Conor Orr and Albert Breer break down the new contract extensions given to Tua Tagovailoa and Jordan Love, the growing number of $50 million quarterbacks, what these teams will do going forward with their salary caps, and what teams may try to take the same route with their rookie QB's that the Packers did with Love
Head and Welcome to the MMGBNFL podcast. Albert Brear is here from Seattle and we are just a motley crew this morning. Albert is bathed in sweat from his morning run along the Pacific Ocean, and I am wearing a two thy seventeen Orlando NFL Pro Bowl hat. Albert brought up an interesting point in our pre show meeting that I may be the only person in the world wearing this hat today, and I think that's probably potentially true.
I can't imagine a circumstance where someone else we're in that. I'm trying to wrack my brain and it would take like a very enthusiastic PR staffer at three forty five Park to have that hat on.
You know what it's I watched a video of the of the Rob Low explaining his NFL hat thing.
And explaining it. I didn't even know that.
Yeah, the NFL sent him hats. They wanted him in a hat, so part of that I think was was pre baked. You know, it was premeditated, But this was I used to work for the NFL.
That makes it so much worse, doesn't it.
With the NFL, like people are gonna love this hat. With the shield.
I mean, look out, NFL shop dot com may crash.
The only thing.
So I.
Used to work for the NFL. You did too, and you know they sent us. I got like a nice hat for I think the NFL's I want to say, it was like NFL on the fifty or Super Bowl fifty season, whatever it was, and they sent us this nice hat. And I was like, well, you know, it's it's it's no different than like if someone works for Verizon, right and wears like a Verizon pullover, you know. And so like maybe once or twice, like I was walking the dog and I was wearing this hat and then I was like, it's it's a white version of the Rob Low hat. I just can't wear it anymore. But this hat super tight.
I I needed something to go out there.
Convertation started. Needed something, needed to something to go out and water the garden this morning. And uh plucked it right off the bottom of the pile, because sometimes I have over two hundred hats, right, So you have to you have to like churn the collection a little bit, and uh, you have to you have to get you know, what's at the bottom to the top.
So it sounds like you're a pack rat like me, which, like my wife is maniacal about throwing stuff out. She does not like clutter. She does not like me collecting stuff. She does not like their being old stuff that I won't throw away hanging around the house. So it appears you don't have that problem.
I don't have that problem. I'm just looking up now what happened in the twenty seventeen Pro Bowl. The AFC defeated the NFC twenty to thirteen. Andy Reid over Jason Garrett. Now, yeah, I believe this was the year after because I covered the year before in Hawaii when Tyler I forgot hurt. Do you remember that? It was like a like a fairly serious injury that kept him out for like a long time.
Oh yeah, no, he got like his fuck got stuck stuck in. It was a foot injury, right.
It was a foot injury. Foot or an ankle injury or something like that.
Wow. And that was just that was like the dream trip for NFL network people. Oh over to Hawaii? Can I just make that trip?
Did you ever go?
I never got to make that trip?
Oh man, I was well, here's the here's the only drawback, right, And I'm not complaining about this, but all of the NFL and the higher ups and the player and their family are at Turtle Bay, right, And Turtle Bay is overlooking the ocean. It's this beautiful resort if you've never been there. And the practice fields are there too, and some of the bigger shot you know, guys get their own like miniature houses on the tournament property. The phill is right. The NFL digital content team was at a courtyard in a dry Mormon section of Hawaii about an hour away from Turtle Bay, like in the middle of it's like the one part of Hawaii that you like if you you know, if you tried, you couldn't find the beach. And so I remember it was like a forty minute walk to a liquor store to get some to get some kona and which was like eleven dollars a bottle back then, and uh yeah, we you know, there was like a food truck. I had some good pad tie. But other than that, that's about what I remember. I didn't go to the beach the whole time I was there.
It's like, here's some Marriott points there was.
It was good for Mariot points, but anyway, we're talking about this flood of QB deals that happened. Albert's also on his training camp trips. We're going to get to some of that in a little bit. Of course. One of the rare times where things get done post five o'clock on a weekend Friday, very weird NFL news time. I was, I was barbicuing, I was having a good time in the backyard, and then I had to come in and write to a tag of Ila and then I went back out kept barbecuing, had to come back in and write Jordan Love. But it's all good. And what's interesting to me about both of these, but specifically with Tua and I want to start there Albert, because this is a lot, this is a minefield. People get upset about this. But my take on the Tuois situation is this, in signing him to that contract, we may never figure out how good Mike McDaniel's offense can be. And Mike McDaniel's offense was so good that it earned to a tongue of ilo of the contract. I think it's like a little snake eating its own tail thing. What what are your thoughts on this?
