3 & Out - Players get paid, Owners meeting wrap-up, Fugazi Friday

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Speaker 1: The volume. What is going on? Everybody Happy Fougayzy Friday. Hopefully everyone is doing well out there on the streets of the real world, and today we will We had a couple of contract extensions Geno Smith, Raiders, Trey McBride, Young ascending tight End, Arizona Cardinals, a couple other things flying around the NFL from the owners meetings this week as well as I didn't really actually have any fugazzy today, but had had some positive notes, some reverse fugazi's and then a little mail bag at John Middlecoff. At John Middlecoff is the Instagram fire in those dms, get your questions answered here on the show, so we will do some mail bag questions as well, and this will be the last podcast the week, so hopefully everyone caught up on all the content we had podcasts basically starting Monday all the way through the week. We had a golf podcast yesterday.
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Speaker 2: I went on Collins Show. If you miss that, we talked a lot of football, some college football in il Over unders, some different stuff out there, so you can check that out YouTube podcast. Like I always say that, make sure you subscribe to the Three and Out podcast if you listen through Collins Feet, Spotify, Apple, wherever you may listen YouTube as well. Got a lot of YouTube content up there, so go subscribe to the page as well. And yeah, but before we dive in, I do need to tell you about my friends, my partners, and the official ticketing app of this podcast. Game time doesn't get any better. Do you want to go to an event? You know? I'm recording this on Thursday afternoon. The Lakers Warriors play tonight, pretty big game if you you know you want to go to some of these NBA games. The playoffs is right around the corner. Playoff basketball is really fun. I mean grew up going to Arco Arena watching the Kings and then before the Warriors moved at Oracle. If you have an NBA team that's good around you, good home court, it is really really fun. Just a couple of hours too, it doesn't even take that long. So Baseball, the Dodgers as of recording this, have not lost a game obviously. The hockey playoffs, comedy shows, concerts, you name it. Go do something fun. Sometimes we need to mix it up. And I'm a big proponent of this because it's like I look back, I haven't done anything fun in a while. Well, I just got married a couple weeks ago, but I know some of you have not, and that's where Game Time comes in. So best ticketing app by far easiest to use. Venues price points are incredible. You can search by them, you can search by the arena, you can search by the team, you can search by the artists. Take the guest work out of buying tickets with game Time. Download the game Time App, Create an account and use the code John for twenty dollars off your first purchase. Terms of play Again, create an account and redeem the code John for twenty dollars off down at the game Time App. Last minute ticket's lowest prices guaranteed. I remember when I first got into radio. I was doing some stuff on the side on local television in the Bay Area, and it was really cool. It was a really big deal for my dad. You know, he could watch Living an hour away, watch me on the Comcast channel that had the Warriors, the Kings, the San Francisco Giants, and I would do like local television shows about Oakland Raiders and San Fransco forty nine ers topics, and I used to be really offended when they wouldn't let me talk basketball or baseball. It's like, guys, I understand, I'm a quote unquote football guy, but I got a radio show that's doing really well in the ratings here and we're talking everything. And he used to really bother me, And eventually my partner told me, like, if you're gonna get pigeonholed at anything, football is not the worst way to go. There are way worse things to get painted into a corner as quote unquote the football guy. And again, like, I don't know if it was a chip on my shoulder, some anger about like I can talk everything. I will talk baseball and basketball, and looking back, it was such a stupid thing to get worked up on. And he was right, like being the football guy, you could do a lot worse in a country that is football obsessed. But I think that's true anything in life. You know, when you enter a company, people look at you. If you start as an intern, sometimes it's hard to shake the way they look at you, even if you've inevitably been there for a while. And I think that happens with quarterbacks. Once you become the backup quarterback, it is very hard to ever be viewed as this guy can be my starting quarterback. Usually you need something extreme to happen, and that happened to Geno Smith when John Schneider traded Russell Wilson to the Denver Broncos. And it, by far is not only the best thing that ever happened to him on the field, because he got a chance to play and he proved that he was a good player. But financially, I don't know if we've ever seen anything like this. I looked it up today. Gino Smith, who, let's face it, after a year or two early on in his career, was just viewed as a guy that was going to struggle to hold on and then he kind of had developed himself as a backup quarterback. And I was guilty of this. I just assumed Geno Smith the rest of his life was going to be a backup quarterback. And as of twenty twenty one, you know, Gino was not a high draft pick, draft in the second round, had made ten million dollars. Now for ninety nine point nine percent of thirty year olds already accumulating ten million dollars in the workforce. It's pretty incredible. But when you're playing in the NFL, you know you started doing the match, You're like the position I play the guy this guy is probably gonna end his career at the time. If you would have bet maybe a couple more contracts to be backup quarterback, I don't know, twenty million dollars. I looked it up today. He is on pace now with this new contract extension from the Raiders that guarantees him over sixty five million dollars minimum. That assumes that he plays bad they cut him. They only have to pay him the true guarantees. He's gonna make well over one hundred and twenty five million dollars. In twenty twenty one, he had a career earnings of ten million dollars, and by twenty twenty seven he will have twelve and a half x that minimum. There's a decent chance he'll be at one hundred and forty one hundred and fifty million dollars. So not only is this guy an incredible story, he got his opportunity, he made the most of it. He became which is pretty crazy. If I would have told anyone, would you have bet that Geno Smith over the next five years would be a dramatically better player than Russell Wilson, there would have been one hundred percent universal agreement, no chance. And I don't think not only is he a better player than Russell Wilson, every team in the league to day would take Geno Smith over Russell Wilson and did not see that coming. But John Schneider Pete Carroll benefited from that. Now Pete Carroll back with the Raiders, they make a trade for