T3 - That Thursday Thang - Tackling Diversity in the NFL, News and Notes, Abdul Carter

Discussion centers on the urgency of improving diversity in the NFL, particularly regarding coaching roles. The Rooney Rule is critiqued for its lack of effectiveness in practical application. A variety of solutions are proposed, including younger ownership, stricter interview protocols, and commitment to community outreach programs. The conversation extends to the upcoming NFL draft, analyzing possible selections to meet team needs and enhance future performance.

• Examining the purpose and limitations of the Rooney Rule 
• Statistics reveal disparities in NFL coaching roles 
• Advocating for younger ownership to encourage change 
• Ideas around stricter hiring practices and transparency 
• Importance of grassroots initiatives to foster coaching interest 
• Discussing prospects for the NFL Draft and team strategy 
• Encouraging ongoing dialogue about diversity in sports 
• Inviting listeners to contribute their ideas and solutions 
• Anticipation for the next stages in football and diversity efforts 

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and Episode Setup
• 19:55 Welcome to C3: The Thursday Show
• 33:03 Discussing Team Loyalty and Backlash
• 46:32 [Ad] We Just Coolin
• 47:12 (Cont.) Discussing Team Loyalty and Backlash
• 2:55:57 The Diversity Conversation in the NFL
• 4:06:35 Analyzing the Effectiveness of the Rooney Rule
• 5:39:01 Solutions We Can Propose
• 7:07:12 Conclusion and Next Steps
• 7:23:43 Draft Talk: Who's the Right Pick?
• 8:06:18 Closing Thoughts on Diversity and Coaching

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Let's go.

Speaker 2: 0:19

Welcome back to C3, that Thursday thing. I'm Mr U, Shane and Herb is in the house. Gentlemen, how's it going tonight? Y'all ready for this?

Speaker 1: 0:31

Man, shane, is here. It feels like the world has corrected itself. You know, the only thing that I think I might have over Shane, the one thing in your life, oh, oh, oh, oh, I got a Mr U shirt though.

Speaker 3: 0:49

Because you didn't have it on today.

Speaker 1: 0:54

I actually stuck it in one of his closets and took this out of there. So don't tell me. I'm upset a little bit that Shane looks better in Alabama stuff than I do. But man, you know you can't hate the player.

Speaker 2: 1:08

I don't know how y'all do it. I'm not asking that player.

Speaker 1: 1:12

I can't. Shane is a superstar man. I think people just need to realize that.

Speaker 2: 1:16

I can't have all these teams in my closet. I don't know how to do that. They're going to have to teach me, man. How do y'all pull that off and endure the backlash that surely comes with it?

Speaker 1: 1:28

I have been an Alabama fan for a while, so backlash comes naturally. Random stuff happens and people hate on Alabama fans randomly. Hey, I'm used to backlash, nothing about it.

Speaker 2: 1:42

You ain't creating it, though. You don't create it by actually going out there and buying some other, buying all brand clothes and having it in your closet. You asking for this, this different, how are y'all doing?

Speaker 1: 1:54

that Not me. I just have Mr U clothing all day.

Speaker 2: 1:59

The other stuff is that we can't see on camera All these other teams, and Shane clearly does the same thing. He has it too. How are y'all pulling it off? How are y'all going to?

Speaker 1: 2:10

We do what we have to do for our content on our channels. Man Copy that. Okay.

Speaker 3: 2:15

You don't have family that buys you stuff.

Speaker 2: 2:19

Do I have family that buys me stuff?

Speaker 3: 2:21

No. Do you have family that supports Alabama?

Speaker 2: 2:24

They don't buy me sports stuff. I don't know what's wrong with them, but yeah, that family that buys me stuff is sports stuff. Yeah, my little sister is probably the exception. She's listening right now. She knows she gives me sports stuff. But yeah, besides that, no, I ain't got it like that. But totally understand that Lady Alka is in the house. Good evening to you, ma'am. So glad to see you tonight. Thanks for joining us. What's up, lady Alka, your comments and your suggestions on this topic?

Speaker 2: 2:53

Well, as you guys know, if you've been watching us, we've been having a bit of a series on the diversity in the NFL. Specifically, some of the sports have been mentioned, but essentially it's the NFL and the Rooney Rule and whether it's working or not, whether it's effective or not. We decided tonight, after hearing some of the comments we heard from you guys on our social media platform, we're going to try to find a solution tonight. I scrounged in articles. I dug as deep as I can go. Shane and Herb have some ideas too, and all you guys that are listening will probably have some better ideas than all of ours. We need to hear it tonight. This is the last night of this series, the last installment of this series Not the end of the conversation, but the last installment for this series tonight and we need some answers. So I'm going to go ahead and set us up real quick and then let everybody get into it. But we kind of established that many say that the Rudy rule is not really effective because management already knows who they're going to hire. Some people say there's no rules that are binding, I guess there's no accountability, so that makes the system patently unfair. We discussed that part. That's not really the thing.

Speaker 2: 4:05

Some people have been and I think I mentioned it somewhere way back, probably one of our older shows that this might be more of a societal question than it is just an NFL question. I think this is happening in other places. Coming from corporate America and I wouldn't run back there if it was the last job on the planet Earth I've seen that so many times People getting passed over, having everything on a resume that you want. But they get passed over because the interviewer and the interviewee just kind of vibe with each other. They kind of they connect oh, we're from the same place in Evansville, oh, you know what I'm saying. And before you know it the person had the job and you don't even know how it happened. And you don't even know how it happened. You're overqualified or you're more qualified than that person and you don't get the job. So it's not really an NFL thing only.

Speaker 2: 4:50

I got some stats here. In the NBA, 70% of the players are black and their coaches represent about 37% of the team of the league. 11 out of 30 teams. Major League Baseball almost the same kind of thing Three out of the 30 teams have a black manager. In the NHL they got 30 teams in the NHL in hockey Got one black coach. He was fired in 1989. So I guess that means they don't have any now.

Speaker 2: 5:21

So this is not just the NFL, but we kind of see it the most because we spend so much time in the nfl. We're trying to figure out what's actually going on here. Uh, honestly, the only thing I've seen that was uh, I guess, encouraging was what happened with the washington commanders. What they did was they got private private equity involved, they got some funding, and what they did was they did what madrid johnson's been doing for years now. It's not really a new thing. He's been going into communities that most people say can't produce money, they can't produce interest in certain products and he went to places like South Central and built movie theaters, businesses, salad shops, things that people said that it would never work in these kind of communities because of the folks that live there and their income and stuff. So he went there and did that many times.

Speaker 2: 6:15

This is not really a new thing, but him being a part of this group of the commanders, I think that was significant and what it's doing now is opening up. If you look at their staff, you see that it's kind of opening some things up as far as diversity goes and they're really addressing it and really being thoughtful about it and intentional. It's kind of sad that it has to be like that, but I think this was going on so far. But overall thoughts because I want to get to a very uncomfortable topic for me in regards to this regarding my giants but overall thoughts about your ability to find a solution how, how did that go? How would that search?

Speaker 1: 6:48

try to find that I'm gonna put up the comment. That kind of goes along with what I was talking to you before we got on air. To me, the biggest solution is a lot of the older owners need to phase out and you're going to have to get some younger ones in there. So, like I know, she might be thinking, hey, I'm kind of joking by this, but it's also kind of right and kind of goes with like what'd you say with magic Johnson? They're going to need the ownership group to change and to get a little younger and to embrace new ideas.

Speaker 1: 7:25

As far as coaching goes, you know and I didn't want to you brought up the other stats. Like it's funny, we do talk about this in the nfl. I've really never really thought about this with the nba because I feel like nba coaches do get more of a fair shake as far as what goes on um, and we talk about the retreads in NFL. You got a guy like Doc Rivers in the NBA who guy seems to fail all the time with the most talent and he still gets jobs.

Speaker 1: 7:54

So it's like yeah, you know what I mean. So it's like it in an NBA I definitely think there's more for sure and a better shot. But NFL wise, I hate to give this answer, but I absolutely feel it's like the ownership groups have to phase out and get younger and then they'll give everyone else a chance, versus hanging on to the 70 and 80-year-old coaches. I don't get that part.

