven years cheated on me about me 33 58 150 played soccer through college now do triathlons half iron man annually with the boat but wow the iron man thing is nuts the trainer at equinox is telling me about it and the guy he played like d line in college football like i don't know why i said it that way i do talk about sports he played that was some did you guys wonder if i was going to ask jackson smith in jigba whether or not dijon love reached out about his off-season workouts i was so tempted i was so tempted but there's a new turn with that story where it's just even worse than it was before so i didn't that'll be the last time i think i referenced him it didn't cross my mind but um if you had asked i don't know if i'd be surprised i had it written down it was going well i thought towards the end you might have been able to sneak it in and it would have been like oh this guy's funny i'm telling he was so nasty as sophomore year and then the word was oh this guy doesn't want to play with this hamstring injury and he's a prima donna and all the shit and like it dinged him i mean he went 20th so the fact that he's this nasty now uh i don't think it's a surprise because it was just ohio state loaded with all these dudes you're like now this guy's this good and you know what i don't understand to speaking of that interview is he was talking about the texas a&m thing and like how he was a fan or whatever none of the texas schools recruited him until really late it's like how does that happen like if you're that good how does it how does this guy in texas that you want to play with him and he's like oh how does he say oh yeah we forgot about jackson smith and jigby so it's going to go to ohio state like if ohio state's recruiting you out of texas you're obviously nasty texas schools just forget about you like it just blows my mind yeah he had 60 touchdowns i think his last two years of high school seems good yeah so um i mean i guess you could argue like oh maybe he's not the biggest guy or whatever but i you know i don't know in your backyard and then if ohio state is interested in a receiver in your backyard and this kid grew up hoping he was going to play for a&m and whatever shit like that happens but yeah i'm with you on that one all right so this guy's sitting here being like hey, I'm super depressed. Can you guys finish my email and not talk about Jackson Smith and Jigba? We will do so right now. Yes, defensive lineman in college. He's doing full Ironmans at the gym and he was telling me all about it. He's a thick dude. It blows my mind. So congrats to you for doing this kind of stuff. Also running, training for a sub three at Philly Marathon this November. Hoops was my first love, but I capped out at 5'8 in high school. All right. I've been together with my girlfriend who's 31. Again, he's 33. Seven years living together for four. Everything was going all caps great. We both have successful careers, have finally started talking about marriage, going ring shopping, looking into freezing eggs, embryos, great relationship. Families are super close, travel the world, going to friends' weddings, the whole thing. This is my person, bold font underlined. Man. We both embrace the work hard, play hard energy and still get after it once or twice a week. She's a relatively small female, 5'4, 115. Wow. That is small. Size to keep up. She has a hard time knowing when to stop. History of stuff in her family, but never drinks alone and only has alcohol and going out. When she goes out, however, she goes hard. As another person who likes to party, I never held it against her, even if it's led to her blacking out, needing to be helped home more frequently than it should. The behavior hasn't shown a material change from when we were in our younger partying days. We both are big runners, actively involved in our local clubs, but we don't know how long it's going to last. We don't know what the future holds for us. We don't know how long it's going to last. Before, I trust her deeply. A while later, a friend who was still there called me and said that she was drunk and I needed to come get her. When I showed up, he told me that he'd seen her making out with another guy at the bar, not the guy that got first. Well, that's good news. But from the run club, which is my theory, my antenna's up, dude, about run clubs. I've got a lot of thoughts on run clubs, too, Kyle. I'm with you. Maybe everybody who's not in one is wrong. But I don't know. There's just a lot of people for me. So that is. But he shows up. I found her coming out of the bathroom with the same guy. We walked home. She claimed they were just. I don't know how much you want me to share this, man. I'm just going to be more vague than you are. You're a little too specific, I think, here. So they're coming out of the bathroom and she's saying, like, oh, don't worry about it. It wasn't about kissing or anything. He's like, when I pushed back, telling her what my friend told me, she said she didn't remember. We had a huge