him, they have, you know, a pretty highly paid he's better than a quote unquote bridge quarterback. But he's definitely just holding the fort down until you find a younger player. But he does allow you to not force a pick. And if Shador Sanders is there at pick six, which who knows, you could convince me that he's gone it too. You could convince me that he doesn't even get drafted in the top ten. It's what makes the draft fascinating most years is we don't have any clue how it's going to play out. But I think it's fair to say that more like if I was a betting man, the Raiders are not going to take a quarterback in the top ten. Doesn't mean they won't. They still can. You easily could pull the trigger. How Pete Carroll did this once upon a time when he signed Matt Flynn and took Russell Wilson in the third round. Now, I do think they'd be more inclined to take a guy on the second day, you know where you know, help John Spytech the Raiders GM when he was in Tampa. Their last two quarterbacks, you know one honestly, the guy they first drafted was Jameis Winston. That blew up in their face. And then you know, found Tom Brady just as a free agent and have to give up a draft pick. And then they found Baker Mayfield for four million dollars. They have to give up a draft pick. So I do wonder if they are going to over extend themselves if they are on the fence, assuming Shador Sanders is there, and now this allows them to, you know, take another position if they want. Not that we didn't know this was coming because when they made the trade for Geno Smith, it was well reported that they they're going to extend him, and they did. And now Geno Smith went from ten million dollars to a career earnings potentially at one hundred and thirty hundred and forty million dollars when his career's all over just a incredible football story, an incredible business story. I mean, if he was a stock and you would have invested him in twenty twenty one, you would have had pretty incredible returns. You know, trade McBride, the Arizona Cardinal tight end, I think represents what the NFL has always been. We spend so much time before the draft, and rightfully so, talking about the high draft picks, Yet the majority of the first round, I think it's like, you know, fifty to fifty chants. These guys are not going to get second contracts with their teams. And if I draft a guy definitely in the top fifteen and he doesn't get a second contract with my team, that's a swing and a miss. But the draft is littered in the second, third, fourth, fifth round, not just with starters, but with all pros, with Pro Bowlers, with Hall of famers, and what's cool about the NFL unlike, you know, definitely basketball, the occasional second round guy becomes a stud Draymond Green, Jokic, But for the most part, the best players are usually drafted pretty high. And in football, like you can find your best player on your team in the third round. And Trey McBride represented what is something that might dramatically change because forever you could take guys pass the first round from smaller schools and they could become a star for you. And that's what Trey McBride did. He came up at Colorado State, he got drafted at the end of the second round, and he's easily one of the best tight ends in the NFL. And I do wonder if a guy like him because he just got a huge contract extension. I didn't realize he had one hundred and eleven catches last year. I mean the last two seasons, he's had eighty one and one hundred and eleven catches, and two years ago, for half that year that was not with Kyler Murray, it was with a backup quarterback. So I mean, this guy's just good. I remember watching him as a rookie when I think he only had like high twenties and catches. You're like, God, this guy moves pretty freaking well. Now two years later, did I think he'd be this I don't know, but he is. He's an excellent player and he got drafted from Colorado State in the second round and he's become a pro bowler. I do wonder and we talk a lot about this with nim Well, with the transfer portal, a guy like him once it's pretty clear like he's an all conference guy and a future NFL player by his second or third year playing in college. If this guy ends up at Colorado State, you know, because I would imagine guys like this now are going into their last non draft eligible year, Texas, Oregon, all the SEC schools, the Big Ten schools, and more than likely this guy ends up at a different school and the butterfly effect of all this. And we've talked a lot about this with Genty, Like Genty, you know, if I was a betting man right now, he probably ends up going in the top ten. But what if he doesn't, you know, and he was a guy if he had transferred to Texas and had a very similar season in the SEC, honestly, we might be talking about him like a top five pick just because this draft's weak. It's like, well, there is no doubt that this guy might be the next Barry Sanders.
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Speaker 3: And he might.
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Speaker 2: But for me and I get some shit with this is like yeah, coming from Boise, like I just judge you a little more harshly. It is different, you know, when you're playing the SEC every week, or even the Big Ten schools like Iowa and Michigan and like those defenders that are all going to go to the NFL in San Diego State and New Mexico, it just is not the same. Even if you're going for three four hundred yards, it's an incredible accomplishment, but it's fair for me to question it. And I love the player. I mean, he was my favorite player in college football this year, but guys like him moving forward, the chances of them staying at Colorado State, staying at Boise State once they are well established, Like this guy's going to the NFL. This guy can immediately help your team. Just cut him in anilcheck. I don't think we're gonna see it that often. And like I talked with Colin yesterday, we talked a lot about college football, and I understand he's not a traditionalist, and for the most part, I'm not necessarily either, Like I'm not a huge just in general in my life hold on to the pass guy like I'm much more of a look forward guy, like I'm all four change. I understand it's inevitable, especially in sports when it comes to money. But like I'm not afraid to say, like I kind of missed the Pac twelve. Like I do not that my life's better or worse because it's gone, but it does. Like sometimes when I see Oregon in Arizona playing in the NCAA tournament and it's a Big twelve vers a Big ten team, like, I'm sorry, that's weird, and I don't really like it, even though I know, like there's no point in getting mad at it. It's not gonna go back like worldly moving forward, and if anything like the Big twelve might not even exist in the next five ten years. But like Trade McBride's the Ashton Gentes, these type players, it's gonna be very, very difficult for schools in the Mountain West to keep these guys. But congrats to Gino Smith, Congrats to Trade McBride for just playing at a really high level and earn a lot of money in a league that has just flushed with cash. A couple