The Herd with Colin CowherdJason McIntyre fills in for Colin to make the case that the underdog Pacers have a real chance to pull off the upset against the heavily favored Thunder. He points out the media coverage surrounding Shedeur Sanders as he fights for reps in Browns OTAs and why people need to accept he will struggle to make the roster, let alone start games this season. Plus, NFL reporter Tom Pelissero joins the show to tell JMac what Shedeur's chances are to make the roster and what if the Colt are concerned about Anthony Richardson's latest shoulder injury.
Thanks for listening to the Best of the Herd podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weekday on Fox Sports Radio in noon to three Eastern nine am to noon Pacific. Find your local station for The Herd at Fox Sports Radio dot com, or stream us live every day on the iHeartRadio app by searching Fox Sports Radio or FSR.
This is the Best of the Herd with Colin Cowherd on Fox Sports Radio.
Oh, it's sending me a final Thursday. Everybody, Are you as excited as I am? Yeah? Everybody, I'm back. It's the Herd on Thursday. It's me Jason McIntyre in Colin Cowherd, although Colin will make an appearance here in the opening segment. Wall You're gonna love it.
You're gonna love it.
Enjoyed today by Alex Hurry. Alex, I know you're peeked. I mean last night apparently the Stanley cuff happened.
I don't know, Boilers taking it game one and ot wild nuts the kingslost tip. So I always kind of like ask myself, is it better if you lose to the team that ends up winning it all? Like then it's like, okay, that's okay, because they ended up winning the whole thing, so it's like they're the champions.
Yeah, so you kind of.
Feel you kind of feel that way, so like as a King's fan and used to cover the team for a while, it's like, it's okay.
It's the champs. Last time I got into the show, Young Sheldon, have you seen it? I never really knew about it, but I guess it's old and my kids started watching Young Sheldon. So listen, no NBA last night. I'm sorry, I'm not watching hockey. It's Benson Bound the Kids. Young Sheldon. Good show. I highly recommend, it's funny. We have a great show today. So Tom pellisawur NFL Network will come in in the final hour. You're gonna want to hear some of his stuff, especially on the Vikings, who I gassed up this week, and what's happening at Cleveland, which you'll get too shortly. Eddie House, you guys don't have a big Eddie House guy. Eddie House mysteriously ghosting me since the Celtics got bounced by the Knicks. We'll talk to him next hour, but I got to start the show obviously with the NBA Finals, Pacers, Thunder feel the excitement. Listen, folks. To say Okac is an overwhelming favorite is an understatement. They are minus seven hundred currently to win the series. It was minus eight. Some money came in on the Pacers, but essentially that means you want to win one hundred dollars, You got a bet seven hundred dollars on Okac. It's dumb. They are massive favorites. Game one I saw the line was ten, are you kidding me? Now? Don't just run to bet the Pacers in game one of the series. I will make a case for Indiana. But it kind of sort of feels like a coronation has already begun. I mean, everybody online and anywhere you go, radio, TV, on the internet, everybody's picking Okaye. I haven't seen anyone take the Pacers yet. And why would you? I mean, Okayse won sixty eight games. And frankly, did you hear Tyrese Haliburton yesterday at Media Day talking about Okasee. Take a listener, Tyrese Haliburton of the Pacers.
They're historically great on both sides of the ball. They have the MVP. I mean, there's so many different things that you could name down the list of why they are so great at what they do and why they're such a great team. You want to go through the best team. You want to go through the best challenge. So this is the best challenge, and this is the best team in the NBA, has been the best team in the NBA all year, and they're well coached, They just they just do everything so well. So there's no shortcuts to beating this team. And we know the odds are stacked against us, but you know, it is what it is.