fight when we got home. I told her to call. The guy that she came out of the bathroom with, she did. And, dude, you got on the phone with him in the moment? Wow. That is a move. I will never forget when a girl I was dating, her boyfriend somehow. Well, I guess ex-boyfriend because that would have been. It was an ex-boyfriend. It was 100% an ex-boyfriend. And he called my house asking for her to talk. And I was like, I never want to be this down. Ever. Ever. I never did that. Although I've been down. So when I pressed him about it, what happened? He admitted. They've been making out and hanging out in the bathroom. So she was immediately remorseful, crying, saying she messed up, insisting this is a one-time thing, that she'd never done anything like this before. She also claims that she would have told me and brought up that she's committed to therapy to figure out why this happened, basically saying all the right things. And truthfully, I believe her. I talked to my brother and members of her family. Both know her well about the situation. They both pointed out the same thing. She gets after it. She loses herself and doesn't know when to stop. Her sister said that she's never seen her care about anyone the way she cares about me. And that they care about me like a brother and supports me however I choose to proceed. Do I put the ring on hold? Dude, I don't know if she's asking us this, but bury this deep, keep the relationship going while she gets help and treat this as a one-time breach from someone I truly believe is my person. Or is this a clear sign to walk away? Much love. All right, Kyle, it sounds like you had some thoughts. Well, I would say, I'd say put it on hold. I mean, I think younger me would have been like, oh, dude, circle of trust broken, move out, whatever. Like that's, but as you get older, you know that people like, find out stuff later on, like old family friends. And it's like, oh, you guys had like a pretty big problem in 08 or something. I had no idea because I was a kid or whatever, but it's like, you guys are great now. The family's still together. There's grandkids, like, you know, people do get over this type of stuff. But, you know, I think you, the whole point of like waiting for the, you know, to give the ring is to scope out and you guys have the seven year relationship. You've been living with each other for four. And there is one glaring thing here is that, you know, she can kind of claim, you know, I was hammered. I wouldn't have done it if I wasn't hammered or I don't know what happened. It's like, if that behavior doesn't change in a, you know, it's a measurable thing that you can take to be like, you cannot, if you want to go out, fine, like I'm not going to be the person who tells you you shouldn't be going out and constantly checking in. But, you know, if you just become like a total different person, you start missing pieces. Like this is before we commit to building something together. I can't know that, you know, you're also a wild card twice a week or maybe you're a wild card the twice a week that you go out. Like that's the thing I think you would maybe want to see some measurable, improvement on before you're like, yeah, we'll fucking figure this out. But I don't think I would walk away. Younger me would tell you like, you know, that's it. But I don't think, I don't have that worldview anymore. I think you're both in your early 30s. People make mistakes. I understand that. It's definitely, it's definitely a put the ring on hold situation for me. Like I, it doesn't mean that it's like you can't come back from this or she doesn't love you. She probably does. I'm sure she feels bad about it. But like blacking out a couple times a week, like, do you really know this is the first time this happened? Like I don't, again, I don't deny that she loves you. But if she's having this repeat behavior of like acting like she's still in college and she's 31 years old, like again, teach their own, do what you want to do. But that like is a little bit of a problem. It's a little bit of a red flag. You go home. It seems like you leave her out a lot. Like that's always going to, that's always going to be in the back of your mind. So. Yeah. Listen, therapy is, therapy is a nice thing to say and do. But like if the root of the problem, is I'm still going to get hammered and just hope it works out. I think that's, that's the thing that's, you know, measurable. That's not saying you're an alcoholic, but that is somebody who has a problem with drinking. You know what I mean? I think there's a, that's the step before you get to, you know, needing it and having physical dependency on it. But you, she squarely has something that's, it's causing problems in her life from drinking. It's a drinking problem. Is he going to be able to get over that though? Like now every time, like she, she almost can't do this anymore, right? Cause it's always going to be in the back of your head. Like, are you going to trust her again in these situations? Not