other funny things from the owners meetings shoji. As you get older, sometimes you go, God, do I sound like my dad or my grandpa? The NFL banned the nose swipe from its celebratory actions after first downs or touchdowns, and my first reaction was like why, and then reading on the internet, still a little confused. If it's a gang celebration or representing cocaine. I don't know. Here's what I definitely know. The owners have absolutely no clue someone getting this information. I would say most people watching football have absolutely no clue that has a negative. I understand pointing a fake gun at someone and shooting like, we all get that one. But the nose swipe meaning something that is negative was not something I had on my bingo card. Another thing is that, you know, it's funny sometimes. You know, I'm viewed as a forty nine er guy, and if I have a negative opinion, people are like, you've changed because of coward. It's like, I'm just saying brand and I contract was a disaster. It is not really an opinion. I'm just reacting to the forty nine ers literally trying to trade the guy five months after signing him. I didn't make that up. That's a well established story that they acknowledged. And I'm sorry if you follow football and you sign a guy to seventy five million dollars guaranteed and then less than six months later, you are attempting to trade the guy, but no one will touch him because he's injured. You regret that contract. It's a bad contract, not because of my opinion or a fans opinion, because the team is literally saying that. But I do think sometimes the forty nine ers, historically they used to be really good at signing guys early and getting them to take less than quote unquote market fair rates. Well, that world's kind of changed, and good players have a lot more I would say, not just leverage, but more people in the end now have more cash to spend. It doesn't necessarily mean salary cap space, but some of these new owners, like I was just thinking Dray green Law who Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch got on a plane to go try to convince not to sign with the Denver Broncos because originally they low balled them. Again not my opinion, something Kyle admitted, and then once they realized that they were way off on the number, they were going to try to match it and convince him to stay. And by the time they flew to Texas, he was over it. And you know, the Denver Broncos signed him and for a while, Like, there were a couple teams here and there that would spend big cash, And just because you had a really rich owner like a Jerry Jones or a Robert Kraft, does not mean they were the ones giving out the biggest quote unquote signing bonus because google it. Historically, they were not the Jeffrey Lowie's, the Jim Haslums. There were three or four teams. But the more and more you influx these richer owners like the fucking Walton family that I don't know have all the Walmart stock and have like four of the siblings some of the richest people in the world, Like thirty million dollars guaranteed means nothing to them. And I think when you lowball people, especially someone that you want to keep, Like again, they didn't want to keep Pufunga, they didn't want to keep some of these players, but Drake Greenlaw was a guy that they desperately wanted to keep. Now they were hoping to get them at their price. Little did they know this guy named Greg Penner, who's married in the Walton family, has an unlimited amount of cash to Span and it's like, yeah, we're willing to pay more than you are, and by the time you are willing to match, that guy's going to be really offended. And so Kyle and John had to jump on a plane to try to convince a player to stay and it didn't work. Like, that's not ideal. And I'm not trying to be negative, Nancy. I would say most of the other players, I have no issue with letting go. And I do think there is risk with Drake greenlaw right, he tore his achilles a year ago. He tried to come back and his body clearly wasn't right. He got in in games. But if he is right, and if the Denver Broncos get a healthy Drake greenlot, they immediately get one of the best linebackers in the league. Well, I'll just dive in. I don't really necessarily have a fugazy today. I actually have a reverse fugazi my car. You know, I've been thinking about getting a new car, and then you look at the prices, You're like Jesus, Wesus. I don't drive very much. I basically drive to the gym, I drive to run some errands, and I drive to the golf course. So it's like me having a car payment with these enormous prices where the car market is gone. Given the car that I would want, it's like, do I need to do it? But then my car's in shambles. Now I have a twenty twelve or eleven Tahoe. It's paid off. It's actually just it's incredible. I've never had any issues, but my brakes were going out, so you take it in. It's but it's worth nothing. And anytime that you go to a mechanic and you don't know anything about a car, you're kind of just in their control and they give you a list of like ten things you could do, like eight thousand dollars with a world and I just look at the guy. I'm like, listen, what do I actually need and what do I not need? And the guy was really cool and he's like, honestly, you just needed these three things. He's like two thousand dollars. The other four things you do not need to do right now. And sometimes you get in situations like that when you know nothing, and we did on Fugazi a long time ago. The you know, when you take your dog to the vet and they give you the bill, it's like, what are you supposed to do? Argue? It the dog can't talk. You want to keep your animal alive. The bill's like twenty three hundred dollars. It's like, what are you supposed to say? No, I'm not going to pay it, just put my dog down. Kind of got you by the balls, and you can get in those situations. But when you get a guy that's just like, you know what, if you want to keep this car running, this is all you need to do. It's like really refreshing. I'm like, they are still good people in this world. Val Kilmer died. You know, I think it's not the biggest grossing movie, not even close of all time. Top Gun came out in nineteen eighty six. I look, I think Titanic technically is made over two billion dollars worldwide. Now, granted, the budget that movie in nineteen ninety seven was two hundred million dollars. Jurassic Park was huge. Some of these late nineties movies still like Hold Records did well over a billion dollars, But also that budget was like sixty five seventy million dollars. I looked it up today. Top Gun the budget for the movie was fifteen million dollars and it did close to like four hundred million dollars. I do think and listen, if we're just going on box office, I'm not gonna win this argument, but I would say, in my life, one of the biggest movies by far, just the impact culturally, the way it's discussed just universally, everyone's seen it or has an opinion. I think part of it is you would say that Tom Cruise has probably had like the longest he's had, like the Lebron James equivalent of a career that just has gone on for like forty