Geez, the way you hear that, I mean, it's like they could take down the ninety seven Bulls. They might sweep the KD. Curry Warriors at this rate. Everybody loves Okacy. By the way, did you hear OKC twenty nine and one against the East this year? Hello, They're gonna be a blood bath, right, you know it? This is right where the Pacers want to be. Nobody really gave them a chance against Cleveland except this guy. I was one of the few out there who picked the Pacers to take take down the Cavs. Now, I didn't pick them to beat the Knicks. Few did. They were underdogs, and what did they do? They just went in Cleveland? First two games, give me those. Then they go on to New York, first two games, I'll take those, and they won the series. And folks, let's just put things in perspective. Have you seen the fallout when you lose to the Indiana Pacers in these playoffs? So the Pacers beat the Bucks in the first round. Obviously Dame went down, obviously not great. And Milwaukee Bucks. All we've heard from them since then is so where do we trade Giannis? Where do we start over? Where do we hit the detonation on this team? Pacers wiped him out. Then the Pacers beat Cleveland and there was basically a fan mutiny in Cleveland. Cleveland was the number one seed in the East almost all season. They run away with the conference. Everybody thinks, oh, we can make the finals. And now it's like, oh, Mike, we lost to the Pacers. We got embarrassed by them.
Do we blow it up? Do we fire the coach?
What do we do? Trade Donovan Mitchell? The Pacers are in disarray and my knicks. Of course, after losing to the Pacers within three days, Tom Thibodeau has fired. Wait to hear some of the whor it's coming out about Jalen Brunson's dad. We'll get to those later in the show, Like oh my gosh, Carl Anthony Towns escapegoat the Pacers do this to you. They shocked the world by shooting forty from three in the playoffs. Nobody's sniffing that. And they were just a good three point shooting team this season. I think they were like ninth or tenth in the league. Now by a mile they' one. And I know the regular season matchups didn't go their way, but I could counter nobody tries in the regular season except okay see. Remember the Knicks got broomed by the Celtics and then turned the tables in the playoffs. So like, let's not read too much into okay see destroying Indiana in the regular season. I'm of the belief that the Pacers everything okay see does well, Indiana can match up. Okay see, you got depth, so do we? Did you notice in the Cleveland series the Pacers had a different leading scorer in every game. I'm telling you they run eight or nine deep. I like how they can throw multiple bodies. Nie Smith nemhard coming off the bench. Ben Sheppard, the mustache dude who doesn't look like much of a player. And then it's like, oh shucks, he just put the muzzle on Jalen Brunson for four minutes.
Like.
The Pacers got guys, They push tempo, they can hang with threes, they got depth, they got a great coach too. Oh, by the way, is the guy who threw a zone at Lebron and the Heatles in the finals, who threw JJ bray at Lebron? Rick Carlos's got some stuff cooked up. I'm here to tell you give me the Pacers in six. I know that's not going to be popular and okay, see, but they already hate me there, so who cares? All right, let's move to Cleveland, which is basically ground zero for NFL OTAs, and the Shadeur Sanders drama continues. Folks, I listen, you never want to overreact to Can we call it imaginary football in June? I mean, they're not playing with like real effort. It's just basic stuff. And the division that we're seeing is so it's the gulf of what you see people saying about shaduor Sanders. You would think he's ready to start week one. I mean, you see former NFL quarterbacks on social media breaking down every pass. Oh my gosh, look at the movement in the pocket. Look at that canon. This is why Shadure is the man. You see, our very own Colin Coward, who oh, by the way, is not even on this continent and is checking in on Shadure Sanders OTAs. This is what Colin Coward put on social media yesterday. No reason to overwork a future Hall of Famer in OTAs. Let's get him some rest for week one. Obviously he's saying that in jest. But the whole overwork thing is because despite all the hype for Shaduur, he's the only quarterback on the Browns who wasn't playing with the ones. Kevin Stefanski said, you go over there and work with the backups and the guys who are, you know, off off season FedEx drivers, you know, who are trying to make an NFL roster at your speech, you do. And the more that Kevin Stefanski does this, I think it empowers all the Shadour guys who are putting on their capes say why is an ee store, Why is Kenny Pickett getting reps over Shador? Well, here's Kevin Stefanski earlier this week on Shador and the other rookie, Dylan Gabriel.
Those guys are doing great.
They are both wired to get in early, get stay late, put in whatever work is required. There's sponges in the meeting room, which I think is really fun for me in my vantage point. I get to sit there and watch the two young guys. Look over and there's Joe forty years old, one super Bowl. There's Kenny Pickett just going into year four, but first round draft pick that's been on a couple of teams, won a super Bowl last year. There's Deshaun had a ton of success in his career. They can kind of feed off of all those guys. So that's the thing I'm really it's fun for me to watch them get better sometimes just by listening.