Yeah, I mean you're right, like it's gonna be hard to separate one from the other. Now. Look, I mean my first thought is that I'm happy for the guy. I think, yeah, i think I'd be reallymiss if we didn't say that. You know, you could say that about any player, but especially this one. You know, like after everything that he went through, the hip coming out of Alabama where that looked like it you know, if things went a little bit of a different way, could have been a really really like one of the we don't see very many career threatening injuries anymore like that could have been a career threatening injury. And then obviously two years ago the rash of concussions that again, you know, being a career threatening situation. You got to be happy for the guy that he made it through all of that. So that's number one. Number two, Like I just I wonder where this goes next, you know, because I mean we're at such a point now where I think we have eight quarterbacks making over fifty million dollars a year. I mean, think about this. Drew Brees was the first player to break the twenty million dollar barrier and that was twelve years ago. So this is now escalated one hundred and fifty in twelve years. That's a huge markup. And yes, quarterbacks are more important, and yet the NFL is making more money. But these aren't outlier deals anymore, you know. So you have a quarter of the league's starting quarterbacks now making that amount of money, and Aaron Rodgers isn't in that group, and you know CJ. Stroud isn't in that group. It's just a really interesting dynamic. You know that we're looking at Kyler Murray isn't in that group, who got a big contract a few years ago. Josh Allen isn't in that group. I'm not counting Mahomes. He is in that group now because of the it's a little hard to value his contract, but it's the price of doing business. It's just going to be interesting to see how these contracts mature, you know, because I think both in this case and the case of the guy we're going to talk about next, these really are three year deals that the teams can bail from after that. So I think it's gonna be fascinating to see where we are with these deals after the twenty twenty sixth season.
That so it's it's a little bit more right, it's the Daniel Jones plus basically, I mean Daniel Jones was essentially a two year deal and we assume that worked out, right, And so what I wonder is, right, you mentioned this sort of group of guys and there is certainly, you know, Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes is going to get a new deal every couple of years commensurate with the market. You would assume that a lot of these guys are going to keep coming up, you know, and taking some bites at the apple. But we have this really interesting part of the league now where you basically have your your alien quarterbacks up here. You know, all the guys that you would want, Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow, justin Herbert, right, you know, your your surefire guys at the top of that axis, right.
Make it there, Yeah.
And then you have your your quarterbacks on just beginning the rookie deals, right, you know, guys like Stroud who are in a good spot and you don't really have to worry about it financially. Then you have just bad teams, right, like, you know, teams that are just like you know, like looking around and being like can we can we talk Josh McCown, at a retirement like we need someone, right. You know, you have those teams, and then you have these other teams who are you know, you have the Giants who hired a really good coach, got the best out of Daniel Jones, and then was forced to pay him based on possible upside. You have the Dolphins, same thing with with Mike McDaniel. And you have these you know, these situations now where you're sort of being punished to be a part of this quarterbacking middle class, right. You know it's you're not paying that much less than the top of the market in any of these circumstances, and you know you're not getting nearly as much either.
I had a really interesting conversation with a with a bunch of people about this. This would have been last offseason, the twenty three offseason, and I talked to guys with the Commanders about their approach, the Falcons about their approach, and the Bucks about their approach. And if you remember, like that off season, those teams sort of like basically tried to kick the can down the road to quarterback. The Falcons with Desmond rid Or, the management with Sam Howe and the Bakers, and the Bucks went and got Baker Mayfield and it worked out for one of the three, right. But I think conceptually the way those teams were thinking wasn't that off, which was I had so I one of them tell me, we think this is like max contracts in the NBA. And when there was a spike in the cap in the NBA, there was a point where it was something like twenty five or twenty six teams in the NBA had at least one guy on a max contract. Now, there weren't twenty six players in the NBA worth a max contract, right, And what teams that had players that were B level players but were paying them at an a level, we're getting it with the return they were getting wasn't very good. So eventually the in the NBA, it matured to the point where teams started to do that a little bit differently. And I can't speak to that quite as much, but it actually created a situation where teams just sort of tried to game it a little bit differently rather than just saying, Okay, well, he's our best player, we're giving him a max contract. That dynamic absolutely exists in the NFL, you know, And if you look at the Dolphins like to prepare for this. What did they do well? They let Christian Wilkins walk, They cut your own Baker, they cut Zavian Howard. They're going with a lot less on defense. Now now they haven't you know, they haven't really cut corners on offense. So they're still going to put two tongue of Belowa in a position to succeed. But where does that leave their defense? You know, this is a totally different dynamic than they've had over to his first two years playing under Mike McDaniel. So I just think from that standpoint, it's really interesting because you know, I do wonder are the Bucks the smart team here? Right? Are the like where they went and got a reclamation project and then they had to pay that reclamation project not much more than half of what two on Jordan love God? Right? Is that they go now the sea with you know Smith, because you're paying half and that at least buys you time, the same way Alex Smith bought the Chiefs time to go find Patrick Mahomes. You know what I mean? Is that smarter than like paying a guy that likes a too is a really good player, but is he capable of carrying a team you know, is he capable of beating some combination of Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Justin Herbert, CJ. Stroud in succession in the AFC playoffs. I don't know, what do you think?
Here's what an extra so Baker Mayfield. If we're going on average salary per year, right two, A toungue of ilo is at fifty three point one million. He is currently again in terms of average per year salary one too, he is the fourth highest paid quarterback in the NFL. He got the extra hundred k to leap frog Jared Goff. Okay, Baker Mayfield is the twenty first highest paid player in the NFL. He's making thirty three point three million dollars per year essentially on kind of a pay as you go deal. He's making less than Nick Bosa, Justin Jefferson, Aaron Rodgers, Derek Carr, Daniel Jones, Matt Stafford, all that stuff. Right, So it's it's a twenty million dollar difference. And I hate to phrase it this way, but this is how owners think. Okay, for an extra twenty million dollars, you're getting a five percent bump in completion percentage, six hundred more passing yards, which boils down to like one point two yards per completion, one more touchdown, and four more interceptions. So if you're an owner, and again this doesn't all boil down to glamour statistics. But there's probably someone in Steven Ross's office right now laying out those economics to him and saying, this is what you're getting for twenty million dollars, and it doesn't seem like a whole lot more than what they're getting for thirty three point three million dollars. Now, there's only so many of these reclamation projects, and one could even reason that to a tongue of Iloa himself is a reclamation project. But he just they replaced, They replaced the old regime fast enough, the Brian Flores regime that Mike McDaniel came in and saved him before the end of the rookie deal. You know, but there are so many players out there, Like let's see what Sam Darnold does with the Vikings this year. I bet it's pretty good. You know, stuff like that. You know, Geno Smith, you're in Seattle.