Speaker 2: 8:22

I want to ask you about the NBA real quick, because obviously you got five guys that are starting. They got a 11 12 man loss, but they got five guys starting basically. So anybody that's a standout, uh, for any matter of years it feels like they might get more of a shot. I think I kind of can see it. It's different than you know, uh, 11 guys on offense and 11 guys on defense. It's a little bit different than that. So so I kind of can see why somebody who like well Doc Rivers, I guess is not the best example I can come up with but somebody who has excelled at playing offense and defense in the NBA, they might get a better shot at a head coaching job. And I think it makes sense. The NFL, they got to do a little bit more work. It seems like when they say like like apples and oranges.

Speaker 1: 9:08

This is like you know apples and like books or something To me. In the NBA, most of your work is probably done before the game, but once you get in the game, if you have the best player on the court and they get to play offense and defense and it's one of five, you can win. I mean, look, lebron james got to the finals with his second best player being booby gibson and most people are like who?

Speaker 1: 9:32

so it's like if you have the best player on the court in basketball, you can get by with subpar coaching. I just don't feel like it's. It's the grind, the head coach in the NFL. Your offense has the ball right. You're trying to coach your offense. You're trying to coach your defense. You actually have to call plays, every single play, to try to match something right. You can have Patrick Mahomes and put him on the Titans and you're not winning the Super Bowl. But if you have the best player in basketball, you can drag your team to the playoffs. There's a chance of making the finals Without you know. Jerry Stackhouse's family said like coaches is overrated in the NBA. I fully believe that. So I think it's way way more. You know it's way harder in.

Speaker 1: 10:21

NFL. I feel like I'm talking too much. Like my boy, Shane hasn't had a chance to chime in.

Speaker 2: 10:26

Are you good man? I like that. Go ahead, shane jump in.

Speaker 3: 10:30

No, like I mean to start off. I agree with Herb with the changing of the guards. The thing of the NFL is. The biggest problem I see beyond just the ruling rule, is I don't know how many owners really want to win. Owning an NFL team basically gives you a license to print money. Most of these owners are okay with being bottom of the barrel. They're not really trying to win.

Speaker 3: 10:56

Now, if you're not trying to win and you just want to make the decision easiest for you, then you don't go looking for the best candidate. You pick the candidate that's going to get you the less backlash. Yes, so you retread. You pick people who look like the other coaches you've already had and you make those decisions. Yeah, now, like you're talking about with uh magic and the group in washington, I don't think this group would be as forward-thinking as they are if the prior owner was not an absolute dumpster, fire of PR, humanity and on numerous other occasions I think that made it for Washington that they can say we have to change. What we can't do is exactly what was done before. So it opens up the room for them. But when you look at the coaching hires at washington, you took two retreads.

Speaker 3: 11:52

So how did the rooney rule play out for a minority african-american owner in this step? You know that's the. The big thing, uh, like we mentioned when we first opened up about this conversation, is, oftentimes you let the group that has perpetrated the issue for this many years be in charge of finding the solution. A solution will never be found. The NFL engaged the Rooney rule to get people to stop asking them about why aren't there more African-American coaches, why is there more diversity in the NFL? And the NFL came up with the Rooney rule and slapped Rooney's name on it in the hopes that this will make the problem go away. And it never has. Yeah, what it did was take it out of the hands of the NFL.

Speaker 1: 12:41

They're like oh, it's not our fault, it's the owner's fault, exactly.

Speaker 3: 12:45

What it did was take it out of the hands of the NFL. They're like oh, it's not our fault, it's the owner's fault, exactly, the NFL gets to go. We created this rule. Now it's on the owners. Yeah, and the thing is, the commissioner is an employee of the owners, right, so he knows that we can keep recycling this issue. But you look at you know there's even diversity. There's a lot more diversity in the ownership groups than there were in the years past. But they're still going to pick their buddies. You still pick the guy that's going to give you the good press conference and he's going to look like every other coach that you hired. When we're talking about teams, you look at Kraft. Kraft decided he didn't want to deal with the Bilicek saga level of aura that he had and he said I can pick anybody I can pick anybody and have them be my head coach and we're going to be okay.

Speaker 3: 13:38

And he picked Gerard Mayo and he set him out to dry. He gave him less than a year to make a change. And then he went out to dry. He gave him less than a year to make a change.

Speaker 2: 13:45

Nice way to put it.

Speaker 3: 13:46

And then he went back to Vrabel, because Vrabel looks the way he wants him to do. Vrabel's going to go for the Patriot way, and when push comes to shove, vrabel's going to be the same guy as he always is. I think Vrabel was a great pick, but Kraft has shown exactly why this rule doesn't help anybody. You gave him a one-year opportunity. That's not a chance to be a coach in the NFL. You can't turn any team around in a year, I don't care how great you are.

Speaker 3: 14:17

You think Jim Harbaugh both you and I huge Harbaugh guy he helped the Charters. They didn't go from last to first place, though, and that's a guy that had already coached in the nfl. You took jerry mayo for being a positional coach and then gave him the leadership of the team, and where I think he failed most was as a ceo, not as a positional coach, not as getting the defense or the offense. He just was not prepared to have to answer every question that comes that way as a team Like. Being an NFL coach is 90% CEO. Now it's your ability to manage the people underneath you and get the results.

Speaker 2: 15:03

And now you got these 11 teams in the league. You know what I got. I think part of this is bugging me because I don't like change. For change sake. I want to try to do something. So you know what? Okay, I did it, I'm saying. But they had 11 clubs that had never hired a black coach, and my favorite team happened to be one of them. Not super thrilled with that, but at the same time I want them to go out and try to find somebody who quote unquote fits the profile so you can say you know what? We're not racist as an organization. Look who we hired. I don't want that either. So it's messy, but we promise we'll try to get into some solutions.

Speaker 2: 15:41

I dug some stuff out. I'm going to just throw it out there rapid fire. We can kind of just break it down, pick it off, go ahead, snipers out there, all the snipers go ahead and shoot it down. It's fine by me, but I want to at least have some ideas, because some of the stuff that I'm hearing I'm not super thrilled about. But I'm going to share what I like and what I don't like that I heard so far mentioned about having an authentic open hiring process.

Speaker 2: 16:05

Basically, what that means is that every interview is going to be monitored. I'm not really against that idea. You know what happens when somebody's on camera. They kind of tighten up their tie a little bit and make sure that they are on their best behavior. So there's that part of it. Understand that could factor into this and then have a idea for a committee to evaluate every interview, almost like on a grading system. So that means like, if it does, if you don't, if you don't have more than 80, you don't have 80 or more, you fail. And if you fail, that that that supposed hiring team has to give up a one or two. Well, a one and a two, along with $250,000. I'm like, is that the answer? Making them pay? I mean, okay, it might solve some things, but again, it's change for change's sake. You know what? If a team says you know what, I know, like, okay, I'm talking to a team who did that recently let's use the Patriots, since it's fresh on our minds If Kraft, under this rule, if Kraft doesn't have a 80% interview valuation or higher, he has to give up a one and a two and be charged $250,000.

Speaker 2: 17:27

Do you really want to force owners into hiring a coach? That's kind of what you're doing. It's not much different than the Rooney Rule itself. So this idea is like it's just Rooney Rule Part B. It's kind of the same thing. You're making them pick. I'm talking about money now. So you think, oh, because owners have money, we can hurt them in their wallets by not by guilting them into hype. That can't be the answer. I like the monitoring idea. I think that's pretty cool. The committee to evaluate Not sure about that. Give up a one or two is going to make everybody hype. The whole league is going to be full of black coaches. It's like, okay, should we a problem, or are we waiting for TSP?

Speaker 3: 18:01

Who's on the committee? Who's on that committee? That was my first question, honestly. Fourteen white owners yeah.

Speaker 1: 18:14

Let me just say this If any Jets fan is on the committee for the Giants thing you're failing Before the thing. You know what they failed. They haven't even done the interview yet. Yeah, thing, you know what they failed. They haven't even done the interview yet, yeah, failed.

Speaker 2: 18:28

You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 18:30

Anytime you introduce a committee into there, you stretch out. How long does it take? Three people to make a decision, six people to make a decision? Your committee is nine, 12, whatever. It's just going to drag the process out and at the end of the day it's an arbitrary. You know, there is no half. The crew might think, oh, that was a great interview. The other half might have been, oh, they just totally skirted the whole thing. So I like the idea. I will say this I do like the idea which one, the monitor or the committee no, I like the fact that they came up with it.

Speaker 1: 19:02

Monitoring ising is probably a much better thing. Somebody actually watching.