years, so that's helped keep it. It's one of his, you know, big movies. I do think Val Kilmer's role in that movie just made ahm Asa superstar. And what's weird is I was looking back, like I love Tombstone. If you think about Top Gun and Tombstone, which for me are my personal Val Kilmer favorite movies, he was like a supporting actor, Like same thing with Heat, which obviously was a huge movie with Pacino and de Niro. It's like he's not playing the starring role. And you look back at some of these pictures of Val in like the late eighties early nineties, you're like, holy shit, that's good. Looking dude. If I was a chick, I mean, no wonder. This dude was probably crushing it in Hollywood, obviously the last stretch of his life, getting sick. And you know, his performance in the sequel Dude Top Gun, where he's not able to talk but he makes a cameo was pretty cool. But man, that's just when he died. You start, you know, as you get older. It's funny. I was walking the dog yesterday and this girl I hadn't. I never recognized her, like I don't see the car on my street. But there's also like a could a sac connected to the street, so maybe she lives in there. She looked like a teenage girl, and definitely by the way she was driving it, and listen, I was very guilty of this. She was going like it felt like fifty miles an hour around to turn. And this is not like a main street. This is just like a road you have to turn on with a bunch of homes, where I would say the average speed that everyone on the street drives before you hang a right is probably less than like fifteen miles an hour. Some people drive like five or ten. If it was a boat, it'd be like a no wake zone and she turns that corner hauling ass and I turned into my dad. I'm like slow down, and I was like, god damn. But I mean, what if I would have been in the middle of the road, or anyone would have been a middle road, especially someone walking a baby or something, it would have been lights out, been game over. And as you get older, you kind of like turn into the people that used to We used to have someone in my neighborhood when I was growing up, and I when I turned sixteen, my grandpa gave me like his nineteen ninety three Ford Explorer. It would have been like two thousand one one. Uh. It had dog hair ever everywhere because he used to roll around with his dog, Tosca a lab smelled. I mean, it was just just your classic kind of beater that you know you can hand me down Ford ex floor puke like gross brown U. But it was my car, and I used to fly around, you know, the neighborhood of where my parents lived, going like fifty miles an hour and the speed limits like twenty five, getting yelled at constantly by people and they eventually tell my parents. My parents would scream me they take away the keys and uh, it's like funny you turn into those people because me and my friends used to make fun of all these people when we were in high school that would put out the signs of like slow down kids, and they're one hundred percent right, And then you get older you despise these kids that think they're like Dale Earnhardt turning corners when it's like, guys, this is a residential neighborhood. Slow the bleach down. And I think it's the same thing. Like looking at Val Kilmer. I was thinking the last couple of nights watching some clips on YouTube, like was the nineties the best generation in terms of art like movies and music? Because I'm pretty confident it is. But then you started talking like that. I feel like my dad when he used to talk about movies and music and stuff that he grew up on. I'm pretty open minded with sports, like I'm not one of those like the best player I've ever seen, Like listen, all these guys are good. I enjoy all these different eras. I'm not stubborn with that. But when it comes to music, like, yeah, it is Doctor Dray and Eminem way better than any of these dudes. Now, yeah, I think so by a mile. Now, I also don't ever want to be that person that's just holding on because in like thirty years, the nineties is going to be really really old. But you know, Val Kilmer, I mean it's crazy. Obviously he was a big movie star and he did Batman, which was probably you know, for him culturally. In any movie that he started, and I always thought I think it was called Wonderland, he played a porn star called Johnny John Holmes. I don't think the movie did that well, but I remember I haven't seen it in a long time, remember watching it one time. I think it was a really good movie. I'm just a Val Kilmer guy and sad to see him go. So hey, any kids out there, slow down in residential neighborhoods and rip de val. 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Speaker 2: Okay, it's mail back time at John Middlecoff at John middlecoff is the Instagram fire in those dms get questions answered here owned a poud question for the Pod curious about the levels of alphas on NFL squads when you were with the Eagles. Was it obvious superstars that were the top dog alphas or some dudes not household names that you were around that just carried the room and clear alphas. You know. When I was with the Eagles, like some of their guys that became alpha's were really young, Kelsey Fletcher, Cox Lane Johnson. Lane was drafted and then I was relieved to my duty, so I actually never was even around Lane. But like when I was there, our best players, I wouldn't say were the alpha leaders, you know, like DeShawn Jackson, Sante Samuel I mean, he's going at it with these were Pro Bowl level, elite players. Asante wasn't better than Dion. I don't know if you saw that online. Sante was a good player. I mean he was, he was a playmaker, couldn't really run, but just in credible instincts. I would say it was like guys like Brent Seleik, Trent Cole they were just like they just had some shit to him. You know. Even at the time, Jason Peters, who was in the prime of his career, I don't think was like what he ultimately became as he aged. And really Mike Vick's first year starting kind of came out of nowhere, right he was the backup going into the season. I actually think I saw it more once I left the NFL and started doing living in the Bay Area, going to Niners practice and Raiders practice. When I went to the Jim Harbaugh team's practice, like Justin Smith, aka the Cowboy, I mean, it was just he's just a dude. He is just on alpha, like this Kyle Shanahan team, Fred Warner, Kittle, Trent It's like alpha's you know. Deebo was like that for a little while and then it kind of got weird. But I would say Fred Greenlaw, Trent Kittle. When I was around the Raiders, Khalil Mack for sure, but Charles Woodson was at the end of his career, like he was just him and Justin Smith. I felt like, and again they were older when I was around him, just carried themselves a little differently, And maybe there's like and I would say, Trent Williams has this little as well an aura around them. Sometimes with a younger guy, it's hard to be the alpha, like the heartbeat of the team when you're not one of the better players, Like you can be one of the tougher guys on the team and someone that no one would f with, but not be like the best players. So you're not