Did you see I mean he's framing Kenny Pickett as a super Bowl winner who is a former first round pick. Talk to any NFL fan and the first word that comes up with Kenny Pickett, oh bum, he's nothing. Well, come on, give me a break. And Kevin Sefanski says, he won a super Bowl and was a first round pick. You guys need to do some more homework before your crown Shador Sanders. And in the morning meeting today, you know, I'm going all in on Chadron. I'm like, listen, he's not getting first team reps. We need to pump the brakes. And somebody smart said, you know, Shadure is like the latest iPhone that comes out, Right, the new iPhone comes out, it's gonna be amazing, it might even be legendary. And then you get the iPhone and it's like, oh, this is cool. It's nothing special. It's not that dramatically different. It's not going to change my life. And I wonder if that's where Shadure is kind of trending. I mean, I mean, the guy's got be Legendary is his motto. He's throwing really lavish NFL draft parties, and he's fourth on the depth chart decidedly. And you know the other argument is, well, Jay, they're treating him like a fifth round quarterback. And I'm like, yeah, that's what they're doing. He wasn't a first round pick. I would have taken in the first but I didn't know all the don nonsense. Well, Jay, you know, Dak Prescott was a third round pick and he got the start. I'm sorry, Dak Prescott, fourth round pick. This is where it gets real good. So I started looking into Dak. How did Dak start as a rookie? Dak was drafted in the fourth round in Dallas. He started out fourth on the depth chart. These are all the things that needed to happen for Dak Prescott to get started and for him to become now the richest quarterback in NFL history. Kellen Moore, who was the backup to Tony Romeoll Kellen Moore broke his leg in training camp, so instantly it's like, oh, who's going to be the backup? So Dak was then battling someone named Jamille Showers, not familiar with his work. He was the second year guy, and Dak outplayed him in a preseason game. That's it, out played him in one, and all of a sudden, Dak went from fourth to the backup. It's like, wow, what a rise. Well, you know what happened after that. Tony Romo broke his back literally in preseason week three, and presto fourth round. Dak Prescott, who six weeks prior was fourth string. Next thing you know, he's starting for the Cowboys and he got his chance, and he made the most of it. That's gonna be the kind of chain of events that's gonna take Shador Sanders from fourth string. I'm not gonna count to Sean Watson because nobody thinks he's really gonna play. The owner has kind of written him off. But that's what it's gonna take for Chadur to overtake Dylan Gabriel and Kenny Pickett or Joe Flacco. I mean, I think we all agree Flacco's a pro. Stefanski loves him. Flacco led them to the playoffs a couple of years ago. He's safe. Maybe you flip Picket to another team and you can scrounge up a third or fourth round draft pick. Who knows likely, but maybe. And then there's Dylan Gabriel, who Stefanski loves. And oh, by the way, oh see Tommy Reese notre Dame legend, not a legend, but I'm throwing around legendary because that's what Shador likes. Anyways, here's Tommy Reese on Dylan Gabriel, Shador Sanders, and the hullab Loop.
You can see them all when in the job, I think, right. And so in terms of the competition. We're so early in the process. We're so early in evaluating that. Yeah, I think, you know, we have a good group of guys that a continue to push one another and by the time September rolls around, will be ready to go.
Oh boy, oh boy. Not a lot of love for mister Shadoor Sanders. So my guess here, and I haven't seen this line hung anywhere in Vegas? How many starts for Shador standers? Like, again, it's way too early to hang a line like that. But I've been lower than the market, lower than the everyone else out there. I'm on like a one and a half. I think it's over under one and a half for Shador Now that's in June. Could that easily change should there be an injury, a trade? YadA, YadA, YadA. Is there a world where all of a sudden, shad maybe starts five games? You know, I don't see it, guys. I'm just gonna remind you. Drake May was a first round pick last year for the Patriots. He didn't sniff a start in September. Now, obviously the coach knew had no clue what he was doing. They run him out of town and Drake Bay's really really good. I don't quite think that's the case with Stefanski and Shadur. Now it's June. I'm not trying to overreact, but man, you gotta love the quarterback drama in Cleveland.
Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays in newone Easter not a em Pacific.
Before we get to my list of the top ten players in the NBA Finals Real Quick, Lebron was on his podcast Mind the Game. You guys need to listen to what he said about Tybee Haliburton.
You look at what's going on with the Pacers throughout the regular season and now throughout the postseason.
You get it.
You get why they are the team they are, and it starts with the head of the snake. Know that, And that's what Halle I mean. You know, you you can gravitate and and bring energy and love and would and would run through a wall for certain guys. And he's a guy that you would do that for just because just because of how how he plays the game. Halle is one of the ones you know, and you know the success is not happening just because it just came out to Blue. It is happening because of Halle and that team.
Listen, I really wanted to put Haliburton one on my list of players in the final. I just can't make the case for him over SGA. But I will say this, I'm ninety nine point nine certain the only USA basketball player who was on the Olympic team last summer who's in the NBA Finals is Tyrese Haliburt. I mean, Chet Holmgren might have been able to make that teams like a bench war, but Tyrese Haliburton and he couldn't even get in the game. Remember it was like Jason Tatum's getting benched. Halliburton could not get on the court. All right, here we go my top ten players in the NBA Finals, counting backwards ten to one. Are we ready?
Yeah?
We got number ten. I'm i go.
Ben Matherick. He's essentially the get a bucket guy off the bench, young kid out Arizona can score but bunches. He had twenty against the Knicks. Really a valuable bench player. Now the problem is he's not a prolific three point shooter. So my guess is the thunder sag off and say, Ben, make your threes. He's great at getting to the tim super athletic Ben Matherick. Number ten, number nine, Alex Caruso, how about it, Former Laker and former Bowl but we never talk about his bull run because he didn't do anything but on a good team. Oh man, Alex Caruso is awesome. Some of these defensive numbers. He has his second best defensive rating of anybody in the playoffs. He's locked down. He guarded Jokic against ed remember that in Game seven. That was like the trump card that they had to play, and they played it and Caruso was excellent. Al Trusso number nine, number eight aaron Ne Smith. I can guarantee you you would not know him if he rang your doorbell and delivered to you a pizza. Not a lot of people do. He was on the Celtics and they kind of cut him loose. I'm sure they regret it. He single handedly brought back the Pacers in Game one against the Knicks, hit eight of nine threes.
Aaron NEI Smith Number eight, number seven.
Cason Wallace might be the guy with the most upside of anybody not named SGA in the finals. I'm telling you, Keason Wallace is awesome. He's an excellent defender. And oh, by the way, he has the best defensive rating of anybody in the playoffs. Brusho's number two ranks third and steals per game. I mean, Kason Wallace is a name to watch. I can see him being the third best player on a championship team in like two years.
Number six, this was tough.
I want Miles Turner. I like him a lot before the playoffs. Laker fans will remember I was on here. Laker's got to go get Bobs Turner. Luca Lebron call Miles Turner, ask him to take less. That's not happening, guys. Turner didn't have a great series against the Knicks, but I'm looking to bet his three pointers over in game one or two because he can get open from the corner and O case he concedes those Boss Turner, great rim protector and three point shooter.
Number five, let's.
Go with Chet Holmgren at five. I really think he's their second best player, but Jay Dubb just had a really good season, so I went Chet here at five. He's still super young. Three games with twenty or more points against the Wolf, so he's starting to come into his own second in blocks in the playoffs. Chet Holmgren is what he thought he was gonna He thought he was gonna be coming out again. Zaga a major upside for Chet.
Number four.
I want Jleb Williams. I know I have not given him his respect or flowers or whatever you guys want to call it much of the season. I don't know if he can be the second best player on a championship team, but he has been this year and their thunder are eleven and one. When he scores seventeen or more in the playoffs, I almost wonder how the Pacers are going to defend him. Do you put Siakam on him? I don't know, but somebody's got a slow J. Dubb because if he goes off usually okay, see wins.
Number three.