Speaker 2: 19:07

That'd be somebody totally independent. It has to be. No one's going to be involved in that part, yeah.

Speaker 1: 19:13

That one I could see being more feasible than the other, but I think Shane was already getting at what I'm saying. The committee one yeah, I don't see that one flying.

Speaker 2: 19:22

Owners aren't going to be doing that either, though, come on, you know owners can't be in the committee.

Speaker 1: 19:30

No, the first thing the owners do is stack the committee. They'll be like, wow, there was 12 Raiders fans on the committee for the Raiders. They were over there drinking and eating and wings and they loved the interview, I think.

Speaker 2: 19:43

Shane had something I think I could Eaton and Wings and they loved the interview Along the other aisles.

Speaker 1: 19:46

I think Shane had some of you.

Speaker 2: 19:47

I think I could.

Speaker 3: 19:49

What I was going to say is like you're saying with the committee, like so how do you prove that you're the right selection for that committee? Like you're going to have people that interviewed other people. Well, they've successfully hired people. I mean, you look at the owners and the businesses that they run that got them to the point to where they got enough money to run an nfl team. There's some pretty shady business practices and hiring techniques that have gone through the woodwork on that.

Speaker 3: 20:20

So I mean I think you're gonna then let you're going to have that committee tell me that that was a great interview. I mean, like Curb said, I mean anytime you get, you know, a quorum in there, you're dealing with different opinions on how things go. Like all three of us could interview the same person, we go hey, I really bonded with that. I thought that answer was great. We could agree on the answer and still think that's not the best choice for the position.

Speaker 1: 20:48

That's fair yeah.

Speaker 2: 20:52

That's fair. The other idea is they all feel like they are basically strong-arming the owners. I don't really care for a lot of them. Some of them are about if you hire people or interview more the owners. I don't really care for a lot of them. Some of them are if you hire people or interview more diverse employees, you can get some more comp picks on scholarships. I'm like on. That's not going to work. Paying a team to keep a minority coach for three years is not. We're not solving the problem. These guys are already super uber wealthy. I mean, they have more money than most people. You're going to pay them to do something that they probably should have been doing, just out of a moral standard, please stop so by analytics.

Speaker 1: 21:39

I don't know where you're going with that. Yeah, well, to that exact point. I would hate if the Pats kept Mayo wanting you know Vrabel the entire time and just like, had to string him along for two years thinking, and next thing, you know Vrabel shows up on staff as a consultant. You know what I mean. Like, wouldn't you hate? I would, all things considered, I'd much rather they did what they did fire Mayo and say we're going to hire the guy. We actually won it all along. It's just unfortunate the way the whole thing plays out.

Speaker 2: 22:11

They were a big rebel.

Speaker 1: 22:14

Exactly they did.

Speaker 2: 22:16

Matter of fact, there was rumors about this in 2022. He was still on his items then and people felt like you know what, as soon as he gets cut loose, they said the Titans are not doing good. So Romero got that and said man, this boy's a lame duck, I don't know if he even knows it. As soon as we become free and he becomes available, that's a wrap. And that's exactly what happened.

Speaker 2: 22:39

The ideas man they're not the analyst's idea. Analytics man what are you going to attract? Where do the candidates come from? I hate that idea. It doesn't make much sense to me.

Speaker 2: 22:49

Expand the talent pool is an idea that may have a little bit of merit, because now, instead of the three or four that they're actually interviewing, now you bring it to 10, the process doesn't go a little longer, which is probably a good thing, and then you have more percentages to look at. If you have six candidates that are minority candidates in a group of eight, it's going to kind of shed a light on, you know, the whole hiring idea. I think if you do the monitoring along with the expanding the talent pool, is it going to solve the problem. Perhaps not, but think about it like this we're talking about how many years we're talking about that this has been going on. I'm losing track of how long this has been going on, but it's been going on longer than I've been alive, probably, or close to it at least. So at least five decades this has been going on.

Speaker 2: 23:46

You can't fix that in 10 minutes. You can't fix that in even five years. It's going to take a while to get there, but I personally I like the monitoring of the interview I did, along with expanding the talent pool. Put those two things together. I think we might have something that might actually work. What do you think about that? Are you guys feeling that one, or do you have a different idea?

Speaker 3: 24:13

On this one, I think that, as has happened offensively in the game, I think college is going to start to speed this process up Lately.

Speaker 3: 24:19

Especially with HBCUs, they're giving former players more and more opportunities. Now Coach Prime and Eddie George have been able to win at theirs and then they've gotten greater opportunities off of that. Eddie George has done a great job with Tennessee State. You know Coach Prime now is at Colorado in the top level. I think that giving more opportunities and seeing how that works out and having different players get those chances will help increase the talent pool.

Speaker 3: 24:49

The thing is like I said in the NFL you have to be a CEO now. You can't just make all your bread and butter on being an offensive genius or you're a great defensive coordinator. That's why I didn't think prime would be great in dallas, because I think dallas is just always going to be a mess. But he has done a great job of being the leader of his program. He doesn't call the offensive plays, he doesn't call the defensive plays and he sure as hell doesn't recruit, but he makes sure that everything goes the way he wants it to go and he's been able to change the culture of those teams that he's taken over. Now is that going to manifest itself in the nfl? I don't think so, because there's still too many people to answer for is different. I think that's a big difference. When the college game in the nfl game and that's what makes it hard for you to be able to say as a talent pool increases, is that just going to help this problem eradicate on its own?

Speaker 1: 25:51

Yeah, can I also say to part of part of what is his first point, as the other part of this is you've got to get more black men interested in coaching. You've got to get more black men interested in coaching. And, let's just be honest, when you get to certain levels, you have like more black guys who are like thinking their career is going to be forever, and you just have more white guys who are like I dream of being a coach one day, and you've kind of got to bridge that, that that gap at an earlier level, to where you have more black guys realize, look, my career is not going to last forever, but I could teach other people this. And you don't have enough guys. It's like, think about the guys that we're mentioning right now who are African American and and and getting into coaching. They're all former players who were really high profile guys and getting into it. Where are the other guys who were like, hey, I only played in high school and my career stopped there and I decided to be a coach. You know what I mean? You have to get that and that's something that's not the NFL's problem, that's not the college problem, that's a cultural problem.

Speaker 1: 26:57

We have to get more of these guys saying like, yeah, I got a buddy right now that I work with, who I've talked to about it, like he used to play the game. He stopped playing at the high school level. When you're a college level and I was like you know the game, you would be a perfect coach Nowhere in his mind to even do it. Those are the kinds of guys that you have to say like, look, it doesn't have to be the Deons you know and the Michael Vicks of the world. You got to get the normal guys who you're like yeah, he played four years in high school, stopped there, became an assistant, you know a manager somewhere and worked his way up. That's where it really has to start. We have to start teaching guys. Just because you can't play anymore doesn't mean you can't be involved in the game anymore. I think that's where we kind of lose the disconnect.

Speaker 2: 27:43

Yeah, I'm with you on that one. I don't know how you learned to become a CEO man without time.

Speaker 1: 27:49

I think that point was perfect, yeah.

Speaker 2: 27:52

Without time in the game. I don't know how you learned that man. You definitely did not learn that in college. It's not. The CEO job is chicken in college, put it like that, you have no shot of doing anything more than an apprentice CEO in college. In the NFL. It's going to take time to do that. I think the guys that we think do that well, find one that didn't have enough time to do so. I challenge you to find, I think, guys like a John Harbaugh. They had time to do that. They had time to grow and develop into that area. Now they can do it easily. They're not only doing recruiting but they're doing personnel stuff. They're managing stuff across the board. He had time to do that. There's some guys on the other side of the spectrum that you draw a male that you want him to do it and he had no opportunity. He didn't have enough time to do it. One opportunity you didn't have enough time to do it. One year, two years isn't enough to learn the kind of skill that you were talking about.

Speaker 3: 28:47

Shane, you know what Herb said. A perfect example is somebody like Aaron Glenn. He was out of football, he had a bunch of successful restaurants, but that drive to be successful in business was not as powerful as the drive to be successful in business was not as powerful as the drive to be successful in football and he took a scout position. Like exactly like you're saying. You these guys that start at the bottom and learn a little bit about every aspect of the nfl world and then become a head coach, and then they remember what it was like going to pick up the free agent when you were the guy that was driving the bus to go get that guy. They remember what it's like to be the turk who had to tell the third round guy that he doesn't have a hope of the nfl anymore. Those guys get the chances to make some of those decisions and see how that world is. When you elevate somebody into that coaching position and they've never had an opportunity to see some of those underlings and how that operates I don't know how you can be prepared for that position and I think that nine times out of ten. That's why head coaches fail, because they get away from what they were great at and they'd stop searching for people that can answer the questions that they don't know the answer to. You think you become a head coach and you know the answers. The coaches that have been great are the ones that don't Like Saban.