be that person anymore. And that's the big talk, right? We got to make a big change here. Otherwise I'm not sure we can go for it. That's, that's a tough thing. I'm, I don't envy that you're going to have to do that, but that's what I do think. I do think the like, Hey, I'm open to going there, but you know, going to therapy to figure out why this happened. All right. Like, or you just like, great. One more thing I got to do. But it's just like, but it's just like, Oh, okay. Like, is that just like, okay. Or you just fucked up and you're just like looking for people to feel bad for you about this. Like, I don't know. Like I, I, she, there have to be some real actual things that she takes. And again, if you want to go through that together and you love her, like there's no reason why you can't figure this thing out in the longterm, but there definitely needs to be a pause. A couple of things here. One is like, it's, it's a bit like when you tell your buddy about a fight scenario and then he tells you what he would have done. And of course he would have like, I would have blocked that punch and then I would have roundhouse kicked him. I would have done this. It's always a roundhouse. And I can't believe you did that. This is what I would have done. So it's very simple for like any man listening to this and you just go like, all right, I'd be a hundred percent out of there, you know, I'm done. And I think there's part of me that would go, well, I can't do this at all. Like I want to marry you and you're pulling this off like after seven years, just cause you wanted to hang out with a dude in the bathroom. Like what the fuck? And if there's also like a dependency, it would make me not to bum out the emailer and things like, is this really the only time this would happen? Can you press her on that? Would she even know? Would she tell you the truth? You're right. It's really like in the argument, Hey, I'm going to go, I'm going to go, I'm going to go to therapy and the whole thing. Like, I think we can figure out why this is happening. Um, like there is a constant, maybe saving a deductible. Yeah. We've solved for X already. We know X is boost, but this is about you. This is about you and her. It's not about anybody else. It's not about us. It's not about anyone listening or any of your relatives or any of your friends. This is about you caring about that person and no one else can put you in that scenario because it is just you. And the thing that sucks about this is the resentment you're feeling. You know, there's an ego, there's an ego thing. Maybe you don't have like, maybe your ego is wired in a way that actually can be beneficial where you just go, Hey, people make mistakes. Like, I think there are times you could say like, Hey, this didn't mean anything. It was an awful set of circumstances. It was a one-off. I'm so sorry, but it actually, this isn't some like coordinated thing where I've been texting with this, like say it was me and I was married and you get caught. It's like, well, you were texting with this person for months and then you, you went to a hotel room and it's like, you can't blame this on just a bad night out. Like this is a completely premeditated, coordinated thing. So if it's truly the truth that this was just this random kind of one-off thing, can you get through that to still stay with, as you said, your person? Because the thing that sucks on some of the scenarios with this is that you end up doing nothing wrong. And then you feel the greatest punishment because you don't allow yourself to be with the person that you truly love. And it's like, well, this sucks even more. So like, she's going to feel whatever, but she at least did something. I didn't even do anything, but I just can't trust you anymore. And now I'm even more bummed out because now, this life that I've planned out in my head for multiple years, it's just not going to happen. It's all disrupted. Look, it's 33. If that's the way that it goes, like I'm just telling you, it all resets. You will find someone else. You will look back on other things and say, as much as that period of time, absolutely suck. I'm so glad that I got through it. I think that's, true almost all of the time when you're going through those brutal relationship stretches of just reminding yourself if you go through it enough that you just go hey the next one like whatever yeah 33 you can still go to most bars and not raise an eyebrow you know so um it's tough it's really tough and you're not going to get a definitive answer you just get away all those different things so that's i would i would never sit here and say you absolutely should or shouldn't do this based on those scenarios all right we've got a lot of girlfriend ones here i don't know must be the season uh let's do uh golf quick here hope all is well long time listener going back to my teenage years prior to dual threat limited release with howie long skit that's chris to you 65 195 currently recovering from shoulder dislocation about two months