You know, the great example, Like I don't think g Know's like I think Geno is a good quarterback, you know what I mean, Like he's making what twenty five? You have it in front of you, right, I think he's making twenty five.
Gino was twenty five. Yes, yeah, I.
Mean he's making like less than half of what those eight players are making.
He makes less than Almon Ross, Saint Brown, Tyreek Hill, Josh Allen. They threw in now it's Josh Allen.
The Dolphins have two receivers who are making more than than Gino.
Wow. Yeah, he's making less than Miles Garrett's got to get a new deal again. By the way, I'm just scrolling through here, Miles Garrett, and it's so fun, Like, you know, all these guys are gonna have to come up again and they are going to get paid.
I use that's something that's another that's another sneaky storyline training camp is all these guys asking for contract adjustments and multiple years left on their deals.
They should I mean, Miles Garrett, Miles.
Garrett, Trent Williams, Matthew Stafford, you know, Max Crosby. There's a lot of these guys that are that are getting adjustments and that's that's what they should be doing good their value anyway, that's off track, but.
Make make it worth my while. One more off track observation. I use stat muse to compare Baker Mayfield's twenty twenty three season with two a tongue of I Lois and stat mus. I don't know if you've used that site very much, but they have illustrations of the players, and I'm just I'm just gonna text you the Baker Mayfield one because it looks wild.
Which network is that does the illustrations for games?
Fox? Because remember Fox started it in COVID.
Right, and like everyone was jacked the first year, is that right? Yes?
Everyone was extremely muscular. They looked like a little bit like.
Like Brady was. Brady was freaking yoked.
It looked like anime almost all right, I'm texting you the Baker Mayfield. He looks like I think the best way to describe this is he looks like, who's the guy who? Uh oh?
Nick?
It's like if Nick Cage was playing Baker Mayfield in a movie about Baker Mayfield.
Well manicured beard, Yeah.
The hair flipped over. I mean, it's undeniably handsome. I'm just saying, undeniably handsome. I worry that for all these other teams. It's like, why wouldn't you just like, what was the fear in letting to.
A for the market. Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I mean I guess the fear is what they could do your locker room, what they could do the psyche of the kid, you know. Again, like I I uh, I don't know, I mean like it just I think I brought up the the idea of Kirk Cousins right for them, which if you look at Kirk Cousins contract, and I'll pull it up right now, but if you look at Kirk Cousins contract, if they were to trade him after the year, right, So, like, let's say theoretically the Falcons trade Kirk Cousins after this season because Michael Pennix has come along and they want to take advantage of having him on a rookie contract, and like it's just the right thing to do for the team, right, So sixty two and a half million dollars of his contract would have already been paid, So they would be paying Kirk Cousins twenty seven and a half million dollars for twenty twenty five, and they'd have forty five million dollar options on him for the two years after that? Is that not a I mean, could you argue that's a better.
Option, yes, or infinitely better or.
At least an option, you know, for for for the Dolphins, and maybe you could renegotiate those last two years and guarantee some of the money, you know. Again, Like it's like, I think the problem in the past has always been and I think this is what's gotten quarterbacks paid. You remember like that game of leap Frog. What was it like maybe like seven years ago, when it was the next quarterback paid, was the highest paid quarterback, where Jimmy was the highest paid quarterback for a while, where Derek Carr was the highest paid quarterback for.
A while, Andrew Luck.
Yeah, Like so there was that game of leap Frog, and I remember what drove that was this fear of what was hind door number two? Right, It's okay, door number one when we pay him, and it's like, wow, we really don't want to pay him, but we really don't want to see what's behind door number two if we don't. I mean, I feel like there's enough quarterbacking depth in the league now and enough offensive ingenuity where it's like I don't know that what's behind door number two is that bad. Didn't the Buccaneers just show us that, right? You know, they draft Kyle Trask, they signed Baker Mayfield as a reclamation project. They get two bytes at that apple, and one of the two works out. They give the guy a relatively modest second contract in a way they go, you know like, I don't know. I just and even the Vikings, like, I give the Vikings credit for not having fear in that situation of what walking away from Kirk cousins with me, And now they've given themselves two bites of the apple. Right. They didn't overreach for JJ McCarthy. They probably took him in the right spot. They Sam signed Sam Donald a reclamation project, and you see what happens with the two of them. You know, So unless you're in this like desperate when now situation where you feel like like you have to do it in the moment, it's just, I mean, I don't know that what's behind door number two is way worse than just breaking the bank for a quarterback who might be the eighth or ninth or tenth quarterback best quarterback league.
You know, I agree, and I don't know.
There's no evidence of paying that quarterback works, right.
