Aaron Donald's return could happen, but SHOULD it?

0:00Summer can smell like so many things. For example, citrus in the sun, spontaneous road trips, and warm backyard evenings that stretch on forever. It's a feeling you want to hold on to long after the season ends. With Pura's Summer Fragrance Collection, you can. Restore your sense of place, bringing the moments that define your summer right into your home, exactly the way you remember them. Clean fragrances, smart control, all from your phone. Visit Pura.com to shop the Summer Collection. Welcome to the athletic football show. I'm Robert Mays. Our final mailbag of the summer is today. We will be deep in training camp stuff next week.

0:41Before we get into the questions, a couple of things I wanted to hit. First of all, sincere thank you to everyone who sent in a question for this show and over the course of the offseason means a lot to us. Everyone engaging with these the way that they do. So thank you very much to everybody who was involved in one of the mailbag shows we did over the course of the offseason. We got a lot of good questions from the Discord this offseason, which was a fun wrinkle. Speaking of the Discord, now is the time to join for a bunch of different reasons. We're getting into the season. I think it's been a really fun place to just spend time and talk about football over the last calendar year or so.

1:14We've got at least 2 ,500 or so members now. I would love to see that continue to tick up. I think if you guys like this show, you would enjoy being a part of it. this year for the first time we are going to have wins pools similar to our wins pool in the discord we're going to divide people up into groups of three you can play with two other people who are part of it and we're going to have prizes merch for the winners of those individual wins pools and so if you've enjoyed standing by and watching our wins pools experience over the last couple years you have a chance to do that on your own you do not have to dress up like chiefsaholic if you lose.

1:52I mean, you guys can do whatever you want. If you guys want to come up with punishments for the loser, that's up to you. But for now, it's just going to be merch for the winners. So please get involved with that if you want to. A lot of fun stuff happening on the Discord. The link to it is in the show description below. So please join if any of that is of interest to you. For now, our final mailbag of the summer with me, Dave, Derek, and Beller. Let's get to it right now.

2:26All right. It's our last mailbag of the off season. We are transitioning next week to full on training camp coverage, which I'm very excited about. I'm a little sad to see the mailbags end. I enjoy doing them. We've gotten a whole host of fantastic questions this off season. It's been nice to have the discord beller. I feel like the discord is, is really changed the influx of questions that we're getting. and the consistency of them. And so just yet another benefit of having the Discord over the last year or so. I couldn't agree more. And our first question for this week's mailbag comes from the Discord and it's from - Bob McAwesome is not his email?

3:04Is that his real name in the email? I mean, I suppose it could be. You never know. But Bob McAwesome, I'm going to assume is not a real name, but he does have a fun question to get us going for this last mailbag of the summer. So thank you, Bob, for getting us started in the right way. He says, I very strongly believe that the 2017 Eagles season is tremendously important in coaches being much more aggressive on fourth down in recent years. Doug Peterson went for it on fourth down, what felt like all the time that season, culminating in the Philly special in the Super Bowl. The Eagles don't make it that far that year or beat the Patriots in one of Tom Brady's career best games without being historically aggressive.

3:39So I guess the question is, am I onto something here or am I being blinded by being an Eagles homer? More broadly, are there any league-wide trends that can be traced to a single moment or season? Robert, what do you say on this one? I think he's right. I mean, you look at the numbers historically and you look at some of the years where that's jumped. In 2016, per TrueMedia, we had 480 go-forward attempts on 4th down in 2016. In 2017, 485. So really, status quo. The next year, we go from 485 to 539 in 2018. and the actual biggest jump is from 2019 to 2020. That's when it really jumps. We're talking like 100 more attempts almost that year.

4:21And so I would trace it to two things. I think it's the Eagles doing it and winning in 2017 and then 2018. They're actually more aggressive in 2018 than they were in 2017. So I think it's the Eagles being successful. And the other team I would throw in there that I think you can directly tie this to, the 2019 Ravens were a dominant regular season team. They very famously went for it several times. You guys remember that clip of Lamar against the Seahawks? Yeah. Yeah. And they went for it. The 2019 Ravens, 26 % of the time nearly that year, which if you compare that to the Eagles, the Eagles were like 20-ish percent of the time in 2017, 2018.

4:589.3 total EPA generated for the Ravens in 2019. The league overall, not the average, overall was at negative 6.6. So just the pure amount of value that the Ravens derived that year from going forward on fourth down. I think when you stack up the 2017 and 2018 Eagles and then the 2019 Ravens, that's when you really see things start to take off from 2020 to 20. I think from 2020 to 2021, we had nearly a 3 % jump in how often teams were going forward on fourth down. So that stretch is hugely important. And I think the Eagles played a big role in it for sure. love questions like this because when I read it I was like ah maybe your Eagles perspective is warping things a little bit and then I looked into it and I came away with the same conclusion where I was like oh I think there's something to this and I just I have different stats that prove the same point what I think is interesting is actually you're right Robert the 2018 Eagles did go for it much more often than 2017 the 2017 Eagles only went for it at the third highest clip, the Packers and Raiders did it more often, just the number of times and the percentage.

6:07They were only third, but they gained the most EPA in the league with their fourth down decisions. So when they were doing it, it was working in a big, big way. And I don't know how you quantify this, but you can't tell me that Philly Philly, you know, the Philly special fourth down decision in a Super Bowl and having it work, it's absolutely got to have an impact on the rest of the league. And I went back and looked. They had two in that game. They had two like big four-down conversions in that Super Bowl. So those are very visible choices. The league-wide go-for-it average from 2011 to 2017 was between 11 % and 13%.

6:47And actually from 16 % to 17%, it went slightly down from just under 13 % to 12.5%. So from 16 to 17, not a huge tick down, but teams were going for it a little bit less often. And then immediately in 2018, it jumped up to 15%. And in 2017, another big number I had, only seven teams went for it on fourth down 15 % of the time or more in 2017. That number doubled the next year. And it just continued moving in that direction to the point where now in 2025, like, like what five, six teams are going for it 30 % of the time or more. And then a third of the league is going for it a quarter of the time.