Speaker 3: 30:13

In college, and even as a defensive coordinator he was with Belichick he knew he didn't have all the answers. So what do you do? You go steal from somebody who's better than you and then you bring them on, like Saban hired every coach that ever got fired and he would have them be an analyst and all he would do is have them go over and go. What would you do in this situation? What do you think is important? Where would you change this? And then, so he just built this library of people that could answer questions for him that either he didn't care enough about to answer or he knew that he was never going to come to that solution. And you need to be an open-minded person to be able to be the CEO of these NFL teams, and I think the guys that come in and think they have the answers those are the ones that are out in three years, okay, I like it, I like it, I like it.

Speaker 2: 31:05

Any other closing thoughts on this? We're going to go ahead and move on to NFL news and notes. We'll be ready to move on. You got some of the thoughts on this.

Speaker 1: 31:11

No, just thank you to the people who did come up with solutions, because they were ahead of me. Even if I disagreed with them, your solution was still better than anything I was coming up with.

Speaker 2: 31:21

So I appreciate it better than anything I was coming up with. Don't know how we solve this situation. Good to see you, big man. Big Mike's Running Wrestling Podcast man, they got an awesome wrestling show. I know I am man. Fantastic show. He said the best leaders in any arena don't have to know everything. They need to know and identify the people that know those things. Staff your weaknesses. Yeah, I totally can get there If you want to. Herb, you can start off with Kelsey and I'm going to drop some news and notes after that. A few things, but what did you hear about Kelsey?

Speaker 1: 31:55

Basically. He said he was coming back for next year, said he's got unfinished business, and you know, yeah, so it's. My immediate thought was are you going to be more focused than last year? You know what does that mean for the team.

Speaker 1: 32:12

And that's I agree with you. I don't think his focus will be different, but I see him. You see the way Kansas City is constructed and with the defense playing well and with Mahomes, do they need him in the regular season to be great, to get into the playoffs and make it? Right now they could use him being great in the playoffs, but that's a Kansas City thing, I think. No matter what you think of Kelsey, he earned the right to leave on his own terms. So I feel like there's people in Kansas City that wish he would have gone ahead and retired. But he says he's here Now. I mean, physically, he's not going to be better next year, right? So it's still going to be probably a step slow, is what I would think, but to his credit, he said he's ready to go. So I mean you got to take him at his word and Kansas City just has to roll with it.

Speaker 2: 33:05

I mean, it was two minutes ago he was talking about how deeply depressed he was. He's ready to go. I feel like we're dealing with a lot of emotional highs and lows. Definitely and in this situation I'm not blaming anybody for it you can speculate whatever you want. All I'm saying is with this particular player, whatever you want. All I'm saying is with this particular player.

Speaker 2: 33:24

I'm seeing a lot of emotional highs and lows. I've seen, thought about it, what three weeks ago or so, some of his play on the field, things he was doing that the cameras caught but nobody talked about. I'm like, wow, that's the little bushley, that's the little bushley stuff right there that you're doing, you know. So he's got a lot of highs and lows and just two days ago I just read it two days ago depressed, deeply depressed, deeply depressed because you didn't win, and thinking about re-evaluating things. And then you know you and your girl going on a vacation. I'm like it's a lot of stuff going on here. So I'm like I don't know if he's even thinking about the legacy part that we talk about a lot of the time with players. We do it all the time. I don't think we can help ourselves at this point. We talk about player legacy Every time we get a chance. I don't care what sport we're talking about. Right now people talk about he's the best. The numbers show me differently. Right now. I see him as the third best and he's not close to Tony Gonzalez or Gronk yet numbers-wise, stats-wise. I'm not talking about amount of Super Bowls, I'm just talking about as far as the raw numbers. If he cares about that kind of stuff, then he needs to come back and have a renewed effort, a renewed emphasis on not only just winning but being the best. That's what you're shooting for.

Speaker 2: 34:40

Some of his comments post-Super Bowl sound like you know what. I don't need to do this that much. It's not that big of a deal. I don't really care about stats, was his exact quote. I'm like he doesn't care about stats. So these numbers here that could potentially put you in the number one tight end after another year or so, you don't care about that. So what do you care about if you don't care about stats? If you, so what do you care about if you don't care about stats? If you care about winning, then get out there and win. The stats take care of themselves. So I don't know where his head is at. What I'm hearing doesn't sound great. But, shane, what do you think about kelsey overall and the comments that herb shared?

Speaker 3: 35:57

well, first I would say I agree with you. I and I said on this podcast before he's not even the best Chiefs tight end of all time, and I think he knows that. I think the one thing I'll give Kelsey respect for is that he knows the guys that came before him that are better than he is and he oftentimes says you know, tony is better, gronk is better.

Speaker 3: 36:23

He shouts out guys that are younger than him in the NFL right now and gives them credit. The one thing out of this whole situation I hope is that this clip right here of you and Herb talking about Kelsey makes it on the Amazon Prime reality show that I'm sure is being recorded right now for his coming here to play. Absolutely, because that's what I thought the second I heard this on their podcast like I've got some unfinished business. Oh, that sounds like a great title for a documentary, because your brother had unfinished business and he played one more year and I think that's what kelsey's trying to get out. He's going to get one more year. I think he retires at the end of this.

Speaker 3: 37:04

Uh, as herb said, I don't think he needs to be special to help Kansas City. I also don't think he's the weakest element in their offensive game plan right now, but I don't think he gets better. Like the things that were tough for him is he doesn't have the same breakaway he had before. He's got some lingering injuries. None of those are going to get better by coming back for another year. That's not going to help him in any way that I see.

Speaker 1: 37:32

He's not going to get faster all of a sudden. Next year Exactly.

Speaker 3: 37:35

Exactly. I mean, I think he'll have a good year because I think being a good player is important to him. I don't think it's the most important thing to him anymore.

Speaker 1: 37:51

I think he's got a lot going on in his world that has taken away from him, and if he tells you that he's putting in the same amount of work as he did before he's lying to himself and everybody else yeah he's in a position where he can make just as much, if not more money off the field than on. So you're like, let me get this straight I can go out here and be in air conditioning situations and make money, or I can have a guy trying to beat me up for three hours and the money's the same. You're throwing practices, I think I'm good.

Speaker 2: 38:24

Sweetheart time. Come on, come on, man. Yeah, you know what I'm saying. Scales are weighing in a whole different direction. But no, I totally get that. If you guys are good with kills, just keep on moving.

Speaker 2: 38:35

Miles Garrett this is funny to me because and I have a question about the next two news notes this guy accomplished a triple crown 92.8 pass rush grade, 23.5% win rate, total pressures these are the metrics that PFF use mostly. But he hit the triple crown. Of course, the trade from Cleveland. For obvious reasons. He didn't seem to have any idea how to handle or resolve the quarterback issue. Like I said, there's videos out here with jerse or resolve the quarterback issue. Like I said, there's, uh, these videos out here with jersey with the quarterback's names on covering the entire back of the jersey. They haven't been able to figure this thing out. Andrew berry, the gm, says he has no intention to honor any requests. Saw today that he said he's now demanding the trade. He's closed, closing the door, all communication. His agent is not talking to the browns at all.

Speaker 2: 39:25

Done, I'm like whoa. His goals were always compete and win for the Super Bowl and now he's sitting here age 32. He's an undrafted free agent. Undrafted. He's a free agent in 2027, and I think the cap hits about 38 million, 38 million or so. So, yeah, I would say so. So, yeah, I would say so. First of all, I do want to go there, but before that, what should Garrett feel in this scenario? How should he respond Me? I feel like you know what, you're not doing anything, but you want me to stay in the same prison that you're in, like Stockholm Syndrome or something. You're going to kidnap me.

Speaker 1: 40:10

There's no Stockholm Syndrome, because he's not liking his captors like at all. They're not bonding, he's done with it he is the GM has Stockholm Syndrome. Yeah, I feel for him, though, because everything he's saying is right. It's one of those things about football I can be the best at my position, or arguably the best in my position, right? We're not going to say what less than top three, top five, right?