necessarily like the leader of the team to be the leader of the team or one of the alphas in the room. Like he kind of got to be one of the better players. So I would say that, like when you're around I mean, Charles Woodson just had this aura around him. It was like I was Charles Woodson and he was cool. I mean, we interviewed him one time and he was he was awesome. But some guys just aren't that vocal. It's like personalities, right, there are some human beings that are really social. There are some people that aren't that social. Right. There are some people that never shut up. There are some people that don't talk a lot. It's no different in a football locker room. Like you can be a leader by example. It's like the hardest working guy going, but just not be a big talker. Like when you were around the Eagles back then, like it was hard to miss, like Leshawn McCoy and Assante, Like they were pretty loud in a good way, like everyone loves Shady. He was like the most likable guy on the team. I would say him like, Selick, what are your thoughts about fantasy football and how it quote grows the game? Does it INCENTIVI fans to watch the games? I think it's incredible. I mean, you know my two sports, football and golf. They use the term, and golf a lot grow the game, like Live did not grow the game. What grows the game is YouTube golf. Like in football, what's been incredible is fantasy football and gambling truly grows the game because the more and more people that participate in that, the more you're gonna watch the sport. I got into the sport before I did either one of those. I've never been a big fantasy football guy. But it's not because I don't think it's like a lot. I understand why other people think it's cool. When I was young, especially in college, when I think a lot of people start playing now, I mean probably playing like junior high in sixth grade in high school, but I was like, I don't want to play fantasy football. I want to play real football, And that was like a driving thing in my life. So I just never really got into it because I wanted to get into actual football and by then, Hell, when I worked in the NFL, I knew people that played in huge fantasy leagues, which I don't. I think is frowned upon they don't know anymore. But I yeah, I think it's a huge, huge part of football. And I would say the growth of the last ten years and I would say now gambling become much more accessible. Is that on steroids? So I would say those two things that drive interest of young people to like the sport that maybe didn't play in high school or growing up, is I mean should be applauded. So I'm a big fan from Australia. What was the biggest professional mistake you made working for the Eagles and how do you overcome it? Congratulations on your recent marriage. What is the plan for the honeymoon? No plan for the honeymoon. I had a buddy in the NFL asked me like, where are you going. I'm like, we just came home. We just needed we were gone for a little while, spend so much money in the wedding. I just needed to take a deep breath. He's like, that's a pro move. We are going to costa Rica before football season in late August. So that's I don't know if that's a technical honeymoon, but we don't really have. We just needed to take a deep breath. She's really busy right now, work stuff. I would say my biggest professional mistake was when Andy got fired and Chip Kelly came in. I was pretty cocky, slash confident, like I was kind of like a made man in the organization, tired by Howie. I was good, I had an area. I was just kind of feeling myself and we had a draft meeting and I just kind of got into it with Chip about Matt Barkley, and I remember one of the couple guys in the draft room that night at the hotel was like, Bro, you can't do that. And I don't regret doing that. I mean, my life has been dramatically better post that moment. But I would say as a younger person, I got humbled pretty fast, and then it was pretty clear a couple weeks later and like that was not a good idea and I'm in trouble here now. Maybe would have replaced me anyway, who knows. I'm not that like arrogant to say that I was untouchable. But that was a moment where I was really feeling myself. And I think anytime when you're a young person and you gained a bunch of confidence, you know, it can go to your head. And I would say at that point in time, it was probably in my head. I was like, I'm best scout in here, I'm an untouchable guy. And then until I wasn't and you realize who the boss in that room was did not like me yapping back. But I think it's just a good lesson for younger people. It's like, sometimes you just just calm down a little bit, even though I technically was right, but that's besides the point. Do you think the narrative around Harbor and Herbert will change if they don't win a playoff game this year? Also, my buddy goes to Vanderbilt and we are going to the Bama game. We were curious if you think Vanderbilt has any more upsets in them this year. I would say on the Vanderbilt front, it does feel like that's a once in a generation type upset, especially given that Caitlin de Bor is coming back and that game was that game in Vanderbilt. So I would imagine that game's in Bama this year. If I'm wrong, regardless where it is, I do think that's a circle on the calendar game for Alabama. I would be stunned if they lose to Vanderbilt two years in a row. But should be fun. I would say, I don't think there's a narrative around Harbaugh. I mean, Harbaugh has coached in the NFL five years, has made the playoffs in four of them, just won a National championship two years ago with like twenty five NFL players. I think Jim Harbaugh universally agreed upon, high level, top end coach. No one's arguing that. I actually think Herbert is the one that's polarizing. I don't see how Harbas's polarizing at this point. He's just a certified ass kicker. You make him your head coach, You're gonna win games? Now? Can he win the Super Bowl? Yeah, that's a narrative for a lot of coaches, right, Can this guy ever win the Super Bowl? We can start going around. Kyle Shanahan would be the leader in the clubhouse, but there are countless other guys that like, can this guy get it done? Lafleour can Kevin O'Connell win a playoff game. I think there are way bigger narratives around other coaches than Jim Harbaugh at this point. But I do think Justin Herbert does have pressure, just given the way he's talked about in the top group. I mean he is in the NFL. I just think considered a top five quarterback, and when you're a top five quarterback, he'd be the fifth. But the other four guys are Mahomes, Allen, Lamar, and Burrow. Like you kind of got to back it up with just better play in the bigger moments. But you could say the same for Lamar, though Lamar I didn't think played a much better in the second half last year. I've heard you discuss the three pointer with Colin thoughts on limiting the amount of attempts a team can take in the first forty six minutes to a game to twenty or twenty five after they reached the limit. Any shot taken behind the arc would count as a two pointer last two minutes of the game. Threes