7:40So, I mean, the trend is undeniable at this point in time, but there's a pretty clear delineation from 2017 to 18 and beyond. I also think in terms of our perception of it and like the you know how everybody sees fourth downs it kind of happened in two ways you get the really good teams doing it the Eagles that year the Ravens shortly thereafter and then I felt like the early Dan Campbell Lions were kind of like a hey you don't have to be great to do this this still goes a really long way for you even if you kind of suck and I think that that was like important to get in everybody's minds like it doesn't matter if like you go on fourth down because like we have all the best players of course we can go for fourth down it's like no you go for fourth down because like the value in having gotten it as opposed to like the you know the risk the pitfall or whatever if you don't it's just like well we're a bad team anyway we kind of got to do these and so I think that was like a perspective shift as well that's when you should go for it right when you're is when you're a bad team and you need to be creating as many edges as you possibly can like this year Seahawks didn't need to go for it that often because the defense was so good so when you don't have the best team I think is actually the best time to be trying to find every single one of these edges that you can.

8:52Fun question. I'm not, I'm not surprised by the outcome. I am surprised by how clear the line is like how clear the delineation, but the defore and after is it's a, it's a good thought and it is proven true when you actually do look at the numbers in terms of other league wide trends. The other one that I would say, if you look at 11 personnel rates in 2017 versus 11 personnel rates in 2018, 18 there's like a four and a half percentage point jump after McVay gets to LA so I do think that some offensive trends you can kind of trace to some big bang moments with guys really transitioning the way they wanted to play offensively that's the other one I would throw out there I think a lot of the other ones I have are like not wide enough like I felt like you know like McDaniel doing some of the cheap motion stuff feels a little bit of a moment but it's not like everybody adopted that in the way that like the fourth down stuff has really taken over the entire NFL though i would also say i you'd have to trace it to a couple different moments Fangio probably deserves the most credit for it in like 2018 with the bears and then but then when Staley did all his stuff in 2020 i'd have to look at the numbers on it but i think that's when you see that like 18 to 20 range with the rams being the best defense in the league again in 2020 that's when the too high stuff really takes hold i think that those are when that's when the shift starts to take place there.

10:11So that's what I would say. I would say 11 personnel stuff with McVay and then the Fangio world really taking over the NFL in like the 2018-2019 range. I do think there's some kind of difference there between obviously the personnel you want to use and what works best and finding advantages on the playing field. It's very important, but with fourth down decision-making, you're just, you're talking like pure math and the numbers of like, you know, gaining an edge. Like, I mean, like Derek said, whether you're a good team, whether you're a bad team, no matter how you're built, this is the math that people are coming up with.

10:45And the other thing I wanted to bring up. It's one size fits all. Yeah, exactly. In a way the personnel can't be. I think it's clearly, I think the Eagles deserve some credit for their role in this. But I also, and it would be a hard thing to chart, but over the last decade, people have gotten into jobs in NFL organizations and NFL organizations have empowered people to say, hey, this is what we need to be thinking about doing. And I think the Eagles were an early adopter of that, but it's just become really prevalent where those sorts of people have, depending on the building, a lot of influence to dictate strategy, not dictate, but suggest strategy.

11:25And coaches are clearly a lot more open to it than they used to be. Do you think the Eagles and the Ravens after that were open enough about the process that went into these decisions that I, you could probably draw a line of influence there as well. It's not just the fact that they were doing it. I think we have a game management guy who's in Doug's ear every single time we're in these situations. They were open about that. And I remember to his credit, because the Ravens are pretty buttoned up about stuff like this. Sheil wrote a story about John Harbaugh after the 2019 season that really dug into the Ravens process in these sorts of moments.

12:03And so I think there was a decent amount of transparency, not just with the final decision, but what went into the final decision that probably had at least some sort of influence in how these teams were building their staffs and putting their processes together. Great question. All right, what's the next one? All right. Next one comes to us from Cade Smith. I'm going to choose to believe this is Cleveland Guardians all-star reliever and very key member of my fantasy team, Cade Smith. Cade has got one. My favorite part about Beller is that he's secretly like is just disgusting fantasy baseball sicko.

12:32Like it's his kids, his fantasy baseball teams, and then us in terms of stacking up his priorities in life. No, it's football too. But my baseball league is like super in-depth where my football teams are just like fun redraft leagues every year. So it's a little bit, you know, I get to scratch both itches with those two. I would have assumed you had like a fantasy World Cup thing, like, you know, time goal scores type of shit. You can basically guarantee that regardless of time of year, I'm in a league or pool of some sort. That is a guarantee. So right now it's fantasy baseball and my unsuccessful World Cup pools coming to an end.

13:10Those kids got to go to college, man. Right? Yeah. We got to start planning early. And hey, Wisconsin, great place. Not cheap. Go Badgers. All right, let's get to Cade's question here. It's about the Tennessee Titans. I have a working theory that the Titans offense under Brian Dable is going to be near the top of the league and 11 personnel. When you look at the strength of the roster at the wide receiver position, Dable's history with personnel usage, and Cam Ward's desire to play point guard, I could see them leaning into that personnel. I would find it interesting to see someone zig while the rest of the league zags with heavy 12 and 13.