Speaker 1: 40:35

he's up there clearly right and have zero ability to affect where our season is going every year. And then look at an organization that's like do you honestly think it's getting better in the next two years that he's there? No, he's going to waste the next two years of this contract easily because they can't solve certain things, and one of the things they're trying to solve they've got a $230 million problem that's not coming back to the field anyway, and when he did make the field, it was terrible. So there's something that he cannot change at all about what's going on. I absolutely don't blame him for wanting out, and I've seen Browns fans. They're like, yeah, I get it. I mean, you know a lot of times when your star player demands a trade.

Speaker 1: 41:24

people turn on them right, Not Browns fans. They're like bro, we want out too. I just happen to still live in Cleveland, so I'm going to support the team, but I feel for them. Imagine being the best at what you do and having zero hope going into every year. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 41:41

It's like pick whatever quarterback you want. Put Patrick Mahomes on that team next year. Put Lamar on that team next year. Do you think it's all of a sudden Super Bowl? No, It'll get better than what it is, but they've just neglected that side for so long that it's just an albatross on them. And because of Deshaun Watson you can't do enough other stuff to fix anything else that you need. So you better hope your quarterback.

Speaker 2: 42:06

Say what Think you'll sit out for two years.

Speaker 1: 42:10

He can't sit out for two years. Like I said, he's got to go play. But it's not getting better in two years.

Speaker 2: 42:18

No, they're in a situation.

Speaker 1: 42:20

The Browns are in a situation right now. If Deshaun got healthy and came back next year and went to like Denver, I'd expect him to play great. Just because he left Cleveland. Like that's the kind of situation that Cleveland's in. They got rid of Baker and now Baker had, like you know, there was MVP talk about Baker in the middle of the year last year. You know what I mean. It's like. Getting out of the gravity of Cleveland makes you better.

Speaker 2: 42:43

Yeah, go like getting out of the gravity of Cleveland makes you better. Yeah, go ahead, shano.

Speaker 3: 42:46

What you got. Well, I think. Just to wrap up, like what Herb said, you look at Miles Garrett and I think he falls under and this is a Detroit Lions problem, but he's a Barry Sanders megatron where you've been the best player in your position. You've always tried, they've never questioned your effort, but you are stuck. So you either make a decision where you go look, I'm just gonna quit, I'll stop playing in the nfl, I've made my money, I'm happy or you request a trade and and miles garrett I mean number one, he is like one of the top 10 first guy off the bus picks. I mean he looks like he was genetically engineered to be the best defensive player in the league, like what he can do and what he's done for that Browns team is impressive, to say the least. But, like Herb said, they've done it to Joe Thomas. Joe Thomas was the best left tackle for many years and he had to block for quarterbacks that didn't deserve to be in the NFL and he did that for years.

Speaker 1: 43:54

Joe should have played quarterback at that point.

Speaker 3: 43:57

Yeah, like Joe knew enough not to show up to the draft and go fishing because this is going to be my career. I'm not going to make it to the draft and go fishing because this is going to be my career. I'm not going to make it to the playoffs, I'm just going to get pummeled for 10 years and play my best. So that's exactly what Myles Garrett's doing. He's led the league in sacks. If you ask offensive tackles who they don't want to go against, his name comes up every single time. You know Kristen Wurst was talking about De, talk about dns. He doesn't like playing against. The first guy he mentioned was miles garrett, because he's like, what do you do? He's the same height as I am. He's what years faster than me and he's stronger than I am. You know where? Where do you try to play him?

Speaker 3: 44:39

And he's stuck with cleveland and up until this year he kept his mouth shut. He didn't say hey, I'd really like some help. It'd be great if you did something to help us. Maybe we can get this quarterback situation figured out. Kept his mouth shut the whole time, and then it gets to the end of the season and it's the same thing again. We don't make the playoffs. We don't have an answer at quarterback. We're going back into the draft to try to figure something out and he goes. I'm sick of it.

Speaker 1: 45:07

Yeah, I can't blame him at all.

Speaker 3: 45:10

No, I don't believe you, If you're Cleveland, he's a great trade piece. I mean, if you're going to get top dollar for somebody, he's one of the guys you're going to get top dollar for. Oh yeah.

Speaker 2: 45:22

Hopefully Barry is smart enough to put his personal feelings aside and his ego and go ahead and get that, because Cleveland needs all the help they can get. I haven't been in their mock draft yet, but I know that they're going to be at least needing eight different positions at least on their team. So yeah, you better go ahead and let them help you. That makes sense to me, all right. So the Bills went ahead and extended a wide receiver Khalil Shakir. I. That makes sense to me. All right.

Speaker 2: 45:46

So the bills went ahead and extended a wide receiver Khalil Shakir. I thought that was pretty interesting. Four years, 60 plus million dollars. Great hands Doesn't drop passes. Reliable. Josh Allen loves him for that, just for that very reason. Always find the open space. He's in a defense. He's really smart Yards after the catch. He doesn't have huge touchdown numbers, but blue collar dude, lunch pair worker, whatever you want to call him. He runs routes, he catches passes man. So right now he looks to be the number one wide receiver. Mac hollins and amari cooper are both free agents. Doubt very highly either one of them are coming back, but shakir has 76 receptions for 821 yards and four touchdowns, so I guess he's the number one guy now. Do you think that Shakir should be number one guy, or should Buffalo keep on looking?

Speaker 1: 47:05

Keep looking. I feel like steady, but not. He doesn't jump off the pages of number one. I feel like it's just been you know good at Buffalo, but I would still be looking for somebody to elevate them for sure.

Speaker 3: 47:19

That, or I think they believe Keon Coleman is going to get another year to try to be the number one.

Speaker 3: 47:25

I wasn't a big fan of his out of the draft, but when you look at Buffalo's offense, it's all about the triangle pass patterns. They use two tight ends and they use Shakir and they all flood into zones and then it's who's ever? The underneath man is the one that's getting the ball. They don't. They don't go for the wide receivers as much as they do Josh Allen. I think he likes Shakir. I think he's a good player. If you're going to be the number one wide receiver, you have to be something, and I don't even think like you, let digs go. I think shakira does a similar thing, not at the same level as what digs did. So you know what did you do? You traded one for another and you got a little bit younger, but did you get better as as a team?

Speaker 1: 48:12

so yeah, it feels like their strategy, instead of having a number one, is like pick up another wide receiver and have like three number twos versus having one number one.

Speaker 3: 48:23

You know, I think they hold on to Matt Collins too, yeah.

Speaker 2: 48:32

You think that's going to help.

Speaker 3: 48:35

I don't think it generally will. But I think Collins has built a good following in Buffalo and I think teammates enjoy having him and I don't think he's going to play all that much longer and I wouldn't be surprised if they give him another year to kind of be that slide-in help-out guy where they try to find somebody else.

Speaker 2: 48:54

I'll do that. More than likely. They're probably going to try to. I forgot what their money is, but I don't think it's great, so they're probably going to go through it. I'm going to go through the draft for that. I doubt they're going through free agency. There's some guys out there that are available, like an Amari Cooper and T Higgins and some others, but I doubt he can make me spend any money on that. We're going to come back to the world camera, but Abdul Carter, there's some news on him, Herb, that you want to go ahead and run through.

Speaker 1: 49:23

That's been interesting because I've been looking through everything since I got here and I guess it just depends on who you talk to. The first thing that popped up was Abdul Carter's going to need surgery get a pin in his foot, blah, blah, blah. Next article Abdul Carter does not need was abdul carter's gonna need surgery get a pin in his foot, blah, blah, blah right. Next article abdul carter does not need surgery, he's gonna be fine, he'll play through this, right third article he's still getting opinions on if he's gonna have surgery or not have surgery.

Speaker 1: 49:50

Yeah, nobody has. Like. His agent will tell you one thing, he might tell you another, the, the, the opinions, you. If you click five articles, you might get three different opinions, right.