Pascal Siakam. I know he was the Eastern Conference MVP, and we had a bit of a debate this morning in the meeting. I think Siakam's a lock at three. But man, he went over thirty three times against the Knicks, and maybe some of that had to do with Karl Anthony Towns guarding him. I mean, I could give Kat ten at least, but Siakam just torched him and he was just up and down the court. He won a title with the Raptors. I went siakam at three, but he's got a case for two.
Number two.
What the halle Tyrese Haliburton, this is my guy. I kind of fell in love with his game last year during the the in season tournaments. Guys, an excellent basketball player does everything well. He is, you know, kind of struggling from three. But when it's clutch time, who else do you want besides Haliburt? Like he has nailed every big time shot. Go look at the end of the cap series. Phenomenal takes down the Knicks in Game one with the buzzer beater. Sterry's Halibert and second best player in the.
Finals Number one SGA.
MVP right minus six hundred to be the finals. MVP, don't love the mid range. He stopped calling him MJ mid range. Stop calling him Kobe just because he makes red range shots. Okay, he's a really, really good basketball player and he's gonna be an NBA champion probably in about eight days. SGA number one.
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Hey, Steve Covino, and I'm Rich David and together we're Covino and Rich on Fox Sports Radio. You could catch us weekdays from five to seven pm Eastern two to four Pacific on Fox Sports radi and of course the iHeartRadio app.
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Yeah, we love quarterback drama in these waters. All right, let's bring on Tom pelasorro NFL Network try to make some sense of Shdure again, Tom and Tom with some of the greatest hair on television. You don't want to overreact to ots, it's June. But when Shador doesn't get first team reps all of a sudden, WHOA wait a minute, they don't like him? What are we supposed to make of it? You cover the league, you know, everything.
Start with this. Jason He's a fifth round pick. The Chador Sanders, Ba's a fifth round pick. And if you went around the league for the I mean, let's just you know, equate to the twenty three years that I've been covering the league, you'd be hard pressed to find a lot of occasions where a fifth round pick as a rookie was getting first team reps. There have been guys drafted in that similar area who eventually have gotten opportunity. Sam Howell toward the end of his rookie year was one, and it's a pretty decent, you know, case study comparison to a Shadoor Sanders, a guy who was rumored, as you know, first second round pick, went up, slide down, to the fifth. He end up getting his opportunity in a year two, but in year one he was a backup.
You know.
Then throwing the fact that you've got Dylan Gabriel there, who clearly the Browns had rated higher on their board than Shador Sanders, plus the guy they traded for in Kenny Pickett, plus the guy they'd gone to the playof Us with in Joe Flacco. And that's without even mentioning to Sean Watson, who in all likelihood is not going to be available to them in twenty twenty five, but he's continuing to rehab here. It just makes logical sense now. Having said that, a lot of times, when you're going through the spring and the way the teams structure their offseason programs, you're installing everything right, You're process of OTAs and mini camp. It's a lot of install and there's some reviewers. You get into mini camp week, then he come all the way back to training camp and you do it again. So they're exposing him to a lot of different types of things. Here, they're exposing all the quarterbacks to different things. They're seeing how they react. I've said this consistently, Jason. I think that's the important thing to remember. Let's see how the reps are divided those first two to three weeks of training camp and then up to and the week beyond the first preseason game. That's going to give you a much clearer picture of exactly where things stand. Is it going to be the chalk starter? Which you have to say, is Joe Flacco again based upon the experience that he's got in that system and they know what they're going to get. Do you potentially see somebody else starting to slip in and getting those first team reps? Have you seen it in training camp? That's going to be the clear indicator. But you know the fact that Ota Shador Sanders is not atop the depth chart. That shouldn't shock anybody because regardless of what his name is, he's a fifth or und pick and those guys just don't get spring opportunities to show that they can run the ones.
A great point. Thank you for providing the clarity. There's a lot of schedure slash Dion fans out there who just don't want to hear that. Now there is a world where Pickett I don't I don't see Flako, but maybe Pickett gets flipped to another team that needs a quarterback. And we just got word this morning that Shane Steichen revealed that Anthony Richardson has a shoulder issue. Now they're not really talking to in depth. I'm sure maybe you've heard more, Tom, but Anthony Richardson will not be doing any activity here for a minute. And uh, that doesn't sound great given his injury history last year with the Colts.