13:39Do you think I'm off with this theory, or is it viable? How interested would you be to see a team try to buck the trend? Feels like a Derek question. Derek, you take this one first. Yeah, I don't think they got much of a choice if you look at the roster. I just don't really see how you— That's Daniel Bellinger or Risher. it's I mean it's it's Daniel Belt like they're all their tight ends like I think Gunnar Helm is like sort of interesting but he's not like a super exciting like a receiving tight end Daniel Bellinger is I think we're all familiar with him at this point he was with Brian Dable in New York during the the Daniel Jones 2022 season the amount of flat routes that Daniel Bellinger ran and caught was astronomical like he might have broken a record doing that um but then you look at the roster it's like I think a lot of it is you cannot really justify having paid the money you paid to Wanda Robinson and not have him on the field a lot like all of the time and and so if you're going to do that he's a player that I think you want to primarily have in the slot and because of that you're probably going to need 11 personnel and there there are ways to get guys into the slot and only be in 12 personnel you know we talked about this on the lessons we learned from offense show where you can get into like wing yy formations and then on the other side you have your two receivers and one can be in the slot but generally you're going to need three receivers to get a slot receiver out there and I do think that with the amount of money they paid for Wondell Robinson they have to do that I also I think it fits what Dable wants to do I think Ward is more flexible than is probably given credit for like I think because of the offenses that he came from in college at Washington State and then Miami where it was a lot of gun it was a lot of spread it was some RPO I think that like that's the natural inclination to say that he does that like he has a quick release and he's good at that but I also think he is capable of more of like the get under center we're gonna boot we're gonna chuck it down the field like I think he can do all that stuff so I think the offense pushing the direction it's going to I do think it will be more spread RPO a sprinkle of quarterback run game that to me says more about Brian Dable than it does about Cam Ward necessarily I know this has no bearing on the future and the coaching staff Staff is different and they've brought in some expensive pieces of personnel.

15:48But I think it's funny that the Titans led the league in 11 personnel last year. So this isn't this wouldn't be some crazy departure from what they were already doing. They just have better pieces to do it this year. I would assume. I'll say this, though. It's not even just that. When your tight ends are Gunner Helm and Shiga Konkwo, you can't really play 12 personnel because neither of those guys. I mean, gutter hell more than Chica Conquo, but you don't really have an inline option among those two guys that you feel good about leaning on. Even if you like Bellinger, Bellinger's a perfectly good player, but I don't think it's substantially different than it was.

16:30I definitely do. I definitely do. They paid him$8 million. They paid him$8 million a year. He's going to play. How much he plays, I don't know. They might be a heavier person. But we're at a 60 % about average 11 personnel rate in the NFL. If they were at 65, it wouldn't shock me. But Dable played about 35 % 12 personnel last year over the first 10 weeks before he was fired. And so I think even if they invested that much in Wandale and Carnell Tate, this group didn't sign Calvin Ridley. Calvin Ridley's been banged up. And if you, let's say Calvin Ridley is a rotational sort of piece for this team rather than a fixture.

17:10year who's playing receiver beyond those three I mean I think like if I O Manor and Chimira DK are like coming off the bench as your four and five I think that's a much better place to be than last year where they were starting players certainly true yeah I O Manor's still an exciting player like the opportunities aren't as obvious for him in year two with what they did with Tate and wandale but he he made some really fun plays last year i think they could be i would say i'd be surprised if they weren't above average 11 personnel team but the idea of them being even as 11 personnel heavy as they were last year or even close to that i'd be surprised after the bellinger thing i i just wouldn't be the other note i had you mentioned last year across stable's entire tenure in new york they were above league average and 12 personnel usage like they were from 22 to 25 they were 12th in the league in 20 in 12 personnel usage so i think they're going to run a lot of 11 if they actually lead the league i don't know but i certainly think they'll be up near the top i'd say this they even though they were up above average in 12 personnel usage every single one of those years they were also high in 11 personnel usage because those are the only two personnel groups they ran if there's not they weren't a lot of like fullback snaps on the brian dable teams or 13 or anything yeah so that's that's why and so I think that they could be a decently heavy 11 team while still running a decent amount of 12 because of the Bellinger thing in terms of whether I want to see teams do this I would say yes and no like I think that like Derek alluded to we've talked about this a little bit with some of the trend shows that we've done if the Nichols are going to start weighing 210 I think the return of a shifty slot receiver and a matchup advantage in those moments you're playing 11 personnel is something to take a look at.

18:59My concern with being an 11 personnel team in a world where running the ball is a non-negotiable is how are you going to run the ball out of 11 personnel? And I think you have to have a specific structure and specific receivers to do that. You know, the teams that are running the ball well out of 11 personnel are these condensed formation teams that have receivers that are willing to block. The Brian D 'Abel has never been a condensed formation sort of person so being an 11 personnel gun team with and being able to run the ball out of those looks I think there are questions about that I think there are difficulties in trying to live and play that way if you look at the best 11 personnel running teams last year specifically in terms of volume in terms of efficiency it's the Rams it's the Bears and it's the Bills and if you look at those 11 personnel snaps with the Bills it's a lot of like Tyrell shavers into the formation as like a de facto tight end.

19:57And I just don't know how much Brian Dable is going to want to play that way. And I think if you're going to have a credible running team out of 11, unless you're the 2021 Eagles or 2022 Eagles, where you just have a group of five that can mash with the quarterback involved on inside zone. I just think it's hard to play that way. Like we've done this with the Bengals for years where they tried to figure out how to do it. And it's also a situation where you got to have the right types of receivers. Like if you are built like the Bengals and the Cowboys, those guys aren't blocking like and they shouldn't be like it's OK to not ask Jamar Chase to block in the core of the formation.

20:33Like that's an OK thing. That's an OK way to approach your offense. I will say this. This is more of a big picture comment than 2026. If the Titans want to become that team over time, Carnell Tate's a son of a of a blocker like like he could give you a chance to do that. Like, not as a rookie, maybe not with the way that this is built right now, but over time, I could see a world where you're like, oh, man, Carnell Tate does so much for them that's not got anything to do with catching the football. I think for me, what it comes down to is like, they're probably going to be more of a gun team, I would imagine.

21:10And if you're going to be a gun 11 personnel team, you either need to be like a really specific the way that like the Bengals are, which again, you have like skyscrapers on the outside or just like superstar receivers. or you have to be like the Eagles who also had really good receivers, but ran like a very, they had five plays type offense. They were just better at them than all of you. Or if you're going to be this 11 personnel gun team, you have to have a quarterback who sees it so, so, so well, which is why I think the Cowboys and the Bengals have been able to get away with it for a long time.