Speaker 1: 50:05

The thing about it is to me, whatever if you decide to draft him, if you don't, if you're not in love with two of the quarterbacks, right and you decide to draft Carter, this, honestly, is not a huge red flag. Red flag for me because you think he's gonna be as good as he's gonna be and you're foregoing the quarterback position for another year. It's not the worst thing in the in the world to decide you need to have him have surgery. Maybe he misses you, you know, beginning of the year or whatever, whatever the timeframe may be, and your team is not great for another year and you punt on the quarterback position for one more year. I don't think it's the worst thing in the world, cause last thing you need is him wrecking a couple games, you know, if you think he's as great as you think he is, and you win one or two more games, and when he's out there healthy and he comes back if you don't have the quarterback position solved. Waiting another year is fine. So I don't, if you think carter is the guy and you don't like the other two quarterbacks, I don't think this stops you from drafting it.

Speaker 1: 51:13

And by all accounts, you know what? What Shane and I said last week. Everything I have listened to. If you believe everyone else in the world, they think Shane and I are wrong and they think he's going to be a star. And when I say everybody, I've listened to random podcasts, podcasts that had nothing to do with these teams, other guys, they love Carter. So I would say, hey, this does not seem that if you have an injury, that's where, like hey, we don't know if you need surgery or not, I'd almost opt for the surgery just because, and then just miss the start. And I would still take him just to make sure this is cleaned up. And I would tell him, like, we're not worried about next year, ok, we're worried about the years afterwards. My feel on it.

Speaker 2: 51:52

Well, this, this is what I want to go. Well, this is what I'm going to go with. This is so many places I can go with this. I think one of the biggest strategies needs to be keep him away from Philly. That's what they need to be doing. This is exactly the kind of player him and Mike Green from Marshall. They're exactly the same kind of players that got some little issues and whatnot people talking about here and there off-field stuff and injuries and that kind of stuff and Philly will take them and there'll be studs out there and they'll be balling out of their minds and Philly will be another juggernaut, a behemoth again next year. So don't let that part happen. That's number one. I want to ask you about his ankle. Does it matter if he's playing on grass or on turf with an injury like this, or is it going to hurt when he plants regardless? Is that what we're talking about? Yeah, nobody seems to care about all that.

Speaker 1: 52:42

It's basically are you taking him number one or not? Like I said, everything I read if you looked at my tabs right now, there's like seven tabs just for him. Nobody cares, nobody cares about that part. You're either drafting him or you're not.

Speaker 2: 52:58

Go ahead, Shane.

Speaker 3: 53:00

Well, I mean, like Herb said, both he and I are in the not-draft-them mode. You know, I got a chance to watch him play a lot in the Big Ten. Is he good? Yes, there's no doubt about it, but I don't think he's as explosive, as strong, as many moves, as Michael Parsons. I think, green, if you're looking for an undersized guy from Marshall, just like you mentioned Yusuf, I think he shows you more pop and power.

Speaker 3: 53:26

I think Abdul-Kartar can be great, but I think having another injury on top of it doesn't make him a first pick. I think, just like Herb said, if I'm a team and I decide that Abdul-Kartar is the guy for me, I have him have surgery and I go. This is going to be great for you, buddy. This gives you an excuse not to be dynamic this first year because you had this surgery. It's going to take time to heal. So if he plays well, then you go. Imagine what he's going to be when he's 100% and they can go to that. And if he doesn't play well, then you say, hey, he's been injured. Like how can you expect him to play up?

Speaker 1: 54:04

to that level yeah.

Speaker 3: 54:08

I mean I don't think he's a number one pick Anywhere from four to ten. I jump up to make a move at him if I can get somebody to move with me. Like I think if the Patriots sit there, it's going to be if Rabel decides he wants a defensive guy or not, and if not, then you drop back in the draft and make some picks. But the big thing that this shows me is that and we've talked about this Cam Ward and Shador Sanders are not number one picks and they're not top three quarterbacks. If you're thinking that an injured defensive end who's undersized is the guy that you're going to make the first pick, yeah.

Speaker 1: 54:49

And you should listen to the talks out there. Man, one of the locked on NFL guys was like has more tools than Micah Park is what he said. So, like I said, the guys love him I mean all the analysts, all the guys they love him.

Speaker 3: 55:04

Go ahead, shane, my bad I watched a second or third string Ohio State offensive lineman absolutely dominate him. If you're talking about how much you can turn it on and what you can do, I mean Notre Dame wasn't afraid of him. Other teams, when they got the chance, were not afraid of him. Michigan ran the ball right at him. If you're going to be this big bad wolf, then you need to be ready when people come get you and I thought that for as much as he got talked about this year, I don't think he had anywhere near as great of a year as he should have.

Speaker 3: 55:46

I saw some times where he went more for the sack and could have made a great play if he had just made the right play, but he wanted to dance around people, he wanted to go to his speed and then he wanted to show I've got this move, I've got that move. You know we talk about Myles Garrett. The thing about Myles Garrett is he can beat you any way. You just have to make a decision on how you're going to protect yourself. I saw some okay offensive linemen in the Big Ten handle him for long enough.

Speaker 2: 56:11

Putting you on the spot real quick and then we'll move on to the Will Campbell conversation. You guys at number one both of you. You're not trading back. You're at number one sitting stand. You have to. You got to make a pick. Who are you guys taking at number one?

Speaker 1: 56:27

And who's number one? The Titans.

Speaker 2: 56:29

Yes, I can't trade back.

Speaker 1: 56:33

I take a shot, I take a quarter.

Speaker 2: 56:35

You don't trust Mr Mayonnaise, you don't trust me, mayonnaise, you don't trust him to give you another chance.

Speaker 1: 56:41

I trust him to be one of the most exciting players in the NFL every single game, but not necessarily for the right reasons. Hey, will he throw a touchdown to his player? Hey, will he be falling backwards and throw a pick six left-handed? You never know. I would absolutely buy a ticket to watch him play, but I have no idea what you're getting every year. So if you honestly said, hey, what are you? You have to pick, you cannot trade because trading back is is the most favorable to me in this situation, I probably take a quarterback or maybe Travis Hunter as my backup, but that's probably where I go where's quarterback man?

Speaker 1: 57:25

I don't, you didn't wait, hold on, I can't get into all these specifics look it was hard enough for me to say let me take a quarterback man, the rest of it I can't get it. I don't know, man, I don't I think, shane has said it a million times like I don't. I don't believe in either one of these two guys to be my number one overall pick. No, look, they could have fine careers, right, I'm not rooting against either one. I don't have any hatred for either one of these two guys. I just see enough holes to where I'm like number one overall.

Speaker 3: 57:57

This is just not it to me, I think if you can't trade back in your Tennessee, I think they take Cam Ward number one.

Speaker 1: 58:08

I can see that.

Speaker 3: 58:12

I think they say he's got a personality we're going to want. He's got arm strength. He's played in multiple different offenses. He should be able to pick our offense up. I think they're going to use that as a way to pick him as Herb, as you mentioned. Yusuf, if it's me in this draft, I'm moving back. I'm going to throw out there about how great those top three guys are. I'm going to talk about. Cam Moore did great in his interview.

Speaker 3: 58:40

Shadar Sanders knows everything about the NFL and I would be waiting for people to try to come up and make a move. If you're a quarterback hungry and you want something, I would be waiting for people to try to come up and make a move. If you're a quarterback hungry and you want something, I would make it look as enticing as possible and I think that this draft is one where, like Travis Hunter is going to get picked early and I don't think in another draft that he would have, because I don't think he's. He's not quarterback number one. There's other defensive backs that I think play in the position purely better than he does, and I think in the NFL he's not going to do the dual support package. So I think he gets a chance to move up, because those quarterbacks are not going to be as great as people are talking about and I think you can already see that spin zone coming right now at the combine, where those quarterbacks are trying everything they can to not show something that says why they shouldn't be the number one pick.

Speaker 1: 59:35

Right.

Speaker 2: 59:36

No, that's fair, that's fair. If it was me, I'd be telling them to trade back too. There's some guys that are between four and seven. Oh.

Speaker 1: 59:45

I would easily yeah.

Speaker 2: 59:47

I'll agree with what I say.

Speaker 1: 59:48

It's because you took that off of the table.

Speaker 3: 59:50

If I had one of these top picks and I could get any package.

Speaker 1: 59:54

oh, I'm trading back in this draft Easy. You wouldn't even have to offer me that much.

Speaker 2: 1:00:01

Two picks and a king-size Reese's.

Speaker 1: 1:00:03

I'm like, ooh, king-size Reese's. Okay, I would sit down and Okay.

Speaker 2: 1:00:07

I was sitting there at one, I wouldn't know what to do. I think I know what we would do if we were at one, but me I don't know what I would do. I love you to Will Johnson, but do I like him at one?