I mean think about it, you know, and it's hard, right. We can have selective memory here, but thinking about quarterbacks like Daniel Jones like to at tongue of Iloa, when has that worked? I mean, I don't know, do you have a historical comp on those guys? I mean, would Jimmy g be a good example? That would Derek Carr be a good example that you know? I don't know. I mean, the postseason numbers are pretty SIMI you know.
I would say with Jimmy, like I would say, so with Jimmy, you got like they built such a good team around him, you know what I mean? Like, so I think what it does is it narrows the path everywhere else. It was like it's like you have to draft really well and you have to coach really well and maybe then you can make it work. You know what I mean. I just can't, Like, I like, there just are not I mean, like there was that period where every Super Bowl champion quarterback was either Tom Brady, Peyton Manning or a quarterback in a rookie contract, you know what I mean. I don't know. You could argue the Giants did it with Eli the second time, Right because he was paid then.
Right, wouldn't you wouldn't you stand a reason? Like and I understand this is like a defeatist attitude, but it's almost like, Okay, if I don't have Patrick Mahomes, if I don't have Josh Allen, if I don't have Joe Burrow, if I don't have Justin Herbert, if I don't have Lamar, I guess I would put Jalen Hurts in that category, you know, on the fringe end of that category, in Matthew Stafford. If I don't have any of those guys capable of elevating the game to a point where it's going to change tipp in my favor because this guy is just white hot, why don't you just throw your hands up and be like, all right, I'm going to take that twenty million, I'm gonna save it, you know, and I'm going to spend it on the middle class of the roster and hope that when we get into the tournament we can bang around and knock some people off. Like wouldn't that hope be better than like, let me pay my guy like the best guy, and hopefully he acts like the best guy, you know what I mean?
Yeah, yeah, I mean it's just it's I think it creates it creates a really difficult again, Like I just think like it makes it. It kills your margin for error, and so now you have to get like everything right, you know what I mean, Like you have to you have to get three or four starters out of every draft class now, and you have to hit on a fifth round pick to like become Fred Warner, you know, to use that now g again with the Niners, Like you have to do those sorts of things then and maybe those things can happen. But that's a tough ask for a team to be kind of put in that position when they have to do it, Like, and how are the Dolphins gonna build up their defense now? You know, like or there's two I have to be Peyton Manning where you know, the Colts invested a little less than their defense. They still had Dwight Frainy, you know, and Robert Mathis, but like they they went like pretty economical in a lot of places on defense, and they had to outscore everybody. That was okay because they had Peyton Manning. Like ken, the Dolphins outscore everybody now, you know, if they're not playing much defense, I think it's a fair question to ask. Remember they got a first year defensive coordinator too. It's gonna be really interesting to watch that.
Tiger doesn't know ays changes stripes. I mean, Sports Illustrated could pay me commensurate with the highest paid sports reporters in the world. And I'm still gonna wear this Pro Bowl hat. You know I'm still gonna wear. I think I got a little toothpaste on my shirt today too, So.
I use it. I use it. I relate this line to a coach this week that that Troy Brown gave me when Troy and I did TV together, Troy the legendary old patriotse receiver, and I thought it was perfect. So saying makes all the sense in the world. Money only makes you more of what you already are, true though, right, like lazy and sloppy. If you think about it, like if you are if if if like you are really really great at something like, well, it's only going to make you feel more pressure to be greater at it, right, Yeah, if you are lazy, well it's only gonna it's only going to give you more reason to take your foot off the gas and now all the things that are in between. Tip.
We we also had the Jordan Love deal, Alvert, and my thought on the Jordan Love deal, I guess you could lump him into it in similarly, I mean, we don't have a huge sample size, and you're buying on him based on potential. But I think I think that I think they're different, and I think that the timing of this is interesting because we have the Jordan Love deal. This is now the second time that the Green Bay Packers have sat a guy for at least a couple of seasons. He's proven, he's been able to play, He's earned a second contract, and so I think that the timing of this is fortuitous for most of the teams that selected quarterbacks in this past draft, because outside of Okay, you know, Caleb Williams is gonna play. Caleb Williams has to play. You know, Jaden Daniels is gonna play. He has to play. The rest of these guys don't have to play. They don't have to play. The Patriots are not making the playoffs this year. They don't have a good roster. Drake May does not have to play. The Vikings have Sam Darnold and justin Jefferson. They're going to be fine offensively, They're going to be better off offensively without JJ McCarthy in the line, O'Connell and Kevin O'Connell. He does not have to play Bonnicks. I don't know. I mean, you're hearing a lot of good stuff about Bix coming out of camp already, and maybe Sean Payton wants to, you know, but he doesn't have to play either.
I'd say Box is the one where I would be okay playing him because he played, He started sixty games in college. He right, So in fact, like I would say, the guy who's like, the guy who is who's least likely to play, might be the one who's the most ready in Panix, you know, right, I think Panics. I think Panics can be ready to roll. But obviously he's not going to play because Kirk Cousins is there.