21:40It's because those guys just see it so well. I'm like, do I think Cam Ward could get there in two years, three years, four years sure next year learning the a new playbook for like the fifth year in a row like he probably is not going to be able to get there at that amount of time it'd be a really interesting offense to watch like i mean obviously when you have when you're the number one pick in year two there's going to be so much interest and curiosity about what you look like brian dable's had success as a coordinator that's going to be one of those units where when we're unwrapping week one and seeing what a team looked like that titans offense on week one first game under brian dable i think is going to be one of those units that that'll be a hangover game week one Derek I don't know who they're playing week one but we'll be watching cam ward that that first Monday for sure all right let's take our first quick break and then come back with a few more your guys's questions one thing I love about summer is how easy everything feels days are a little more relaxed and I find myself reaching for the same comfortable go anywhere pieces again and again that's why I keep coming back to quince they focus on well-made essentials that naturally become those everyday staples you live in all season long.

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25:48but before you move on to the next question jets titans is week one that it's the most monday hangover game ever conceived we just put it in katie can you make a rundown right now for the week one hangover and just put that as the rundown doc already exists katie just go ahead and put it in and especially for week one the high that we're all coming out of of like week one of nfl football is back and our hangover is jets titans i can't wait i'm already looking forward to it by the way the monday hangover is back this year guys if you're curious as we're programming the season we're gonna do the hangover again three months ahead of time announcing that yeah what we got it what would go more nuclear on the athletic football show cam ward being great in that game or geno smith being great in that game like take your pick i hope it's like the steelers jets game where they both score 40 for some reason and it's just like who cares otherwise it's sophie's choice for derrick yeah all right what's the next question let's do it It's a good question.

26:49We got coming here too. And it kind of has to do with teams like this. Eric Thompson. Every year, the NFL has several teams that stumble their way to three-win seasons or worse. But not all bad years are created equal. Titans fans knew it was going to be a rough year last year with a young QB, while the Raiders collapsed with Geno and Pete Carroll at the helm, caught a lot of their fans off guard. My question for the guys is, what would be the ideal way to have a three-win season? Do you want a rookie QB in place showing promising flashes without the support needed around him to win consistently?

27:18or would you rather have young pieces elsewhere? An exciting rookie receiver catching passes from a likable journeyman you know isn't the future, but who cares because you're going to have a top five pick. Or does losing just suck no matter what, and there's no way to enjoy 14 losses? Love this question. Dave, why don't you take this one first? I mean, I think we just saw the ideal way to do this. Technically, they won four games, but the 2024 Patriots, I mean, the ideal way to do this is to suck and know that you have a guy at quarterback. And there's there's a dozen other ways to be excited.

27:52Another, you know, you could have young pieces on defense or a great young receiver, and that's cool and all. But the quarterback makes everything go. And so if you're confident by the end of your quarterback's rookie year, this guy is going to give us a chance to be something. We just got to put talent around him. That's the ideal way to do it. And for that matter, I mean, the Patriots are a great example. You feel good about Drake may going in and then you get to spend a whole draft class picking at the top, trying to put talent around him. And so I mean, it's basic because quarterbacks are so obvious, but that's the ideal.

28:31And like you have Drake may playing well enough to be exciting. And then you add Will Campbell and Travion Henderson and Jared Wilson and Craig Woodson and all these guys on top of it. certainly not saying every team in this situation is going to go to the Super Bowl in year two, but that's just the ideal way to suffer through a shitty season. Or I guess if you don't have a quarterback and you are terrible in a year where there's an obvious quarterback worth getting excited about, that is also a good way to do it. I think the 24 Patriots are like the ideal, like everybody's praying for that, right?

29:10Where like you score on the quarterback and like he plays pretty well and then you kind of overhaul everything the next year what was part of me that believes that but also you still have the unknown of like you have to find the right coach even if the quarterback is right i i think suffering through just a bottoming out coach situation and having that be an unknown i think it's if we're stacking up the types of situations you'd want i know i have that guy at quarterback is near the top but i still think there are other recent examples that like to me in my opinion the 2021 lions are like the platonic ideal of this where you won three games you have a rookie draft class where your fourth round receiver had almost a thousand yards it's like holy shit we found this guy they drafted penne soul in the first round they played extremely hard in the back half of that season ben johnson got elevated to be the passing game coordinator and so you felt the shift on offense where it's like oh man like the infrastructure here feels pretty good and so that that to me still feels like the best answer because there was so much stuff clearly in place beyond the quarterback the 24 patriots some stuff still needed to come together for you to ultimately be the team that you wanted to be it's interesting because the lions thing like leaves fewer unknowns and like golf wasn't the sexiest quarterback but i think we all probably generally agree that by the end of that year it was like oh he was better than we remembered at the end of his rams days and so there was like the bigger biggest question left because he played fine that year but he wasn't much better the following couple seasons but at least there were like like you're saying like so like five different factors that you could point to and be like that's good but I still think with the Patriots like you found the hardest one that is to find and I do think that there's like an element of that that is like that's the ideal I will say I think a pretty realistic and like relatively often occurrence of this happens where a 10-ish win team does have a quarterback and then he gets hurt and then like the team kind of falters and then the next year they like draft somebody in the top five and they're great the 2015 cowboys obviously like romo goes down and like they luck into dac but them being able to draft zeke where they did with their offensive line like that supercharges some stuff uh the 20 i think 18 49ers won four games because jimmy garoppolo got hurt and then they and like they had some young pieces like George Kittle was just getting really turning into a star player.

31:32Fred Warner was starting to come alive. They had those defensive tackles. And then they draft Nick Bosa, who like goes and has an incredible year the following year. And then I had one more that this is actually probably the most realistic on both ends in that like it was the right situation for it. And it didn't turn out the 2023 Arizona Cardinals, where Kyler Murray is not fully healthy. It's like early in a young coach's tenure, you can kind of live with some of these struggles. and then they go and get a top five pick and you're like oh we're gonna add this top five pick to Trey McBride is coming along we have James Connor like our fourth round third round or our third round rookie receiver Michael Wilson caught like 40 balls for us like this can go and this can like really become something and then it like kind of fizzles out two years later but like in theory that was all of the right recipe they reminded me of the 2021 Lions when we were watching the 2023 Cardinals I think there was they're similar sort of vibes the difference is the Lions continued to ascend to like an elite level and the Cardinals plateaued at that point.