Speaker 1: 1:00:22

Probably not.

Speaker 2: 1:00:23

I love you to Mason Graham and I'd see him at one.

Speaker 1: 1:00:25

Yeah, no, I get Mr Mason Graham. I see him at one, I just not out of it.

Speaker 2: 1:00:29

Yeah, so I get that All right. So we were on another show Tuesday night. It was awesome and we were talking about the whole premise with that. I was the GM for the Giants and everybody on the panel was helping me to analyze basically my GMs or help me decide who to pick. And you agree with me that Will Campbell should have been our first pick, based on how the draft landed. I forgot, I think was I still at three yet we're doing trade back. I was still at three and we picked Will Campbell for obvious reasons.

Speaker 2: 1:01:04

The tackle situation with Andrew Thomas is good. He's come over for injury. I mean somebody at the tackle spot that andrew thomas is good, he's come over for injury. I mean somebody at the tackle spot that can kind of help out there. So we we got him. But one of my panel guys hit me up offline and said I understand why shane made that move. So I'm giving you a chance to defend your pick of will campbell uh, from lsu. Why do you think he was the right pick? You used Giants as an example. That's what it was His move from. Was it move from left to right or right to left? I forgot how he moved, but he made a transition on the tackle spot. He can play both, I think, but he moved from right to left or left to right. I'm moving left to right right now I can't tell which one it is. But go ahead, man, and defend your point, and we'll jump into it a little bit.

Speaker 3: 1:01:52

I think there are a couple of things on that podcast that Jesse brought up that I would question. First of all, I don't think the Giants are secure at any offensive line position. I mean, based on the grading that I gave gave them, I thought that was one of their weakest positions overall. Uh, so when I match them up, do I think other people can play that spot? Yes, but you look at where your draft capital is. If you're not going to take a quarterback in the top three and you don't have another player that sticks out for you, will campbell would be a guy I would take a shot at. Now.

Speaker 3: 1:02:26

The big thing that's going to come out this week is they're going to talk about arm length, because he has arms that are the length of a normal-sized human being, and for left tackle in the NFL, that's a deficient spot for you to be in. Here's a breakdown for Will Campbell, starter from day one at LSU, has given up five sacks in 2,533 snaps. When the top three defensive ends in the SEC were questioned, who is the worst tackle for you to have to play against, I'll mention Will Campbell. Will Campbell is the first player as an offensive lineman at lsu to be gifted the number seven, which is given to the best player from louisiana at louisiana state, the first offensive lineman ever. He's got great recovery, good speed. His problem is he doesn't have arm length and he over punches to try to get around that. My point to jesse is and jesse was talking about I don't like moving left tackles to right tackle because that's like going into the test that's most important for you and trying to take it in your second language, you become accustomed to doing everything on the left hand side as a left tackle.

Speaker 3: 1:03:49

If I look at campbell and the way the nfl is now, I draft him at number three and I play him at guard on the giants. I'd say I got a left tackle that can dominate, I got a left guard that can dominate. Let's secure one side of the offensive line and figure this out. I think you move him inside. I think he has the ability to be somebody like Zach Martin, who got moved from tackle at Notre Dame to play interior for the Dallas Cowboys and made more Pro Bowls than penalties called on him in his entire career.

Speaker 3: 1:04:23

There's nothing that I watched on Will Campbell that tells me that he can't be a day one starter in the NFL and if I'm a GM or I'm a scout, that's how I know how I pick a first 10 player. He needs to be a guy that is guaranteed to start on my team on day one and play. Will Campbell can do that. I can understand.

Speaker 3: 1:04:46

If Jesse wanted to go defense, I think the Giants have way more issues on that offensive line. Will Campbell can do that. I can understand. If Jesse wanted to go defense, I think the Giants have way more issues on that offensive line and if you're going to take a quarterback and you don't protect him, you're going to be in the same boat you've been in this entire time. So I'd rather get an offensive lineman, even if I have to move him and make that move. I trust Will Campbell. If the Giants don't take him, I would be extremely happy as a Patriots fan to take him at number four and he can play on the left-hand side and he can block for Drake May and I think the Patriots would love to rub that in the Giants' face.

Speaker 2: 1:05:21

Well, we got some. I'm going to get on that. We got some news coming up soon regarding Jess and I about some uh interesting thing coming up. So it won't be the first time that we're going to disagree. But no defense at three. It presents a challenge because, first off, you know, I love me some michigan. I won't let nobody talk bad about him in my, in my presence. I love him to make my michigan wolverines. But you got graham out here defensive tackle and then you got will johnson, who I think is the best quarterback in this draft.

Speaker 2: 1:05:49

In my opinion, neither one of those guys, if we picked either one of them at three, people would have us vilified If we picked either one of them guys at three. Just like you said, positional value, so on and so forth. So if you're not taking a quarterback, I mean honestly, what else could you do? The way that draft laid out, I didn't even have an option to take. Uh, well, I guess I could have took Will Johnson or Mason Graham, but the value didn't make sense to me at number three. And if we didn't take the quarterback, which we didn't do, what options do I have? I mean, I could try to take McMillan, but I think that's too high for him and he's dropping out for some other reasons. That may take him down to 12 or 13 mid-first round.

Speaker 2: 1:06:28

So the only option. That was a sure thing. I said you know what this guy's a day one starter. We can take him right now and he can work. It's Will Campbell. Who else just argument with defense? Who else on defense can I take here? I can't take McCarroll Williams at number three up nine spots from where he's probably going to be at nine or ten spots. Will Campbell was the, in my mind, a no-brainer. We had to do that. So in real life I think it's going to be a little bit different. I'm not. I mean I'm sure he'll be there at three, but is that what we're going to do? I don't. I mean, the GMs spend a lot of time with quarterbacks and watching them practice and whatnot. So I don't know. But go ahead, shane, what you got.

Speaker 3: 1:07:19

I mean the other thing is the GM and the head coach should already be gone. If you're going to have to make this pick, what is me going to say? Pick, do for you. You make a wrong decision, you're fired anyways. You make a great pick and you can stand behind like I made a great move. You go defense when your team has been this terrible on offense. What does that show your fan base? Here we go again. You're going to pick, you know, kayvon Thibodeau for nothing and play him on a defensive line, but don't put him maximizes position. You have Dexter Lawrence. You have some defensive pieces. If you're an offensive coordinator and you think that you can solve these problems without an offensive line, you're absolutely out of your mind.

Speaker 3: 1:08:05

And if you look at what happens in the NFC East, whose defense are you going to be better by picking a defensive player? Nobody. And if you don't get a better offensive line, philadelphia is going to kill you again, washington is going to kill you, dallas is going to kill you. So you better figure it out.

Speaker 2: 1:08:29

I can't speak for the Giants fan because I'm not bipolar. But I will say this, though, that you know we got a lot of areas to cover and one of the reasons why and I think I said this on this show with you guys I think you guys agree with me I'm not sure if you did or didn't I think you did but the only reason why I said that these guys have a chance to stay on for one more year, which is this year this is the one, this is the litmus test I guess you could say with dayball and shane is because they never got a chance to pick their quarterback. What they did with daniel jones was almost kind of like that, but not exactly what you would want in a new regime. You want to go into the draft and have somebody you can actually develop, especially when you're buying Dayball and supposedly being good at developing quarterbacks. In my mind, this is their shot to do that.

Speaker 2: 1:09:14

Where they get the quarterback in the draft, honestly, there's no consequence to me. They can take Kyle McCord, but whoever you get, this is your shot to develop them and make them an NFL quarterback and save your highs, because if you don't do that, I don't care who you get on offense or defense, we're still going to have the same quarterback questions we had this year and you're going to have the same backlash, maybe even a little bit more of a hotter seat, if you don't do that. So they have to get a quarterback here and they have to develop them.

Speaker 3: 1:09:46

Well, who was the head coach in the uh gm when they signed the extension? They were all exactly. So don't give me the. I didn't have a chance to pick my quarterback I didn't say, I'm talking about your draft no, no, no, but that's what I'm saying, but that's a mute point, though.

Speaker 3: 1:10:04

You, you, you, okay to have him sign on again to be your quarterback. That means that you decided he's going to be the piece that we did. If he's the head coach of the gm and you don't think he's the one, you don't re-sign him well, that's.