So my understanding, Jason is that this is not, you know, a huge blinking red light type of awarding here on Anthony Richardson. He had the ac joint injury last year. He's been dealing with the shoulder through the offseason. Neil A. Latrash, the famed surgeon. Basically, the advice was he went in doubt rested here. The Colts doctors have been on board with the plan all along. Everybody's communicating here. I was told this morning one thousand percent Anthony Richardson's going to be ready to roll when we come to training camp. But certainly it's cast in a different light when you suddenly have a legitimate player to try to beat him out. This isn't Gardner, Minshew, this isn't Joe Flacco. This is Daniel Jones, who was a first round draft pick and his one games in the league has won a playoff game in his time with the Giants, and somebody that the coaching staff in Indianapolis really liked when they were looking for who's going to be the right player, the right veteran to challenge Anthony Richardson. Now, all those first team reps you will presume go to Daniel Jones in mini caamp and again anytime we're talking about these battles, they're going to be sorted out in training camp. But the bottom line is, when you're watching one guy get all the reps, if you feel good about it the way that your brain is thinking for the next six weeks leading up to training camp, Daniel Jones has an opportunity to influence that here over the next week.
Now, I do recall stich In had a ton of success. I believe Jalen Hurts and Philly and everybody thought, oh, running quarterback, it's going to work. With Richardson, it really hasn't so far. Is that cause for concern? Coupled with the injuries.
Well, Anthony Richardson, I wouldn't even consider Jason a running quarterback so much as he was a big raw athlete, you just don't get six foot five, two hundred and fifty pound guys who have absolute candidates for arms. We started thirteen games in college. It was a massive projection. They're sitting there with the number four overall pick. They weren't going to be able in that draft to get Bryce Young or get c J. Stroud. Who's really you take Anthony Richardson or do you take Will Levis. They had pressure on them because they've been going the veteran route through you know, the Carson Wentzes and Philip Rivers and Matt Ryans of the world. Chris Baller needed to draft the quarterback here, and you understood it from an upside perspective with Anthony Richardson, But you know, as much as the ceiling was high, the floor was low, and we really still don't have an idea of exactly what direction he's going to go because he flat out hasn't been on the field. When you're a guy who just needs reps above all else, spending a lot of time in the training room is going to hinder that development because you're just not getting those types of opportunities here. So yes, that was certainly part of the consideration was the success with an athletic type quarterback. Will Levis is a really good athlete too. Nobody's built like Jalen Purds, but you thought there'd be some similar elements you might be able to unleash here. The bottom line is Anthony Richardson has missed so much time in his young career for a guy who also missed time and didn't play a whole lot in college, he's just he's a complete enigma at this point. You know, I don't put the bus label on him.
We just don't know what he is.
And until he's actually able to stay on the field and show some of that progression, that's where he's.
Going to stay.
Trug with Tom Pellisero NFL Network. All right, Tom, let me ask you CJ. Stroud. Also, we got word this week he's dealing with shoulder soreness. Can you for foot for football people, can you put that in lingos to what that means?
In June, well, we had.
I think report Sayan's a peck, we had report Sayants' shoulder. We got Jamiko Ryan's going full NHL and saying general body soreness. It doesn't sound like it's a big deal. Again, we're in June, you're not playing games in June. You got three months until this thing kicks off, and so if there's any types of an issue, you're going to hold back on a guy who's as important to your team as CJ. Stroud when it comes to the spring. But we also know shoulder injuries have a habit of lingering, which is also why you back off. Whether it's Richardson, whether it's Stroud, whether it's anybody else, you back off those things in the spring just because, yeah, those reps are important, but they're not nearly as important as being available in the fall. I would say, you know, let's keep an eye on it as we get to start a training camp. If CJ. Stroud is, you know, ramped up to a full go within the first week of camp, I wouldn't say there's a big concern. If we get several weeks in the camp and they're still holding back on his throwing regimen, it might be a little bit more to it.