32:29I'll say this to Derek's point about the, the quarterback gets hurt. That is, that is correct. If you're looking at the long-term benefits of the franchise, right? If you can look back on that two or three years later and say, Oh man, we really benefited from this happening. That viewpoint and you landing on those types of seasons is the opinion of a person who does not root for a team. Correct. A hundred percent. Because in the moment, if you're a fan of that team, that sucks. Well, it sucks, but it's copium is what it is. Like, that's where you arrive after you deal with the pain of sucking.

33:07Where, like, once you're— On March 15th, you're okay with that season. But on October 20th, you're having a bad time. I would even say—I lived the 2015 Cowboys season, and I—oh, my God, dark times. where this is the second mailbag in a row where we brought up the 2015 Cowboys season. But like they traded for Brandon Whedon or they signed Brandon Whedon. They traded for Matt Castle. And there's like a six week period where you're like, if they can just hold on, like if they can just go two and four with Castle and Whedon. And then by like November, you're just like, I can't believe I ever thought that mattered.

33:44What a waste of time. And then by December, you're just like, all right, let's lose out. Cause like, like, come on, let's just pick in the top five, forget trying to remain relevant. So like, it's like the stages of grief, you know, like, and by December, I think a team in that situation by like December is reaching the acceptance phase. That one actually is the toughest one. If you were a fan, cause I think the year before they won like 12 games, like this was a good Cowboys roster. They just, the quarterback goes and it just, and they started the season 2014. It was good. Yes. Yes. Like they were a really good.

34:19So like that one is harder to live through. At least the Cardinals and the Niners, like they weren't good before that. So if you have a year that gets sunk, it's like I feel like that doesn't hurt quite as bad. My only pushback on Robert's point, I completely understand how important coaching is. And you see the consistency and the results that guys like McVay and Shanahan are able to get and succeed with various quarterbacks. But from a fan's perspective, even as much long-term peace and happiness that might give you, like the quarterback is still the guy that makes Sundays enjoyable week in and week out.

34:54And like, no matter what else is going on and think about how many successful quarterbacks have played with coaches that the fan base wasn't always happy with. I'm thinking about Rogers and McCarthy and green Bay. I'm thinking about McDermott and Josh Allen, where no matter what that looks like in the big picture, Josh Allen's still going to do some wild shit every other Sunday, if not every Sunday. And ultimately that's what makes this whole thing enjoyable. So I, ideally you hit on both of those things and you have the quarterback coach pairing that makes you relevant for 15 years. But even if not, having the quarterback is going to make your Sundays enjoyable in good years and frustrating years.

35:38There's no doubt about that. I also think with the 2021 Lions specifically, the young players is a huge part of it. Like when you were starting a rebuild, having that first draft class clearly be a home run, that's a necessary part of you enjoying that season. Like if I'm on Ross St. Brown hadn't had the season that he did in 2021, I don't really care about what you look like under Dan Campbell and a better offensive infrastructure in the second half of the season. But you watched that. What Penny Sewell and I'm on Ross St. Brown did that year. And you had a Lee McNeil, you know, in the second half of the season, show some flashes like those early draft classes.

36:17When you're starting over again as a bad team, that to me is a huge part of like how much hope I'm willing to buy into. the last thing i'll say you know what's funny about that 2024 patriots obviously may was like incredible nobody else from that draft class did anything it was like jaylen folk who's not on the team anymore like javon baker a bunch of backup offensive linemen that i'm not even sure they are on the roster anymore like it was literally all eggs in the drake may basket all right beller what's our next one all right will shanahan's got the next question will says are cornerbacks the easiest position to evaluate or are GMs just on an evaluation heater?

36:54For context, in ESPN's top 10 cornerbacks poll, nine of the 10 corners selected were former first round picks. The 10th, Cooper DeGene, went 40th overall. And then nine of those played, the nine that were first rounders were among the 15 highest picks used on corner since 2018. I guess that's kind of like redundant, right? If they're first round picks, they're probably going to be nine of the 15 highest since 2018. But still worth noting, these were all very highly selected players. Don't think I've ever seen such a high home run rate at a premium position. So what do we think here, Robert? Easiest position to evaluate, or are GMs just doing their jobs really well here?

37:29Neither. I think that this is just a – the highest-picked cornerbacks end up becoming the best cornerbacks in part because it is a traits position. I think that's part of it, where some of these other positions that are really hard to evaluate are hard to evaluate. And it's not even just hard to evaluate. It's that you have some of the best players in the league getting picked a little bit later in drafts because success of the position isn't necessarily based on traits. But I think this is kind of similar, Derek, to the running back conversation that we've been having a little bit this offseason where the guys who you draft really, really high, the hit rate on those is good.

38:05But it doesn't mean it's necessarily an easy position to evaluate as you get a little bit deeper into the first round. If you look at historical hit rates since since 2006, PFF did a thing about this last year. The hit rate a corner and on day one is actually one of the lowest in the entire NFL. There's a lot of first round picks a corner that did not end up working out. And so I think it's true. You're saying two different things. You can say the best corners in the league are guys you're typically drafting in the top half of the first round is a different out is a different conclusion to reach.

38:39then this is an easy position to evaluate because there are still plenty of swings and misses with highly drafted corners, even relative to other positions. If you look back at like the last 20 years. Yeah. I'm glad you brought up some of the other positions. I think that like, I do think we're on a little bit of a heater. Like the guys over the last five years, like are pretty damn good. But I think generally I think of cornerback very similar to the way I think of like drafting offensive tackles. Like you can find offensive linemen, like playable guys in the second or third round or whatever but most of those guys are not going to be guys that you can weaponize that like you know you can really use in the run game all this stuff whereas the corner you know mirror of that is like you can find a nice cornerback in the second round or third round or whatever like noel williams who we were talking about you can find some of those guys in the third round you're not going to find patrick sertans or sauce gardeners in the second or third round like you really do like you said is it a traits position and to be able to have the the footwork, the length, the size, the speed to run with a lot of these high level NFL receivers.