would not be restricted, would limit the number of threes taken, create strategy on when to take them. I don't like doing that type stuff like arbitrarily picking things like you can only bunt in the last three innings, right, you can only throw pass forty yards once a half, you can only shoot so many threes, Like, yes, the three is either part of the game or it's not to me. If you're going to have an issue with the three, extend the line. But you can't limit the number of times I can take a shot that doesn't exist anywhere else in any Like you can't hit a home run here because you've already hit three. You can't you got to kick field goals because you've already scored four touchdowns. I think we're just like kind of arbitrarily And I've listen, You're not alone. I've heard other people bring that up. I think that's fucking stupid. I really do. I think it's insane. I don't think three pointers. I think sometimes when I hear basketball people discuss why less people are watching, I think they're too close to the sun. I think it's very, very hard for them to see the big picture. It's not just that every game looks the same and people are shooting threes. They lost people with the tanking and people not playing and the season becoming baseball none of the games mattering and the games simply do not matter. And you know, for the first these last stretch a couple of weeks, there are some big games, but for the most part, like football feels like that throughout the entire season, Basketball and baseball have lost us during the rag season because it does not feel like the games matter. I think that it's all the three pointers. The Warriors were shooting a lot of three pointers a decade ago, and a lot of more people were watching it. To me, it's truly the people do not play games, they sit and the tanking all kind of mixed into one. Now. I'd also argue the tanking thing like no one's watching the Utah Jazz anyway or the Pelicans, but I do think they're all it's kind of intertwined. Just the games not mattering, and literally the teams don't care about the games. I'm a sports lawyer who graduated with my law degree from Marquette and go to my sports law and got my sports law certificate from a national institute. I have also worked in multiple NCAA athletic offices. I'm currently listening to your podcast mail Bag, where someone asks you about universities employing student athletes. You were spot on about title nine entitle I don't know the numerology with the V and the two ones, but let's just say fifteen. But additionally, the even bigger problem is once students become employees, their scholarship becomes taxable. The issue is most of the student athletes, especially non football and basketball, don't bring in enough under nil to afford the taxes for their scholarship dollars, so becoming employees for the university is a non starter. Hope that helps. I'm always available for conversation. Why I would say this, I would imagine the universities have zero desire to quote unquote employee the softball team, the soccer team held, the baseball team, those people are not getting employed. It would just be the men's football team. Well, I mean there's only men's football, but football and men's basketball and potentially women's basketball. Now I don't know about the rules. If you employ them, do you have to employ everyone else? Because if that's the case, then football is breaking off. But I hear you there are a lot of complications and it's not It's a I would say, Harry situation moving forward, So we'll see how it plays out. I don't know. I feel like it's gonna get worse for it gets better, which to me is kind of entertaining. I don't care for the mailback. Big fan of the show. I've enjoyed some of your quote unquote life lesson segments, so I'll continue the trend. I turned twenty four in a couple of weeks and will graduate with an MBA in May. I'm moving to Minneapolis in June for a job in finance. I was curious if you have any tips looking back on the twenty four year old version of yourself, mostly intangibly, when approaching career success. Also, an Iowa State student graduate who watched Party melt down in person several times, I wouldn't pay him even close to top five money god hater here perty did a lot for your school. I would say, that's a great question. Uh, you can't look at everything when you're young about immediate success and worrying about like the next day, the next week, the next month. Some of your moves when you know your industry doesn't isn't apples to apples to the world that I grew up in in college football or the NFL, or even radio. But you have to think big picture. So you know, if you go into the mindset of like, oh, I'm getting I'm getting screwed here, I'm doing that. It's it's hard because as a young person, they're going to ask you to do some dumb stuff and part of that is proving your worth. Now there gets to a point like maybe they are taking advantage of you. But like as a young person, you know, I would imagine if you're single, you don't have kids, you're not married, like, spend extra time, you know, and just be available and say yes more than you say no, and usually early on that can lead to good things. So I would say, also, it's easy, and I was guilty of this, and most people are. When you're young and hungry and ambitious, you probably think you know there's not Probably you do think you know a lot more than you actually know. And the fifty year old, the sixty year old people in charge don't want all your takes all the time. So just be careful about being too aggressive and just ease into some things early. You know, don't go in there and think you're reinventing the wheel in whatever world you're working in. You know, especially and then you know, once you're able to really soak into any opportunity you get, whether they take you to a big meeting, a big closing, even if you have nothing to do with any of it. You know, really kind of soak in things like God, that's take away the positive experiences, things that you learn from them, and then also see things that you don't like and things that you're like, I don't That's not how I'm going to operate when I as I move up in the world. But I would say just be willing to say yes to a lot of things because in your mid twenties, like you got a lot of time on your hands, and you don't have much going on in terms of like family requirements or marriage or those things, assuming maybe you already married with kids, but if you're not, you can really take advantage of And some of it's gonna be stupid. Some of it you'll look back like, what a waste of my time, But some of it is not, and it's type stuff that can change your life. So I would just go in ambitious and willing to say yes and just grind because you'll look back you're like, how did I do that? Well, that's the time in your twenties is the time to work crazy hours and really make hay. So like once you get to your thirties, like world becomes a little easier in theory. Maybe not, but a lot of stuff's out of your control too. You gotta like you just gotta put all your chips in the middle the table and just see what happens. There's