But all of so, I mean, the Falcons are obviously doing it. And what's interesting about the Falcon situation to me is when they decided to do it. Because so let's let's look let's take a look back at kind of the under the hood here. Terry font knows their general manager, right, He's gone seven to ten for three years. He's taken some big swings on draft picks that you know. I mean, these guys aren't. It's a fun collection of skillful players, but they are not crushing it by any stretch of the imagination. And I'm not saying that Terry's in trouble, But if you're a GM that is facing this sort of mountain of negative evidence, very rarely do you make a move that is probably going to benefit the guy who's taking the job after you're done with it, right, you know. And so if Terry is doing this, if he's adopting the packerway, nobody else has any excuse because we know it works. We know that it immeasurably gets these guys better. It makes them more able to play and handle the riggers of the game when they get out there. So my question to you is, like, why isn't this an alarm bell for everybody else to be like, dude, let's just do this. Like why is Drake may playing this year? If he's going to play, why is JJ McCarthy playing this year? He shouldn't play.
I would say a huge part of it's a function of job security in the NFL, and like you said, like not wanting to get with somebody else, somebody ready for somebody else.
Job security should be tied to your willingness to make these.
Movies, you know.
But because I know, I understand that, I know how it is.
I know, I know it's easy to sit here in July and say that, Yeah. It's another thing to when you know it's November and like there's a Sunday where it's pouring rain and there's twenty five thousand people in the stadium and there's some like like Journeyman playing quarterback for you, and the owner is basically like like what are we doing here? You know, Like like I think you know.
What I would say. I would say, hey, tighten of industry, you sit down, you shut your mouth, and you watch Taylor Heineke.
All right, I'd say, I'm not saying it's right, but I'm saying, like, I think that's what happens, you know, Like I and like how often I you know, the chart I keep, right, Like of course, like the chart I keep and I keep it because, like I the the the impetus for that was, like I got sick of listening to coaches say they were going to red shirt their quarterback, you know what I mean, like and lo and behold in week four he's out there. I mean, if you remember Kenny Pickett ran with the threes for the entire summer in Pittsburgh behind not Chess Mitch Trubisky, but also Mason Rudolph got no work with the ones, and all of a sudden he's out there in week four. And this is the Steelers. This is not like this isn't you know, I'm not gonna look, this isn't like the Commanders under under Dan Snyder or you know, like it's it's it's it's the Steelers that did this. So you know, I think you're right like that, more teams should do it this way. I think you're right, the more young quarterbacks should be afforded that time. I just think there are very few coaches that have the job security or franchises that have the stability to support that. And I had this conversation with Matt Lafleur last summer, and I asked him, like, do you still think you did the right thing? And sitting Jordan Luck and now this is before we knew what he was going to become. Right, we had no idea what he was going to become. And his answer to me was, I think every young quarterback should sit. And his reasoning was, usually you throw the guy out there and he's on a bad team, and he gets the crap knocked out of him, and then his confidence gets crushed. And at this level of football, with how fast things move, how good guys are, it's almost impossible to get a guy's confidence back after its loss. And I thought that was a really interesting point. He was more or less saying like he could have ruined Jordan Love by throwing him out there a couple of years ago, and they resisted the urge too, even you know, there were even points in games where they could have put him in early in his career and they did. You know, you got to applaud them for the discipline, and I think it would be the right thing to do for a lot of guys. Unfortunately, because of the circumstances day's NFL, too many teams, he is an unrealistic thing to do.
Do you think the Patriots can pull it off? Though Bob Craft's a good owner.
They could, They could. I mean, I think so they'll be interesting because they're going to be in this position that they've met that they haven't been in in forever and ever and ever and ever where they could be that team on November one that has nobody in the stands. It's a hard stadium to get to Connor, and the weather's bad, and the weather's bad.
One rode in, one rode out, and.
There weather's bad in New England and there are other teams that are that are good there, you know. So you get to November and it's like, I think the Crafts will be aware if they're not being talked about on the radio. I think the Crafts will be, you know, obviously keenly aware of what's happening in their stadium. And so can they resist the urge to say like no, I don't want to see Jill Kobe were said it anymore? Like like that's that doesn't move a needle for me. When the team's two and seven, you know, it'll be an interesting test. I do think I will say this. I do think the one to me, the guy who I think is going to have real discipline about is Kevin O'Connell. And maybe I'll back in my face on Halloween. You know, if JJ McCarthy's out there, it's throwing four picks. But I think Kevin O'Connell is the one who, at least from the way I understand, has a really detailed plan as far as what he wants JJ McCarthy to accomplish before he puts him on the field, and wants to be very disciplined about it. And I think the Patriots had that sort of plan too, you know, obviously the Falcons have a flexibility. So so yeah, I mean I think it's I think it's that and then I you know, the other thing is to Connor, I think the other thing is part of the pressure to get them out on the field is to take advantage of the rookie contract. That's something we should mention also for sure.
But it's not like the Jordan love thing ended up being overly expensive, you know what I mean, right, Like, if you do it that way, you know, yeah, I mean, I know, you're not getting the best years, You're not getting the absolute premium value, right.
I mean, like probably it doesn't help that like when you have Patrick Mahomes winning the MVP in year two and strout playing like he did as a rookie, you know, obviously, like that's the other thing the owner is going to look at it is like, well, why couldn't you get our guy in position to do that? Where not everybody, like not everybody progresses that way. You know.
It all comes back to what we really want to say every time, Albert, and that is owners are the worst. They ruin everything they really do. We could have a whole league at Jordan Loves.
Why why I use that. I said that before. They have this toy and they want to play with it, you know what I mean, they're like five year olds. They have this toy. They just came home. I mean, Toys r US doesn't exist anymore, right, Like.