39:41Those guys aren't really making it to pick 57 a lot of the time. I think you're asking for trouble saying it's easy to evaluate any position in the draft, but I think I'm willing to say that it's easy to tell when a cornerback has it with a capital I. Like it's easy. you don't have to watch a lot of Pat Sertan or Derek Stingley, especially in this day and age with the super conferences, a top tier corner. I know sauce just came out of Cincinnati not that long ago, but like for the most part, a top tier corner is coming out of the sec or the big 10. And they spent two seasons going against the, all these freakish receivers that are populating the league every single year.

40:25And it takes like eight minutes, not even, it takes like three minutes to be like, oh yep okay he's sticking with that guy he's physical he's he can he's not getting blown past he can run with everybody and even in the case of a quignon mitchell who did go to toledo one or two days into senior bowl practice quignon mitchell's just bullying the shit out of everybody and you're like okay yep this looks didn't he even leave because they were like he's like too good you can go deuces yeah i'm out of here so i think it's it's pretty i i hesitate to even say easy but like when when you see those guys it clicks pretty quick when when you're watching guys of that caliber but i agree with y 'all it gets dicey after like the obvious cb1 i mean we're only we're only a couple years removed from emmanuel forbes and deontay banks going over joey porter jr just as an example so well then forbes go ahead of christian gonzalez am i making that up he went one spot ahead of gonzo i left gonzo out of it because he still went top 20 but But like Joey Porter Jr.

41:29technically falling to the second round, it's a huge miss for the NFL. Joey Porter Jr. is awesome. And on top of that, like 2020 is getting farther away. But Jeff Okuda and C.J. Henderson were top 10 picks not all that long ago. So I don't think we got it completely figured out. But when a Stingley or a Sertan comes around, it's pretty easy to spot. C.J. Henderson, though, that was a little bit surprising for him to go that high. Okuda is really the only guy in the last 10 years where he had that it factor, Dave, that you're talking about and did not succeed. But the fact that he's the exception and a lot of these other guys have been successful recently, again, it feels really similar to running back.

42:13Where if you went further back, you have your Morris Claiborne's and your Justin Gilbert's that are kind of like the Trent Richardson of cornerbacks. But at least in the last, let's say, 10-ish years, the guys that have been drafted really high and were supposed to be those dudes, other than Okuda, for the most part, have turned into really good players. And I wanted to really quickly mention, because this brought up the ESPN survey of all these guys being in the top 10, I brought up tackles because literally all but one of those guys were first-round picks. The exception is Jordan Mailata, who is like, almost doesn't count.

42:50yeah by the way it's not almost doesn't count he does not count yeah he's like that's such a ridiculous situation what would you tell someone that's in a decision-making position in the nfl about what you should learn from jordan mailata's story like what what about that is replicable not a single thing like if the list of exceptions is just you then it's not that useful of a list He is the only guy. Other than that, it's again, we've talked about it so much in the lead up to the draft about tackle specifically and why. And I think that list is a very accurate reflection of exactly what we're talking about.

43:26All right. Before we move on, let's take one more quick break.

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44:39Corbin DuBois says lots of scuttlebutt about the possible return of Aaron Donald. My question isn't if you think it will happen, but rather, do you want it to happen? What would Shula's defense actually look like with Miles and Aaron on the field at the same time? Derek, what say you on this? I mean, save for Seattle Seahawks fans, does anybody not want this to happen? He's Aaron Donald. Maybe me. why because are you like is this a situation of like because of we saw him go out at his peak all that stuff yes i mean i guess but like i i kind of still believe that if anybody could come back after having not played for a couple years it is probably aaron donald i'm not even doubting him it's that's not even what this is if anybody can come back at age 35 after not having played football for three years and not embarrass himself it's absolutely aaron donald there i would there's part of me that would like it to just be what it was like he had a 10 he played in the league for 10 years it's just all stars on his reference page right now so he made the pro bowl every single season he was first team all pro eight times in 10 years one of the years he wasn't he was the defensive rookie of the year the only time he was not a first team all pro in the nfl is in 2022 when he got hurt and he missed six games.

46:03That's it. And so there is something to me about a player having like a picture-perfect career and going out on their own terms and being just purely one of the best players to ever do it. Like, I want to remember Aaron Donald as the player Aaron Donald was during those final couple years of his career. I want to remember Aaron Donald as the quality of player he was when he's pointing to his ring finger as he gets that sack against the Bengals. And I know he played a couple more years after that, but he never fell off. He was always Aaron Donald. And so the idea of that guy, like one of those players that just is like an all-time figure in the NFL, looking like 65 % of himself just as like a novelty thing to come back just because Miles Garrett is there, selfishly, I don't really want that.

46:52And I guess my playing devil's advocate to myself, I don't think differently about J.J. Watts peak just because the last few years he was a little bit banged up. Like it doesn't really color the greatness in a way that diminishes it in any way. And so I don't think this would either. But I don't know. I love just a clean end where a guy went out when he was still the best to do it. And there's part of me that just wishes we could leave it like that and just leave it like crystallized in amber for all times. I'm between the two of you because I want another Aaron Donald season in the same way that I want new Lord of the Rings movies where it's like they're all terrible.

47:35All the Lord of the Rings content that's coming out is so bad. That's what I was going to say is like, if you can assure me that this is going to be a well-made movie, good casting decisions, everybody's in it for the right reason. This is an actual good movie that is worthy of putting on the bookshelf next to my extended editions of the original movies. Let's talk. I absolutely want that. If this is a piece of shit because there's demand for this content and you're just going to throw shit at the wall, spare me. I don't need it. I don't want it. I don't want to see that. I don't want one of my favorite properties to be associated with that crap just because y 'all want to make some money.

48:17Keep Amazon away from this. That's what we have to do. That's why I don't think it's that. Aaron Donald doesn't need to come back. He's already the best to ever do it. If he wants to come back, he's ready to go. That's what I think. I lean toward Derek's idea. Aaron Donald is not going to do this just to do it. And like, we all see the videos like Aaron Donald's been throwing up 120 pound dumbbells during retirement just for fun. Like Jared verse was joking last off season about how Donald tried to kill him in a workout. Like, so if anybody's going to do it, it's Aaron Donald. And on top of that, he certainly doesn't have to move mountains on a defensive front that has Miles Garrett.