no guarantee on anything, So that's part of what makes life fun. Longtime Niner fan frustrated every time I hear Kyle Shanahan get called a genius. If he were, he wouldn't be losing Super Bowls. I feel like Kyle is trying to live in Dad's shadow. Who gets credit for giving him the title quote unquote genius Albert Einstein was a genius. Jason, Yeah, I would say, here's the thing, I don't know who you know. I think a lot of players some of the stuff that Kyle gets held in high regard when it comes to offense and when it comes to play calling are the way other coaches and players on his own team talk about him. And also like he's had a lot of success as a head coach. I do think to be a sports genius as a coach, you need to create something from scratch. Like he is running his father's offense. Now he has found a way. You know, his dad was became famous in the mid to late nineties running this, so he's doing it almost thirty years later at a high level. So clearly he's adapted off of it. But I'm with you, like to be a true quote unquote genius Bill Walsh, I think gets a lot of credit for developing the West Coast offense, though there were concepts that I'm pretty sure that he had taken from other places, but like he mastered that in the early late seventies, early eighties. So like or you know, some of these defensive coordinators that create the Tampa two or some of the defenses that Belichick and Saban created. Yeah, is he a quote unquote genius. Yeah, you could argue that's a little strong, but Kyle is a really, really good coach who had a bad year. Thought for the mailback, the Titans should not draft cam Ward at number one, or any quarterback for at least the first three rounds in this year's draft. Ward isn't better than any of last year's first round quarterbacks, so I wouldn't reach for him at number one. They should go get Kirk Cousins and wait to draft their quarterback of the future. The Titans just finish their O line rebuild with additions of Dan Moore and Kevin Zeitdler in free agency, so Cousins should be decently protected and can run the offense for a season or two. Don't overthink it. Draft Abduel Carter and win eight to nine games in a week division. I think new GM Mike Borganzi, who was the Kansaie Chiefs since nine, is too smart to draft a non elite quarterback prospect. Your thoughts their drafting cam Ward like it's at this point in time, it would be one of the craziest pivots. Everyone in the NFL thinks they're drafting cam Ward. The Titans believe they're drafting cam Ward, and that's led by the coach and the GM. So listen, there is dramatic risk taking this guy, right. But I would just say, from a skill set standpoint, the top three guys Caleb, Drake May, and Oh Jayden. Those three guys would definitely I would say get drafted above cam Ward. I do think cam Ward is physically more gifted than a twenty five year and I like Michael Penis a lot and hell, I probably would have taken him in the top ten. But cam Ward is a better NFL prospect than Michael Pennix's. I would say he's a better NFL prospect than Bo Knicks and JJ McCarthy. Doesn't mean you're canna be better players, but just his skill set, physical characteristics like they are better. Now would he have gone ahead, I don't know, but I don't think it's that crazy to take him number one overall. It's not a great draft if you can create him into I don't know, a top twelve ish quarterback at risky one d per but I would say Kirk Cousins has a ton of risk. Kirk Cousins might be shot, might be done, like it just could be over. He's thirty seven years old, an achilles, can't move, arm strengths, looks like it's kind of diminishing. He's had an incredible career, made hundreds of millions of dollars. But you could, let's just say you do what you said, sign you'd have to trade for him. Trade for Kirk Cousins. Draft ab Duel Carter, what if cousins just awful, I mean just terrible. I say this about the Falcons. At least they did have Michael Pennix behind him, so it's like, hey, we'll just go with Michael Pennix. What would the Titans do if like five games in it's like, oh, this thing is a disaster. You'd be in trouble. Uh. Mail back question. I just saw the NFL announce Global Markets program for twenty five where teams are partnering with partnering with certain countries to build the game and drive eyeballs on the sport moving forward. My question, how did they decide what countries would PARTI and which teams get to allocate resources? Where congress on the wedding Yeah, and support from your neighbor in north in Canada. I don't know. I mean you're asking the wrong guy here on like who gets to be connected with what? I do wonder now that they have Amazon, but even the Netflix Christmas time, if they use that to gather some data? And I wonder if just going to play a game in Dubai is just like, oh, we'll go to Dubai. They got a lot of money, we turn looking to expand or did they see some data there. Same thing with Brazil, same thing with Spain. I've always said that they're doing that to try to expand their ability to stream. But what if they saw on streaming where they should lean in and if you're Netflix and those people you're working with the NFL, like, hey, you got people here, this is where you should play a game, which I would imagine is happening, so listen. I don't pretend to have the information of why who goes where, but I don't think it's random that they're going back to back years in Brazil or this upcoming year they're going to Spain, and then inevitably they're going to Dubai. Like it's I think they're seeing data, there are people there and there is a demand, and maybe Netflix says we have a large percentage of people that watch in these areas, so you're like working hand in hand with the crew, would be my educated guest, could be wrong, but it's like, there are only so many possibilities here. What is the life of an NFL scout And why did you say you weren't going to get another NFL job after the Eagles, Because when I got out in the summer of twenty thirteen. The only people I know that works for the Eagles and some of the people that I had worked with, you know, Daniel Jeremiah had gone to television, Lewis Ridick was going to ESPN, Andy had hired job On Dorsey, and John Dorsey ran personnel and Andy wasn't gonna so the only person he took from the Eagles was Veach. Now they got several others since then, you know, from the scouting perspective, But I just I didn't really have that many people around the league I could call to try to get a job. I know way more people today than I did then, and then things just yeah, just like what am I going to do? So I just pivoted fast. I probably could have figured it out, maybe not that season, but like the following season got back in. But by the fall things started going well with I was like going on local television and radio. I was like, screw it, I'll just do this, and then I did it and just never looked back. I you know, I think when you say the term most people assume college, and I've done both. I've worked. I worked in the office, and when you work in the office, you're basically just working not quite coaches hours during