But it does. It's inside of Macy's, is it really? Yeah? So you go, you go into Macy's now and there's like you know, fun there's like the Perfume counter and like the Polo store and the Tommy Hill figure store, and like Toys r US is just in that general Yeah, it's no, it's nowhere near what it was, right It's it's it's nowhere close.
Is there like signage it says toys or signage?
Yeah, but again it's like at least at our Macy's, it's like it's very small. There's probably like kind of handful of toys.
It's very sad, Yeah, because there was nothing better, as like a six year old than your parents taking here of the toys r.
Us and letting you pick out whatever you want. I mean it was never a carte blanche, but yeah, I usually remember that five or ten dollars limit.
You know, they had everything there. They had like the bike section where they had the bikes, they had the video games was a big one for me growing up. You know where you you pulled the little tickets out right like they had Yeah, did the game up? You had to pull the tickets out. It's always like really, I think we talked about this last week with the NCAA. Game was always nerve wracking and going to the store, like, you know, wondering whether or not that was gonna be in there for you to pull out and bring to the front. Yeah, they did everything. Those places were magical.
W w F figures, which was which is important to me because it's you have to differse fire some of those two. Yeah, I had to make sure that they had Alice.
No. I think I think I would have been like a different a different generation of w W w w F figures.
You're more of a Brett Hart guy.
Yeah, I was a big Brett Hart guy.
Sewn Michaels, John Michaels.
So I actually I'm old enough to remember Sean Michaels and the Rockers when he was uh, you know, before he uh he super kicked Mary Janetti and throw him through the window. Yeah, like Ultimate Warrior Hull Cogan, Like that's more my era.
Okay. My parting thought here on the Jordan Love deal is it's it's a little less punitive in my mind. Well two things. It's a little less likely than to to not work out, I think, and also it's a little less punitive that it doesn't work out because Jordan has been The reason that it's less likely is that Jordan has been been marinated in this system forever and it's second nature to him at this point, and so the likelihood of ultimate failure is not there for me. I mean, I think that there's probably whatever you want to say, a higher ceiling, right or a higher floor. And I think it's less punitive because if you're Green Bay, you're already probably thinking about the next time that you're gonna do this. By the time that Jordan Love is twenty six. Now by the time that he's twenty eight, there's gonna be another guy on the roster, you know, and he's gonna be sitting there and he's gonna be waiting, and Jordan Love's gonna have to beat him back and he's gonna have to play better. And you know, so with Green Bay, you've already you've already created the expectation. I have the comparison, and I'm curious what you think of this in my column. Green Bay is like those Nordic countries you know, that have like it doesn't cost any money to go to the doctor, and you know, everybody just has like an organic hot spring in their backyard, and you don't.
It's so healthy, Like.
Everyone looks super, super good looking, and like, I don't know if this is a thing that happens, but I imagine it does. Like you just you you get to leave work after lunch. Maybe maybe you don't even have to work. I don't know, like do you have to work there? I don't know, But so Green Bays like that, right, And when we talk about Nordic countries in America, we're like, oh, well, we can't do that. Because upah ba bah right, it's impossible.
Like COVID like not exists in Sweden too, or something probably not.
I mean, they were probably just so happy that COVID just went away.
You know, I can't there was something going around. It feels like ten years ago, but it was like something about like COVID not really affecting Sweeten or something crazy.
Surprise. You know, all these beautiful son is in our backyard. Just burn it right off, you.
Know what's there? I don't really understand.
So, but but here when we talk like you know, when we always talk about that, right, it's like, well, why can't America be like that? You know, and everyone's like, well, there's here's eleven million reasons why and it's not that great and you don't understand and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Right, but it's the same thing that you and I were talking about with the Jordan Love contract. Well, why can't more teams do that? Well, you don't understand because the NFL works like this and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. But Green Bay exists alone in this little area and it's expected of them and it's their thing. And so if Jordan Love ends up kind of playing like but this year, you just draft another guy and it's like okay, cool, like, you know, and we're not paying him a whole lot because it's on a rookie contract and he's gonna push Jordan Love. And either Jordan Love's gonna play better or he's not gonna play very well at all.
You know.
And I would imagine triple bonus that Jordan Love is not going to get a standing appointment on Pat McAfee to complain about it every week, which is gonna be nice. So it's all good.
Although although if you remember, like.
Maybe Patt'll pay him a million dollars too.
I don't remember when the Aaron Rodgers Brett far thing.
I don't think it's gonna happen with Jordan Love because by all accounts, he's an incredible guy, right, like, but uh, if you remember, like at the beginning the Aaron Rodgers Brett Farr thing, Aaron Rodgers is kind of the victim and the good guy and.
All of that, and so it wound up going where it went. But he, uh, you know, there are a couple of things I think on on on Jordan Love, like I I think number one, they're like, I think he's still going up, whereas with Tua, I think we have an idea of what he is. We've seen enough of Tua to know what he is. It's it feels like Jordan Love is still a sending and you can see this physical ability that like the ceiling, like he still has not come close to hitting his ceiling. And I think we got a taste of where he can go at the end of last year, and he got better over the course of last year. So that's number one. Number two, I I like.