Speaker 2: 1:10:18

That's more. I think, more of a gm thing, I don't. His body language said to me that he didn't really care for this situation. He, his body language, looked like somebody who was just like the boss wanted this. I'm not making excuses for Dayball, I'm just saying that's how it looked. So I know a lot's going to be on Shane. I think he's the ringleader behind a lot of that stuff. The debauchery situation. It's all him. I don't think Dayball can take the blame for either one of those things.

Speaker 2: 1:10:44

But your point is valid. We're here now and we wasted time with Daniel Jones. 2022 was an anomaly, but here we are trying to figure stuff out and get a quarterback again. So I mean, at this point, I mean, what else can we do? But at least go ahead and try to get a quarterback that you can theoretically develop. Can you develop a quarterback? I guess we'll find out. But what else can we do? We can't go and try to get these guys with no position of value with a third pick. If we can't trade back, we should anyways, so we can get more picks. We got so many needs, so many depth issues, that we got Huh.

Speaker 3: 1:11:23

That's the problem. People draft quarterbacks and they think that you're going to become developed in the NFL. The NFL does a terrible job of developing people. They don't develop them.

Speaker 2: 1:11:42

I can't really argue that I haven't seen anything that says these guys can develop a quarterback, because I haven't seen it happen. I'm kind of just hoping here. Can you please do it now so we're not sitting here for another 10 years? Go ahead, herb.

Speaker 1: 1:11:57

Oh no, it's funny to listen to some of the stuff I say. Get a different reaction after a couple weeks, maybe after things calm down. That's all I'm going to say about the Giants part. That was very interesting to watch. I gave a lot of those ideas, and I was treated a little more harshly than my boy Shane. I appreciate him saying the exact same thing.

Speaker 2: 1:12:26

I'm sitting here going through draft. I'm seeing it going through draft. I appreciate you. This is great. The love affairs is awesome. Send you guys flowers now.

Speaker 1: 1:12:37

I will say this. I will say this when they're drafting at, they might not have a choice of quarterbacks, so you're going to run into the same excuse if this person fails. Oh, we just drafted who was there, because there was only two draftable guys and we got this one and he didn't work out.

Speaker 2: 1:12:56

So it's not our fault. We didn't train this guy.

Speaker 1: 1:13:01

Excuses are already built in to certain things.

Speaker 2: 1:13:05

Yeah, that can't work now, though it shouldn't, it shouldn't, it shouldn't. I said his name and it's not because it was just a throwaway name. I mean, honestly, I'm looking at everything in the mirror of Daniel Jones. I mean, I go on other shows. The hosts of these shows make me do this. It's not what I want. They had me going back to Daniel Jones. I'm like I had a news note about him. I can't even talk about this week because we ran out of time, so I'm going to do it next week, but they keep having me go back to Daniel Jones as the.

Speaker 2: 1:13:34

They don't use Eli, they don't use Phil Simms, they use Daniel Jones as the measuring stick for quarterbacks. I'm like I was against that thing from the beginning, from the start. I don't mean not pick him at six, don't pick him, period. I didn't see it. I get the whole Eli Cliff connection. I saw it. I get that, but I didn't see that in him and it bared out to be truth. And he didn't. He was off the park. So now here we are, trying to do the thing all over again.

Speaker 2: 1:14:12

So when I mentioned Kyle McCord, I was dead serious. I'm actually good with that If you're going to use Daniel Jones as a measuring stick and say you know what everybody we mentioned against Daniel Jones. I'll take Kyle McCord, as fast as you can blink your eye. I'll get two guys that are quality, first and second round, the best BPAs available, because we need anybody, so it doesn't really matter and then the third round I'll take him, or the fourth round, if he's around that long, I'll take Kyle McCord in a minute. I bet you he can throw the open receivers. I bet you he can do that. You mean like his footwork or some other things decision-making-wise. I bet you he can do that much. I didn't see that nearly at all in Daniel Jones. Jalen Hyde was somebody. I don't even know what his story is, but there was a time when Wanda Robinson was wide open. Malik Naver was wide open. Nothing, the ball would stay in his hand. He'd be crumpled to the ground like a little school child. I've seen things happen so many more times than I can count. So, lady Hayes, kyle McCord I'm not trying to say this guy is the second coming to Dan Marino.

Speaker 2: 1:15:14

All I'm saying is that, in comparison, you can't tell me he's not better than Daniel Jones. That right, there would have me with an offline conversation, because I know you don't think that. So all I'm saying is that anybody that's a halfway decent quarterback is good in this situation, based on where we are right now, I would take almost anybody that can actually play quarterback at an efficient level. You know what I'm saying. So this is just, honestly, man to be real, doing these mock drafts, I'm digging into this stuff more than I have in a long time. I like it, but I'm seeing things I haven't seen before. I'm hearing different perspectives. It's just a lot going on. So I'm just I don't know what the giant's supposed to do. I'm excited about this draft special.

Speaker 2: 1:15:58

I don't know what I'm going to say out here, how I'm going to feel when that pick comes down, if we trade back. I don't know what's going to happen. I'm just like, hey, get the best play you can, and woods, get a free agency, get a free agent quarterback or something I don't know. You're looking at stafford and we in the mix, so to speak, whatever that means. So I don't know what are the kind of closing thoughts of you guys. That this was a great commentary man. Great thoughts from you guys. What else you got on this man? Any encouragement for your board man you love me right, else you got on this man. Any encouragement for your board man, you love me right. What you got for me, man, any encouragement for me, man, anything to help me stay afloat out here, out here in these mean streets. Got something for me, man?

Speaker 1: 1:16:38

Shane got you Because he's on your books. I get on your bad side too often. I'm not trying to be quiet.

Speaker 2: 1:16:47

No, I don't play for the Giants. I ain't taking it that personal.

Speaker 3: 1:16:50

I'm just animated man.

Speaker 1: 1:16:52

I'm just telling you, Shane and I managed to say the exact same thing twice and the reactions were different. Hey man, I appreciate you guys, Shane this is why you got the top spot. Shane you the man. You just I sat here and watched it and I was like bro, I could have swore I said that a couple weeks ago.

Speaker 2: 1:17:15

I got my head bit off.

Speaker 1: 1:17:16

I was like man, this is crazy.

Speaker 2: 1:17:20

It's like getting my head off on the show bill in the air. I didn't bite nobody's head off.

Speaker 1: 1:17:26

You ain't been watching your own show you. I ain't bite nobody's head off.

Speaker 2: 1:17:31

I just asked for this. You ain't been watching your own show. Then you don't even watch your own show. I watch every single one of these episodes, but it's all good though.

Speaker 1: 1:17:38

It's all good, but if you ain't got any, then it's fine.

Speaker 2: 1:17:42

I'm going to keep on encouraging y'all, though, Even though I'm not going to get no encouragement today. I'm going to keep y'all, though Even though I'm not getting no encouragement today, I'm going to keep on encouraging y'all. I love y'all like that. I'm going to keep doing that for y'all. That's where we at, but this was good, man. We are done with the diversity series.

Speaker 2: 1:17:57

I'm not sure where we're going next, but we got a lot of time between now and the next NFL season. Oh my God, we got a lot of time to fill, so we are going to get real creative. Have some fun out here. I'm going to tell you right now I'm feeling an itch for some baseball man. We got to incorporate that into our combos. Man, I'm missing it. Man, I'm about to send Emma B a letter the other day. I can't watch those spring training games, Can't have me blocked out. I'm about to send him a strongly worded email. I was hot. Yeah, we're going to talk some Major League Baseball on this podcast. We have to. I let Herb handle the NBA stuff and we're just kind of just backing him up. That's fine, but the Major League stuff, we're going to have to jump on it. I think Shane and I can bring some good topics to the table, and I know Herb knows enough about it that he can roll. You're going to bring hockey. Just give me about a month's notice, all right.

Speaker 1: 1:18:51

That's how I feel about baseball. So if y'all tell me, hey, I'll look up the stuff for baseball. That's it. Ain't bad as hockey, right I mean I probably watch the same amount of both.

Speaker 2: 1:19:06

You should do great on Wednesday, so I don't know what you're talking about. I remember this. I don't remember that. Good stuff, man. Thank you guys. Everybody that's listening and vibing with our show. We have fun, like usual. Thanks so much for this and we hope you enjoy. Please like and subscribe Our YouTube channels and our social media accounts. Follow us back, man. We look to hear more from you guys, as diehard sports fans grab them from with this man. But see you again next thursday. We are out of here.