All, Right, let's go to a team, you know, well, Minnesota Vikings that wanted an impassion rant about how I believe in JJ McCarthy. Hey, Jim Harball believed in him, Kevin O'Connell believes in him, and starting to get some pushbacks from some people offline. What are you hearing about McCarthy's situation in Minnesota, his recovery from the surgeries. I mean, he hasn't thrown an NFL pass yet. How are things going for him?
Well, first off, Jason, he's he's put the weight back on. We all saw him on the sideline last year when he's we weighing like a buck seventy or something. He's put the weight back on. He's upwards to two hundred pounds. He looks a lot better physically at this point. And everything I've been told is that he's, you know, essentially full go in terms of doing football activities through the spring. Here now there's no contact in the spring, we'll see, you know, how cautious if it all the vikings are when we get into training camp. But in terms of how JJ McCarthy has embraced everything from learning the offense to you know, I was at the Warriors Wolves game five in front and center at center course, Justin Jefferson sitting next to JJ McCarthy, and I said to Justin you know, Hey, like you know, it's interesting in your next to him. He's like, hey, I feel like I want to bring him out in the world. The fact that Justin is kind of rallying around him, he's at the OTA's developing chemistry with his new quarterback. I would not overlook that in terms of the belief that teammates have in him. Certainly the front office has a high degree of belief in JJ McCarthy. That's why they traded up one spot to go get him in the draft a year ago. There's a huge unknown when you're talking about a guy who not only didn't play as a rookie, didn't have any reps Jason. I mean he tore them Inniscus in the first preseason again missed the entire year. There's a lot he had to go through. There was a second procedure that he had to have in December. But everything from a physical perspective is tracking now. It's just in an offense where we've seen different quarterbacks Kirk Cousin, Sam Darnold play at least statistically the best football of their lives. Let's see if JJ McCarthy could elevate his game once those live bullets start flying, all right.
Going off the board here, Tom NFC North is loaded kindly ranked the quarterbacks heading into this season in the NFC North. It's very tough. I think I've done this with three people and all of them gave different answers.
Well, I think that the guy you have to look at is Jordan Love first and foremost in terms of a young player who is on the ascent. He dealt with injuries last year. I mean that injury that he had in the opener in Brazil was no joke.
You know.
It took him a few weeks to get back, battled through it probably wasn't one hundred percent, then got banged up again later in the season here. But the Jordan Love that we've seen at his best, the Jordan Love we saw down the stretch in twenty twenty three, that last throw against the forty nine ers. Notwithstanding, that's a really, really good quarterback. Jared Goff is obviously one at a really high level. Guy's been to the Super Bowl, He's played really good football for the Lions. You know, I mean, I'm not giving you a hot take here, Jason, but you say, one game with one of those two guys, I'd say, well, the guy who's done it before is Jared Goff, but the guy you probably trust more in the skill set is Jordan Love. So those guys are probably one A, one B, however you want to rank them. JJ McCarthy is a total unknown. Like I said, he has not taken a regular season snap. He's only taken the preseason snaps in one game. Let's see where we are with him when we get into the season. And then Caleb Williams I would still put in the unknown bucket because Nancy suck. Caleb Williams play pretty good football last year. And if you look at really ramping up to that game against the Commanders that everybody remembers for Tyreek Stevenson taunting the fans and they hit the Hail Mary. If that game goes the other way, Jason, it's the Bears that are in first place in the NFC North. The Commanders take a huge loss on their home field. Where's the rest of that season go with? The Bears didn't win another game, Matt Everfluss got fired before they won another game, and we pay team against the Packers. But Kaleb was on the ascent. You saw it like weeks three, four, five, you saw him play better and better football. I am fascinated to see what Ben Johnson is going to be able to do with him. I'm fascinating to see what without Ben Johnson the Lions are gonna do with Jared Goff. I would just say for me, in terms of the trajectory, the upside, knowing how Matt lafleuor coaches him, it's hard to bet against Jordan Love is the top quarterback within the division. But we got multiple guys that we just haven't seen do it, at least for any extended period yet that those rankings could be all over the place by.
Stem all Right, Tom Pellisero, NFL Network, Great stuff, Enjoy the offseason. I'll talk to you soon, Tom,