I look at what like, I look at what's around Jordan Love, and I look at what he's accomplished, and to me, it's a little bit different than what like some of these other guys have accomplished because he is, I think older than all of his receivers, right, yeah, Christian Watt, Christian Watson, Romeo Dobbs, do, Tavian Wicks like all of these guys, you know, you know, Muskrave at tight end like they they they've got a really young group around him and he won despite the you know issues they had with injuries in the offensive line, losing David Baktiari again, Like you just look at like the amount of things that happened last year, right, and the makeup of the team that the Packers put around him, and it's like, God, Like, I'm not saying that was a bad circumstance, but there were a lot of reasons why it might not have worked and where he had to be the guy and he was capable of being the guy, And I think that creates a little bit of a different context, you know, for a young quarterback. So I really like where Jordan Love is. You know, I don't think what we saw at the end of last year was fake.
And I do think his ability to help young guys around him at such a young age, Like he doesn't have like Stefan Diggs out there with him the way that Josh Allen does. He doesn't have, you know, he doesn't have Tyreek Hill out there with him and Travis Kelcey out there with him the way that Patrick Mahomes did. Like he legitimately had to be the guy, you know at points last year, and he showed that he was capable of that. And I don't think that that's something you can just ignore, like because when you pay a guy like that, that's what you're asking him to be. So I think he's capable of doing it, and I'm really really interested to see where you can take it, because I think Matt Lafleur and all those guys don't get nearly enough credit for the environment they created for him. But he really has answered the bell, you know, being having having been given what he's been given.
Albert, you're a few days into your training camp tour. Where have you gone so far? And what has been the single, uh single most mind blowing thing that you've witnessed so far? And it can't be and it can't be airline travel related.
Okay, well I did think they lost my bag.
Last night, but you still don't have your bag.
No, no, no, no, no no. So Delta is still kind of working out the kings, like by My training camp trip kicked off with a canceled Delta flight. But Delta's honestly the best of the airline, so I hate even like getting after them. That was a pretty big mess last week, so my trip got delayed by a day and I and last night somehow my bag wound up in a lot wrong carousel, which led me to believe for a half hour that they lost my bag. Then they said, oh, well, some of these bags that were supposed to be on Carrolsel five wound up on Carousel three, and so not so bad. Just cost me what a half hours sleep? Okay, So I've been to the Chargers, the Raiders, the Rams, the Cowboys, the Saints, and yesterday the Cardinals. What was the question, what was the.
Single most mind blowing thing that you've seen so far that you think will have a far reaching impact on the upcoming NFL season.
I thought it was interesting seeing the Chargers just in general, and how like Jim Harbaugh is already like that program is already Jim Harbaugh's program, right, Like I was talking to uh, I was talking to people there about about Derwin James, and Jim had kind of said to me, how how much like he loves Derwin James, right, loves loves, loves your Derwin James. And so it's sort of become this running joke in the building, how it's like do what number three does? Right, So that's a very Jim Harbaugh thing like that he's found like his guys already, right. And then there was a like after practice they have these things. You have flip sleds.
Are I'm just now discovering a flip sled.
Yeah, I just figured out what they are too. But like you know, so for people who don't know, how do you describe a Connor, It's like you're almost doing like a like a dead lift. You pick up a sled and it's got weights in the middle of it, and you flip it over and you keep having It's almost like you're flipping a tire. Basically, that's the best way to describe it. So I don't know if I've seen this in an NFL practice before, and the rules are really tightened, but everybody, for like a half hour after practice, the Charger practice I was at, was doing flip sleds all the players after practice. That was Jim Harborugh thing, right, But maybe the most Jim Harbough thing was So he's walking over and they're doing this like kind of glad hat handing, like meet and greet with the city of Inglewood, right because they're opening their new facility and ribbon cutting whatever. So Jim's walking over with somebody from the Chargers to the Inglewood people, and you know, they give they gave him the rundown on. Okay, like this is the ribbon cutting. There's firefighters here, police officers here, you know, the the mayor's here, and we just wanted you to come over, you know, shake their hands, say hello, take a few pictures. And Jim will sim He's like, you want to bring the whole team over for a pictures? He said, Now, Jim, you don't need to do that. No, don't worry about it. Not a big deal. So Jim goes over there for ten minutes, like shakes hands and says he low to everybody and all of that. Right, then he runs back the team teams warming up about about to get ready for a stretch. So the city officials are then there are like kind of like holding the ribbon right like and starting to like get the ribbon in positioned for the cutting, right and then all of a sudden, you hear like four loud whistles and Harbad just waives the entire team of and yeah, before you know it, that ribbon cutting has ninety Chargers players and a couple dozen Chargers coaches in the background, all smiling. So yeah, really good vibes at Chargers camp. Very i'd say, very harbor vibes, and I think we're gonna hear a lot of good stories. You know. The great thing is about him Connor is that like And I wish I had a better appreciation for this when I was when I I wish I had better appreciation this for this when he was with the Niners. I think it explains him to some degree. He just freaking loves his job. He genuinely loves his job. And that explains so much about the way he carries himself, you know what I mean. In fact, I think it explains basically everything. So that would be one thing. The other thing that was interesting was the Cowboys. How quickly everybody went off the field. Have you been to cowboys camp before?
I have not. And Nap me and Napa wouldn't vibe very well.
You know, Nap, it's Oxnard, which is which they're about an eight hour drive apart, but close enough. Uh.
Oxnard is not close to Napa.
No?
Is that true?
North of l A.
Yeah, Oxnard is an hour north of are Is it wine country?
No? I don't think so.
Maybe there's no vineyards in ox nerd There might.