ago ouch and anyone that's had shoulder issues in the past i'm sure they can relate with how great the sleep is you that said been a while but my pickup basketball game is corey brewer just not the 51 point game what an awesome stat that is thank you for reminding the world on to the actual content i'm married into extremely avid golf family i'm the charles barkley of 20 years ago at golf so it's been an adjustment for me that i deep down could give a damn about after about five years of marriage uh and this summer has been kind of nice having a fucked up shoulder to have the big no to say to family golf events well this past week i've been married to a girl who's been I decided, F it. I'll go out and bond. They're buying the cart anyway. So I go with the wife and my in-laws and watch them golf. Insert your alcohol sponsor here that I drank all day long on the golf cart. I like this guy. Well, by hole three or four, I got to noticing how long it took my father-in-law and brother-in-law to hit the ball off the tee box. After a while, I got to timing them from the moment my brother-in-law put the tee in the ground. From the moment he put the ball and the tee in the ground to him making impact with the ball on average was 35 seconds. Is this fucking insane? Kyle, it seems like you had a quick thought there. I just said, I like this guy. That's all. I like the way he wrote the email. Out of his jib. Okay. For added context, they're both very serious about golf being sub 80 on just about most courses. They might have two alcoholic drinks, the entire 18 holes, no big there, but there's no shooting the shit, trash talk, laughing, nothing. It's a straight face. We are using the range finder damn near every shot on every hole, even though we golf at this fucking place weekly. You seem to hate this. So let's just, we could probably stop reading and say, stop. Just don't go anymore. Yeah. Um, you were thinking of your home. Go ahead. No, I was gonna say, just because you play a golf course doesn't mean you don't need the range finder. There's different angles. There's different distances. Like you don't, I don't know. It sounds like you don't like golf, which is fine. This guy doesn't like golf. This isn't your golf tribe. You're more of an easygoing, right? Whack that shit. Go find it. You're into the bro golf culture, right? You probably, you know, you're probably watching the videos, the taco challenges. You like guys getting hammered on the course, golf carts flipping. That's fine about thinking about getting that, uh, that fake golf club that actually dispenses cocktails. You know, I looked at that. I, I looked at it. I'd be like, come on, dude, what are you doing? Just learn how to swing before you start doing shit like that. Yeah. Um, yeah, there's just different vibe shifts in golf. I, I, I will say like there, if guys taking too long, like that is annoying, but you know, I don't know if you're getting a range finder out, that's not, that's not like an abnormal thing to do. Yeah. I think you're losing. It sounds like the tee box thing bothers him more. And like the other things are, you know, he thinks they're, you know, adding to the argument, but you end up losing the message when you start picking apart every little thing. It's like a cow herd monologue where it's like, Oh, and then it's like, Oh, you're adding even more shit to this. I don't think the range finder is a big deal. Do you guys think I golf or do you guys think I drink when I golf? No, maybe when you do the night golf, when you do your par three, you don't even do it there. No. I mean, if I drive, I, I wouldn't even have like a beer. Uh, maybe one I'm playing big Cedar though. Big Vermont shout out to big Cedar in Missouri. We're coming in a few weeks, maybe a month trip dudes trip Vermont guys getting together. Um, where are you in the handicap of the group? Like where are you? What do you, what do you rank at Pinehurst? People were really upset. They thought that I, I was lying cause I played well and it's just so annoying. Like the guys be like, you're not a, you know, you're not. So I think I'm a 20 right now. If you've got a high handicap, you can do some damage if you play decently. Well, yeah, I got a thing. I almost won the whole thing and I'm glad I didn't cause I didn't, I didn't want to deal with it. I got a quick thing before we sign off of this one. I, the next time you hear my voice will be, I'll be in a bachelor party with 17 dudes. This is Dominican crew. Not that that matters, but I just wanted to tell you what's going on. Uh, me and my other boy, he is the other white guy. Uh, I'm assuming he's way better at golf than me. I'm very bad. We're talking about, you know, sneaking away and going golfing and the word has gotten out. And there's a bunch of guys who have never golfed before that are really jazzed up to just do everything. And they're trying to be like, Oh, we should golf. We should golf. And I just don't think I should be teaching anybody how to golf or the rules. I'm