49:00In addition, even with verse gone, they still have so much young talent on that front. So even in a lesser role, if Donald can come in and be dominant, I want to see it. And like, if I thought you really can be, I guess that's my thing. Yes. So for to be like a 60 snap a game player, like he was at his peak. No, but I'm imagining the world where like, again, he already has this like might never be a career like that again. I think there's you can add another element to that where if he comes back after having retired for two years and has like three and a half sacks during a playoff run and is incredible during the Super Bowl.

49:39That's another like who the hell else has ever done what he just just running up the score on his legacy by coming back and doing that. That I will. You've convinced me that just the like even if it's a remote possibility, the chance that he could do that and just add on to everything he's already done. I'm willing to entertain that. Rams are also in a position where they could make him active on game day just to play third downs and fourth quarter snaps if that's what they wanted to do. And so if that's all he has to be responsible for, I'm in the only thing that scares me. And like, I'm knocking on all the wood because this would suck.

50:15But like if Stafford gets hurt or something goes wrong with the offense and Aaron Donald is just playing out the string for a mid Rams team. not great not great bob but no risk it no biscuit also i would be curious why he wants to do it i guess that's also part of it like i if he wants to just be a part of a team again and he misses it and he wants to be back and all that stuff like let him do what he wants like i i'm i support aaron donald making the choices he needs to to feel fulfilled in his life i just think looking at his career i'd probably be fulfilled You know, what's what's interesting about that is like we from the outside, I think we tend to think they're going for another Super Bowl.

50:57Donald wants another ring. And I'm sure that's part of it. But what if arguably the best defender of the modern era just wants to play next to the other best defender of the modern era? Like what is something incredibly cool about that? Yeah, I want to play with miles. It's like a passing of the torch. Almost. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I will be very curious to hear him articulate this when it comes time. If he comes back, I'm really looking forward to what those discussions might look like the first time he's in front of a microphone and people try to ask him, like, what is the motivation here? Why do you want to do this?

51:32Like, that's cool. Like, the idea of I just want to see what it's like to play with a player like this. That's really cool. I would support that if that were the reason. But I don't know. There's part of me that this is just me being risk averse. this is me just being somebody that fears the downside in most things a one more counterpoint maze you you do not think about brady's last season when you think about the totality of what he accomplished so like even if it's not what aaron donald would prefer that'll fade over time like even if it goes sideways it's different though it's different though it's like to me it's more it's much closer to like jordan on the wizards than it is to tom brady like that's just How much time do you spend thinking about Jordan on the Wizards, though?

52:16Like, I mean, I know it happened, but when I think about it, I wish it didn't happen. Yeah. I wish it didn't happen. Like, I think it would be better for everyone involved if it didn't happen. That's fair. How do you feel about the Wizards years, Beller? Tried not to think of him, but I'm almost positive that his, there's a Sports Illustrated cover of when he turned some, like, milestone age with him in the Wizards jersey. that's like we'll say that you know memorialized for all time this is even different though than that too because that's like jordan going and playing for a different team like this is donald coming back home like this is who he's always played for so i think there's that element of it too that is kind of cool all right you guys have swayed me enough i'm open to it i will be excited when it happens i i have my reservations but i will be excited when it happens that's that's the support I'll put on this.

53:09All right, Bill, what's the next one? Okay, guys, last mailbag question of the summer, and it comes to us from Matthew Marcus. Matthew says, The World Cup has got me thinking about the value of a third-place game. Instead of a lackluster Pro Bowl, let's take the two losers of the conference championship games and let them compete as the ultimate precursor to the Super Bowl. Imagine getting to see the matchup between the 2018 Chiefs and Saints or witnessing Aaron Rodgers become a four-time bronze medalist. No more skill challenge or debate over Pro Bowl snubs. just another week of good quality football roger goodell you're welcome so the question here for matthew is what matchups would you have wanted to see the most from the past decade or so are there any that would have been more interesting to you than the super bowl was that year uh robert why don't you take this one first 2018 chief saints is the best one that to me is the best possible answer answer i mean both of those teams were coin flip moments let's generously call them coin flip moments away from going to the Super Bowl.

54:06I'm sure the fan bases would resent that framing, but they were very, very close to going to the Super Bowl. They were Super Bowl caliber teams. Both those teams were awesome. And so that would probably be number one. A couple others that I had, 2020 would have been Packers-Bills. Yeah. There has been the resurgent Rodgers MVP and the emergence Josh Allen season. So that one's really fun. 2015. The 2015 Patriots and the 2015 Cardinals. I just would have liked to have seen that 2015 Cardinals team play one more game. They were so good, man. I really loved that team. I have a very soft spot in my heart for the 2015 Cardinals.

54:44And so those are probably the ones that come to mind. My only like downer about this, there's a 0 % chance under any circumstances that this would ever happen. Absolutely not. Can I take it a step further and say, I don't really want it with no offense to Marcus. Like, I don't I don't really want it. I think there's something really heartbreakingly beautiful about the way that the conference championship losers have to, like, be at the senior bowl four days later and just like stew in the wreckage of what happened. Like, I don't want to see you play another game. I want you to just sit in the hurt and the shittiness of how it feels to not be getting ready for the Super Bowl.

55:27I can't describe to people what it is like the NFC and AFC championship games when it comes to being at an NFL game are a completely different situation than everything else like the Super Bowl is cool it is fun to be at the Super Bowl I go every single year I make a point to go every single year because I still think it's awesome to go to the Super Bowl the Super Bowl in the moment and there are dead when you see a team lose in like a devastating way there's absolutely something to that but it's kind of weird like they're in some makeshift locker room it's not one team's crowd like there's something different to the deflating nature of losing in the super bowl when you're in when you go in an afc championship game the energy in the buildings is just so different because it is a home crowd that the fall when you don't get there after getting so so close it's a thousand yards there when it's over like guys takes weeks and weeks and weeks to get over for some of these guys.