I don't know. I mean that, I'm not I'm not I'm not that right up on the on the local.
Commerce, but oh how about that?
But yeah, so, uh, like norm you go to Cowboys camp, there's like a real circus feel to it, and like after practice, everybody sort of hangs out on the field, right, and so it's like a good opportunity for all of us to say a lot to people we haven't seen it in a while or whatever. They were all in. They all moved from the practice field insights so fast this year. And it's just something that I noticed because you know, I talked to Mike McCarthy before practice about the idea that they're trying to take advantage of every moment and every minute that they have and you know, like chasing them one percent or whatever. It's just you can kind of feel the you can feel the a little bit of the pressure that's on so many people there, which I think is really interesting because you know, you have they're maybe there're three best players in contract situations in Dak Prescott, Michael Parsons, and Ceedee Lamb. And then of course they're head coaches in a contract here too.
It's a it's a it's a speedy four hundred and eight miles six hour and twenty four minute drive by exaggerated.
Sorry about that, but I don't know what to make of the Cowboys. I could see them being I can see them winning twelve or thirteen games. I could see them being five hundred, missing the playoffs. So I don't know what to make of them.
I just need to redeem myself. Like there has to be a vineyard in ox Nerd. There has to be one. There's a vineyard cafe ox Nerd Winery wine tasting an ox Nerd. Okay, uh Herzog Sellars obviously everyone knows about that. M. Joseph Herzog. We produce quality wines and being that we're a kosher winery, sustainable winery, just the perfect fit.
Dog Sellars is in her Sog Sellar.
In Oxnard kosher, sustainable.
I was having trouble getting that out.
Magna Vinos sell award winning Magnavino sellers.
So you're right, it's like a wine hotbed.
I'm not sure hotbed is the right word here. There's like three stray sellers. This is this is an edge ere. If you're looking for something edgy. Everything. Everyone describes themselves as award winning here.
Yeah, they must have a lot of awards for a wine.
A good savin yon Blanc, a tempera Nillo, a shard name Merleau, a Sarrah, and many more varieties. You strike me as a Sarrah guy. Do you like Sarah?
Not a big Surra guy. I'm more more of a conventional Kianti cab.
Yeah, all right, Well, I have a lot of great recommendations for you Knoxnard. The next time you're out there, we will be.
I I personally now think it's a hotbed.
You know what happened is I think what.
I'm going to refer to it as a hotbed now?
I think I think one NFL national reporter told me once that they were they closed out training camp in Oxnard, drove up to Napa to meet their significant other and like had like a little vacation before the season started. And that was always something that I was like, I was trying to sell to my wife, it's a good idea.
Or did you conflate the Raiders and Cowboys camps?
No, the Raiders were in Napa.
Yeah, all right.
Well, Connor's learning a little bit about the NFL. He's this is only year fifteen for me, So.
The Raiders Camp was hilarious though, because it was it this Marriott with beautiful scenery everywhere, and then the practice field had this like ugly twelve foot cement wall around it because Al Davis was paranoid about people seeing in. So the Marriott had to deal with like there being this like practice field outside of their walls with this again, this like unsightly like twelve foot c wall. They're gonna I'm getting that wall down now.
They're gonna see Marcus Tueo Sisopo. Don't let out the secrets. They're gonna see a discontented Carson Palmer and Randy Moss. Don't let anybody know. So we'll have Albert from the road next week likely as well, we'll have Gilberto and Matt who are also traveling. I'm gonna get out of my house. At some point they locked me in this basement, but once they open that window, I'm gonna crawl out of here and get myself the Giants camp to Jets camp. I'm gonna drive up and down the East coast and see some football. Until then, hang tight. Check SI dot com. We got the football preview issue coming out, which is very very exciting. I can't tell you, guys. I just I saw.
Why does that drop? Because we go I'm excited for that.
Too, drops in about two weeks, and I'll just say this, okay, talk about behind the secenaans. I saw a sneak peek of the cover, not telling you who's on it, not telling you anything about it, but I am telling you it looks cool.
Okay, So so I at least know. I can't speak to whether it looks cool, but I know the idea was cool.
So the idea was cool. Came up editor editor John Plume had a big had a big light bulb moment there. So listen, I'm just saying this. The magazine is better than ever. This is a vintage like power packed football preview issue. So we'll talk about that more though as the days are coming, as well as I'll leave this as a as a hangar for next week. Something I did for the football Preview issue that was a marvel of mathematics, something that no other human being on earth can do. So just let that marinade for a week. Albert will be on the road. He's only going to lose his bags a few more times. We're gonna see how sweaty. We can get him for the podcast next week because I do think that the turns will be good on this. So when if you're watching this on YouTube or if you're listening to it and you can just feel it kind of like pouring out of his body, leave us a rating review, let us know hashtag how sweaty is Albert h next.
Week I will be in hold on one second. This is great podcasting. When I've got to look something.
Up, I hope it's like Florida you.
Just look but you just looked up. You just looked up California geography.
So I think, yeah, people love hearing other people google stuff.
It's like it's it's it's what the public wants. Is Monday the fifth. Yes, you will be getting me from Cincinnati, Ohio, God's country. Who it is humid there, so I get a slightly sweatier version.
Made all right, Thank you guys very much as always for tuning in, and we really really appreciate it. Leave us a rating interview as always. It does help hang around from Matt and Gilbert till later in the week and we'll talk to you