the season, but it's just getting there six thirty seven am if you want to get a workout, maybe thirty six in the morning. And you're there early in the week till eight, nine, ten o'clock at night, just watching guys, watching players, writing reports or doing advance of an opponent. And you're also in charge like that crew of like free agency, so you're running the free agent boards. You're kind of help running guys on the street. You know a player like Trey Lance right now who's not on a team, Like you're running lists of guys like those practice squad guys. You're following pretty closely. Like you're just really working with the NFL guys. College guys are focused on the college guys, And I think the best scouts have done both because I think the best way to transition to college is to understand what's going on the pro game. And then when you work in college, I mean, you're just driving school to school scouting, watching players, finding out information, typeing in a lot of reports. I mean you're just going school to school, typing a ton and driving a ton and eating a lot of snacks, driving around trying so you don't and drinking a lot of coffee. Hotel Marriott to Marriott baby. So yeah, I mean, it just it depends on the team. I mean, some teams have guys that do pro and college. As you work up the ranks, you know, you become like a number two or number three, you dabble in both, and then those guys start working helping the GM out, dealing with agents, running workouts. So it's kind of like, you know, you meet people that travel a lot for work, like a I don't even know if these guys exist anymore because of technology, but like the traveling salesmen. It's kind of what a scout is. You know, you got a couple of states, three or four states, and you just go all the schools, obviously the big ones, the small ones, the ones in between, and you're just you're going to games on the weekend. It's just it's it's not a lifestyle. It kind of is your life. It's just one of those jobs where you just I mean it's basically a ten to eleven month a year job because you know, in the summer, you watch guys getting ready for the fall. Then in the fall you're grinding the guys that you're scouting, and then in the spring your all star games combine pro days in the meetings, so really you get May. May and June are kind of slow, but you're still working, and then July you kind of get a little rest, and then by the end training camp starts. So obviously varies a little team to team, but for the most part you're just you're watching a lot of football. You know, one thing I've learned, I love football. I mean they've made my career off talking about it off, watching it off, just having it be a part of my life. I didn't love football enough, Like I'm going way farther doing this than I would have there. You have to be, i mean, addicted to the sport to be good at it, like the addiction that all the gms have. And I'm lucky enough to know some of them. The Howie Roseman's, the Jason Lights, the Beaches, the Spy Text, the Adam Peters, the John lynches Less Snead, John Schneider. I mean, these guys, if football was cracked, they'd be crack addicts. They're addicted to football and everything in part of it. It becomes it becomes a very lucrative profession once you get to their level, and honestly, they probably watched less football than they ever have during the week. But the business of football, it just becomes your life, and you know, it's just it's it's a grind, there's no doubt about it. It's Wall Street on grass baby, long hours, long days, and until you get to the top couple rings of the food chain and the scouting profession, you don't make that much money relative to how long you work relative to other businesses. Like if you worked in other multi billion dollar industries and you were good and you're working as much, the amount of money you would make would be decent. I mean you'd be making you'd be a top couple percenter. But I mean there are a lot of scouts out there grinding their ass off. You know, even if they're making one hundred grand relative to working you ain't working forty hour work weeks. I mean you're talking some weeks or eighty ninety. You don't see your family, you're gone. It's listen, you're not digging ditches. And it's an awesome job in theory, but it is a lot of work. And it's also a profession where no one knows how good you were, right at least as a coach. You like, if I'm a quarterback coach and every one of my staff gets fired because we won five games, but my quarterback played well, people be like, oh, that guy's probably pretty good, and you get a lot. But as a like, who knows is he good? Is he bad? No one really knows. That's I remember thinking that when I got out, like, how would anyone know how good or bad I am? No one would know. No one knows a lot. It's like when all these guys get hired, unless you're like a repeat GM, like you've already had a gig, which doesn't happen very often. Like coaches, it's like, oh they for example, John Spytech just got hired, like just because he's been in my orbit for a long time, I know a lot about him. But if you're a Raider fan, you've seen the name, but it's like you it's like is he good? Is he bad? Was he actually done? And then you hear stories like we're closely with Brady. Obviously he's good at his job, but you just never know. You know, some of these guys, Adam Peters I saw for a long time, like he was always in the mix. It's like, well, what is he actually doing relative to the GM or the coach, and at least like as a coordinator, as an offensive or defensive coordinator, it's pretty clear like this guy's like Brian Flores. I don't know if he's great at like managing the whole team, but there is no disputing Brian Flores is an elite defensive coordinator, elite vic Fangio. Same thing. Now we know because we saw probably not a head coach Flores. Maybe he's learned from it, maybe not, I don't know, but like Flora's give him the defense shit. I mean, I can't imagine what Flora would look like if you had like elite players. He might have like a his defense might be like the greatest scoring defense we've ever seen, if he had like three or four Hall of Famers on it. But there's no disputing it because we watch him play, and then we see other coordinators like this guy sucks. This guy is not good at his job. Yet there are scouts that probably suck at their job and there are probably ones that are really good and no one has any clue. And the difference is in that profession, like the way guys keep jobs and the way guys lose jobs. You know in most dysfunctional organizations, like well, do they like you or do they not? And you could argue that's a lot that's true for a lot of professions. It's like do the people like you or do they not? Because they're like, yeah, this guy doesn't p that well. We all know these people in different industries, but like, ah, he's well liked by the boss. Guy that owns a company fucking loves this guy. Guys, they get rid of him yesterday, no one would notice. But he's he's a made man in this company. It's kind of similar
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