56:24I think the Super Bowl is just, there's so much buildup. You're almost emotionally exhausted by the time you get there. And so I just can't imagine like Josh Allen playing in like the third place game after losing to the Chiefs two years ago. Like there's just not, for all the guys that just say F it to the Pro Bowl, the amount of guys that would be like, there's no under penalty of death. I would not play in the third place game after what just happened to me last week. I don't even know. So I like the idea of incentives, like maybe, you know, maybe if the teams were playing for some major draft pick.

57:00But like, that's an organizational issue. What is Josh Allen? Josh Allen's like, yeah, screw you. You don't give each guy like five million dollars to play that game. Listen, I love this sport. It's incredible. This sport hurts too much to play another game for no reason, really. And I'm talking about the emotional toll, let alone the physical toll. Yes. And like, especially too, if you're doing draft pick stuff and this always comes up when you talk about like players having to think about draft picks, it's like, oh, I'm going to play so our team can move up three spots on the draft board so they can replace me.

57:32It's like an insane way to think about it. I'm like, why would we do that? It just doesn't make any sense. I, the, the, the, just the ache of championship weekend being over like for everybody to, except for the two teams getting ready for the Superbowl were sad because there's only one more game left. And like the schedule looks empty all of a sudden you're, you think about how far away the season is. And imagine being the teams that just finished, just came up short in that game and thinking of all the work that went into getting to this moment where you came up short. I think it would cheapen it to have something else on the schedule.

58:10You just need to stew in that for a little while. There's something about getting to the Super Bowl. There is something as a player, like the experience of going through it and how important it is for winning one, obviously, is a completely different conversation. But the act of getting there and playing in it for the first time, having never experienced it before, ache is the right word. Like if you continually fall short and you never get there, There is an ache that I think guys just have a really hard time getting over. So asking them to play a week later for nothing is, I think, maybe would be a tough ask.

58:42Yeah, like, I don't know about that part of his question. But is there and the interesting part to me is the are there any of these loser versus loser matchups that you would have rather have seen than the Super Bowl? Well, Mays gave a few. Yeah, those are a couple. Chief Saints is the only other one that I immediately came to, and I actually came off of it. But in terms of team quality, the 23 Lions and Ravens were awesome. The problem is the Ravens beat the shit out of the Lions in week six that year. That is true. Like, absolutely throttled them. And so I was like, ah, that doesn't really feel like it has the same shine, even if they were probably top five teams that season.

59:20Pretty good one that fly that's below the radar. ironically one it's a rematch of a previous super bowl which i irrationally hate by the way like it's been a tough couple years for me between chiefs eagles too and patriots seahawks too i hate super bowl rematches they're not interesting to me is this going to be another i know where this is going so this is a super bowl rematch and ironically the two teams that lost conference championship weekend got shellacked they got their asses kicked but 2016 packers stealers would have been pretty sick because it, I mean, it's obviously a rematch, but in 2011, in 2010, Antonio Brown was not a piece of that Steelers team and Le 'Veon Bell wasn't even there.

1:00:05So you got the killer bees and then the Packers, Jordy Nelson was a role player on the 2010 team, but he was capital J Jordy in 2016 and Devante Adams had broken out by that point too. So seeing the killer bees go against prime Rogers with those receivers would have been cinema. I would have been in on that. It is fun on those terms, but I just think I was at that 2016 NFC championship game. It was the last game with the Georgia dome. I didn't need to see that Packers team play again after, after what happened to them against the Falcons. I was, I was all good with that. I think it says more about the quality of the 2016 Falcons and the quality of the 2016 Patriots than it does about either of those other teams.

1:00:45They got absolutely murdered which was shocking to me because a week before they beat the cowboys and i was like well this feels like a team of destiny and then they were on the table team no that was the run the table team and so i felt like they that was a magical season if you were a packers fan but that's partially why i'm sure it was such a rude awakening just to get curb stomped in that game against the falcons well dave i thought when you said super bowl rematches i thought you were going to go 2020 Chiefs Niners. That's that would have been another like, you know, because like that, you know, I know, you know, the Chiefs lose that game to the Bengals and Mahomes plays like the worst half of football he had ever played.

1:01:23That was a really damn good team. And that Niners team was awesome that, you know, just, it just ended the way that it did. Yeah. But Chiefs Saints, I mean, Matthew laid it out. Chiefs Saints 2018 is easily the best answer. That's the best answer. Yeah. Yeah. All right. That's all we got. It's our last mailbag question of the summer. I say this every single time. I genuinely mean it. We sincerely appreciate the level of engagement from you guys on this. It is such a fun thing to do every single week. You know, we do four shows a week in the offseason. You know, it is made easier by the fact that you guys are a part of the creative process in how we fill those shows.

1:02:01And we would not do it this way if we didn't enjoy the quality of the questions. I can't remember who it was, but somebody reached out to me recently and a colleague and was just like, I can't believe the quality of the questions that you guys get in the mailbags. And I was like, yeah, man, that's why we do them. Like we have an incredibly engaged, thoughtful audience. And I appreciate that on a bunch of different levels, but I definitely appreciate it in this case because it's just so obvious the utility that comes along with it. And so, again, we would not do these guys if you we would not do these if you guys did not engage with them in the way that you do.

1:02:42And it means a lot to me how much thought and effort and care and curiosity goes into some of this, because it you guys seeing it that way just makes me feel a lot better about what we're trying to put out and the standard that we're trying to reach. So sincerely appreciate everyone who took the time to send in a question. This is another reminder that if you're somebody who's emailed in questions, if you're thinking this way, join the Discord. These are the discussions that are happening all day, every day in the Discord. Hypotheticals, just rankings, comparisons. What do you guys think about this?

1:03:17This is going on in some capacity pretty much 24 hours a day in the Discord. So if this stuff is of interest to you, please sign up. There is a link in the description of the show. Now is the time to do it as we get started or as we ramp up to the season. But if you are not a member and this stuff is appealing to you, please jump on it because I think you'll be happy that you did. For now, that is all we've got. We will be back tomorrow. Talk to you guys very soon. Thanks for tuning in. Make sure to hit that subscribe or follow button so you never miss an episode. If you enjoyed what you heard, please like, comment, and leave a rating.

1:03:51We'll see you next time.

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