like, I don't know. You know, it's, we've seen each other sparsely since college. We're coming around, you know, you know, rallying around our boy getting married in winter. And I'm just wondering if maybe I should even just not golf rather than maybe there's eight other, maybe six other guys who are going to be swing, renting clubs and swinging them for the first time. And I just feel like this is not the time. It started as like, maybe we could sneak off. I don't think I should be leading this charge on a golf course. So you guys think I should cancel the just like, forget about it. Golf. Yeah, it's nice. How hot is it gonna be? It's gonna be like 98 198. We're there for like four days, including the travel days. And it's gonna be advantage if you play. Maybe over me. I mean, I don't think I have any discernible advantage. But I imagine they might be doing baseball swings. And you know, I don't know how many balls are all gonna have to because nobody's we're not bringing. Yeah, I think I think you need to just you to be the guy who's just says that golf's not gonna happen. It's not happening. You can't do it. Because that's you can't that you're gonna be it's gonna be miserable for you. It's gonna be hot. And you're gonna be worried about these dudes that don't I'm excited. That's my opening like one guy's eyes to be like, dude, remember that time Kyle took his golfing? And that's where I got my start from. But like, it just seems like it's gonna be a problem. Yeah, okay. Don't think you're having fun there. We could be done. Back to our email. I asked my college buddy fantasy football group. They said he's definitely very serious slash. Fighting demons. Alright, so they do take a long time to tee off. The rangefinder thing isn't that big of a deal. They don't want to you guys are two completely different worlds around the guy. No one's right. No one's wrong. You shouldn't you just shouldn't get this isn't a bonding experience. You're super annoyed by the whole thing. You shouldn't do it anymore. Email continues. Not gonna lie. It's shit like this that makes me never really want to get that serious about the lifelong sport. I extremely dislike golfing with them as compared to doing best ball and shotgunning drinks after missing a putt. They're always golfing 18 and never just nine holes. My wife's dad wonders why I've gotten sales rep of the year three of the past five years. Maybe it's because I'm actually training store employees while the other reps are out working on their short game. Oh, it's getting personal now. Yeah, they're great guys. They stick with what they're good at. And only that not gonna lie. I feel like a bitch when I've golfed with them in the past, but I just quickly remind myself that they wouldn't know how to gut a deer when it comes down to it. Take this anywhere you want. I don't know how to get a deer. Kyle, do you? No, I wouldn't even try. I've seen, I've seen like the post op of that. And I, I mean, no, thanks dude. No, thanks. Two completely different people. It just because there's a marriage here in the mix, you shouldn't go. I can't believe they want you to go with them, right? You gotta be showing some signs of how you feel. I mean, this should be a situation where there's somebody that's just too mad and be like, Hey, do you not like me? And the person goes, I don't. He's like, that's great. Cause I don't like you either. And then you're like, can we never pretend that this matters? That'd be an amazing, like relief to me too. Like I we've been wasting all of these hours over the years, having to worry about this dynamic and we don't like each other and it's signed off and this is great. Do you want to hang out? No, I don't want per yeah, exactly. I don't want to hang out either. You guys need to go to your separate corners. Cause I don't think they want anything to do with you either. Yeah. I've mentioned to you, like, do they get along otherwise? Or is it, is, does the golf just kind of bring out the animosity in these people? Like, I don't know, like, can you hang out some layers and just, and just. Just drink if that's what you want to do all day. I, I don't know. Like you can't gut these guys can't gut a deer. Yeah. He thinks that's a very specific way to end. Yeah. That must be a sick burn in some parts of the, of this country. I'm not in that part, but I felt less like a man when I read it, I'm jealous that he knows how to do it. I wouldn't know how to do it. I don't know that I want, I don't like, I'm not thinking about it this weekend being like, damn it. But, uh, there's other ways to get medicine stakes. You know, your body has way too much to go around. They're always trying to give it away. I swear Chen waiters all over. I've got the way I'm ready to go. I'm ready to go if need be. All right. That'll do it for the show today. Thanks to Tom. Thanks to Kevin. Thanks to Kyle. Thanks to sir. Rudy. Good luck, Kyle, in your future endeavors. Ryan Rusillo show all episodes available on Netflix, Barstool sports. Yeah. you